Wow. Since I started my search for information regarding John Chang 4 years ago, I never came across so much material until I found this Forum. Also, Im amazed how it has evolved since the first post until now.
First of all I would like to congratulate the moderator/administrator for the incredible job of withstanding so many conflicts, I'm pretty sure this is your zen trainning (with all due respect to all zen practicioners here).
The porpuose of this post is to share with you my experiences in the search for mysteries in the old traditions. I really hope this helps anyone out there trying to figure out this whole mess. Please I beg you excuse me for my not so good english and I'll try to elaborate as much as possible in some difficult subjects I find hard to explain in this language.
As a martial artist all I can tell you is that I was blessed with a great teacher who is true from top to bottom, but not because of his amazing superhuman powers but because of his commitment and true love to martial arts. His name is Fermin Morales and he is a Lima Lama teacher in Mexico city. Why do I think he is real? Well first of all from the most mundane aspect, he is a professional fighter and a National Kick Boxing Champion. Second because since very little he has dedicated his life to martial arts perfectioning and research. He was born in a very poor and tough neighborhood and he had to learn to defend himself from a very young age. From here all he cared was perfecting his technique, first for survival and years later for self mastering.
He never cared for money or fame, actually if you ever have the chance to come to my city you will find that he teaches in a very modest neighborhood (poor for american standards) in a simple small gym where many of the tranning items are hand made and charges only 50 dollars a month for all-you-can-train in terms of hours. Always on the learning process, he has never stopped studying new systems and he actually taught himself Enlgish in order to be able to read books in this language.The third reason I think is real is because his system doesn't have any secret deadly technique but hard work and discipline, actually he teaches in a very rough way which is famous because not everyone who enters is able to keep on with the trainning. This last thing confirms that he is not interested in making his art a trade like many so called teachers out there do (Don't misunderstand me he does teach anyone who is really interested in learning but he does expect some commitment and sacrifice). What does this has to do with this forum? well it was from him that I made up my own standards in order to look for internal art teacher. He also, in his way, has looked for grandmasters in martial arts and came to be dissapointed too like many of us here. He left me with some principles i would like to share with you:
1.- Anyone who teaches "the path" must have walked the path before.
Many people out there think they are masters just by holding a belt and having attended a few courses. In order to be able to transmit an art you must have lived the art, matured with the art and made it part of you. True masters live up to what they teach.
2.- "The path" is a lonely one.
You and only you truly know how much you have advanced in a certian discipline. A masters guidance and supervision is important but the only recognition must come from within. This is true for every enlightment path.
3.-Many teachers are jealous of their art and might withhold some of their teachings because of personal ego.
A true master, specially an enlightened one, is above his Ego. My master recommends not let your guard down, if something they are teaching you is not working for you dont discard it immediatly and try to see if its because its bullcrap or because they are concealing something from you.
4.- Test and experiment.
Not everything out there is useful and not everything is s$%#t. Use what works for you. Everyone has a different constitution and nature and might need a little tayloring of the art they practice.
Now I will talk about something more mystical in its nature: Traditional paths of knowledge.
Many of us, if not all of us, here are completely amazed by the traditional oriental mysteries and sometimes forget the rich and truly amazing treasures we have in the regions we live in. In my case I live in a country (Mexico) were shamanism was an everyday's activity in the ancient cultures that inhabited this place before the spanish conquest.Anyone who has read Carlos Cataneda's "teachings of Don Juan" might have a glimpse of what im talking about. Must of the shaman tradition derived to withcraft and folklore superstition nowdays but the power is still out there. For example mexican withcraft has some true manifestations thanks that it keeps some ancient practices that were passed down. I've heard that some real shammans are out there in some extremely poor and isolated communities in the middle of the jungle (south) or the desert (north) and dont look for any monetary gain in what they do. With this I've just said in the last paragraph I want to illustrate the next points:
1.- Just because an art is incomplete doesnt mean it is useless. I used to get very frustrated because of this everytime i tried learning an internal art and discovering that it was not truly original. Beware here too because being incomplete does may involve high risk.
2.- If you look for a traditional knowledge path try looking within your own country at first, mainly because it's gonna be easier and there are fewer chances of getting into a fraud ( you know the language and you might "know people" if you get my drift).
I also want to talk to you about what I've been reading here about tracking Mo pai or some look alike practice and all I can tell you is the facts that a have seen through your posts:
1.- Kosta Danaos and John Chang have renounced teaching.
2.- Sean Denty contradicts himself at least two times in his posts, first when he criticizes Healing tao by writing down the fact that a true teacher wont invite you to workshops ( Hmmmmmm Foundation trainning rings a bell) and secondly by posting a link of a video in youtube of his master's master, which is later proved in another video to be a fraud
3.- John Changs might or might not be a fraud but he is the only of the "grandmasters" discussed here that didn't make a penny with his teachings and didn't have any interest in proving to the world that what he does is real.
