Peaceful Warrior Woman: Protector of Your Body and Boundaries

What is a peaceful warrior?

The term Peaceful Warrior may seem like an oxymoron. I took the idea from the book (and movie) Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman. I chose the term to help make it clear that this women’s self-defense class offers much more than just the physical techniques of self-defense. In fact, the physical techniques are less important than the situational awareness training and practice. There is an emphasis on how to protect yourself, not just physically, but emotionally.

The knowledge that you can protect both your physical and emotional boundaries will provide you with self-empowerment and self-efficacy. My work in both mind-body medicine and in the martial arts has been all about living a disciplined way of life that builds and maintains those qualities throughout life.

This class is also about learning how to develop a very high level of mindful attention and curiosity to body movement, yours as well as the body movement of those around you.

Learning to trust your intuition is essential to staying safe from human predators. As a peaceful warrior and expert in reading people’s intentions, you will be able to stay safe and to keep those with you safe.

It is highly unlikely that a peaceful warrior woman would ever be physically attacked because predators can easily see by her level of situational awareness and the way she walks and holds herself that she would be a hard target.

Great example of a wing chun expert enforcing clear boundaries.

This unique women’s self-defense class offers training in four integrated areas:

How to put your mind in your center of mass:
When your mind is in your center, you will feel centered, grounded, confident, and assertive. Most predators will leave you alone because they will view you as a hard target. Also, with your mind in your center, you will quiet the normally loud mental chatter that otherwise prevents you from knowing instantly who is safe to be around and who isn’t.

In addition, with your mind in your center rather than in the mental chatter that we all commonly get lost in, you will more easily tune in to your bodily sensations that inform your intuition. As you quiet the mental chatter, you will better intuit when something or someone seems a little off. When we trust and honor our intuition, we can easily detect potential danger and avoid it, whether the threat is a stranger or someone we know.

At the birth of civilization, humans began to lose their animal instincts. The practice of learning to pay attention to how you move on a very high level can help you regain some of your animal nature and animal instincts. Humans are the only animals that don’t move from their center of mass. As your ability to move from your center improves, you will experience increased aliveness in your life. Like other animals, you will be more aware of and in harmony with your environment.

Although it’s important to review past events and plan for future events, almost all of us spend far too much time doing that and not nearly enough time living in the real world. The real world is the world of the present moment. It is the world of moving from your center of mass. Living in the real world means fully experiencing everything going on in our immediate environment, which is not possible when we are caught up in reviewing, planning, and other forms of mental chatter.

How to move from your center of mass was expressed most succinctly by Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon: “Don’t think, feel!”
Situational Awareness
Each week we will spend a couple of minutes discussing some of the ways to identify and avoid potential danger, including identifying behaviors common to human predators. However, it is important to not get fixated on looking for specific predator behaviors because you will miss a behavior you are not looking for.

In the unlikely event of an actual attack, your situational awareness will allow you to see it coming, which will give you the opportunity to evade if possible or to preemptively attack the attacker as he begins to initiate his attack. That element of surprise will give you an enormous advantage. Rapists and other violent criminals attack hard, fast, and use the element of surprise to close the distance. The predator will always have the advantage unless you are skilled and practiced enough in situational awareness to sense the threat in time to either avoid the predator or to preempt the attack with your own surprise attack.

Situational awareness and learning to live and move from your center are directly related in this class because my approach to them are as a path to living with greater aliveness throughout the day. The more time you spend each day practicing moving from your center in all activities, the greater your ability to rapidly shift back and forth between analytical thinking and your animal way of moving from your center. This will also allow you to rapidly switch back and forth between the fine motor control needed for operating all the functions of your electronic devices and the gross motor control needed for defending yourself.

No matter how much self-defense training you acquire, physical altercations are always very dangerous, which is why maintaining situational awareness is far more important than self-defense techniques. One of the goals of situational awareness is to sense potential danger in time to avoid ever finding yourself in the same space as a predator.

Some people are concerned that practicing situational awareness all the time will make them paranoid. If you are focused on narrowly looking for predator behaviors in everyone, that could happen. However, situational awareness and self-awareness, when practiced the way I teach them, actually lead to feeling more alive, self-empowered, and self-assured. The situational awareness I teach trains you to simply be curious about your constantly changing immediate environment. The sense of curiosity about people and situations leads to a more vibrant way of life.
Boundary setting
As you develop situational awareness as a routine practice, you will feel increasingly centered and confident. Predators and others will see by the centered way you walk and hold yourself that you maintain impeccable boundaries and they will leave you alone. Predators prey on the weak, and avoid women who are very aware, grounded in their physicality, assertive, and maintain clear boundaries. In many situations, verbal boundary setting is sufficient to dissuade a predator. However, verbal boundary setting works well only when your physicality backs up your words. The more you train, the less likely you are to ever need to use the self-defense techniques taught in this class. However, learning to move from your center will strengthen your boundary-setting abilities, and it is essential in order for your hand and foot weapons to reach their intended targets with accuracy, speed, and power.

In terms of maintaining clear, protective boundaries, self-awareness is actually more important than situational awareness. The more self-aware you are, the greater your intuition. This is because intuition is based on the feelings you are experiencing in that moment, which then informs your intuitive hunches.
Self-defense techniques
The self-defense techniques taught in the Peaceful Warrior Woman: Protector of Your Body and Boundaries class are for use specifically with the types of predators that prey on women, regardless of whether the predator is a family member, co-worker, boss, authority figure, or stranger. My philosophy is to teach you just a few techniques that you can confidently master, rather than to teach a plethora of techniques that you won’t possibly be able to call up and effectively use amid the chaos and terror of a real attack. The few techniques taught in this class are intended to hurt the attacker enough to allow you to get away. These simple techniques are learned by pairing up with your classmates each week and going through practice drills in slow motion with each other and then practicing with full power and speed on a pad.

To physically defend yourself, you must be able to move well. You need to be able to move with speed and fluidly because power is greatly magnified by speed and because your techniques won’t work if the attacker sees them coming. Aside from the importance of staying physically fit to effectively defend yourself, it is essential to live and move from your center rather than from your head. Each week you will be coached on how to more effectively move your center of mass when practicing with your classmates.

In addition to practicing moving from your center, you must learn to read the body language of others. This will help you to profile suspected possible predators based on how they move. Learning to predict the actions of others will give you a great advantage. Two-person drills that teach you how to predict each other’s movements through physical contact will help you to time your strikes and kicks to accurately reach the intended targets. These physical cues, when combined with visual cues, go a long way in keeping you safe.

Although this is not a martial arts class, the method of movement as well as the ability to sense the intentions and movements of an attacker come out of the martial art of wing chun. For example, the abilities to connect your limbs to your center, to utilize fulcrums and multiple, simultaneous vectors of force, to coordinate your body movements, and the ability to capitalize on the attacker’s movements all come from the martial art of wing chun. As a wing chun practitioner, I want to maintain physical contact with an attacker because it enables me to predict and take advantage of his moves. Wing chun was originally created by and for women, to allow them to overpower bigger and stronger men.

The traditional wing chun form sets are not taught in this class because this is not a wing chun class; it is a women’s self-defense class. However, I will teach one section of the first form set because it will help you learn to connect your center to your limbs and to direct your intention out from your center to your fingertips.

Many of the people selling women’s self-defense courses include fancy, exotic techniques like this one to attract students. The technique shown in this photo won’t work in a realistic attack without considerable training. The techniques taught in my class are not exotic or fancy; they are simple and effective for non-martial artists.

Benefits of this class in daily life:

When you practice keeping your attention in your center, you will more naturally be able to maintain impeccable boundaries, not only with potential predators, but in every interpersonal interaction.
You will feel greater aliveness as you become more aware of your immediate environment throughout the day.
You will be able to deal with life’s daily challenges from a very centered place; this is possible because you will be less distracted by mental chatter and obsessive thinking.
Once you are able to see mental chatter for what it is, you will be less concerned with being judged by others or by the need to please others. And you will be less bothered by your self-judgements.
Over time you will increasingly move in a more natural, human animal-like way.
Your physical movements throughout the day will become interesting to you as you develop curiosity about how to move from your center the way humans move when not caught up in constant mental chatter.
As a peaceful warrior, you can be a caring, respectful, sensitive, and warm person while also being a person who is prepared to be violent when necessary, in order to protect yourself and others.
Many people think that training in how to be violent makes women less feminine and more violent, but the opposite is true. The self-efficacy and confidence that you can protect your body and boundaries actually serves to reduce anxiety and fear, making you a more calm, accepting, and warm person.
The knowledge and confidence that you are capable of protecting your body and boundaries empowers you in other areas of life.
The confidence to claim your personal space leads to assertiveness without any loss of femininity.
Self-empowerment translates to a richer life and success in achieving your goals.
Newfound confidence allows you to self-express and to ask for what you want in all areas of life. It also leads to comfort in saying “No” to unwanted requests.

Move when touched

Unless you are in the safety of your home or in a place where you know and trust everyone around you, learn to instinctively move evasively whenever someone touches you. If you feel a hand on your shoulder, step away and if it is a stranger, immediately assert yourself in whatever way seems right given the circumstances. Quick evasive reflexes are essential. It’s important to assertively set clear boundaries immediately.

This peaceful warrior woman is smashing her elbow into the side of the attacker’s jaw. When delivered with your body mass behind it, an elbow strike can inflict serious injury; eventually, when you get to the advanced level, it will be your most powerful upper body weapon.

The physical self-defense techniques taught in this class:

Simple techniques to master:

Oblique kicks to shins and ankles (if about to be grabbed from the front)
Rear heel kicks to shins (if grabbed from behind)
Hard, fast, open-hand slaps to the eyes and face (deployed as soon as his attention is on his damaged shins and ankles)
Upward palm-heel strikes to the nose (deployed as soon as his attention is on his damaged shins and ankles)

Slightly more complex techniques

Combination of the open-hand slaps and palm-heel strikes (following your kicks to his shins and ankles)
Knees to inner thigh and groin (following your palm-heels to his nose and slaps to his face and eyes)

Advanced techniques: These require considerably more precision, speed, and power to be effective and are only taught when you can move from your center and effectively read the attacker’s moves.

Cupped palm claps to the ears
Elbows to the jaw, throat, eyes, side of neck, back of neck, and back of the head
Chops (aka knife-hand or blade-hand) to throat or neck
Hammer fists to the jaw, throat, side of the neck, back of neck, and groin

Even the simplest techniques just described can temporarily disable an attacker long enough for you to get away, provided they are deployed with speed, power, and accuracy. Accuracy is developed in class as you practice with your classmates in slow motion. However, in a real situation, accuracy is diminished because of your loss of fine motor skills, due to adrenalin flooding your system. The solution is to train in accuracy, power, and speed on a regular basis. The reality is that taking this class for just one seven-week course will only serve as an introduction. Although all the above techniques are extremely effective when delivered from your center of mass, it takes a lot of practice to be able to find the openings to deliver your strikes and kicks to their intended targets, and to do so with speed, power, and accuracy.

Most self-defense instructors fail to inform their students that many techniques that work well in class have no effect at all on an attacker who has adrenalin flooding his system or may even have street drugs in his system, which will make him impervious to pain. Many highly skilled martial artists have learned this the hard way.

Targets

In class you will learn the most vulnerable parts of an attacker’s body, known as targets. You will also learn the parts of your own body that can be used as so-called empty-hand weapons. You will learn how, when, and where to apply your empty-hand weapons on the attacker’s body. I recommend a daily practice of looking at people (especially big men) around you and identifying (in your mind) all the vulnerable targets on each person’s body.

The self-defense techniques are learned as you pair up with classmates and practice in slow-motion each week. You will later practice delivering these techniques with speed and full power on a pad that I hold for you. As you hit the pad, I will be coaching you on something specific each week to improve your biomechanics, speed, accuracy, and power.

It can be a big confidence-builder to know the vulnerable targets on an attacker’s body and to know what hand and foot weapons to use on each target.

However, in a real situation, very few of your strikes and kicks will ever reach their intended targets. Also, no matter how experienced you are, you will be in a very dangerous situation, which is why situational awareness and self-awareness are so essential in order to avoid danger.

In this photo, compare her large blunt elbow with her smaller and fragile fist. The fist has a lot of very small bones and fragile joints, whereas the elbow is a blunt force weapon. Well-connected elbow strikes to vulnerable targets using your body mass may hurt him enough for you to escape. Only use your fists as hammer-fist strikes to vulnerable targets. Boxers punch with the knuckles but their hands are wrapped and gloved.

When evasion or even escape aren’t possible you must use violence and deception

When you or someone with you is about to be attacked, the primary goal should always be to escape. But, if that’s not possible, you must use violent techniques that physically incapacitate the attacker. To do that with speed, accuracy, and power, you must be able to adopt the mind-state of a warrior rather than the mind-state of a victim. That comes from regular practice over time.

Use of Deception

If you are ever in a situation where you are not able to evade or preemptively attack the attacker because he has already ambushed and overpowered you, deception may buy you time. For example, you may get an attacker to momentarily let his guard down by giving him the false impression that you are not going to put up a fight. Then, as soon as you see an opening to attack vital targets, you attack and don’t let up until you can get away.

Mind-state of a peaceful warrior woman

A peaceful warrior woman is not afraid to be assertive because she knows it will not diminish her femininity and it will not interfere with being a warm, gentle, and empathic person.

There is never a need to be aggressive unless you are actually physically attacked. Men as well as women have been sucker punched when they try to act tough or aggressively. If you challenge or threaten someone who insults you or bumps into you, you are inciting possible violence. Personally, I am what’s known as a “grey man,” always maintaining a calm, low profile, even when someone insults me or bumps into me.

However, once an attack is on, you then must become the aggressor. Don’t let your mind get distracted by thoughts about how to not get raped or killed. If your mind is distracted by thoughts of escape, you won’t be able to access your full power. You must physically injure him to prevent him from doing whatever he wants to do with you.

What is your intention? Although your ultimate intention is to get away from the predator, that intention needs to be put on hold. Your immediate intention must be to disable the attacker. In other words, 100% of your attention needs to be on attacking the attacker. During the attack, you must be the warrior that you’ve been trained to be. Then, only when he is momentarily unable to continue his attack, your intention needs to shift to getting away.

When escape isn’t possible you must attack the attacker

Preemptively attack the attacker

Always assume the attacker has a gun or knife even though it isn’t visible to you.

Weapons are meant to be felt, not seen. In most cases, if someone puts a gun or a knife in your face, the intent is to threaten you in order to get something from you, not to kill you. If the intent is to kill you, in most cases you won’t see it coming.

Because you must always assume an attacker has a concealed gun or knife, you must disable him or her before the attacker has a chance to pull it out. If you are attacked by a man, he will assume he will easily be able to have his way with you. If you inflict pain on the attacker, he will then pull out the concealed gun or knife that he didn’t think he’d need before you struck or kicked him; you cannot let that happen. Therefore, simply inflicting pain will not keep you safe. Your only hope for a safe escape is to disable him so he can’t chase after you and can’t pull out his knife or gun.

Fight for your life

In the stress and chaos of a real attack, you must keep attacking every vulnerable target that you can access and not stop until your attacker is incapacitated enough to allow you to get away. Once someone has attacked you or is about to attack you, you must instinctively (without conscious thought) identify vulnerable targets on his body and keep attacking those targets as they present themselves, instinctively choosing your most available empty-hand weapons as openings appear from moment-to-moment. For example, the lead weapon taught in class is the oblique shin kick, delivered with your body mass behind it. However, it is not one kick. You will practice kicking with your left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot, and continue that way. As his various vulnerable targets open up, you will deploy your palm-heels, blade-hands, hammer-fists, elbows, and knees. You will know when you can stop attacking because there will be a chance to safely get away.

Theoretically, one well-placed strike or kick to one of his vulnerable targets, such as his throat, with your mass behind it could be all you need to allow for an easy escape. The problem is that with all the adrenalin in your system and loss of fine motor control, you will have to keep fighting for your life until you can finally land a clean shot and get away.

A ponytail, braids, a scarf, or anything a predator can grab gives him the ability to control your movements. With practice, you will learn to center yourself and then use rotational forces to launch your counterattack even in this bad situation. An example of the use of rotational forces appears in my Biu Gee video that appears on the About Me: My Life in the Martial Arts page.

Speed and power are essential

Practice drills of various types will help you learn to strike and kick using multiple vectors of force and to move from your center with power and speed. If you lack fluidity, your movements will be too slow. The faster you strike and kick, the more power you will have. Power does not come from body-building; it comes from optimization of biomechanics. The more you train to live in your body center, the more you will optimize your biomechanics. If you choose to take on continuous training, you will begin to instinctively use your most available empty-hand weapons to strike his most available vulnerable targets as they open up. When one of his targets opens up, it will only be for an instant. Once you can rely on your instincts, you will dramatically improve your chances of avoidance, evasion, and escape.

When to preemptively strike

If you master the practice of situational awareness you are less likely to ever be attacked. However, being human, you will let your guard down occasionally. At those times, you are still vulnerable to an attack. Your best chance would then be to preemptively attack the attacker the moment a potential attacker moves closer to you after you have tried to talk him down or given him your wallet or purse (if demanded). You must begin attacking him before he strikes or grabs you. By preemptively attacking the predator, he will be caught off guard, which is what he expects to do to you. He will not expect and will not be prepared for a preemptive attack from you. Furthermore, preemptive shin kicks as he is coming in will multiply the power of your kicks. That type of kick is terribly painful and cannot be defended against.

Throughout your day, study how people move. Various practices you will do with your classmates each week offer an opportunity to learn by feel how people move. These exercises will help you learn to intuit the intentions of a possible predator.

More on Situational Awareness

Situational awareness, as I teach it, is a way of life whereby you are fully present in your moment-to-moment experience, which includes awareness of both your own behavior as well as the behavior of everyone around you. You will learn how to profile potential predators based on their behavior. You will learn the dozens of warning signs evident in their behavior—many of which are very subtle and normally go unnoticed. Situational awareness also includes awareness of your intuitive suspicions and the ability to honor them.

Be sure to study the separate Situational Awareness page, which is much more detailed.

Spend some time watching animals in their natural habitats and you will notice that they are always alert to what’s going on around them, even when they are eating. Early humans were like that too. That high level of situational awareness will not only keep you safe, it will also help you feel more alive.

Someone can be very charming yet be very unsafe to be around

It is very common to meet someone who appears to be very nice and very charming, who later turns out to be abusive and dangerous. Some of the most notorious mass murderers were known by neighbors and friends as being very nice people. At some point we have all been in the presence of that type of predator without being consciously aware of the danger. One famous example of that type of psychopathic predator was Ted Bundy. You may have a family member, acquaintance, neighbor, or co-worker fitting that description; be wary of them. Learn to honor subtle bodily cues that inform your intuition. And learn to trust your very subtle feelings that lead you to sense that something is not quite right.

An extremely helpful method, adapted from Nonviolent Communication (NVC), which I taught for several years, is the following four-step process:

Observation: What objective information do I have, using my senses, on what is going on in my immediate environment in this moment?
Feeling: What emotion am I experiencing in this moment?
Need: What do I need in this moment? (Examples: space, safety, choice, respect)
Request: The request needs to be something that can realistically be carried out.

Example of the four-step process: 1.”You just stepped toward me after I stepped back.” (my observation). 2. I’m feeling uncomfortable with that.” (my feeling). 3. “I need space.” (expression of my need). 4. “Step back.” (my request, expressed assertively). At that point, if you cannot get away, you need to aggressively attack and keep attacking until you can get away.

Many predators rely on trust

Although women are often ambushed by a stranger and taken to a secondary location, one of the most dangerous situations is when a family member or trusted authority figure takes advantage of previously established trust in order to molest or rape. Those of us who were abused as children by a parent or other trusted figure are particularly vulnerable to freezing. Men as well as women who are normally very assertive will commonly freeze in a situation where the attacker is someone we know and trust. The term for this is willful blindness, but I can assure you, it is not done consciously, and it takes a lot of self-awareness work to develop an alternative. I have personally suffered from willful blindness. Predators know they can take advantage of that freeze. In the class we address ways to break the freeze; one of the best ways is to practice just a few techniques until you master them, as opposed to learning dozens of techniques that you can’t possibly master. This prevents the confusion of what to do during a real attack. If you have mastered three techniques, you will be able to break the freeze much faster than someone who has hundreds of techniques to consider.

The Freeze

Although the freeze is common and normal for both men and women, you cannot think and reason your way out of it. It is important to utilize a heuristic, a hard and fast rule you can always fall back on. The one I like is: “Move.” As a heuristic, it will be your automatic response to break the freeze. Every second that you delay in attacking your attacker, your risk of being raped and killed increases. That’s why you will want to practice the oblique shin kick and heel shin kick until they become an automatic response, which will also help break or even prevent the freeze. Having to figure out which technique to use during an actual attack is very detrimental to breaking the freeze. The most common thought people have when they freeze is: “Why is this happening?” If you have the oblique shin kick as your automatic default technique, you will be less likely to freeze.

Watch for any subtle behavior that is a deviation from that person’s baseline behavior or any sense that something is a little off

Women are most often attacked by someone they know. You can use this to your advantage because you know that person’s baseline normal behavior. Any deviation from that person’s baseline behavior should be an immediate warning signal to you that you could be in danger.

Situational awareness includes observing meta-communication and other behaviors in order to predict a possible predator’s intentions and whether that person is safe to be around.

Don’t be nice; be safe

You must take evasive action even when you aren’t sure if someone poses a real threat. This can be quite challenging for some people. Many rape victims have reported failing to take evasive action based on their intuitive sense that someone could be a potential threat. Had they acted on their intuitive sense of possible danger they most likely could have prevented the attack. When asked why they allowed the guy to touch them, why they got in the elevator, entered the room, or got into the vehicle, despite sensing possible danger, a common answer was that they thought they were overreacting and didn’t want the guy to be insulted. If you feel any slight discomfort with someone, whether it is a family member, neighbor, boss, co-worker, or a stranger, honor your fear and avoid anyone that triggers your fear. Sometimes that person may feel insulted, but you will be safe.

There is an expression: “Keep your head on a swivel.” Paying attention to everyone around you will keep you safe because even if a predator decides to target you, you will see him in time to not be there when he attacks.

If someone feels insulted by your cold behavior, that’s their responsibility, not yours

You are never responsible for anyone else’s feelings. The more you set clear boundaries, the easier it becomes to maintain them. If you are uncomfortable with anything about someone, act on it. Maintain your boundaries with your voice and your body language.

Yelling for Help: Anytime someone is bothering you in any way, yell for help; bringing attention to the situation is often enough to scare off the predator and attract sheepdogs (protectors).

Stalkers

As soon as you have some evidence that someone may possibly be stalking you, completely change your daily routines and keep varying the order each day. Stalkers look for a predictable time and place where they can trap you. Be unpredictable in every way you can imagine. You can even change how you look each day. Never, under any circumstances, should you ever post anything related to your schedule on social media or tell anyone where you are going when there are strangers around who can hear you.

You must always maintain awareness so that you never get ambushed

If a stranger wants to kidnap and rape you, he will most often ambush you and then threaten to kill you to get you to comply so he can take you to a secondary location, which you have to avoid at all costs. Once he has your attention, he may tell you that he doesn’t want to have to kill you and that if you go along with all his demands you will be safe. The reality is that going along with his demands will put you in mortal danger. Even if he threatens you with a gun or knife, you must get away before he gets a chance to take you to a secondary location, because once he has you isolated, it will be too late, and he will have his way with you.

Attacks do not occur without warning, but the warnings are often very subtle and usually go unnoticed by the victims. However, if you practice a high level of situational awareness and honor your intuition, and never tell yourself that you are overreacting, you will almost always be able to stay safe. In the very rare instance where someone attacks you, you will see it coming and will be prepared to effectively defend yourself.

Physical fitness is essential to a warrior woman

Although not part of class time, students are encouraged to maintain a disciplined physical fitness routine that includes strength training, stretching, coordination and balance activities, as well as daily aerobic workouts. Being physically fit not only makes it possible to move with speed, agility, quick reaction time, and lightning reflexes, you will feel empowered and confident in your physical abilities. It’s optimal to eat small nutrient-dense meals that are mostly plant-based; the normal western diet that includes fast food, junk food, and bakery foods is not conducive to health or high performance for a warrior woman.

The following books are directly relevant to this class and highly recommended

Wing Chun History

Ng Mui and her exceptional student, a young woman named Yim Wing Chun are believed to have created what later became known as wing chun, which resulted from Ng Mui’s life-long experience as an extraordinary martial arts master and Shaolin nun. Because there is no written history of wing chun prior to the twentieth century, a few variants of its history exist. Here is a brief history of this art, provided mostly by wing chun historian Danny Xuan from his book: Tao of Wing Chun. The Southern Shaolin Temple, which had existed for well over a thousand years was destroyed by the Qing dynasty in mid-18^th century. Because the Shaolin were master fighters, they were seen as a potential threat to the dynasty leaders. Ng Mui was one of only a handful of Shaolin warriors to survive the attack. It is believed that she then found her way to one of the several matriarchal villages in southwest China (near Tibet), where she trained at length in the warrior arts of those women. Unlike the male-dominated arts she had mastered at the Shaolin Temple, her training in that matriarchal village would have been perfectly suited to female warriors. It is believed that she then evolved and further improved what she had learned. Her student, Yim Wing Chun and Yim’s husband are believed to be the ones who first began to systematize the art, which continued to be refined by those who followed.

After Yim Wing Chun’s death, her husband, Leung Bok-Chao (a life-long martial arts expert) named the art wing chun after his wife to honor her major contribution to it. Leung Bok-Chao’s student, Leung Lan-Kwai would have been the first one to learn the art now named wing chun. Leung Lan-Kwai later taught wing chun to six members of the Red Boat Opera Group around 1850. Two of them (Leung Yee-Tai and Wong Wa-Bo) taught Leung Jan who later became one of the most respected wing chun masters of any time period. Leung Jan most likely further refined the art of wing chun. Leung Jan taught his son Leung Bik, who may have even surpassed his father in the level of mastery. Leung Jan also taught Chan Wah Shun, who also became a very highly accomplished wing chun master. Leung Jan died in 1901.

Ip Man (the most famous wing chun master in the history of the art) trained with Chan Wah Shun, who died in 1906. He later trained with Chan Wah Shun’s student Ng Chung So. In addition, Ip Man trained with Leung Bik, who died in 1920. Traditionally, martial arts masters taught very few students. Ip Man was the first wing chun master to teach a very large number of students in Hong Kong beginning in 1949 and continuing until his death in 1972. One of Ip Man’s students was Chu Shong Tin, who was considered so extraordinary by Leung Sheung, Lok Yiu, and Ip Man’s other top students during the 1950s that they all said they couldn’t even figure out what Chu Shong Tin was doing. It is believed that what made Chu Shong Tin so extraordinary was that he had rediscovered the internal aspects of the art that would have been an essential element in what Ng Mui and Yim Wing Chun taught. Chu Shong Tin taught my teacher Nima King from 2005 until Grandmaster Chu’s death in 2014.

The martial arts have always been practiced predominantly by men, but wing chun is a very unique art, which actually favors women. It is clear to all of us who practice wing chun that big muscular men are at a disadvantage in this art. Grandmaster Chu Shong Tin reported that of all his students, a woman named Ada achieved the highest level of the internal aspects of the art.