Many people, including myself in my young days, would think that if a teacher gave complete and clear instructions to his students, and they follow the instructions correctly, then they would succeed in their learning. Later I discovered from personal experiences, both in learning as well as in teaching, that this was not so.
From Heart to Heart
There are many other aspects to learning and teaching besides the instructions. One important category of these aspects may be generalized as a “heart-to-heart transmission”. This heart-to-heart transmission often happens when the teacher and the student are face to face, but it is not just face to face instruction, and may sometimes occur even when they are separated by a considerable distance.
It is certainly not just correcting a student's physical form to prevent harm. In fact, often in such a heart-to-heart transmission, the teacher may ignore physical mistakes. Heart-to-heart transmissions have some common factors.
Zen Mind
All heart-to-heart transmissions operate at a heightened state of consciousness, also called meditative state of mind or zen state of mind, where there is no intellectualization or reasoning. Hence, masters ask their students to follow instructions without questions, because once they start to question, they would come out of this zen state of mind into their ordinary, everyday mind.Those who think that following a master's instructions without question is subservient simply have no inkling of what a heart-to-heart transmission is.
Trust the Master
Another common factor is that the students have complete trust in their masters. This trust is not blind or subservient but intelligent and due to deep respect, and is normally not demanded by the sifu but volunteered by the students themselves. Without this trust and the deep respect for their masters, the students would be unable to receive the profound teaching transmitted by the sifu, not because the sifu did not want to transmit but because the students' doubt and arrogance block the transmission itself.
Beyond Words
A third factor is that although words are often used in the transmission, the heart-to-heart transmission itself is beyond verbalization. A mediocre instructor using exactly the same words would be unable to transmit the intended techniques, skills, or wisdom. Besides the tone, the authority, and the sincerity of the master's teaching, which are crucial, there is also an inexplicable transference of experience and ability in the form of energy and mind from the master to the students. Therefore, a teacher who does not have direct experience of what he teaches will be unable to transmit that teaching to his students.
Heart-to-heart transmissions can be of different types and of vastly different levels. At the lowest level, they may occur in an instructor teaching a student how to drive a car elegantly or how to kick a football skillfully into a goal. Hence, one may read all the instructions from a manual about driving or football kicking, yet be unable to attain the desired skills.
Similarly, in Kung Fu training one may learn the required techniques from a book or a video, but without the heart-to-heart transmission of skills from a caring instructor, he may still be unable to execute a seemingly effortless defence against a strong, massive opponent. But it is in advanced arts and spiritual cultivation that heart-to-heart transmissions are most heard of but little understood.
An Example
A brief description of how I taught students to direct chi to massage their lungs may give some idea of heart-to-heart transmission. The instructions are simple and straight-forward. Basically they consist of the following: “Relax. Generate your chi flow. Direct the chi to your lungs and massage them.”
You may learn for years the techniques of relaxation, of generating chi flow, and of directing chi to massage internal organs from books, videos, or instructors who themselves do not have such skills, yet to no avail. But students who attended my chi kung course on “Massaging Internal Organs” successfully acquired these skills in just one day!
How did I do it? By transmitting the required skills beyond the verbal instructions I used, but sometimes by a transference of energy and mind, I got the students to relax, then helped them to start their energy flow, then led them to direct their chi to massage their organs. Would the students be able to massage their organs on their own without my help? Yes, after they have been led by my heart-to-heart transmission to acquire the skills, they can do so on their own by following appropriate techniques.
This was what my master, Sifu Ho Fatt Nam, meant when he said, “Yiat lei thong, pak lei meng”, which means “Once you can walk a mile, you can walk a hundred miles.”
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