Wudang Kungfu and Health-Preserving Principles
Wudang Martial Arts is based on the principle of health preservation. For example, Wudang internal boxing, whether sword or fist techniques, each move is designed to optimally regulate the physical and mental state, with the effects of relaxing tendons, activating blood, nourishing the five internal organs, and cultivating the mind. Even in combat, it does not violate the health-preserving principles, using methods like “using four ounces to defeat a thousand catties” and “borrowing the opponent’s strength to strike.” Therefore, all Wudang Martial Arts must have health-preserving functions.

Specifically, Wudang Martial Arts attaches great importance to the cultivation of jing (essence), qi (vital energy), and shen (spirit) in practice, emphasizing the process of refining jing into qi, refining qi into shen, and refining shen into emptiness. It always adheres to the three regulations (regulating the mind, regulating the breath, and regulating the body), never violating medical and health principles. In any gongfa, it emphasizes the training of hand, eye, body, method, and foot externally, and jing, shen, qi, strength, and gong internally. Both internal and external aspects adhere to the simultaneous cultivation of centrality, correctness, balance, circularity, relaxation, stillness, softness, and flexibility, focusing on yin-yang transformation, circular twists, combination of movement and stillness, and softness containing rigidity. It establishes an ordered process of “taking dantian cultivation as the core, smooth meridian and qi-blood flow as the guide, and improving gonadal system function as the focus.”

Practicing to a certain level, on the one hand, it enhances human vitality and achieves the effect of preventing diseases and prolonging life; on the other hand, by reasonably utilizing human physiological characteristics, it exerts unexpected self-defense and combat effects, embodying Zhang Sanfeng’s true intention of “hoping to enable all heroes in the world to prolong life, not pursuing the trivial study of combat.” Zhang Sanfeng’s term “heroes in the world” is not just a title for martial artists but a praise for all common people, containing the heart of helping and saving the world.