The Chinese people prefer to refer to Shaolin wushu as “a unique type of gong-fu, in which traditional Chinese martial arts and the Chan tenets are integrated”. However I choose to refer to Shaolin wushu as “wushu imbued with Chan”. It goes without saying that Shaolin wushu is the most valuable heirloom of Shaolin Monastery and of Buddhism as a whole. Actually it is regarded as part of not only China’s cultural heritage but the world’s cultural heritage.

I am a monk of Shaolin Monastery. And it is my duty to practice Shaolin wushu. Generally speaking, Shaolin wushu can serve as a very good medium by which people can be induced to become interested in the tenets of Chan. In this sense Shaolin wushu serves as an advantage which is available only to the monkhood of Shaolin Monastery in its endeavor to propagate the tenets of Chan. Nowadays the public have become more and more interested in those sports items in which traditional Chinese martial arts belong. More and more people are taking fervently to Shaolin wushu as it is the cream of traditional Chinese martial arts. This portends an excellent opportunity to which Shaolin Monastery should actively rise to for the purpose of inducing the general public to take to practicing Shaolin wushu so that on the one hand they can improve their health through Shaolin wushu training. And, on the other, Shaolin Monastery can channel its propagation of the Chan doctrine through Shaolin wushu training to the general public.

Why do the general public desire to improve their health? It is either because they labor under the misgivings that their health might lapse sooner or later, or because their health has already lapsed. Undergoing a process of training in Shaolin wushu can certainly be the apt solution to problems related to their health. But worries besetting the laity are not exclusively about bad health. They encompass a wide range of issues. Although other items of sports can also function well to improve a human being’s health, yet they can do little to iron out the entire range of worries or grievances the mundane life is replete with. Apart from improving the health of its secular practitioners, Shaolin wushu serves as an usher leading them to a new mental horizon where they would be acquainted with a new mode of outlook on life, or rather with a new insight into the nature of mundane life. This might inspire them with a hope that their worldly worries or grievances can be put an end to. And that once and for all! Shaolin wushu, also going by the name of Shaolin gong-fu is actually an efficient means for either initiating or renewing a self-cultivation program. Moreover Shaolin wushu can be a catalyst helping intensify a practitioner’s religious fervor for Buddhism.(From My Heart My Buddha)