50 Years of Tao

Sifu Paolillo’s Tao Mountain Sanctuary in Western North Carolina

2025 marks 50 years since the founding of the Tao Institute by Sifu F. J. Paolillo.  As I have reflected on this milestone for the school and for Sifu, I feel the legacy of the Tao Institute actually encompasses three major achievements.  First, is the establishment of the school itself.  Second, the development of the Tao Institute system.  And third, the creation of Tao Style.

All three of these achievements were not so much aspirations but manifestations of Sifu’s vision of what the art could be, which he himself searched for but could not find, and eventually capitulated through his own work and study.

Founding The School

“The Great Leader distributes his love impartially to all people.  He builds temples in order to regain the spiritual focus that people have lost due to their scattered minds.”

— Hexagram 59, Wind over Water, Ni Hua Ching

Creating and maintaining a school for 50 years is an immense effort that requires unwavering dedication and consistency that few are able to achieve.  Sifu Paolillo is not only the Master of his organization and the creative force behind his system, he has also been an active teacher even now into his late seventies.

Sifu has a steady and constant presence that has anchored the school for 50 years.  Although the form, location, and style of teaching has evolved, Sifu’s role as a teacher has seen almost no interruption in his long career.  He rarely travels or is ill — and for most of his life had an abundance of energy to train for many hours followed by a full day of teaching.  Sifu Paolillo’s own Sifu (Grandmaster Chan Pui) used to call him “Number One Reliable.”  This was, of course, because as a student he never missed a lesson for any reason.  He is the same way as a teacher, rarely missing a class.  Only in the last decade has he conceded to taking off holidays.

Sifu is not only a master martial artist, but also a master teacher.  He is a natural strategist, and has continuously developed, and fine tuned his system to suit the needs of students at the most subtle levels.  Through countless hours of daily study and practice, Sifu has cultivated an encyclopedic level of knowledge in the realm of martial arts, qigong, and Taoist alchemy, and conveys a great depth and breadth of information on every relevant subject to his students generously.  However, the realm where Sifu is most gifted is mind to mind transmission.  Through this he provides subtle guidance with very few words to assist students towards the development of their own awareness.  The energetic guidance that Sifu brings through imbues the school with a substance beyond just forms and knowledge — it is a pathway to the rhythm of a life lived in continuous transformation.

Sifu is the kind of teacher who is able to offer continuous depth over a lifetime, as he himself lives the Tao as a way of life in every possible aspect.  The pull of society does not phase him, as his orientation is with the Tao first, and his personality is steadfast like a mountain, immovable at times but more importantly, unmoved.  His constancy is rare, but serves an important purpose in a world that is rapidly changing.  He shows by example what it is to be still and unwavering, yet flexible and adaptive, in every type of change.

A school as a place is more than just an empty room.  It is a gathering place for all to focus their minds on spiritual development and the higher nature of all things.  In time, such a space gathers energy that holds within it a momentum towards the higher principle for all who enter to join — and in a world so filled with darkness, creates an anchor for such an energy to continue to exist.  For there is the path of the creative, and the path of the destructive — the one we feed is the one that grows.  Constructive and creative spaces are important for the health of the spirit, to remain oriented to an aligning principle — and for the health of the world, to remain connected to the streams of natural wisdom.

The master is the one who guides the energy of the space, keeps it clear, and maintains its order.  Sifu’s uncompromising diligence in this matter has kept the school as a pillar of strength for the community and a mainstay for thousands of students over five decades.  As the school transforms and expands now into the digital space, we continue to maintain the same quality and integrity in our work.  It is this hidden foundation of virtue that makes the way for a true transmission.

Creating the Tao Institute System & Tao Style

The Tao Institute System was born from Sifu’s determination to discover the deeper essence of martial arts.  In Sifu’s childhood, he always felt that he wanted to be either a fighter or a priest, as he had a lifelong affinity for the fighting arts and likewise, a strong connection with spirit.  It wasn’t until he was older, and began learning Eastern martial arts and spirituality, that he realized that these two seemingly disparate aspects of life could be unified under one path.

Sifu was first exposed to the Eastern martial arts through Okinawan & Japanese systems in his teen years and early twenties, and deeply resonated with the practice.  As a boy, Sifu had been a student of Western Boxing, listening to & watching fights on the radio & tv — but once he discovered the Eastern arts a whole new world opened up.  From a martial standpoint, he appreciated the focus on whole body movement that included both hand and foot technique — something that is limited in Western Boxing.  But even more importantly, it was through the martial arts that he first encountered Eastern philosophy, and eventually Tao — and it was this philosophy of mind and spirit development, and its interrelationship with martial arts, that influenced Sifu the most.  Having grown up in a challenging environment, Sifu often says that practicing martial arts made him stop fighting.

From the beginning, Sifu trained and studied voraciously.  He practiced with a number of teachers and styles, and accrued an extensive library of books on martial arts and eastern philosophy from the Harvard Book Store near his home in Cambridge, MA.  In his early years, as Sifu trained in different styles, he often felt their limitations and found himself naturally evolving in his approach to each system.  Without intending to, he had already started to develop his own style of movement.  This style was based on his practical understanding of fighting and a desire for more freedom and fluidity in his movements in general.

As a young practitioner, knowing that there was more to discover, Sifu sought a master with deep knowledge.  In this time period (the 1970s), there was still limited access to teachers and information with regards to Eastern mysticism, Tao, and Chinese martial arts — and he longed for a teacher who could share a more complete understanding.  Through his studies, Sifu had concluded that his next step was to meet a Praying Mantis master, and went to his altar to ask for this teacher to come into his life.  Soon after, this wish became reality.

Sifu Paolillo in a Praying Mantis Posture

When Sifu Paolillo finally met his Kung Fu Sifu, Chan Pui (who I will refer to from now on as “Grandmaster Chan”) in 1976, there was an immediate connection between the two.  Sifu often says his years studying under Grandmaster Chan were the happiest of his life.  He had, finally, a real opportunity to study a complete and comprehensive system of Kung Fu and learn true Kung Fu culture from an authentic master.  Sifu and his master spent many hours together in private lessons training rigorously, discussing Kung Fu philosophy, and learning about additional topics like Chinese medicine, the art of teaching, and more.  Grandmaster Chan was Sifu’s true initiation into the world of Chinese Martial Arts.

By this time, Sifu had already developed forms in his own style, Tao Style, and was running his own independent school.  Upon their first meeting, Grandmaster Chan had invited Sifu Paolillo to perform at the John Hancock Hall in Boston for a Kung Fu Exhibition.  It was at that performance that Sifu first debuted Tao Style on a public stage.  It was a great success and well received by his soon to be master.  

Over the years, Grandmaster Chan encouraged Sifu to continue developing Tao Style, and requested he perform it at every demonstration.  Sifu in these years did a number of creative demonstrations solo and with his students.  Grandmaster said, “Tao is good for you, good for your students, and audience likes Tao.”  Such an acknowledgment from a traditional master is rare.  Sifu’s master was often mystified by Sifu’s natural acuity with the martial arts and affinity for Taoist study, and always respected his path.  As Sifu became more and more interested in the internal martial arts, Grandmaster Chan offered to help connect him to the right teachers, and personally vetted Sifu’s training with a number of masters in Chen Style Tai Chi Ch’uan and Baguazhang.

To this day Sifu holds Grandmaster Chan in the highest regard and is forever grateful to all that he gave him in order to assist him in carving out his own destiny, even against all convention.  

Sifu’s study with his internal teachers helped to establish the building blocks of the Tao Institute system.  With deep consideration and natural unfolding, Sifu carefully selected what traditional internal martial arts studies would help him develop the skills he was hoping to incorporate.  As the pieces came into place, Sifu’s own practice and creative work also evolved.  By 1993, Sifu had learned the first two Chen Tai Chi Ch’uan forms, Silk Reeling Spiral Power Qigong, and the Dragon Style Baguazhang form and felt he had sufficient framework to continue to grow with.  These studies were internalized and later brought into the curriculum for all students.

Interspersed with a wide breadth of traditional studies in Sifu’s system — both from the Internal Martial Arts realm and that of Shantung Praying Mantis — was always Tao Style.  Tao Style is like the stew where all the ingredients come together.  It is Sifu’s daily study, daily practice, and daily experimentation organized into form.  With each passing year, the way of moving became more and more refined.  Sifu’s studies helped him become well rounded as a martial artist, and his pursuit of Tao and internal alchemy kept him in a state of continuous advancement.  Sifu’s high level of skill in martial arts, along with his natural intuitive ability and sincerity towards the practice, has allowed him to synthesize the full spectrum of his lifetime of study into a coherent whole — and that is Tao Style and the Tao Institute system.

The Tao Institute System contains all of the fundamental work from the traditional martial arts that Sifu has studied.  These have been meticulously and skillfully blended to make a comprehensive foundation in which all styles are naturally interconnected.  This part of the system required much consideration on Sifu’s part over many decades to decide standardizations such as: which system of stances we would use, which type of bow, which system of eight mother palms, and in some cases, to gently adjust the frameworks of each form to be smoother and more consistent with Sifu’s central ethos of Tao and Tai Chi Principle in every posture.

The Tao Style on the other hand, is Sifu’s own style — a form of movement that he has personally developed over the course of his lifetime.  Tao Style is the central and unique focus of the entire Tao Institute system, existing at both its foundational and most advanced levels.  This style of movement is designed to be eminently practical from a martial art perspective, and is rooted in the philosophy of change at every level.  Sifu’s primary influences in Tao Style are the footwork of Baguazhang, the snake-like movements of Tai Chi Ch’uan, and Praying Mantis hand technique.  The supple, fluid movements of Tao Style are graceful, free flowing and also cultivating.

Sifu feels it is necessary and important for the system to contain both the traditional training and the Tao Style.  His philosophy in martial arts is one of Tradition and Change.  He believes that we must honor the past and learn from the past, but also be able to move in the present.  The traditional foundation conveys many essential skills for all students, and there would be no purpose in reinventing the wheel of an already brilliant previously established order.  It is these foundations that became the launching pad for Sifu’s Tao Style to flourish creatively to its fullest potential in the present time.  And, equally, these foundations are important for the student to flourish to their fullest potential in the training.

In our current culture of instant gratification, not many are able to appreciate the work Sifu has done to develop this system to the degree of perfection that he has.  It takes patience to learn, but the fruits are great.  In my view, Sifu’s lifetime of hard work is only now starting to ripen.  The primary foundation is settling into a consistent form, and his best work is still being created.  We have much ahead of us to share still yet, and that, in itself, is exciting

Tao Style Today

Tao style has gone through many evolutions.  Sifu has created and forgotten hundreds of forms.  Some were a part of the school curriculum but eventually retired, others were created especially for specific students, and others continue to be reshaped.

The forms that make up the current Tao Style training date back to the 1980s.  Many were spontaneous creations brought about by student interests or curriculum needs.  These forms are original developments that contain ideas derived from essential concepts in Baguazhang, Taoist Cosmological theory, Praying Mantis or Tai Chi Ch’uan that Sifu wanted to explore in his own way.  Often times, these were created to give the students a different type of practice to reinforce, improve upon, deepen, or make more fluid, their already existing forms.

In a more recent period, Sifu became focused on developing introductory forms for many of our traditional studies.  These are the forms that make up the current entry level curriculum, including the four major weapons short forms.  These forms are meticulously crafted by Sifu to incorporate all the essential methods and techniques of each style or weapon, and create a more natural progression for student learning.

In this current period, Sifu has become most focused on the highest culmination of his work thus far, and that is his cosmic work.

This period of Sifu’s creative work is one that is defined by a deeper rhythm. It is no longer about the methods or the styles, but rather a larger cosmic concept that drives his interest.  This work is much more complex and nuanced than that which came before.  

What is important to understand about Sifu’s interpretation of the Tao is that it is not derivative of Taoist Temple or Religious study and is therefore not traditional within that context either.  In the years when Sifu was first developing this work, there was no direct access to Taoist martial arts and spiritual culture as there is today.  What he learned from masters was as a martial artist — the study of Tao was his own work and transmission.  What he has developed in his work is derived from a deep mastery of martial arts under tutelage and an ongoing study and attunement to the principles of the Taoist Cosmology in its purest forms.  Sifu’s natural affinity for Tao suggests a soul level understanding and relationship with this work — one ongoing over many lifetimes.  And he follows naturally within the order of these arts as they have historically evolved.  Their creation operating from a combination of technical skill development and attunement to divine principle.

The Tao is a philosophical and cosmological worldview that emerged from China.  The symbolism and perspective of Tao underlies many aspects of East and Southeast Asian cultures, in a similar way that Christian and Pagan worldviews form the structure of Western European ethos.  Yet there is a universality to Tao that makes it possible for it to exist regardless of time and place.  The Tao is a principle-based philosophy, and it is this quality that has made it unique in history, and ensured its survival over thousands of years.  The practice of Tao is historically multifaceted with all families and temples having their own unique take.  Taoist culture was also known to have a place for all those who did not fit into the traditional order of Chinese society.  Taoism is at once a lifestyle of East Asian people who follow its practices and concepts in every day life, an intense ascetic spiritual path for eccentric individuals, and the ultimate principle of warfare and state building.  Because it is about principles, not dogma, it can be all of those things.  It adapts in all circumstances.

So I express all of this to explain how the Tao can thrive organically in the West, even though this is not the place of its origin.  And how an American master, like Sifu, could possibly be working with Taoist wisdom on a deep level, despite not being Chinese.  Taoist principles are universal.  We only use the word “Tao” as it is the framework through which we understand it.  Other cultures use different frameworks.  However, in our view, the Tao is the most concise.  Of course, personal resonance and orientation in the traditional culture of martial arts is also a strong influence as to why this philosophy naturally suits this work.

Sifu’s spiritual & creative process has deepened significantly since moving to the Appalachian Mountains here in Western North Carolina in 2002.  A genuine relationship with nature is commonplace here, as nature itself is wild and intense.  The spirits of the mountains are active and present.  All who spend time here naturally acknowledge this, even if they are not the spiritual type.  It is why this area attracts every kind of spiritual practitioner from Christians to Buddhists to New Age to many Taoists as well.  The natives who live here and who lived here before, understood and cultivated this land according to its spiritual properties.  And many of those wisdoms still exist here despite many centuries of destructive influences.

I feel that the spirit of this area has also informed Sifu’s Tao.  To me, this is a beautiful reflection of the universality of Taoist Cosmology and its ability to join with and harmonize with every environment.  The spirit of these mountains is as much involved with our work as its historical origins upon other high mountains on the other side of the world.  Separated by culture and distance, but unified in spirit.  Able to speak the same language and understand each other perfectly.  This is what is meant by speaking with no words.

The Tao, like all spiritual principles, represents a doorway.  All it requires to open, is sincerity.  Our own skills and expressions therein are those of our soul’s “de” or virtuous path.  This path is unique for everyone.  For Sifu, he has brought forth a deep capability in the martial arts and embodiment of Taoist principles, which is a great gift for all on the receiving end.  Through the practice he has laid out, we become more attuned to these principles ourselves — and enter a process of transformation that is unique to us.  In that way, the practice is not about performing a martial art, but rather a portal of realization that we are consciously engaged in.

The Impact & Legacy of Sifu’s Work

The influence of Sifu’s work upon students is uniquely Tao.  His system catalyzes students to engage with embodied spirituality on a level that is extremely rare, shaping each person in a way that is unique to them and their journey. 

For those who are interested in martial arts, the many dimensions of understanding Sifu is able to transmit accelerates development and broadens perception.  For those who are interested in health or healing, the whole body integration, strengthening and qi building that his work offers is comprehensive.  For those who are seeking spiritual transformation, the purity of the energy work is true and the possibility for continuous process is profound.

Sifu’s creative spirit uplifts and stabilizes students’ individuality.  His work is focused not just on the development of a cultivation practice, but in creating a lifestyle of Tao.  This is achieved through the transmission of the living energy of Taoist principles.  More than form, it is this formless essence that is gradually absorbed by the student through regular practice, instruction, and insight.  This is the subtle aspect that produces the true impact.

The focus of Taoist cultivation is on developing a genuine relationship and integration with the energetic world, whose laws are governed by the principles of Taoist Cosmology.  This is an active process where the practitioner is engaging consciously with opening, building, and moving their own energies and developing the energetic body.  It is through this process that the student naturally undergoes a transformation as they start to align with and come into greater congruence with their own essence and natural path.  Health, longevity, enhanced intuition, well being and skill development in various areas are all just natural byproducts of this process of self integration.

An area where Sifu Paolillo is particularly skillful as a teacher is in providing the necessary discipline to assist students in remaining oriented to the path of Tao (the path of universal order), and also the freedom to allow each student’s natural gifts to manifest (the way of each person’s higher soul).  Sifu is an ingenious visionary when it comes to life strategies, and he easily sees the qualities present in each person, able to guide them in seeing for themselves how their abilities can be applied, and how to discern the trajectory of any of life’s major decisions.  Most importantly, he always emphasizes being oneself authentically and from the spirit, rather than the conditioned ego, even if this is at odds with the expectations of society.  And true to the Taoist way, he teaches how to do this in a way that is not forceful or contrarian, but gentle and natural in its unfolding.

The practice of Tao Style, Baguazhang, and Tai Chi Ch’uan all contribute to the disposition of a flexible and adaptive outward flow, with a firm and centered core.  That is, a person who is solid and unwavering within the spirit of who they are, yet able to bend and yield with any kind of change.  So at first, the concept is understood in the body and mind — then later, awakened in the spirit — until ultimately, it bleeds out into all of life.

Thank you, Sifu for 50 years of true dedication and Kung Fu.  We honor your work, and look forward to another 50 years together inside the house you built called Tao Institute.

With gratitude 🙏

Meditation Chamber at Sifu’s Tao Mountain Sanctuary