Martial Art Schools are predominately closed minded institutions, rigid, always resisting change. Each individual school and its branches are restricted by invisible, yet nevertheless real boundaries. Techniques originating from different schools are disregarded despite their capacity to improve a traditional school in efficiency and effectiveness.
Upon any martial art school's introduction into society, some assimilation naturally occurs over the course of time as part of the newly discovered openness. The assimilation can range from minute changes to the inclusion of concepts from entirely different ideas. Wing Chun Kung Fu, as propagated by Grandmaster Stephen T.K. Chan is a shinning example of a martial art that has and still is evolving, without sacrificing the deep rooted traditions from which it originated.
The general consensus is that there are two types of martial art master-teachers; traditionalists who believe that everything should be conserver, unaltered from one generation to another, and eclectics, who draw from all fighting arts different techniques with the aim of improving on the original school. The major problem however with some ecletics is that at the end of their development no original roots can be found within their system, and so they are faced with the realization that all their dreams have uprooted their past and set them on the path of a new martial art.