Wudangquan is a more specific grouping of internal martial arts named for their association in popular Chinese legend with the Taoist monasteries of the Wudang Mountains in Hubei province.
These styles were enumerated by Sun Lutang as tai chi, xingyiquan and baguazhang, but most also include bajiquan and the legendary Wudang Sword.
The term neijia and the distinction between internal and external martial arts first appears in Huang Zongxi's 1669 Epitaph for Wang Zhengnan.
Internal styles focus on awareness of the spirit, mind, qi and the use of relaxed (sōng 鬆) leverage rather than muscular tension.
The reason for the generally slow pace is to improve coordination and balance by increasing the work load, and to require the student to pay minute attention to their whole body and its weight as they perform a technique.
At an advanced level, and in actual fighting, internal styles are performed quickly, but the goal is to learn to involve the entire body in every motion, to stay relaxed, with deep, controlled breathing, and to coordinate the motions of the body and the breathing accurately according to the dictates of the forms while maintaining perfect balance.
Examples of external styles are Shaolin kung fu, with its direct explosive attacks and many wushu forms that have spectacular aerial techniques.
For example, the tai chi teacher Wu Jianquan: Those who practice [Shaolin kung fu] leap about with strength and force; people not proficient at this kind of training soon lose their breath and are exhausted.
Thus, tai chi in spite of its roots in martial arts has become similar in scope to qigong, the purely meditative practice based on notions of circulation of qi.
[12][page needed] Internal styles have been associated in legend and in much popular fiction with the Taoist monasteries of the Wudang Mountains in central China.
Often, genuine internal practices are highly exaggerated to the point of making them seem miraculous, as in the novels of Jin Yong and Gu Long.