I've had mixed experiences with martial arts.
I took Tae Kwon Do for about 7 months back in high school. I was probably in the best shape of my life at that point physically, and getting really focused mentally too.
In college I took Tai Chi for 2 semesters. They called it White Lotus style, we mostly focused on Qigong, basic forms, self defense, and developing chi sensitivity. I loved that class, I was regaining flexibility, health, and learning to do energy healing at the same time. Unfortunately I moved away.
I later took a few classes with a Kung Fu/Tai Chi Quan master from the Shaolin school. He quite bluntly told me that White Lotus was made up and inferior to Shaolin. That may be, but those two semesters of classes sure seemed real to me.
The classes he taught were extremely focused on mastering the minute details of the form before anything else was taught. I needed the discipline training but couldn't stay there either.