Several posts ago, I was talking about my goals in martial arts. Here’s the last post I wrote in that series. That post was about how martial arts have changed me for the better, which is not what I want to talk about here. I mean, it is part of the deeper meaning, but it’s not what I want to focus on here. In the first post I wrote on this topic, I talked, amongst other things, which weapon forms I wanted to teach myself. I had a list as long as my arm, and then, something interesting happened.
My Taiji teacher sent me a video of her teacher’s student (who is also a teacher now) showing practical applications of the Fan Form. Which was really cool. At the same time, I’m teaching myself the left side of the Fan Form (as I mentioned before). I reached near the end of the form, and then I realized that I was fudging things in a way that meant I had messed something up. This is something that is common while practicing because we are human. Humans make mistakes. Plus our brains are prone to shorting out, and memories are porous.
You have to know that this was the last weapons form I had taught myself before I had my medical crisis. Which meant I had to reteach it to myself afterwardls. Or wait. It might have been the first weapons form I taught myself after my medical crisis. I think it was the latter. Either way, that meant that my brain was not quite ready for it, and I forgot…well, a lot.
In the first half, it was just a few little things here and there. No biggie. But then I got to the place where I was struggling to teach myself the left side, and I discovered that I had left out several movements in a row. I had muddled them all together and completely dropped some of them. We’re talking five or six movements in a row. Once I realized that I had fucked up that whole section, I stopped teaching myself the left side because I knew that I had to reteach myself the right side.
You know what? I’m glad this happened. Why? For a few reasons. One, because it reminded me that I need to look at my forms and refine them. Two, because even though I messed up a lot of shit, I also taught myself most of it just fine. It cemented my decision to teach myself weapon forms, and I’m pleased that my teacher has faith in me in this endeavor. In fact, she recently told me that she was proud of me for going down this path. That made me feel good because I had been thinking I was pretty lax with my practice. It’s only recently that I’ve gotten serious about learning more weapon forms.
In this post above, I have included a video of my teacher’s teacher with one of his teachers practicing certain Taiji movements/postures and their applications. It’s an old video, obviously, but still good. They are doing the postures: Ward Off, Roll Back, Press, and Push. The last three are always done together in our Solo Long Form, and that’s several times. Master Choi (teacher’s teacher’s teacher) is on the right and Sifu Ray (teacher’s teacher) is on the left.
It’s interesting because Master Choi did not start out in Taiji, and in fact, he was skeptical of it for several years. Once he started studying it, though, he saw the use of it and incorporated it into his practice. However, he believes that everything should have martial aspects to it so his stance is different. In traditional Taiji, we have our weight either 60% forward and 40% back (usually) or the opposite (can be up to 70% weight on one foot).
Master Choi, on the other hand, believes in weight being 100% on one foot (can go down to 90%) for power. He does not really care about the health aspects because he’s focused on combat. It’s a very different mindset, and one that I really appreciate. I am very much drawn to the combat side of things. I am glad it’s good for my health, obviously, but that’s not the first thing I think about when it comes to Taiji.
I’ve been at it for roughly fifteen years. It’s only been since my medical crisis that I’ve really felt like I know a thing or two about Taiji. And that I wanted to add more to my repertoire. I had already taught myself the Double Saber Form, and I was itching to add the Fan Form to what I already knew.
Then, I got in a bit of rut. I just practiced what I knew every day. Which was fine. It’s not wise to just cram new forms into the brain, especially when you’ve had brain damage like I have. That’s for real, by the way. I’m not being snarky. I had two cardiac arrests and a major stroke. My brother said that it was a really bad stroke. It was the size of a golf ball, and it was in the part of my brain that handles motor control.
I am goddamn lucky. I am so fucking lucky to be alive. I’m also really luck y that I did not have to do any rehab for my stroke. I haev said that this is due to three things: love, luck, and taiji. I firmly believe that my daily practice of Taiji saw me through my medical crisis. I’m not saying that I was immune to death (obviously not!) because of Taiji, but I am also not not saying it made me invincible.
That’s a joke, but it didn’t feel far from the truth. I died twice and came back without batting an eye. Do you understand what I’m saying? I died. Twice! And I lived to tell the tale. How the fuck do I tell that to normies without making them think I had lost my mind? Hell, I felt like I had lost my mind more often than not whet I think about it. Maybe it’s because I can’t remember any of it, but it just does not seem real to me. Still.
I consider these my bonus days since I should not be alive. This is all gravy. For the first year after I was alive, this was a good thing. The extra days, I mean. Nowadays, well, I’m not so sure about it, but I want to do something positive–which is adding more martial arts to my life.
That’s it for today, and I’ll write more about it tomorrow.