I am centered,... or am I?

 

After our second open training on Saturday, I felt a sensation of accomplishment. I finally have the full sequence of Da Mu Hsing V memorized. I know it's just another part of another form but it is the one form that I have been learning from my first day of Kung Fu or even further back when I learned by watching my sons from the bench. It feels like a bit of a milestone so I padded myself on the shoulder for it. There were numerous other fantastic learning opportunities that presented themself and I thank all of you for your time and patience! One lesson came a bit delayed, and while I knew there was an opportunity, I didn't anticipate its impact.

During training, I asked my son to take a video of me, doing my beta version of my "Quirl" form (by the way the closest word I can think of for pronunciations is s~quirl, just forget about the S!). I wanted to gain some information on the length of my form and of course, get a sense of what it looks like from the outside. Well, I got exactly that but then I also had a real light bulb moment as I watched myself moving through my form. I didn't like what I was seeing! The problem wasn't the sequence it was the fact that my movements look very different from what I thought I felt. Now that is probably not a revelation to most of you or at least I hope I'm not the only one feeling like I'm basically Bruce Lee and in reality looking like a sloth that thinks it's Bruce Lee. I'm not actually surprised about this observation but what I am amazed about is seeing the total absence of - moving out of my center - and that is the part I'm a bit shocked about. 

How on earth could I have listened to so many talks about feeling our center, generating our power out of our center and hips, and not realizing that I am way too high and way too short in all my stances and moves?

I suppose everything has its time, while I celebrated the accomplishment of having learned the sequences of most of my forms I now in a way go back to the beginning to relearn how every single move should feel if I settle in properly. 

I spent the rest of the weekend playing with this and I realize now I was actually trying to lower my center but instead of extending my poses and with that my spine, I made myself small by bending my knees more and bending my torso forward almost crouching thinking that this will take care of it. This discovery is still mostly theoretical at this point but my intent for the next little while is clear. 

I'm excited to see how my Kung Fu will change when adjusting my stances comes more naturally to me. At the moment I feel awkward like I'm exaggerating every step but I think this is due to the discomfort of challenging my muscle memories of the last 4 years. 

I'll be back with more on that...!