by Phillip Starr
You see it in most karate, taekwondo, and gong-fu schools nowadays; when the students are told to go through a particular form, it's done in a nice 4-beat rhythm, kind of like Lawrence Welk counting off, “And a-one, and a-two, and a-three”... There's little, if any, spirit to it and the rhythm never changes throughout the whole set. I call this “Globbing your way through a form.” It's a necessary thing when students are learning a form, trying to memorize the movements. But once the body remembers the form and it can be done without having to consciously think about which movement(s) come next, such practice is detrimental to training.
It must be remembered that most forms are imaginary combat situations, wherein the practitioner is surrounded by numerous villains who are tring to hasten his demise. Some forms are practiced primarily to develop certain skill(s) and don't necessarily involve several imaginary foes. I'm not referring to such forms in this article.
Real combat doesn't occur in a nice, even 4-beat rhythm. So it must be with your forms. You have to study them carefully to determine where the rhythm changes. Without proper rhythm, there can be no real spirit; the form is stillborn. It has no soul.
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