Dear Family,
I have been very busy since Sifu left Florida to return to Malaysia, but it would be a shame to not post anything about the wonderful Crossroads at Four Gates course we had here. (Sifu has already posted the videos on shaolin.org, and I have to say that our videographer, Joe Siciliano, did a really wonderful job.)
This course was the grand finale of Sifu's North America tour this year, and also the grand finale of my series of courses with him. He was really fired up to teach the course, and he was more Tigerish than I'm used to seeing him, which was good for all of us on the course. We had a nice mix of relatively senior and junior students. The result was an intense, brain-fry, be-torn-down-and-then-built-back-up experience for many of the juniors (many of whom were my own students), and lessons on multiple levels for the seniors, including some terrific master classes in how to teach.
On the first day, we reviewed the basic stances and reviewed the routine of the Four Gates set and focused on form. The course itself focused on the force method, and I can happily say that I gained a deeper understanding and skill of the force method. Sifu emphasized the order of routine, form, force, flow. He also interestingly applied his 30% method lesson to it as a means of gradual progress. For instance, if your form is currently at 30%, you shouldn't aim at 100%, but at 35%. If you aim at 100%, you will confuse yourself trying to keep track of too many corrections, but if you focus on solidifying a few corrections before moving onto others, you will progress faster. Sifu did a masterful job of not only showing his typical picture-perfect form, but of demonstrating making small improvements at lower levels of form. He spent a lot of time making individual corrections in front of the rest of the class so that we could all benefit. I told him that night that he had easily saved me a year's worth of teaching my students.
One thing that really stood out to me was the general lack of waist rotation when executing patterns in Four Gates, at least relative to some of the other sets I've learned.
On the second day, we focused on force and then flow. I had the clearest experience I've ever had of force overflowing into flow when, at one point, I intentionally reduced flow and increased force...and the result was more force and more flow!
On the third day, we went through all 4 combat sequences in 4 hours! David Langford and Michael Helgeson were the real stars, as Sifu entrusted them with learning and demonstrating each piece of the sequences throughout the rest of the course. It was a very fast pace, and while many of my students were brain fried from trying to keep up, I happily noticed that even when they responded out-of-sequence, they still responded well. No small feat for what are some deceptively sophisticated applications.
On the fourth day, we did some review and then spent some time on special features of Four Gates, like defending with one hand and defending all categories of attack using Four Gates patterns. Again, Sifu was very systematic with his approach, and it's really impressive for me to think about how it has evolved and simplified over the years I've been learning from him. We also spent some time in groups with seniors teaching juniors under Sifu's observation.
All in all, it was a terrific course, and everyone improved so much over four days. It also really nicely complemented the Wudang 3 Harmonies course and Cosmos Palm course. Where the 3 Harmonies course focused on the flow method and some of the signature skills of Taijiquan, Baguazhang, and Xingyiquan, Four Gates focused on the force method with some good, old southern Shaolin. We used some of the same methods of application in the Four Gates course as we did on Cosmos Palm, resulting in both increased spread and depth for me personally.
It was a special pleasure to take a course with Sifu along with my students, and we are going to have a lot of fun developing our skills with Four Gates over the coming year! Thank you Sifu and to everyone who took part
I have been very busy since Sifu left Florida to return to Malaysia, but it would be a shame to not post anything about the wonderful Crossroads at Four Gates course we had here. (Sifu has already posted the videos on shaolin.org, and I have to say that our videographer, Joe Siciliano, did a really wonderful job.)
This course was the grand finale of Sifu's North America tour this year, and also the grand finale of my series of courses with him. He was really fired up to teach the course, and he was more Tigerish than I'm used to seeing him, which was good for all of us on the course. We had a nice mix of relatively senior and junior students. The result was an intense, brain-fry, be-torn-down-and-then-built-back-up experience for many of the juniors (many of whom were my own students), and lessons on multiple levels for the seniors, including some terrific master classes in how to teach.
On the first day, we reviewed the basic stances and reviewed the routine of the Four Gates set and focused on form. The course itself focused on the force method, and I can happily say that I gained a deeper understanding and skill of the force method. Sifu emphasized the order of routine, form, force, flow. He also interestingly applied his 30% method lesson to it as a means of gradual progress. For instance, if your form is currently at 30%, you shouldn't aim at 100%, but at 35%. If you aim at 100%, you will confuse yourself trying to keep track of too many corrections, but if you focus on solidifying a few corrections before moving onto others, you will progress faster. Sifu did a masterful job of not only showing his typical picture-perfect form, but of demonstrating making small improvements at lower levels of form. He spent a lot of time making individual corrections in front of the rest of the class so that we could all benefit. I told him that night that he had easily saved me a year's worth of teaching my students.
One thing that really stood out to me was the general lack of waist rotation when executing patterns in Four Gates, at least relative to some of the other sets I've learned.
On the second day, we focused on force and then flow. I had the clearest experience I've ever had of force overflowing into flow when, at one point, I intentionally reduced flow and increased force...and the result was more force and more flow!
On the third day, we went through all 4 combat sequences in 4 hours! David Langford and Michael Helgeson were the real stars, as Sifu entrusted them with learning and demonstrating each piece of the sequences throughout the rest of the course. It was a very fast pace, and while many of my students were brain fried from trying to keep up, I happily noticed that even when they responded out-of-sequence, they still responded well. No small feat for what are some deceptively sophisticated applications.
On the fourth day, we did some review and then spent some time on special features of Four Gates, like defending with one hand and defending all categories of attack using Four Gates patterns. Again, Sifu was very systematic with his approach, and it's really impressive for me to think about how it has evolved and simplified over the years I've been learning from him. We also spent some time in groups with seniors teaching juniors under Sifu's observation.
All in all, it was a terrific course, and everyone improved so much over four days. It also really nicely complemented the Wudang 3 Harmonies course and Cosmos Palm course. Where the 3 Harmonies course focused on the flow method and some of the signature skills of Taijiquan, Baguazhang, and Xingyiquan, Four Gates focused on the force method with some good, old southern Shaolin. We used some of the same methods of application in the Four Gates course as we did on Cosmos Palm, resulting in both increased spread and depth for me personally.
It was a special pleasure to take a course with Sifu along with my students, and we are going to have a lot of fun developing our skills with Four Gates over the coming year! Thank you Sifu and to everyone who took part
Comment