Presenter: Chen Zhonghua Length: 66 mins Difficulty: 3/5 Language: English
Year: 2022 Location: Edmonton, Canada
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*** Personal notes on the video instructions ***
– All pinyin is written in full capitals with tone indicated as a number following it (easier to lookup if you want the corresponding character later).
– These notes reflect what I understood from the class. I share them to incentivize people to watch the video and do not in any way constitute a replacement for it. When you watch the video, you will definitely pick up things I didn’t.
– FOR INSTRUCTORS: Towards the end, there is a very, very important point for instructors on levels and rotations — please have a look.
Acronyms used in the notes:
– LF = Left foot
– RF = Right foot
– LN = Left Knee
– RN = Right Knee
– LL = Left Leg
– RL = Right Leg
– LK = Left KUA4
– RK = Right KUA4
– LH = Left Hand
– RH = Right Hand
– LE = Left Elbow
– RE = Right Elbow
– LS = Left Shoulder
– RS = Right Shoulder
– LA = Left Arm
– RA = Right Arm
– CL = Chest centre line
– TH = Top of the head
– PC = Positive circle
– NC = Negative circle
– CB – Shovel Out / Shovel Step (CHAN3 BU4)
– XMB – Small horse stance (XIAO3 MA3 BU4)
– ZMB – Left horse stance (ZUO3 MA3 BU4)
– YMB – Right horse stance (YOU4 MA3 BU4)
1. Discussion – Trip to Vienna
.. 1. Two gears – Bite and KUA
……1. Explanation on 1st Vienna Workshop is clear
…….. 1. This took place in 2017 or 2018.
…….. 2. Probably worth checking out that video out
……2. Movement – Foundation:
…….. 1. hand out on a track (have a look a the video)
……3. When the waist is fuller, it is easier to see the movement. Otherwise, it looks like you’re using too much upper body
…….. 1. Movement should be focused on the KUA4, not on the chest
…….. 2. Trying to be very technical when switching from the upper body to the KUA4
…….. 3. Even if you make the change, the upper body shows better
…….. 4. DT cannot be too loose:
…………1. If KUA4 too lose, only KUA moving, then tossing
…………2. No swing sideways
…………3. Knees change a lot
…….. 5. Kua must open but not switch sideways
…………1. GOLDEN NUGGET: “When you look at the end of things, and corner of things, they don’t swing or wiggle.”
…………2. You need to preserve the alignment, not compromising
…….. 6. There was a concept around rotation and its appearance. I need to review this later (it sounded profound, but it’s probably simple).
……4. Typical problem: elbow gets stuck
…….. 1. Error is imitating Hong’s, not the principle he taught
…….. 2. Solution is to do the stretches across multiple points
…….. 3. GOLDEN NUGGET: “if you’re stuck, your body bends. If you’re open, your body is normal.”
…….. 4. If the joints are open, Chin Na won’t work
…………1. Open joints prevents falling (because you’re not stuck)
…….. 5. When the shoulder is correct, there is no movement
…………1. it’s contained without tossing
…………2. VERY COOL: trick if your shoulder is near the point of becoming stuck: you can use the KUA to release it (see, it’s simple, practical!!)
…….. 6. Elbow should always be inside
…………1. Important clarification on the curvature bounds for the shoulder movement.
…………2. Squeezing the shoulder towards the back reaches a point where it needs to go out. This movement is circular, going to the middle of the chest since like a ball bearing
2. Corrections
.. 1. Body rotation is key
.. 2. Beginners need to be clear that we’re trying to create the required body mechanics based on rotation. Rotations then appear to make movements
……1. There was a digression here I didn’t quite follow (on planet movements and other things) but see Personal Reflection #3 for what I took from it — maybe that is helpful.
……2. Add details GRADUALLY, first get the idea of the form first and progressively overload the requirements
…….. 1. Try to keep this order and not to put things in a different order because it may be over-optimizing
……3. To go forward:
…….. 1. Understand the choreography
…….. 2. Make yourself big
…….. 3. Continue to make improvements gradually
.. 3. Behave like little kids once you learn something new
……1. Focus on those points a lot, comment on it
……2. Don’t lose focus on other things
…….. 1. Otherwise, we get lost in specific details, and you lose the correction or process points
.. 4. “Don’t work on things you want to work on. Work on what other people told you you need to work on.”
……1. Likely, what you want to work on is not important, and other people at a higher level can see stuff that’s a higher priority based on their knowledge
…….. 1. The higher their level, the better the advice they can give (it’s the same as looking for a primary source when doing research.
.. 5. It is important to do a low, stable stance and maintain it light.
……1. If you lose the ability to move, check if you’re not separating enough YIN and YANG4 or you’re being double heavy.
……2. You must avoid these two mistakes or work towards correcting them as much as possible.
3. Personal reflection
.. 1. Being able to follow up some of the concepts Master Chen pointed
……- I think the time Kelvin took to explain the theory and principles at the beginning of this year really, really paid off for me.
……- The structure “Theory -> Principles -> Requirements or Application” is very efficient (at least to me, because I learn things better this way. Maybe others learn differently).
……- For example, defining the outside/inside and their relationship helped me a lot to understand this class.
.. 2. Shoulder as a ball bearing
……- The shoulder joint is, actually, a ball-socket joint, just like the hip joint. So I wonder if this circular motion of a ball-bearing motion is optimal.
.. 3. Rotation versus moving
……- No wonder we want to move our arms instead of just rotating – there are just too many degrees of freedom (to name a few: force on each knee, force one each hip, force at different points in the back, force at shoulder, force at the elbows, force at the wrists, and so on).
……- As we’re typically not used to complying with the requirements of rotations as defined by Practical Method, we use a wrong set of degrees of freedom to try to achieve the same end-point.
……- Probably, the above points are just a different way to express the digression in another way