Forms are the theatre of teaching without words, the lessons are able to settle at their own pace and make their own sense.
Humour requires an open and nimble mind, it allows us to simultaneously see what is in front of us without unneeded complexity and also see things in a new and refreshing light.
For instance…
Q. What is the difference between a Greengrocer and an Aeroplane Pilot?
A. One sells veggies, and one flies a ‘plane.
Sometimes things are as obvious and in our faces as that, no need for inner depth or secret understanding.
Some other jokes help us see that we were in fact looking in the wrong direction…
Two girls were talking and one said to the other…
… “I lost my virginity years ago, but luckily I still have the box in came in!
Boom, Boom, sooner or later the really important things are not so important after all.
So above all else let’s try to be mentally flexible and open-minded.
2023 is just around the corner, do we know what it is we are carrying forwards to this new year.
I hope so, because that is all we have to build on…
…our past training is the foundation for our future progress.
Or regress!
As always we should begin with a question.
What is a FORM?
A FORM is a collation of IDEAS.
A FORM is a piece of theatre we use to explore and interpret these collated IDEAS.
It is a per-FORM-ance.
Intellectually a FORM is a filing cabinet to store all relevant data.
We could go as far as to say that a Form is ‘the box’ the IDEA came in.
Accepting this is the first step to understanding what is inside the box.
Anybody that has even the slightest understanding of Wing Chun knows that everything we do is infused with and directed by the Sil Lim Tao.
In short, in Wing Chun, everything is Sil Lim Tao.
Do we understand what we mean when we say “everything”?
A Form is a method for those few that know the deep secrets to explain their knowledge to the multitude that doesn’t know these secrets even exist.
Forms are the theatre of teaching without words, the lessons are able to settle at their own pace and make their own sense.
Forms are alchemy, a way to take a base material, the novice, and through practice, refine it to a more noble material, the practitioner, and eventually, a Master.
If like me you prefer science, in a book entitled Human Performance, the well-known psychologist Paul Fitts proposed three stages of learning motor skills:
- a cognitive phase.
- an associative phase.
- an autonomous phase.
Whichever lens we choose, whatever prose we use…
… Forms are the uncarved block that already contains the masterpiece before the first touch of the chisel.
Or the thumb drive that holds the algorithm.
The wordless wisdom holds us hostage.
I know from experience how difficult it is to dedicate time to doing just Forms, it took me around 7 years to finally commit and settle into a new way of approaching the work, but I also know that it is Forms that link us to the reality of using Wing Chun out in the wild.
If we are looking in the right direction.
TWO GUYS WALKED INTO A BAR.
OUCH!!!
IT WAS AN IRON BAR.
TOMMY COOPER.
Wing Chun Sydney, Australia 