The spear helps a lot with orienting ourselves and also using a weapon makes it more obvious if we are using the Chen Taiji principles correctly. During the lecture, Sifu explained the principles and more details about how to feel, when we are practicing, if we are doing the right thing. It can be that we are doing the exact same movements but the power is not there. Power takes time to develop but there is more than just one kind of power.
Â
Chan Si Jing is quite amazing to watch and practice and is the foundation for all spiralling movements we do during the forms. In the lecture, Sifu went through each one and demonstrated and described how to feel it better. This helped a lot as we could see how each one connected to the lower body and the upper body and to the movement itself.
Â
Afterwards, we started the form and we went through the first, then second parts. With these, I was quite confident and it was good to go through it indoors, as it was raining torrentially outside. Sifu mentioned if we need to do the form inside, we should make the steps smaller and always relocate only where necessary so we don’t break the flow of the form too much. I thought it would be much harder but I got used to it quite quickly and could remember the form even in a different space than usual.
Â
The third and fourth parts were harder as there are a lot of turns here so it’s easy to miss one and the whole form to be slightly different because of that. Thankfully, Sifu went through them in quite a lot of detail and we could see each part how it connects better and the directions were a lot clearer than before. It is nice to be able to go through over and over through each seminar in a lot of detail. Senior students and fellow students are always very helpful as we could check each other in the separate zoom rooms and this makes learning a lot more fun and it feels like a joint effort.
Â
The last parts were, of course, more tricky but I am now more and more sure of each part and I can see how the whole form connects from beginning to the end. It will take some time to be able to learn Chen Taiji Spear properly but I am looking forward to it as it is a very beautiful, dynamic form which teaches a lot about how to use the Chen Taiji energy in the right way with a weapon.
Â
Thank you Sifu, very much enjoying Chen Spear and learning a lot from it!
by Radu Hurmuz
Student Comments
Â
Great to hear more details on Sigong’s system for training Chan Si Jin. I love the new part – more of the monkey staff energy showing.
Thank you Sigong.
Paul Hogg
Â
Another fascinating and informative spear seminar. Lots of great details and insights, also in the breakout rooms. Thank Sigong. Peter Hogg
Â
Great to go over the Chan Si Jin in the lecture, understanding better how to apply the principles of Taijiquan to these exercises. The form is now quite long, so I have to pay attention to the directions, and which part I am doing, otherwise it can all go wrong really quickly! Thank you Sigong for breaking down the difficult twirlings. Christine