In Eight Pieces of Silk, there’s this motion where one hand sinks below the groin, and the other rises above the head, palms out towards the ground and sky. Then they snap into place, so the fingers are now pointed directly at the ground with one hand, and at the sky with the other. It’s a wrist-lock, of sorts, and it needs to have some ‘snap’ in it to be worthwhile. But finding that ‘snap’, that ‘click’… is going to take some time.
On the ten repetitions I tried to do this morning, I got maybe one snap. I’m not sure what I did to get it, though. Experiment and practice is in order. Yet the key here is to have some sense of what one is looking for, and then go for it. Recognize it when you find it, and then learn to cultivate that practice.
[…] Today was a step towards that. Tomorrow may be a step away from it. In brief, I did Five Golden Coins first, which (after an absence from it) feels like the perfect complement to tai chi. I still need a regular source of cardio exercise, but FGC is good! Then the tai chi form, relatively quickly. Then Eight Pieces of Silk, relatively slowly. Then the form, slowly. Then the form, very fast, where I was looking for the snap. […]