A few days ago, I had an insight about the movement Bend the Bow, which occurs in both Five Golden Coins and Eight Pieces of Silk. Rather than just turning the body from the shoulders, one should pull the body with the muscles on the flanks.

Except, today I realized that Bend the Bow in Five Golden Coins isn’t the same maneuver as Bend the Bow to Shoot the Hawk. Silly me.  In Bend the Bow, one pulls from the flanks, sure.  One does the bow pulling first on one side of the body, and then the other, in smooth succession.  That’s easy.

In Bend the Bow to Shoot the Hawk, though, the action is this: draw back the imaginary bowstring with one arm, and aim with the hand of the other arm.  This should tighten the flank muscles on the arm that’s drawing back. Then, the flank muscles on the other side of the body! tighten and pull the aiming arm, the arm out in front, so that the torso swings around and the arm out in front is aiming at something behind you! Gaah! It’s not the same move at all!

So, I started doing the two moves ‘correctly’ this morning.  Ow.  We’ll see how long I can remember to do this.