郑顺利师傅 Master Tay S L

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Xingyi Kempo Training Diary: 03.07.10

It was a raining and drizzling Saturday morning. A perfect condition to snooze a little longer in the bed. However, I was already up and ready for our training! After warming up, we went on to practice our Santi Shi and Splitting Fist. Splitting Fist is one of the five basic strikes that every Xingyiquan exponent has to learn. These five basic strikes were choreographed with the concept of the Chinese classical five elements theory. Splitting Fist belongs to the element of Metal. Splitting Fist is know as 劈拳 in Chinese and 劈 literally means chopping.

Master Tay reminded us that the motion of Splitting Fist is akin to chopping our target with an axe. Its motion is a downward swing with our striking palms from a higher position towards our target. I mentioned striking palm instead of striking fist is because the Splitting Fist that we are learning is in open-hand form and not in clenched fist form. This variation was introduced by Master Li Luoneng, the founder of Hebei Style Xingyiquan.

Everyone got to try the application of Splitting Fist by striking on the punching pads again!

Teck Tiong's' attempt!

My attempt!

I find that the target-striking exercises are very interesting and useful. They help me to understand that I can hurt my myself if I land my strikes on the wrong time and wrong way.

After striking with Splitting Fist for some time, Master Tay taught us the Drilling Fist as well. Drilling Fist belongs to the element of Water. I think the remaining Fists will be taught in the five elements generating cycle sequence. So after Drilling Fist, we should be learning Crushing (Wood), Pounding (Fire) and Crossing Fists (Earth).

As usual, we end the training by cooling down, Yangshen Gongfa and sitting meditation.

Sitting meditation at the end of lesson.

The practice of such meditation is to calm ourselves down. Such sitting breathing meditation can be practiced at any quiet place. It helps to ease and calm our monkey minds. A good sitting will make one feel refreshed, or even better, bring us clarity.

Looking forward to the next training!

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