Shao-Lin Memory
By Mohamed Seyam
One of the most intriguing aspects of our art is the amount of material we have. This aspect was what really attracted me to the art when I stumbled upon the CSC-Boulder school. I knew I had to be a part of this system right from the beginning. But I had no idea at the time how much it was going to influence my life, especially my memory.
Having never taken martial arts before, I struggled with the material at the beginning. As I white belt, I had a hard time remembering Lohan #2, not to mention the Tai Chi 24 combined form. It took me about a month to get Lohan #2 as well as the rest of my white belt material memorized. After a little preparation, I felt ready to test to yellow belt. I told Jay (yes, CSC-SF’s own Jay), that I think I’ll be ready to test soon. He told me I should do both my yellow belt test and Tai Chi test at the same time. It took me by surprise. I didn’t know the Tai Chi form! But I went home that night and practiced the 24 combined form, and somehow I did know it. I didn’t know where it came from, but it was there! And so I tested to yellow belt and did my Tai Chi test a couple of days later.
Then I started my yellow belt training. And I faced another challenge: Se Meng T’ao Lien. I was stuck again. But I was able to get it into memory a little faster this time around. Additionally, I decided to start going to festivals to see what they were like. I heard so much about them, but never went to one. My first festival was Fist of the Crazy Mad Drunk. It was so much fun! After that day, I was hooked. I decided at that moment that I was going to every festival that I can! “Who knows how long I’ll be in Boulder?” was what I thought. I had to take the opportunity to see as many forms as possible in case the time ever came for me to move away from a Shao-Lin center.
Fast forward to today. I’ve learned so much in our art, from animal styles to weapons and even internal forms that I never imagined existed. I had gotten to a point where I could have almost any form memorized by the end of the day. I didn’t think much about it, I just attributed my memory gain to just coming to class all the time. But it turns out it was a little more than that.
At the end of class one night, Elder Master Sharon was discussing forms. She mentioned the fact that we have so many forms in our art, and that it’s overwhelming trying to remember all of it. She said that there will be a point where we should memorize some forms to the point that we can do the form at anytime, even if we hadn’t practiced the form for months! Kinda like when you haven’t heard a song that you like for a long time, but you hear it playing and remember all the lyrics.
I thought a lot about what Master Sharon said that day. It made me realize why it was becoming easier for me to memorize forms. It all started when I first learned the Hua 9 Ring Broadsword form. Something about that form just connected with me. The heroic postures and the flow of the form felt right to me. Ever since that time, I felt like it was becoming easier to memorize forms. Rather than shoving the movements into my brain, I would feel the flow of every form, almost as if I found some sort of hidden pattern within the movements. The only problem was that my memory only worked short term. If I didn’t practice a form often enough after I learned it, I would forget it. So then how do you get to a point where you can memorize a form, not practice for a while, and then bust it out any time you want?
Well, I haven’t completely figured out the answer to that, but it’s something I’m working on! Especially now that I did move away from a Shao-Lin. I’ve been devising a method to try to keep forms in my memory longer. I’ve been to a couple of festivals since I moved, and it’s helped so far. I basically practice the form every day for a week. Then the next week I practice it every other day, and so on. I practice the form a little less often, so that I don’t have to practice it every day. I’m still working out the kinks, and I’ll let you know if it works out!
Now if that’s not enough, I’ve got one more little story. It’s one of the reasons I want to keep up my training, besides my love for the art and the people in it! It was the weirdest experience of my life!
Elder Master Sharon was teaching us He’ Hsiang Ku, the female drunken immortal. It was the last day of the form, and we were working on the second to last bit of the form. Master Sharon had let us practice that section a few times before she showed us the ending. I practiced it a couple of times and then stood around to let it sink into my mind. While I was doing that, Master Sharon had asked Sifu Pat, the Fort Collins instructor, to finish up the form in front of her while everyone else was still working on the previous section. I just stood there and watched as he did it a couple of times. And then it happened. Granted it was a relatively short section, but I had just memorized the rest of the form! It was like my brain just sent me the message “Download Complete.” I didn’t know what to do! I was debating whether I should tell someone or not! I ended up telling a couple of my fellow 1st blacks, and hurriedly showed them the last section right before Master Sharon taught it to us. It was my first glimpse of photographic memory! Maybe one day I’ll be able to develop that ability!
Good luck with your training, and I hope to see you at a future festival!
Mo S.