Shaolin Flower Set and Asking Bridges course discussion

[Mark Blohm]

Good Effects

Dear Family,

Last night I practiced Siu Lim Tau(the first section of Siu Lin Tau) from Wing Choon Kung Fu for the first time since the Flower Set course. And I was so happy that the performance was much enhanced by the new skills I learned in Finland. It was more powerful, but the word I would use to describe the overall improvement would be "rich". The force, the flow, the relaxation. It was all much more rich. It was the hard force I had been generating before, underlaid and enhanced by that beautiful flow.

This is some first hand experience of what Sifu was repeating again and again at the course, summed up very nicely by Markus Siheng, and which Sifu has reproduced here in The Aim of Shaolin Wahnam:

Understanding and learning the richness of these arts provide us with not only the great honor to preserve their essence for future generations of practitioners, and the perspective to understand the scope of our training, but it also deepens the basics.

This brings us to a common misconception regarding selective courses of different kungfu arts that have recently become available to us: Many seem to think that in daily kungfu training, we can choose only to either widen the scope or deepen the skill.

This is not the case. As everyone who has attended the selective courses can tell, having access to many methods does not mean you have to scatter your attention at the expense of developing skills, but actually helps us achieve great depth and broad understanding simultaneously, at an accelerated rate.

[AlexBaranosky]

Hello,

Does anyone know where the Flower Set gets its name?

Best,
Alex

[Mark Blohm]

The name comes after

Dear Alex Sihing,

I wondered that too.

From experiencing the course, I think I cam up with AN answer. To practice the style with all it's skills and benefits made me (and still makes me) feel beautiful. Though it may sound narcissistic to some other people, this is how I feel as a result. I feel this extending to my daily life at work, with friends, going to the supermarket.....The set really opened up the beauty of Sifu's Kung Fu for us. Everything about the set to me is just beautiful.

Perhaps when the ancient Masters experienced these skills when they reached such a high level of Kung Fu attainment, they thought, what shall we call it?

How about Flower

[Mark Blohm]

Hello Everyone,

I Just saw this quote on Sifu's website....

While many martial arts tend to make their practitioners belligerent and aggressive, Tai Chi Chuan helps its adepts to become calm and composed. This comes about not through moralizing by instructors, but through the nature of Tai Chi Chuan practice itself. It is more suitable than most other martial arts for character development, as the very nature of its training, with its emphasis on gracefulness, gentleness, and harmonious energy flow, is intrinsic to the development of mental freshness and cosmic harmony.

— Sifu Wong Kiew Kit

I really identify with what Sifu has written much more after attending the Flower Set course....I'm fascinated by the similarities between the Flower Set and Taijiquan!

The Source of Life is at the Waist!

[Mark Blohm]

How the Flower Set got its Name

Dear Family,

Firstly I'd like to say that it's great to hear that the flowers are in bull bloom in Ireland this weekend

Secondly,

I've received some interesting background from a special source


There are three explanations on how the Flower Set got its name.

A Shaolin master was practicing the set under a plum flower tree. The chi he generated was so strong that it caused a rain of plum flowers, which were in blossom, to fall all over him. Thus he called the set the Flower Set.

Another explanation is that the “weaving-flower hand” (also called the “flowery hand”) is frequently used in the set. It is found, for example, in “Double Worshipping of the Buddha”, “Horizontally Sweep Thousand Armies”, “Swimming Dragon Plays with Water”, and the Cloud Hand movement before “Golden Leopard Rushes at Rock”.

The third explanation lies in the “poetic formula” hiding the secrets of the set in the open, as follows

Mut yu mui fa thei thei hoi
Kap foong po yu khun wan loi

The “poetic formula” is in Cantonese. It literally means:

Blossoming like plum flowers in full gear
Swift wind rain storm clouds flowing here

The “poetic formula" figuratively describes the movements of the Flower Set like what we practiced at the course in Finland. The movements are beautiful, gentle, fast, deceptive, covering, overwhelming, continuous, powerful, and flowing.

[Fabienne]

Dear Sisook

Wow, this is so cool!

I, from a more romantic point of view, really like the first explanation.
It would make an amazing scene in a movie, no doubt about it. I can already see the orange-golden leaves falling and hear the fitting music=).

But the third explanation really touches my heart. Reading these words, it feels like everything Sigung taught us about the flower set, the amazing philosophy and Ng Mui.

Thank you for this great information=)!

Shaolin greetings

Fabienne

[Mark Blohm]

Hi Fabienne!

Thanks for your comment.
You know, maybe all of the stories are true.

In the same way, take a look again at these descriptive words:

beautiful, gentle, fast, deceptive, covering, overwhelming, continuous, powerful, and flowing

Isn't it great that the nature of the set are these at the same time?

gentle AND powerful

flowing AND deceptive

And it's not my experience that these have to be in different applications, rather these characteristics exist at the same time. Think about Swimming Dragon Plays with Water. In my experience it's both gentle and powerful at the same time.

Nice

[Omar]

beautiful, gentle, fast, deceptive, covering, overwhelming, continuous, powerful, and flowing

Even a single pattern fits all the descriptions, and the one that first comes to my mind is double worship of the Buddha. To me this pattern feels like the essence of the flower set when I practise.

[Mark Blohm]

We Can Work it Out

Dear Family,

It would be fun to get a lot of people participating to discover the secrets of the poem. I have attached the Cantonese and Mandarin pronunciations, the English meaning, as well as the beautiful traditional Chinese characters of the poem.

I would like to invite all to participate, especially those who have attended the Flower Set Course. Try to discover the hidden meaning in the poem.

Have Fun

[Luo Lang]

Dear Mark,
Thanks for your kind invitation to have some fun and to have the chance to learn some deeper meanings for our development.

I am not quite sure though if it's related to the Chinese New year which is correlated to the moon chalendar. Chinese new year starts on the 23. day in the 12. moon.

Now from perspective of the seasonal chances it is the start of the snowmelting in Northchina and the start of the plumflower season in Southchina.

As I understand, the Plum Flower has an important significant meaning in Chinese culture:
The plum flower in Chinese tradition is a meaning for a newstart restart, of the heavenly, infinite change and it may have a mystical relation to the celebration of the Immortals in Heaven.

There may be some relations that the meaning of Flower Set could be a kind of new start in the Southern Temple after the Northern one was destroyed, though I shall leave that as a speculation.

Nevertheless, blossom may also mean, opening, after beeing nourished. What was quite obvious to the course participants that all of us opened our heart and spirit more.

Swift wind rain storm clouds flowing:
It may be related to the swift diseptive character of this style, it's agile footwork, it's cloudy handmovement and it's powerful strikes, though one may not achieve those skills neglecting the flowing aspect.

On a maybe other meaning, the rain may be related to the Water in the elementary process. The Plumflower may be related to the Earth. Water nourishes Earth.

I had my fun!

Best regards

[Mark Blohm]

Dear Roland Siheng,

Very interesting observations!

Isn't it nice that when we share, we deepen our understanding and even consolidate some skill?

Would anyone else like to comment? Perhaps be inspired by Sifu Roland's writing...

[Mark Blohm]

Here's the poem with the Zhuyin Fuhao pronunciation guide. This is the pronunciation guide used all over Taiwan(where Traditional Chinese characters are in full use), and which I prefer to Pinyin.

Nice!

[Fabienne]

A humble and random try

Dear family

Since I am nowhere near as eloquent and knowledgeable as Sisook, Sifu and generally all the other course participants, I will post my humble view on this as soon as possible, before even more excellently thought-out stuff will be posted. Especially since this was all I could come up with right at the moment^^.

Also, I apologize beforehand: These are but speculations, there’s no way that I could get my hands on any “facts”.
There is also no way that I can top the explanations already given by Sisook and Sifu, so I will try to approach this from a different, albeit more random, side. Also, my focus is on the first half of the poem, since the second half has already been explained beautifully.

So, after an attempt to “think profoundly”, I asked myself:
“Well, who could’ve actually named the set, except Ng Mui, let alone create a poem?”
It, of course, must have been someone who maybe even practiced this style as well or had at least seen it in some of its amazing applications in action.

Maybe the name could have come from the people living in the Yunnan and/or Guangxi province?
When Ng Mui travelled in these areas, maybe some folks happened to witness parts of the set, thus rumours got spread and the beauty of the style led people to, for lack of more kung fu-knowledge, call it the “flower”-set.
I had this thought, because “Flower”-set seems astoundingly simple a name, especially considering that it’s applications and patterns are very, very poetically put at times.
(But then again, the same thing applies to other sets as well…)

Who do we know of that practiced the flower set except the venerable Ng Mui? Or rather, whom do we know about that could’ve witnessed Ng Mui fight and live to tell?

Now, why not move from random to a little bit more adventurous=)?

Maybe the phrase “blossoming like plum flowers in full gear” could be sort of a “homage” to the style from Ng Mui herself.
Again, it’s a far stretch, but I’m having fun with this^^!
Plum flowers, whilst still retaining their other spiritual meanings, have apparently at times been used as a metaphor to depict revolutionary struggle as well.

Sifu told me about how Ng Mui went her own way, no matter what, so she was more than a revolutionary herself, if I dare say so.
So perhaps, if Ng Mui was the same person as Lu Si Liang, the poem maybe sort of pays tribute to the style, in order to remember some of her most noticeable “revolutionary” acts (penetrating the Qing palace and rocking it, for example).
Maybe someone else created the poem as an ode to her fightin style; to honour her brave and incredible deed.
In my simple-minded thinking, this would certainly fit the metaphor=).

Or maybe Ng Mui simply was trying to tell us that all the lady-warriors are going to waltz over their male counterparts with relative ease, AS LONG as they practice the flower set, teehee =D! Then again, this is not the point, and the flower-set is not supposed to be for women only=).

But simply put, I can only repeat what Sigung and many other family-members have said:
A planted seed will one day bloom into a magnificent flower. Our spirits, intellect and grace will grow and bloom alongside it, especially when we focus our attention on the potential and endless beauty of the mind-blowing flower-set.

(But then again, where’s the fun in “simply put” =D?)

Also, I really hope for everybody else that has visited the course to contribute to this thread as well.

Thank you so much for your patience. Its infinity is much appreciated=).

Shaolin greetings

Fabienne


P.S.:
How about “gear” is meant as everything sort of “clicking” into place? Because this was exactly how it felt like for me after returning to the basics during regular practice =D.
Geez, too much random in one sitting. I need to go to bed, I think^^.

[Mark Blohm]

and the flower-set is not supposed to be for women only=)

Right!

Thank you Fabienne, for your great contribution

I see a beautiful link between Kung Fu and Spiritual Cultivation....

[Mark Blohm]

密 如 梅 花 朵 朵 開

Perhaps we can see further if we look closer. Some of the characters I know, and some I'm aided by dictionary definitions/native speaker insights. Let's start with the first line, character by character. There are 7 characters.

1) [1] dense; thick; tight [2] close; intimate

2) like, as if

3) 4) plum flower

5) 6) 7) 朵 is used as to count flowers or clouds. Like if you say one flower, you actually write "one 朵 flower" or "一 朵 花". I've been told that "朵 朵 開" can mean "each and every" or "one after another".

Perhaps another way to read the first line then is "bunched like plum flowers each one opening"

I'll be back to look at the second line soon.

Carry on!