A Fun Talk About Our Hyungs?

[KyungYet]

Hello, all -

So this is what I teach my students about our hyungs (forms) in Tang Soo Do:

"The first forms, the basic forms, represent our early study in the martial arts: they are simple and direct. They are called the "ki cho" hyungs; ki = energy and cho = first, so literally, "the first energy forms."

The next set of forms, the intermediate forms, represent our teenage years. We have learned enough to be dangerous and can sometimes be arrogant in our fighting style. They are called the "pyong an" hyungs. Pyong an means "peaceful confidence." They occasionally contain moves that are unnecessarily showy (think Pyong An Sahm Dan's taunting stance after the first ki-hap), because this is the way a teenager thinks and shows off.

The next set of forms is the advanced forms, the ni han chi hyungs. They are ancient: originating in the 1100s. These forms represent your adult years. You are more mature and wise than when you performed your Pyong Ans. As such, each move is precise, quick, and wastes no unnecessary motion. They simulate fighting with your back against a wall, moving only from side to side in the horse or straddle-leg stance."

Ok, after this is where things get iffy. For example, I've recently picked up the Chil Sungs - the forms of the Seven stars, right? These are more internal forms, if I understand correctly. But where does one traditionally learn them? In between the basic and intermediate, or the intermediate and advanced? You have to understand that I learned American Tang Soo Do (Chuck Norris style) and only recently turned my interests to the more traditional aspects of my own accord.

Finally, we have a whole bunch of solo forms that don't group together well and I have no idea what order they go in. Any thoughts on:

Ship su

Chin te

Jun Be

Cheong

Tae Jee Hul

Goon sung Ku

Roe Hi

I've never really seen those forms spelled out so I probably wrote them wrong, and I might have missed some, and they could be well out of "order" if there is an order to them. My instructors doled these out in secret like they were well-kept family recipes so its been a pain in the butt making any sense of them, although I know how to *do* them. I would love your wisdom on these forms and on my whole hyung schpiel as a whole!

Tanx, folks!

KY

[bushido_man96]

There may not be any kind of way to "relate" how those forms are in comparison to the others. Keep in mind, when forms first started being used, there was no "beginning" or "advanced" forms. There were just forms. If we are to believe how the stories go, one learned a form, then its interpretations and applications, and did that form. If you wanted to seek out another, you sought out who did what you wanted. It wasn't necessarily more advanced, just different.

Today, with the advent of the ranking systems, we have to have some way of making the grading system work gradually. So, we have forms that are broken apart into smaller sets to make them simpler to learn, or take the ones we believe to be easier, and have lower ranks do them first. Its nice to throw in some philosophy fairy-dust to exude a bit more interest from them, but not totally necessary, in my opinion.

Now, some styles, like ATA TKD and the ITF and WTF, deliberately designed forms to get somewhat more challenging as the student progresses in rank. Some styles do this better than others, but they try to do it. With this in mind, we see how the delivery system of bringing MA to the public has changed from what it was to what it is now.

Anyway, I'm sure I didn't really answer your question or help you at all. But, I don't know much about the Tang Soo Do forms aside from what I've read in the book I have on them. They are a lot closer to the Shotokan style forms than any of the TKD forms I have ever done, though, so your style has more of that link than mine does.