Sylvie's Technique Vlog - Developing Continuity in Shadow (12 min) (Patreon)

Published:

2021-07-15 08:51:57

Imported:

2021-08

Content

I'm kind of stoked on the series on shadowboxing that has been unfolding on my channel for the past many months. Shadow is honestly so complex, even though it's so fundamental. Just because something is basic doesn't mean it's simple or easy. Some of the hardest things are categorically basic and foundational... balance, for example. Shadowboxing is hard because you're just put to it with little or no context, which isn't necessarily a bad thing because it's all about self-development, but it can be disorienting and I think a lot of people write it off way before every realizing how useful it is. So, I look forward to making many, many shadowboxing videos, vlogs, ruminations, etc.

To get the most out of this technique vlog watch the Yodkhupon Muay Thai Library session on The Art of Shadowboxing

This vlog came about because I was helping Yodkhunpon with another student of his, who is on a very different place in his path than I am. Yodkhunpon is the King of Shadowboxing in that he basically carved himself as a fighter out of that work, and he did so beautifully. Watch his full Shadowboxing session in the Muay Thai Library, it's brilliant, and the question and answer we did is on Youtube as well.

watch it here

But Yodkhunpon called me over to help with his student because I speak English and Thai and he was banking on me being able to explain something. The issue was beyond language, really, but it's also immeasurably common: we have habits, all of us. This student was struggling under the "freestyle" nature of shadowboxing because he just repeated the same patters over and over and both he and Yodkhunpon were frustrated by trying to elaborate on it. From the student, "I have no idea what to do next," and from Yodkhunpon, "just do another thing, anything." They're both right. I explained to this student that shadowboxing is like language, in that I can pause within a sentence and then carry on without changing topic or even really interrupting the flow - it's "phrasing." There are pauses, slowing down, pausing to think, even stuttering and it's not "wrong." So, in this video I use his example of a habitual jab, cross and then reset. Great, start from there. USE the reset.

It's so important to start from where we really are. That's the bummer about being tossed into the deep end with shadowboxing and told to just "do it" for 3 rounds or whatever. Yes, it's a warmup, but you're on display and lost and in your own head and you lose all the potential joy of that freedom by the self-consciousness of that method. So just start from lost, that's a place to start! Add one thing to the end. Now add one thing to the start. It's memorization and clusters and combos at the beginning, the same way you learn language in little chunks that you just repeat over and over again. A kid says "baba" and it means 5 things, but eventually there is distinction and meaning and flow. Same with shadow... slowly.

The second part of this, as you get more comfortable, is to figure out the ways in which your shadow is and isn't like other parts of your training. I'm way more free in shadowboxing than I am in sparring and I want to figure out why. I can feel differences, but being aware of them takes some effort. Then figuring out that I like how something feels on pads but not on the bag... why aren't they the same and which one do I prefer? How do I make them the same? And if you're trying to become more fluent in shadow, steal from the other contexts where you have interaction: sparring, padwork, even the bag is interactive. Learn how to teach yourself. Shape yourself. Like Yodkhunpon.