TTT1 - This is basically my shared experience with anyone who reads this, as to the path of learning Wing Chun Gung Fu. From my experience, this part of the formula should never be deviated from. The basis of all development should always follow in these exact foot steps. Stance, punch, and then 1st form. Over the years, just like fools, we’ve played around with it. There were times in order to appease the changes in American mentality to training we tried series of modifications to the approach. For example, in Depaul we eventually disregard the stance and just said to stand naturally. We had a limited amount of time, shorter attention spans, and we tried to adjust to the crowd. In the end, I hated making these modifications to appease the masses, and in the end, I really hated teaching there. Always remember teach how you want to teach. As Conan would’ve said it, “here’s the candy, I’m willing to offer you... If you want to eat it, then do so. If you don’t like it, then to hell with you.” Okay, maybe Conan wouldn’t have said it that way, but you get the idea about it.
The fact is this is the foundation, it would be like by-passing the main ingredients of the cake and just saying, put whatever you want, in order to get quicker results. And, in reality, while it may seem like a slower pace at first, those with a more solid foundation, just developed that much quicker, then those who stray away from it. What I’m telling you is from my experience, and often times in training as well as in teaching, sometimes your Sifu may say, if you touch the stove it’s hot. But, unfortunately, one must sometimes touch the stove to fully understand how hot it is. When it comes to teaching the art, YGKYM, punch, 1st form, will lead you the most stable of path for development.