Exaggerated

Forms are an exaggeration… in a good way.  The idea is to get students to exaggerate a motion (or an idea) so that they gain a better understanding of it.

Mo Yut Do is a great example.  One of the central ideas of the form is tension and relaxation.  You clinch just about every muscle you can find in your body for one move then relax it for the next.  This means you spend about 5 or 6 seconds feeling like you’ve touched a live electric wire then an equal amount of time trying to be as relaxed as possible.

Pretty dramatic stuff.  The hope is that by exaggerating the state of tension and the state of relaxation the student will gains some insight into the relationship between tension and relaxation and how they might be used (in moderation) in fighting.  The exaggeration is a tool for putting a particular concept under the microscope.