Forms and patterns - time to start during a pandemic?

I had no time for forms, finding my martial arts time was better invested in things like padwork and sparring. How the world has changed! What with Coronavirus shutting down schools, are we entering a time when forms come into their own?

For the first time ever, I'm jealous of people who can practice forms at home. These are words I never thought I'd utter!

 

Learn a form!
Naihanchi/Tekki shodan is short and sweet, doesn't need much space, looks a bit esoteric and weird but has some really cool clinch applications.
I 'learnt' 31 jo kata from sensei youtube.

 

If you do Sanda, string together some lengthy combos. Repeat. You don't have to do forms in the old-school karate or taekwondo way to do forms. I wouldn't try to learn the Pinan/Heian/Pyong-ahn forms (common in many forms of karate and in tang soo do) without some in-person instruction, since there's going to be some body mechanics very different from what you're used to...but there's nothing stopping anyone who does any kickboxing-like art from memorizing and practicing Enshin katas:

 

What on God's green earth is stopping you from doing forms?

Mitlov echoed my thoughts when I read your post.

 

I don’t know any ‘traditional forms’, but there’s nothing stopping me from inventing my own forms. I did a spot of shadow boxing this morning, which is similar if not the same.

 

I wouldn't say shadow boxing is the same.

Repeating the same sequence of movement allows for deeper study, which you can touch on in shadow boxing but you won't get the same depth of exploration.

I guess I'm lumped into the "anti-forms" crowd, but honestly I've never said forms are bad training, just a terrible way to teach technique. If you are making up your own out of techniques you have got to work against resisting opponents, then the level of visualisation and the benefit you will get out of it will far exceed copying someone else's form and then attempting to reverse-engineer something useful out of it.

I also think you can forget about unlocking esoteric secrets from copying someone else's form. Forms don't hold any secrets, the person doing them does. You can only get out of them what you put in (in the context of actually being able to apply any of it in a fight).

 

Except my new forms, which will hold secrets known only to Keeper of the Peach Garden of Immortality.*

*Although for only $100 per month, you will be able to access these secrets on my celestial YouTube channel.