Forums > Beginner Poi Moves > Reverse Thread The Needle

Posted: 20th Apr 2010
Can you do the reverse butterfly with either hand on top? If not, get that down first. Then just like one would do for a forward TTN, start switching which hand is on top. Do a few beats with right on top. Switch and do a few beats with the left on top. Switch... etc. And gradually try to decrease the number of beats between switches.

To make things easier:
Start with doing big circles like extensions at first, instead of just small circles infront of you. This makes it so that you have more time to think about which hand is going to go on top before you actually have to cross them. Or do it without poi first, just making the motion with your arms. This way you can slow it down as much as you want. Then gradually make smaller and smaller circles, and you can start accentuating that classic TTN-movement of pushing and pulling your arms.

Edit: That was how do get into outward TTN from scratch. But to address you problem more specifically, I'd suggest trying to concentrate on the hand that's pushing from underneath (I'm assuming that's the one that keeps wrapping up the other one). Normally one tends to concentrate on the hand that's pulling and on top. But if the poi underneath is hitting the wrist of the other arm, you need to make sure you're punching that lower arm out fast enough.

I hope this helped at all .
EDITED_BY: ReVo (1271784808)

Posted: 20th Apr 2010
not my thread but thank you so much. Have been encountering similar problems. I love how all it takes is another perspective to make that penny drop

would rather have a bottle-in-front-of-me than a frontal lobotomy

"The dangers of life are infinate and among them is safety"(geothe)

Posted: 21st Apr 2010
Reverse TTN was a bitch! took me a month to get it from when i got forward. the problem is timing and how familiar you are with forward.

Here's something that may help or may confuse you... it helps me but not everyone.

everything you do in forwards is essentially the same thing as reverse if you were standing upsidown. so if you're doing butterfly and spinning forwards and you picture yourself upsidown, your poi will be doing the same motion but in relation to you (the imaginary upsidown you) it will be in reverse. the reason this is helpful (for many moves but especially rev TTN) is because you already know the timing with forwrds and the points where you cross your poi. so once you can picture that you should have a better idea of where in the reverse TTN you can switch which hand is in front.

Posted: 21st Apr 2010
well i actually learned this version first but the way i do it is different i put my arms under the other not over i have never actually even thought to attempt it over

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able, and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" - Epicurus

Posted: 22nd Apr 2010
Thanks much ReVo, I'm slowly but surely working it out now. I should hopefully have a good flow with it here soon, just have to work out the timing a little more. I'm wishing I started working with directly after getting the forward down because that timing keeps coming back and causing the issues when it needs to be reversed.

Poifull, you're absolutely correct about that proficiency forward! From here on out I'll try to not lean towards sticking with my dominant sense of direction and try to work out all variations instead of fine tuning what feels natural(for me that's everything forward and right hand leading/dominant).

~Rock on!~

"As the pattern gets more intricate and subtle, being swept along is no longer enough"-Waking Life

(All you RLers this is epitome_of_lame *waves hello*)

Posted: 23rd Apr 2010
This is one of the moves (along with 5bt weaves especially) where I see the forward version's muscle memory tripping people up when they're trying to learn it. When doing it forward, you swing the bottom hand on top of the other one and forward; doing it reverse, you swing the top hand to the bottom and forwards. But what happens a lot is your hand will automatically want to do it the forward way (which wraps it around your wrist), which is confusing because your muscle memory makes it *feel* like you must be doing it right. All you can really do is try to keep an eye on it, break it down, and tough it out...

p|.q|r:|::s|.s|s:|:.s|q.|:p|s.|.p|s

Posted: 23rd Apr 2010
By the time I got round to learning TTN at all, I had been completely comfortable with both butterflies. Once I got one, it took another half-hour to get the other.

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland