©NamdevKLD 2010
Human beings have five direct tangible senses: vision, hearing, touch, taste, smell. But, of course, you knew this. Right now as you ‘read’ this your brain is processing each symbol and translating it to an understandable form, then stringing the connected symbols together until you have a perception of the meaning behind the word, the sentence, the paragraph. In the end, though, you are not thinking with your eyes. They are merely the receptive tool used by the brain to collect information about the outside world. The eyes themselves get little or no thought during the entire process of reading this. Of course my eyes aren’t being thought about as I read, you are thinking, that would just be crazy complicated for my brain (albeit super-brain) to keep track of so much at the same time. And you would be correct in your assumption. I don’t need to think about focusing or moving my eyes. These actions are controlled by other parts of my brain on a subconscious level. But these motions are flesh, neuron based actions. I’m not taking about the flesh and blood action of the brain. The motor of the brain. No. I'm referring to the mind. The complete, active mind. The full identity of the mind. The whole self.
I’m also not making some grand metaphysical leap that a million years of quiet meditation would just barely reveal. The senses don’t think*. They are senses, conduits for the mind into the tangible universe. What I’m talking about is taking steps into your awareness. To become a participant into your perceptions.
We tend to only care about the data being input. If my eyes see something move quickly I react. If my stove is hot and I touch it I pull away. If something is loud, I cover my ears. So many of my actions are in fact subconscious reactions when it comes to my senses.
As I’m listening to someone speak, my ears are not actively part of the conversation, because my mind is busy translating the verbal symbols and worse…the mind is already busy creating replies to what is heard. The enlightenment crowd would call this ‘normal’ living as unconscious living. That you are unaware of your true self or more importantly, your true self is not living in the moment.
There in lies the principle: learning to think with your senses so that when you are touching, listening, seeing, they are in a sense a direct connected extension of your mind at that moment. As a martial artist you should immediately see the potential for such open direct connection to your underlying consciousness.
I will give you an example. When working with an Uke you might find that you need to visually assess the position of his hands during a joint manipulation. You might then have to check your angle and your distance, and process the necessary time it will take you to move from point A to point B. These actions are all based off of one sense: Your sight. The other four are laying there asleep. What must be remembered is that the universe deals in absolutes. Energy not used to work as Kinetic energy is lying in wait as potential energy (assuming the absence of Entropy). For example, your sense of touch isn’t simply the act of feeling something surface and knowing if it is hard or soft, warm or cold. It is far more complicated than that. It tells you the relationship of the object in question, its orientation in space, its distance from you, and a multitude of other things your visual cortex can work out, but at a slower pace. And this is the crux: Each sense takes time to do a task that is not native to its purpose.
We have all done it. Held something in our hands that was unfamiliar to us and we were forced to take our eyes to the object and literally ‘feel’ it with our eyes. The mind is capable of processing the ‘feel’ of the object through the other sense, but it is not a native action and this takes a bit more reflective time.
As a martial artist, it behooves the individual to start to use the other senses for their native purposes. The process of doing so is really very simple and it only requires that you be aware of the learning process going on under the surface as you let the other senses do their thing. The first thing to do is slow way down. Babies are magical at this, as they learn to co-ordinate their actions, by learning to walk. A slow moving baby teetering on his feet is better balanced than a baby trying to run across the carpet when first discovering the ability to stand. We’ve all heard it before: Walk before you run.
Next and in conjunction to slowing down, use the sense from a correct distance. Touch is a clever occupier of space. Let it manage the distance for you. Imagine going to a car race and standing at the edge of the track and only being able to see the cars zip past your little section at two hundred miles an hour. You wouldn’t be able to even tell who was winning. Or, as we’ve all seen, having your ear right to the speaker at a concert. Whatever he’s hearing isn’t music. Nor would it be music if he was two miles away. Find, by slowing down and paying close attention to what the sense is telling you, the right distance. And lastly, when you have to trust another sense to objectify the findings of a more native sense, tell yourself your findings. This means, that you do not simply accept the findings. You mind is a clever animal, it will dismiss the native sense for the more tangible findings of the other sense, thus diminishing the importance of the native sense. For example, you pick up a rubber ball and normally you'd feel the texture of the rubber ball, and look at it, saying, 'oh that's how it looks'. Thus diminishing the value of the texture to a visual response so that the next time you see that texture it's connected to your eyes not your fingers. So if you feel that you need to look, say at a hand position relative to your own, tell yourself what you were feeling while you were connected to the hand: "I feel his fingers and they feel like they are pointed down toward the ground". Let the sense of feel be responsible for the entire action and the eyes were simply a witness to the act, not the primary sense for the whole outcome.
Lastly, we are visually based. It’s sad, but it’s pretty much our underlying reality. It takes a lot of training to undo this 80-20 rule (Eight percent of our input comes from our eyes). This is mostly because touch, smell, taste, aren’t really used, expect to tell is about pleasure and pain. You need to break yourself of that one and return those three senses back to a state of being part of your every day participation in this life. Start thinking with your hands as they type. Notice the texture of the keys, the distance to each keystroke, the pressure of your knuckles as you push down. Participate in the action not just the consequence.
*The senses don’t think. Interestingly enough, there is a theory that applies the idea that the whole body is part of the mind complex. Not simply the gray matter, but the entire nervous system, right down to the pain receptors in your toes, are part of the cognitive, interactive, mind.
Monday, April 19, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
The sacred Warrior path
The new students are always looking for challenges, to have fun, to participate in the camaraderie of the adventure or to assume control of the helm and lead the ship into what waters they believe the whole expedition should be heading. Although it may seem like a good time for the teacher to participate in the movement of the students, to be fluid, to alter and adapt, I believe that the teacher should remain as focused on his own warrior craft as possible. That once the doors close and class begins, the teacher becomes serious about the craft. I see the possibility of a great disservice to both the student and the teacher if this basic tenet is not followed.
Omote
When a student begins to sand box or question or participates in below a standard of respect in the dojo he is being inauthentic to his desire to learn. His behavior, even in jest, diminishes his intention. It lowers his standard of attention, his ability to learn, and his intention of retaining information gleaned. At the same time it, inversely, increases his attachment to his ego, by self perpetuation of his internal self loving perfection, thus increasing his judgments of situations and skill sets that he may not fully understand. The more he is allowed to play around, the more possibility that he will simply not respect the teaching nor the time there and will in fact miss the real, deeper, point of the whole. The omote, that is, what is seen, for the student is the process of learning a martial art. For them, at this stage, discipline should almost be paramount.
The problem arises when you attempt to institute a strict ethical approach in a martial arts dojo. In another time or in another place, such reverence of the place and the teachings were made possible by the realization of what the undesired end could be: that is death. New students to the martial way were raised with the warrior intuitions and strict moral upbringing, coupled with the everyday experience of war and fighting that came with true self determination.* The current society is so designed to eliminate ultimate self determination by outlawing and the subtle undermining of personal growth. This isn’t a judgment, simply an observation of the facts. By removing the constant threats of old, our modern society has bred a child like adult, whom spends much of his early adult years playing like a child in his adult body. This translates into how the body is used, how it learns, what value it applies to those things it learns, and more importantly, the value-less-ness of those things it did not learn. For those things that get lost are hard fought to impress upon unwilling flesh later.
Those students that are sandboxing, asking a lot of what if questions, who struggle and fight back against techniques, are designed by our society to behave this way, and as a teacher, you should help them to see that they aren’t even really seeing themselves, not fully. Like looking into a series of foggy mirrors trying to find your one true reflection. The teacher’s job is not simply to offer a martial art. The art itself is a tool and nothing more. But his job is to help the student become a human being. A true, self determinate, independent, lover of life, defender of his ideals. The true teacher is a mirror breaker. Taking us back to our first image. That’s how important we are to the teacher, that he takes on the ‘karma’ of all those broken mirrors right along with us.
The problem is that the student whom practices these behaviors is not trying to rise to the teacher, but is instead trying to bring the teacher to his own level. A student of first year math has no right to take a course in algebra; his presence in the class would be disruptive. He’d be lost, question everything, and basically find no value in the whole proceeding. Is a white belt really much different? The difference is, we are suppose to have the patience and love for the beginner’s heart, to help nurture his unique nature and foster in him a true grown up human being. Can you see the conundrum this creates? Where in the student, by his nature, is drawing the whole downward and the teacher is attempting to elevate the situation. Of course in any closed system, black body radiation is very efficient. In other words, the teacher radiates at a black body, whom simply reflects with little absorption.
Ura
For the teacher, his desire to offer the student the best possible education in regards to his martial training can be all consuming. This leads to cases of getting to what if scenarios, jumping into the sand box to play with the students, and so forth. I cannot speak for all teachers, for some might find this method of teaching beneficial. Some styles, some purposes, some warrior creeds may in fact desire this approach. I can only reflect my limited viewpoint and the few notch hole observations I’ve made of this vast battlefield. It is my opinion that teachers should not sand-box, or fall prey to the ‘what if’. Unless, they fully intend to go 100% on the student. The teacher must always exhibit his intention to fully perform the techniques, the approaches, the desires of the school and most importantly: his own Warriorship. If at any time he softens, to allow for the student to postulate or play, then he is doing damage to his own identity. By giving room to others whom will take advantage of the situation for their own benefit.
The teacher needs to remember that the student has signed on to learn, not just the throwing of fists into the air, but all the underlying, metaphysical, aspects of what is going on in the dojo. Where the Warriorship leads. I have a friend who teaches Yoga and it disheartens her when she finds students returning to her classes that haven’t realized that Yoga is a spiritual practice, that it’s not simply a place to become limber and socialize. That the yoga studio is a place of reverence, a kind of temple. It may not be a church to me, but it is a great spiritual path to her and I respect that and would assume that those entering her doors should quickly learn that there is a penance to be paid and homage to be adorned. The same is true for every Endeavour that a student undertakes. Whether that is martial arts or basket weaving. There is a seriousness, a meaning, a point to the adventure. Every step of our lives is … Our life and it should be serious. One of my favorite Hindi says is, “Before your birth, god inscribed upon you your allotted number of breathes. It is yours to decide how to use them.” I have a limited scope, a finite time. Why waste it with half truths and half-hearted foolishness?
It therefore is necessary for the teacher, in order to maintain his own path, to not engage in things that would bring him away from his identity. Sandboxing, what if, etc. leads the teacher into someone’s feign where most likely he will be flanked and crushed. Remain true to your strategies, stick to your tactics. Do not, never, let the student pull you down to his simple mathematics. It’s not your fault he doesn’t know Pythagoras and sometimes the only way to show him that there is more than addition and subtraction is to simply dump the entire system of Algebraic geometry on him and watch him squirm. It’s not mean, it’s not cruel. Often times our egos get in the way of ourselves. I disagree with ego killers, I submit that the ego is necessary for existence. That it is an intrinsic part of our being and that no matter how hard you try to destroy it, it will simply evolve to be the thing you called destroyed. I can’t think of a single person who can outthink himself, for you are only as smart as your own capacity. How can I fool my own thinking, let alone a part so fundamental that it has access to the whole of my mind? I believe that the folly of the ego is that it can become a monster, unchecked, without restraint. That is the creature of desire of wanton waste a warrior should beat with a stick until it dies (overly dramatic visualization intentionalized) .
The point is simple: The teacher at his core, should live up to his ethos, not offer the conversion of sacred ideas to bland passing phases in hopes that those who see can look past the obvious rape of the basic foundations of the idea and see the real meaning. In the end, the opposite is always true and the sacrifice is lost to history leaving only event as evidence of it’s every happening. From there the event takes on what ever meaning an individual requires it to, thus, the sacred is lost. Warriors protect their own sacred selves.
* - Our modern society is repulsed by war, so they seem to think, more so than our ancestors. We forget to realize that not to long ago a group of guys, a few thousand men, could seize an entire nation, simply because they wanted too. Those times aren’t dead. Selfish desires of power haven’t ended. In fact, they have increased as we have been vilified and stripped of our freedoms. A warrior ideal, that is, the realization of self-determination over social responsibility via guilt (nothing wrong with being socially responsible, but it should come from the enactment of the Golden Rule, not from fear of reprisal or scorn) his highly needed in our current world. We need real, excuse the brash statement, Jedi knights, whom are determined to place more than themselves, more than their gods, more than their governments at the center of all things. Truth seekers.
Omote
When a student begins to sand box or question or participates in below a standard of respect in the dojo he is being inauthentic to his desire to learn. His behavior, even in jest, diminishes his intention. It lowers his standard of attention, his ability to learn, and his intention of retaining information gleaned. At the same time it, inversely, increases his attachment to his ego, by self perpetuation of his internal self loving perfection, thus increasing his judgments of situations and skill sets that he may not fully understand. The more he is allowed to play around, the more possibility that he will simply not respect the teaching nor the time there and will in fact miss the real, deeper, point of the whole. The omote, that is, what is seen, for the student is the process of learning a martial art. For them, at this stage, discipline should almost be paramount.
The problem arises when you attempt to institute a strict ethical approach in a martial arts dojo. In another time or in another place, such reverence of the place and the teachings were made possible by the realization of what the undesired end could be: that is death. New students to the martial way were raised with the warrior intuitions and strict moral upbringing, coupled with the everyday experience of war and fighting that came with true self determination.* The current society is so designed to eliminate ultimate self determination by outlawing and the subtle undermining of personal growth. This isn’t a judgment, simply an observation of the facts. By removing the constant threats of old, our modern society has bred a child like adult, whom spends much of his early adult years playing like a child in his adult body. This translates into how the body is used, how it learns, what value it applies to those things it learns, and more importantly, the value-less-ness of those things it did not learn. For those things that get lost are hard fought to impress upon unwilling flesh later.
Those students that are sandboxing, asking a lot of what if questions, who struggle and fight back against techniques, are designed by our society to behave this way, and as a teacher, you should help them to see that they aren’t even really seeing themselves, not fully. Like looking into a series of foggy mirrors trying to find your one true reflection. The teacher’s job is not simply to offer a martial art. The art itself is a tool and nothing more. But his job is to help the student become a human being. A true, self determinate, independent, lover of life, defender of his ideals. The true teacher is a mirror breaker. Taking us back to our first image. That’s how important we are to the teacher, that he takes on the ‘karma’ of all those broken mirrors right along with us.
The problem is that the student whom practices these behaviors is not trying to rise to the teacher, but is instead trying to bring the teacher to his own level. A student of first year math has no right to take a course in algebra; his presence in the class would be disruptive. He’d be lost, question everything, and basically find no value in the whole proceeding. Is a white belt really much different? The difference is, we are suppose to have the patience and love for the beginner’s heart, to help nurture his unique nature and foster in him a true grown up human being. Can you see the conundrum this creates? Where in the student, by his nature, is drawing the whole downward and the teacher is attempting to elevate the situation. Of course in any closed system, black body radiation is very efficient. In other words, the teacher radiates at a black body, whom simply reflects with little absorption.
Ura
For the teacher, his desire to offer the student the best possible education in regards to his martial training can be all consuming. This leads to cases of getting to what if scenarios, jumping into the sand box to play with the students, and so forth. I cannot speak for all teachers, for some might find this method of teaching beneficial. Some styles, some purposes, some warrior creeds may in fact desire this approach. I can only reflect my limited viewpoint and the few notch hole observations I’ve made of this vast battlefield. It is my opinion that teachers should not sand-box, or fall prey to the ‘what if’. Unless, they fully intend to go 100% on the student. The teacher must always exhibit his intention to fully perform the techniques, the approaches, the desires of the school and most importantly: his own Warriorship. If at any time he softens, to allow for the student to postulate or play, then he is doing damage to his own identity. By giving room to others whom will take advantage of the situation for their own benefit.
The teacher needs to remember that the student has signed on to learn, not just the throwing of fists into the air, but all the underlying, metaphysical, aspects of what is going on in the dojo. Where the Warriorship leads. I have a friend who teaches Yoga and it disheartens her when she finds students returning to her classes that haven’t realized that Yoga is a spiritual practice, that it’s not simply a place to become limber and socialize. That the yoga studio is a place of reverence, a kind of temple. It may not be a church to me, but it is a great spiritual path to her and I respect that and would assume that those entering her doors should quickly learn that there is a penance to be paid and homage to be adorned. The same is true for every Endeavour that a student undertakes. Whether that is martial arts or basket weaving. There is a seriousness, a meaning, a point to the adventure. Every step of our lives is … Our life and it should be serious. One of my favorite Hindi says is, “Before your birth, god inscribed upon you your allotted number of breathes. It is yours to decide how to use them.” I have a limited scope, a finite time. Why waste it with half truths and half-hearted foolishness?
It therefore is necessary for the teacher, in order to maintain his own path, to not engage in things that would bring him away from his identity. Sandboxing, what if, etc. leads the teacher into someone’s feign where most likely he will be flanked and crushed. Remain true to your strategies, stick to your tactics. Do not, never, let the student pull you down to his simple mathematics. It’s not your fault he doesn’t know Pythagoras and sometimes the only way to show him that there is more than addition and subtraction is to simply dump the entire system of Algebraic geometry on him and watch him squirm. It’s not mean, it’s not cruel. Often times our egos get in the way of ourselves. I disagree with ego killers, I submit that the ego is necessary for existence. That it is an intrinsic part of our being and that no matter how hard you try to destroy it, it will simply evolve to be the thing you called destroyed. I can’t think of a single person who can outthink himself, for you are only as smart as your own capacity. How can I fool my own thinking, let alone a part so fundamental that it has access to the whole of my mind? I believe that the folly of the ego is that it can become a monster, unchecked, without restraint. That is the creature of desire of wanton waste a warrior should beat with a stick until it dies (overly dramatic visualization intentionalized) .
The point is simple: The teacher at his core, should live up to his ethos, not offer the conversion of sacred ideas to bland passing phases in hopes that those who see can look past the obvious rape of the basic foundations of the idea and see the real meaning. In the end, the opposite is always true and the sacrifice is lost to history leaving only event as evidence of it’s every happening. From there the event takes on what ever meaning an individual requires it to, thus, the sacred is lost. Warriors protect their own sacred selves.
* - Our modern society is repulsed by war, so they seem to think, more so than our ancestors. We forget to realize that not to long ago a group of guys, a few thousand men, could seize an entire nation, simply because they wanted too. Those times aren’t dead. Selfish desires of power haven’t ended. In fact, they have increased as we have been vilified and stripped of our freedoms. A warrior ideal, that is, the realization of self-determination over social responsibility via guilt (nothing wrong with being socially responsible, but it should come from the enactment of the Golden Rule, not from fear of reprisal or scorn) his highly needed in our current world. We need real, excuse the brash statement, Jedi knights, whom are determined to place more than themselves, more than their gods, more than their governments at the center of all things. Truth seekers.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
The iron wall starts here.
So often I’m assailed by the white robed bare foot community with their delicate words of ascension into the realms of the enlightened. They speak of it, these pajama wearing types as if it were getting on a hot air balloon ride. Where on a clean spring day one drifts effortlessly up into the open serene sky, with the world ever visible below. Where once in the soft gaze of heaven god appears in his ever manifest beauty and the whole of the universe is revealed.
Ridiculous.
The act of changing anything is a complex undertaking, like climbing mount Everest, or more probably, an out and out war. For the reality of those whom seek** the ultimate self one has the fight of a life on his hands: his two most opposing sides. Neither side can settle for a truce or arrange a cease fire. Neither could live with the other once the presence of one is recognized. How could the enlightened self live with the selfish ego? And how could the ego allow the open endless spirit put down so many of the carefully laid traps it spent years creating?
All great endeavors require the destruction (if that word is to negative for your delicate ears, then: re-invention by the dis assembly…) of previously created paradigms. We have to willingly assail the wall of the self in order to find the cracks. We must change the whole of our being in one swallow. This is never not a violent act. The only other option is to simply leave the self as it is and return to the cave to fade from the world.
Did the Buddha simple sit by a tree one afternoon after having a nice meal and some wine before bed and come to the conclusions he did? No. His war of the self took years and even when he thought he had it mastered, sitting there under the Bod-hi tree, he was attacked again by “Love / Death” and his many incarnations of the maya of life. Even then he had to fight and as the gods threw swords and spears from a million million million minions, the Buddha didn’t sit and take the wounds, he fought them off with his own devices. He was at war!
The point of my rant is simple. We are a species of re-creation. Each birth is a genesis into the universe. A starting over. With these origins some other thing must be sacrificed and even in the most violent ways, destroyed.
A samurai or a warrior’s spirit is not in his sacrifice, but in his overcoming. His death is a kind of rebirth to something not so obvious. His actions are in fact the cocoon of his metamorphosis, it is by way of his every action that he can even spin the silk by which he changes.
** There are few real seekers these days. Most of us (including myself) are satisfied with the fox of the ego whom is a cleverer being than your conscious mind could ever be. For the Fox accepts all faiths, all ideas, all values, all thoughts, all ways of approaching. it is clever enough to even accept those things that supposedly destroy it knowing full well that without the actual war against it, the actual usurping of the power from it, it will be like a character in Shakespeare, whispering just the right words into the ear at the right time and never fading from it's place. It has nothing to worry over, for it realizes that it must exist if we are to remain as we are today.
Ridiculous.
The act of changing anything is a complex undertaking, like climbing mount Everest, or more probably, an out and out war. For the reality of those whom seek** the ultimate self one has the fight of a life on his hands: his two most opposing sides. Neither side can settle for a truce or arrange a cease fire. Neither could live with the other once the presence of one is recognized. How could the enlightened self live with the selfish ego? And how could the ego allow the open endless spirit put down so many of the carefully laid traps it spent years creating?
All great endeavors require the destruction (if that word is to negative for your delicate ears, then: re-invention by the dis assembly…) of previously created paradigms. We have to willingly assail the wall of the self in order to find the cracks. We must change the whole of our being in one swallow. This is never not a violent act. The only other option is to simply leave the self as it is and return to the cave to fade from the world.
Did the Buddha simple sit by a tree one afternoon after having a nice meal and some wine before bed and come to the conclusions he did? No. His war of the self took years and even when he thought he had it mastered, sitting there under the Bod-hi tree, he was attacked again by “Love / Death” and his many incarnations of the maya of life. Even then he had to fight and as the gods threw swords and spears from a million million million minions, the Buddha didn’t sit and take the wounds, he fought them off with his own devices. He was at war!
The point of my rant is simple. We are a species of re-creation. Each birth is a genesis into the universe. A starting over. With these origins some other thing must be sacrificed and even in the most violent ways, destroyed.
A samurai or a warrior’s spirit is not in his sacrifice, but in his overcoming. His death is a kind of rebirth to something not so obvious. His actions are in fact the cocoon of his metamorphosis, it is by way of his every action that he can even spin the silk by which he changes.
** There are few real seekers these days. Most of us (including myself) are satisfied with the fox of the ego whom is a cleverer being than your conscious mind could ever be. For the Fox accepts all faiths, all ideas, all values, all thoughts, all ways of approaching. it is clever enough to even accept those things that supposedly destroy it knowing full well that without the actual war against it, the actual usurping of the power from it, it will be like a character in Shakespeare, whispering just the right words into the ear at the right time and never fading from it's place. It has nothing to worry over, for it realizes that it must exist if we are to remain as we are today.
Friday, August 28, 2009
The Nature of the sword
In you am I
Sheathed you are a Dragon
where your fiery heart pounds.
Unleashed a Buddha.
Sheathed you are a Dragon
where your fiery heart pounds.
Unleashed a Buddha.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Training
Training
There is an oddity in the nature of our physical learning versus that of our discovery of knowledge. Most of our schooling systems take very small steps at the onset to see how quickly the student can learn. In the case of math it starts with understanding the numbers, what they actually mean, and then building on that with basic addition, then subtraction, and so on. History, science, Language, are all built on piece by piece until a clear picture of the underlying principles are visible to the student, versus simply plying the brain with an overwhelming strata of data.
Physical learning tries sometimes to include this sort of approach. A newcomer to baseball is taught the locations on the field, the idea of catching, the nature of batting, etc. But the most important parts of the physical learning are scarcely acknowledged. For example, in baseball, one is taught to hold the bat, where to stand, and what to swing at, but the subtle nuisances of direction of the hands, angle of the bat, the location of the feet, and all that other stuff are simply glossed over. A very primitive ideal is usually in place by physical type teachers, that is: only some knowledge can be taught, the rest is inherit. They tend to believe that you either have it or you do not and there is no amount of training that will every help you hit the ball more often, further, or accurately. They believe it is natural talent.
There is a certain truth to this, but it is not complete nor is it a law of a nature, instead it is more like a loose rule. The truth is that we human beings are wired in a particular manner. Some of us can step up to the plate and swing the bat ‘naturally’ because we hardwired our brains to understand the subtle physics of the sport, while others, whom have not wired themselves that way, need some programming to come to the same place. And yes, we are responsible for the wiring itself, nature makes the paths, some easier and more plentiful, but the actual learning is related to sensory input from birth.
It is possible, with proper teaching to be just as good as any other person at any given talent, related to age and physical circumstances of course.
I propose that the problem is in the way things are taught. Since I am mostly writing about martial arts, I will try to keep my analogies on the dojo floor and off the baseball field.
I believe that in most training halls the order in which the student acquires his skills are out of step with the nature of the brain and the subsequent mind/body complex. Most training halls do not indicate the order of learning a particular technique or skill, but instead leave this up to the student. This is a mistake. The student should not be allowed to dictate his own learning path.
If a student is working on his punching and he, by his mental wiring, believes that speed is the key, he will put that long before learning to punch straight, or if he believes that power is the only real importance than speed will be an irrelevancy.
The old saying, “Practice Makes Perfect” is completely wrong and should read, “Practice makes Permanent.”
The proper order of learning
Accuracy
I believe, that accuracy should be absolutely first and that everything should be practiced as at such a slow speed that it could barely be distinguishable as technique. If a student had the ability to simulate slow motion in fluid single thought, and do so only on the idea of hitting an exact spot every single time, this would greatly increase the students accuracy. Training, should include long meditations on the techniques, done very slowly in the minds eye. All training should move as slow and fluid as possible, finding the exact locations of pressure, the exact points of strikes, the exact ‘mental’ state of the moment and more importantly the exact purpose of the technique, the struggle, and what the individual warrior ship means. There is a flood behind every strike.
Speed
Once accuracy has been improved then the inclusion of speed begins. It should start slowly, and progress, but not to full speed. The point of the process is to wire the brain to understand the timing involved in the situation, to develop a better spatial relationship, and to understand the dynamics of their own motor skills and reflex times.
Power
And once some understanding of speed is incorporated into the study, then power should be included. This means understanding the dynamics of the muscle and the body position, the nature of gravity, mass, etc.
I go back to the sword often, because although it is a dangerous weapon, it can be easily ruined in the hands of someone that takes no time to learn the necessary approach to wielding it. If for example, I handed the sword to some one that held it like a mallet at the fair, wanting to hit the bell with the striker, He would most likely bend the blade in the target or strike something other than the target because he hadn’t the faintest idea of controlling the tip of the blade let alone the angle of the cutting edge. If I handed it someone that played a lot of video games he would have incredibly quick reflexes but he may not understand the nature of ‘strength’ when powering the blade into a target that caused him to stick the blade and bend it. One action is not enough, focus on one idea is never enough. Martial arts, like all truly esoteric approaches to the universe are multiple, a kind of many headed deity, not unlike those found in India. True knowledge is not known by the the hammer that strikes the bell but by those ears, miles away that hear it fully.
Imagine (yep, sports reference) if you could slow the process of a pitch down, yet keep it’s correct arc from the pitcher to home plate, only just slow it down, so that you could swing the bat slowly, accurately, right down on to the ball, instead of having to practice at full speed every time. Luckily we martial artist can slow the pitch down by controlling every action of ourselves, and through visualization of the process.
There is an oddity in the nature of our physical learning versus that of our discovery of knowledge. Most of our schooling systems take very small steps at the onset to see how quickly the student can learn. In the case of math it starts with understanding the numbers, what they actually mean, and then building on that with basic addition, then subtraction, and so on. History, science, Language, are all built on piece by piece until a clear picture of the underlying principles are visible to the student, versus simply plying the brain with an overwhelming strata of data.
Physical learning tries sometimes to include this sort of approach. A newcomer to baseball is taught the locations on the field, the idea of catching, the nature of batting, etc. But the most important parts of the physical learning are scarcely acknowledged. For example, in baseball, one is taught to hold the bat, where to stand, and what to swing at, but the subtle nuisances of direction of the hands, angle of the bat, the location of the feet, and all that other stuff are simply glossed over. A very primitive ideal is usually in place by physical type teachers, that is: only some knowledge can be taught, the rest is inherit. They tend to believe that you either have it or you do not and there is no amount of training that will every help you hit the ball more often, further, or accurately. They believe it is natural talent.
There is a certain truth to this, but it is not complete nor is it a law of a nature, instead it is more like a loose rule. The truth is that we human beings are wired in a particular manner. Some of us can step up to the plate and swing the bat ‘naturally’ because we hardwired our brains to understand the subtle physics of the sport, while others, whom have not wired themselves that way, need some programming to come to the same place. And yes, we are responsible for the wiring itself, nature makes the paths, some easier and more plentiful, but the actual learning is related to sensory input from birth.
It is possible, with proper teaching to be just as good as any other person at any given talent, related to age and physical circumstances of course.
I propose that the problem is in the way things are taught. Since I am mostly writing about martial arts, I will try to keep my analogies on the dojo floor and off the baseball field.
I believe that in most training halls the order in which the student acquires his skills are out of step with the nature of the brain and the subsequent mind/body complex. Most training halls do not indicate the order of learning a particular technique or skill, but instead leave this up to the student. This is a mistake. The student should not be allowed to dictate his own learning path.
If a student is working on his punching and he, by his mental wiring, believes that speed is the key, he will put that long before learning to punch straight, or if he believes that power is the only real importance than speed will be an irrelevancy.
The old saying, “Practice Makes Perfect” is completely wrong and should read, “Practice makes Permanent.”
The proper order of learning
Accuracy
I believe, that accuracy should be absolutely first and that everything should be practiced as at such a slow speed that it could barely be distinguishable as technique. If a student had the ability to simulate slow motion in fluid single thought, and do so only on the idea of hitting an exact spot every single time, this would greatly increase the students accuracy. Training, should include long meditations on the techniques, done very slowly in the minds eye. All training should move as slow and fluid as possible, finding the exact locations of pressure, the exact points of strikes, the exact ‘mental’ state of the moment and more importantly the exact purpose of the technique, the struggle, and what the individual warrior ship means. There is a flood behind every strike.
Speed
Once accuracy has been improved then the inclusion of speed begins. It should start slowly, and progress, but not to full speed. The point of the process is to wire the brain to understand the timing involved in the situation, to develop a better spatial relationship, and to understand the dynamics of their own motor skills and reflex times.
Power
And once some understanding of speed is incorporated into the study, then power should be included. This means understanding the dynamics of the muscle and the body position, the nature of gravity, mass, etc.
I go back to the sword often, because although it is a dangerous weapon, it can be easily ruined in the hands of someone that takes no time to learn the necessary approach to wielding it. If for example, I handed the sword to some one that held it like a mallet at the fair, wanting to hit the bell with the striker, He would most likely bend the blade in the target or strike something other than the target because he hadn’t the faintest idea of controlling the tip of the blade let alone the angle of the cutting edge. If I handed it someone that played a lot of video games he would have incredibly quick reflexes but he may not understand the nature of ‘strength’ when powering the blade into a target that caused him to stick the blade and bend it. One action is not enough, focus on one idea is never enough. Martial arts, like all truly esoteric approaches to the universe are multiple, a kind of many headed deity, not unlike those found in India. True knowledge is not known by the the hammer that strikes the bell but by those ears, miles away that hear it fully.
Imagine (yep, sports reference) if you could slow the process of a pitch down, yet keep it’s correct arc from the pitcher to home plate, only just slow it down, so that you could swing the bat slowly, accurately, right down on to the ball, instead of having to practice at full speed every time. Luckily we martial artist can slow the pitch down by controlling every action of ourselves, and through visualization of the process.
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