Martial Arts

[Pete]

She's younger than me, but not disgracefully so

And the age gap is...?

[FullAuto]

Six years.

 

Will you be squeezing a belt when you grow old (or now when I think about it)?!!??!?!?!

 

Quite possibly!

 

There's a course in Germany in December, just a weekend really, which would be nice to go to, and unfortunately my wallet is looking a little slim. So of course, I turn to the internet, and the internet lets me down badly. Flights? £170 and upwards. I'm only going to Munich FFS!

 

I was reliably informed I could do it for about £110 if I take a coach to London and then the train from there. The internet tells me this is not so. A tad disappointed, really, as the Germans are kindly letting us sleep in the dojo (free), the course is cheap, the local aikidoka always put on a massive welcome that puts us Brits to shame, and it'll be excellent training.

 

But no.

[FullAuto]

Third finger, right hand, broken in three places. Two minor, one is going to take months to fill in (spot the biggest gap. Yes, that one).

 

Pretty bad time to get it, really. Have my first dan preparation session on the 27th of January. Not really critical or anything, but my style is shot to pieces, as I cannot grip properly with that hand, nor can I make a fist or strike, or block or parry with it.

[Sunflash]

Ouch.

[Space Voyager]

Ouch.

 

THIS. How did this happen? Typing too hard?

[Thorondor]

How did this happen? Typing too hard?

 

Think again.

 

https://enthralledintheway.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/brick-breaking-factoid.jpg

 

What else?

 

Have my first dan preparation session on the 27th of January. Not really critical or anything, but my style is shot to pieces, as I cannot grip properly with that hand, nor can I make a fist or strike, or block or parry with it.

 

Tough break there, FA. Quite literally.

 

Still, wth the right mindset, I believe you can adapt and overcome. You've had trouble before and you didn't let your condition keep you down.

 

It may sound nonsensical, but I think this too might make you a better fighter, if you adjust to minimise shortcomings.

 

For instance:

- you can still make perfectly good blocks with your wrist/forearm

- also, who said you should block. Evading a blow instead of blocking it is better, if you're skilled enough.

- you know you can't use your right hand to punch/strike, but that doesn't mean you can't make feints with it as if you were to, so diverting your opponent's attention, even if momentarily only to deliver what you did want to deliver elsewhere

 

::

 

Wishes of a solid recovery. Stand tall, FA!

[FullAuto]

Good old aikido, is how. Training with a black belt, and as he's around my size, we tend to be a bit more energetic with the techniques, knowing we both can take it. As a result, we've dinged each other up before, but never seriously, it's always been a bruise, or getting winded, we both have a laugh, and then we get on with it. This time I turned, threw him, and my finger got caught and twisted in his gi sleeve. I haven't told him, nor will I, as he's a nice chap and he'll feel bad (even though it was technically my fault), I just said I don't know how it happened.

 

Good points, thanks Thor.

[FullAuto]

"You need to take a week off." Y told me, as I knelt on the side of the mat, one side of my back hot and sparking with pain. "It is not about the quantity of training, it is about the quality. Your test is coming." He's a new black belt, been training for many years but in a different style. He has only recently joined us, and has been a valuable addition, eager to learn our way of doing things, happy to demonstrate his old style, and interested in synthesising the two.

 

Yesterday, I trained, my finger nearly healed, and as the session drew to a close, we were cycling through a simple attack/throw as a group. I attacked, and as I was thrown (gently, I might add) something in my back stretched and did not like it one bit. It let me know, and left me breathless. I waited the last five minutes out, furious, and afterwards struggled to get dressed (pulling my socks on was especially horrendous) and spent the car trip home in agony. It hurt so much I was breathing through pursed lips, careful not to breathe in or out too deeply. I thought it might be pleurisy or something at first, but quickly isolated it. My trapezius, right side, from below my shoulderblade up to the top of it, next to my spine. Sitting down hurt, laying down hurt, leaning hurt, walking hurt, moving my arms hurt. It was ridiculous.

 

Of course, this came out of the blue, right? No. On Monday, I had a back spasm in the same place, and ignored it. Took Tuesday off thanks to work, no class on Wednesday, Thursday class passed without a problem...now here I am, when I should be doing my second dan preparation course. We have another course, a three-day job, 29-31 March, and all the comments I've got from the black belts say the same thing. "Don't train. Rest. Heal. You need to be fit for the Easter course." It seems like they all know something I don't.

 

Lately I've seen a new crop of students come in, some stay, some leave. I've helped them train, sat and watched them grade with my fingers crossed. I've watched one of them go from a good student to a stroppy one, and one go from a know-it-all to someone who listens and learns. I've seen one try his luck and get shot down repeatedly by a certain black belt lady, and felt amusement (15 year age gap, next to no chance), horror (was I that stupid when I was 21), melancholy and outright despair. I've been training almost two years now, and had resigned myself (with mixed emotions, but mostly relief) to another year or two of training before getting my black belt. There's no rush. I want to be very sharp indeed when I do grade. Now it seems like the time is near at hand, and if I pass, it will be two years, almost to the day, from when I started training.

 

A black belt has some status in the West, it's supposedly the mark of an expert, whereas the traditional Eastern view of it is you are someone who knows the basics well enough to be called a beginner. I prefer the old way. I want to be good at aikido. I don't feel I'm there yet, and I don't feel I will be worthy of a black belt.

[Thorondor]

I see you're still finding out about muscles you scarcely knew you had, FA.

 

Well, this is assuredly not the best way for one to discover a usually discrete muscle has this much overall significance and in such a pointedly painful way.

 

From the very beginning it was apparent you've put your back, but especially your heart, into it. You wanted to improve, to make it count, and you have - not abstractly, but concretely - you felt the progress in skill, fulfilment and satisfaction in the very way your body achieved, better and better, what you asked of it.

 

There's a then and a there's a now. No two ways about it. You fought for it and you _are_ at a higher plateau.

 

There is a fine line somewhere that divides what we can do from what we will do. Having the drive to outdo ourselves is often what makes the difference bewtween accomplishment or failure at any given challenge.

 

There is also another important divide which pertains the difference between pushing yourself hard enough to go the distance, and pushing yourself too hard for your own good, effectively preventing yourself from making it.

 

This balance is real, and you're not always in the best position to gauge on what side of the line you are entirely by yourself.

 

You've spoken of the hindsight you've gained. What you can now perceive in the inexperience of those starting out, pitfalls, growth and errors in their ways, to the extent you see some reflection of your earlier self on the path to where you now are.

 

If others more experienced than you offer advice, it stands to reason you should likewise weigh them in.

 

You feel you have not yet met the limit of your abilities, and you don't want to stand down before you do. One can but respect that.

 

It is what leads me to believe you truly can, and will, go farther.

 

::

 

Tempering your immediate expectations in the right measure to enable you to ultimately do so is, in my view, the only real challenge you now stand to overcome.

[FullAuto]

Always a learning experience listening to you, Thorondor. Thank you.

 

One of the new students got angry with me recently. Discussing aikido in a post-session pub session, I pointed out that his recent successful grading had little to do with the quality of his technique. As he was graded by sensei, I pointed this out and he got angry. I explained that sensei is not interested in techniques, he's interested in aikido, and the look of confusion was priceless. When he asked me to explain, I could only help but wonder at having seen him smoothly reply when asked before about what aikido is, "Oh it's a way to reconcile energy etc etc." and this just confirmed what I had suspected. He was just giving answers by rote, parroting stuff he had read. I pointed out that aikido isn't about techniques, the techniques are just the first step in teaching you principles. "What principles?" He asked, and I felt an immense wave of anger and frustration.

 

Here's this new boy, been training six months or so, not really paying attention, just repeating what he's said, and not really being inquisitive about it, despite giving the impression that he's reading books on it and listening. He wants me to lay out what it's all about, which will do him no good, because you can't just memorise it and have it work. You integrate it by doing it, over and over, combined with discovering it. Instead he wants to be fed it by someone who put the work in. It's odd, too, because he's been to courses and seminars where the instructor has explicitly said "Aikido is not about techniques." Which makes me think he's just been turning up, going through the motions, and not listening or thinking at all. :-/

 

Compare this student, D, with Y, an established black belt from another style, who is constantly curious and inquisitive. It's bizarre. I remember when I started aikido, six months in I couldn't read enough, I soaked up info like a sponge. I knew aikido wasn't about technique, although I may not have had a clue what it was about, I paid attention, I listened to the instructors and fellow students, I read aikiweb voraciously, and so on. And I'm far from alone in that. Lots of other people do it, some of whom have been doing aikido for decades.

 

Looking at a week off, and not feeling too good about it, I wonder if I've placed too much importance in aikido and the people I train with. Perhaps i need time off to get a grip, get some distance, and just cool off a little.

[Space Voyager]

something in my back stretched and did not like it one bit.

Bah, this happened to me when I stretched my back in the morning. The point being that you are damn sturdy to need a good throw.

 

A black belt has some status in the West, it's supposedly the mark of an expert, whereas the traditional Eastern view of it is you are someone who knows the basics well enough to be called a beginner.

Oh? Didn't know that. And I have been training martial arts for next to a decade.

 

Which brings me to the guy you are describing.

 

He seems like a regular "I like to sweat it out, and martial arts are a good option" guy, much like I was. Not interested in deep philosophy, no mumbo jumbo. Just exercise.

 

I've seen many people delve deeply into the roots of martial arts, many of those finding much more than there ever was to be found. Finding one's way when you've seen none before is good, but retaining a healthy distance from anything that promises a true and correct way to look at life is even better. I'm not saying you shouldn't take the deep route yourself, just don't demand it from others.

[FullAuto]

Oh? Didn't know that. And I have been training martial arts for next to a decade.

 

Yup, see https://www.judoinfo.com/obi.htm and umpteen other links. From the link:

 

Earning a black belt is like graduating from high school or college. It indicates you have achieved a basic level of proficiency, learned the fundamental skills and can perform them in a functional manner, and you are now ready to pursue Judo on a more serious and advanced level as a professional or a person seeking an advanced degree would.

 

It doesn't mean you're an expert killing machine. I'm fairly sure this has come about from the black belt diaspora, as black belts travelled from Japan to teach outside of their country, they wore black belts, students eventually got black belts, etc. There's a massive difference between someone who has been doing it for decades for a living and is a 5th dan, and someone who has been doing it for a few years and has just got their 1st dan.

 

Which brings me to the guy you are describing.

 

He seems like a regular "I like to sweat it out, and martial arts are a good option" guy, much like I was. Not interested in deep philosophy, no mumbo jumbo. Just exercise.

 

I've seen many people delve deeply into the roots of martial arts, many of those finding much more than there ever was to be found. Finding one's way when you've seen none before is good, but retaining a healthy distance from anything that promises a true and correct way to look at life is even better. I'm not saying you shouldn't take the deep route yourself, just don't demand it from others.

 

I see what you mean. I think I've explained poorly here, sorry SV. I'm not really talking about the philosophical part of it, although aikido reckons the two are inextricably linked (I'm not so sure). I'm talking about the physical principles, the body mechanics, forces, physics etc that underlie the techniques, the reasons why they work. One of them, for instance, probably the most fundamental, is spiral movement. Sometimes it's done by the hands, sometimes by the feet, sometimes by the hips, but it's the one constant. Now, I could tell him "Spiral movement." and it would do him no good. Telling him won't enable him to put it into action. You have to train, and actually do the movements over and over, until they become ingrained. Then you realise, "Hey, these techniques are all the same kind of movement..." and once you're conscious of what you were doing unconsciously, you can start to experiment with it. Me telling him to do spiral movements won't unlock the physical experience he needs, it's not a power up.

[Space Voyager]

That is true, I agree. I misunderstood, sorry. Becoming better demands repetition, and LOTS of it. Either you do it and get better, or you'll be stuck in the same place indefinitely. This is exactly what I did. There still was advance but much slower than it could have been.

 

This black belt issue is interesting. Obviously it took a completely different meaning here. The knowledge demanded at our karate club was pretty high, people changed clubs as they would be given a black belt when they had a blue one in our club. The fastest advancement was in half a year, and nobody expected one to do it (it was certainly not impossible, but it demanded quite an investment in the training). The fastest possible rout to a black belt was therefore three years and a half, the reality was much slower.

 

Oh, and we needed to gain battle points, too. Training competitions (ring, referee, the whole deal) were introduced as our chief sensei realized that people were training for years and gained levels, but nobody had any real courage, befitting a calm mind of a martial artist. Got quite some sore ribs and two broken fingers from those, luckily my nose escaped destruction. What I wanted to say was that a competition and a danger of real pain and damage puts you in a position unknown before and you need overcome a lot of fears you never knew you had. I didn't like the fighting, though it was a path to advancement in all ways.

[FullAuto]

That is true, I agree. I misunderstood, sorry.

 

My fault, squire, I didn't explain clearly.

 

Becoming better demands repetition, and LOTS of it. Either you do it and get better, or you'll be stuck in the same place indefinitely. This is exactly what I did. There still was advance but much slower than it could have been.

 

It seems that however fast we advance, we all improve, then plateau, then dip a little, then improve, plateau, etc. This repeats over and over, and we do it all at our own individual pace. Someone who races through the lower kyus might plateau for a very long time, or someone who slowly grinds all the way up to brown might then race on to black. What was slowing you down?

 

This black belt issue is interesting. Obviously it took a completely different meaning here. The knowledge demanded at our karate club was pretty high, people changed clubs as they would be given a black belt when they had a blue one in our club. The fastest advancement was in half a year, and nobody expected one to do it (it was certainly not impossible, but it demanded quite an investment in the training). The fastest possible rout to a black belt was therefore three years and a half, the reality was much slower.

 

The average in aikido seems to be around four. I know one black belt who, through dedicated training and a good amount of natural talent, has done it in two. She's very good, though.

 

Oh, and we needed to gain battle points, too. Training competitions (ring, referee, the whole deal) were introduced as our chief sensei realized that people were training for years and gained levels, but nobody had any real courage, befitting a calm mind of a martial artist. Got quite some sore ribs and two broken fingers from those, luckily my nose escaped destruction. What I wanted to say was that a competition and a danger of real pain and damage puts you in a position unknown before and you need overcome a lot of fears you never knew you had. I didn't like the fighting, though it was a path to advancement in all ways.

 

Sounds like good hard training to me. Sadly, my nose was probably the first casualty in my MA training (I do have quite a big nose, though). I'm not sure anyone likes it, not really. I'm sure some pretend to, and some relish trying to deal out damage, but an actual fight tends to involve give and take. It's excellent for learning.

[FullAuto]

So, the three day Easter course is over, and I'm mostly intact. Finger hurts a little, back hurts a little, but I'm okay. Taking that time off was the right thing to do, though it still makes me sick to admit it. I wasn't asked to go for my black, which was a relief. Having two weeks off is not the kind of run up I want.

 

Because I'm lazy, I've only just sorted out making the Yokota course photos from last year public, so you should be able to see them here.

[FullAuto]

Broken toe! That is all.

[Zombie]

Ouch!

 

Get well soon?

 

- Zombie

[Space Voyager]

Ah crap, that hurts. And the doctors can do nothing about it.

 

Thread lightly, FA.

[Thorondor]

Broken toe! That is all.

 

 

*Karate kid comes to mind*

 

You're far from crippled, and I pity the fool who thinks otherwise.

 

Also, I must ask - who did you kill in the process?

 

::

 

You're not exactly in a lucky streak, though, huh?

 

Wishes of a speedy recovery, FA.

[FullAuto]

It's been stood on twice in two nights now, not a happy toe. Aside from that, it's fine, thanks chaps.

 

Had a coaching course at the weekend. 9 browns, and it was about as entertaining as it could be (not very). Some very dry material indeed, but it has meant I now understand just how much work goes in to instructing (tracking individual progress alone is a shitload of effort). We also covered legal stuff, getting sued, child protection etc. I'm glad to say, if we had any paedophiles thinking of becoming instructors they would be dissuaded by the sheer amount of hoops they would have to jump through. Makes me sick that it's necessary, but it is necessary. The teaching system also has multiple redundancies to prevent abuse taking place, so kids' classes are to start in June in our new full-time dojo.

 

Speaking of which, there will also be Wednesday and Friday classes, so I'm looking at going to those too. Hopefully, I can start notching up seven training sessions per week.

 

Reflecting upon the course, it was far too easy to pass, all you had to be was not totally incompetent, and that was it. The idea that you're now qualified to run a class after two days of theory and a single demonstration is pretty ridiculous, really. I don't think I'll ever be an instructor, I don't want to be saddled with that much responsibility (even ignoring things like getting sued by idiots who 'get injured' after one session and think it's okay to milk you for money), I'm not happy with the amount of factors that lie outside my control. Even with insurance and safety measures, it's just not for me. It's a shame, because I find helping others really rewarding, it often leads you to a new understanding anyway, but it is very satisfying on its own. I may do so when I have something new to teach, but if the people who taught me are still around, er, teaching, what use can I possibly be?

[Space Voyager]

From the little we know, it is obvious you already have a lot to pass to the youger generations. The approach and zeal for learning new techniques alone must be enough to make you an instructor for life...

 

Btw, is there a way to do it professionally?

[FullAuto]

Well, I mean that everyone who taught me, is still around, teaching. So I don't really have anything new to contribute. Okay, if you gave me a room full of beginners, I could teach them something, but it's nothing the other instructors couldn't do. If the people who taught me everything I know about aikido are still going, there doesn't seem to be a point in me doing it.

 

Doing it as a profession is possible, but you do need a pretty dense core of students to be able to afford it. At the moment, we have one doing it full time, our sensei. Everyone else runs, at most, three classes a week, with most only doing one. So it's a strictly part-time thing for the majority. It's no doubt easier in a city, where you have a higher population, and so a higher average attendance and your losses are replaced very quickly by new students. Thinking about the sort of numbers you get, I think it's fair to say 90% drop out quickly, within a couple of months. Of that remaining 10%, another 5% drop out within a year. That remaining 5%, it seems to me most carry on, sometimes with considerable breaks, but it is something they then do for years. So although you get regular 'swells' of interest, that interest is only short term, and the money they bring in cannot be counted on. You have to recruit like mad in order to get a core of students who don't just pack it in when they face a challenge.

[FullAuto]

Sooooo...as a result of me pulling a totally different aikidoka lady in record time, I'm going to be nuking this thread because it is 90% damning evidence.

 

Enjoy your memories, suckers.

[Space Voyager]

I'm not sure I understood this (hope so anyway), but I'm looking forward to the nuking!

[Thorondor]

 

That's it, FA - I'm pulling out of this thread.

 

Split.

 

Gone.

 

::

 

Right now, before risking any exposure to undoubtedly consciousness-altering materials in your payload.

 

*bunker seals*