Natural Aggression
Posted on | November 19, 2008
There is a wide controversy that continues still today as to whether aggression is a good feature for a Martial Art student to have. Some argue that aggression is bad because it allows it to get the better of you and so you start thinking with emotions, aka your mind gets “clouded”. Others argue back that aggression gets your blood pumping and allows those who are even normally docile to immediately jump in and start fighting back if a situation arises that calls for it. I can see both sides of the situation, but both of those sides have it wrong and both sides have it right. What they don’t seem to realize is that there are different types of aggression.
Marks over at MarksTraining wrote an article about aggression: Aggression in the Martial Arts. In his article he wrote:
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Take the following example. A new student starts training and after a couple of lessons of learning basic techniques, his told he will start sparring. Really nervous as its his first time, he does not really try any techniques he has practiced, instead just stands there taking many controlled punches as his sparring partner decides to go light on him. This carries on for the next few lessons, but his sparring partner strikes him harder and harder in a bid to make him counter. Knowing that the beginner has to start throwing punches back, his teacher shouts, “hit him, hit him”. After a few more lessons of the same punishment, the beginner decides that enough is enough. However many times he gets hit, he makes up his mind that he shall also start hitting back, hard. His aggression increases immensely and as the weeks go by, he learns that he has to also strike back himself in order to save taking any punishment.
You may have been in this predicament or know someone who has. Someone who goes from being non aggressive to be becoming someone who does not take any abuse from anyone and uses aggression to overcome others.
Obviously for self defense situations, he would probably find that he shall be able to take care of himself but in the long run has the aggression he has built through training and sparring done more worse than good. Is today’s martial arts training producing bad people instead of good ones which is what the old masters intended?
I think in the situation he was talking about, yes, the way the teacher taught has caused the student to learn aggression in the wrong way.
The teacher is basically wearing the student down until he “snaps” and starts fighting back. That kind of aggression is angry aggression. The student should actually be learning natural aggression, as I like to call it.
In angry aggression mode, the student is caught up with emotions and thus that will actually decrease his skills and technique and not allow him to learn properly. In natural aggression mode, the student learns to be naturally aggressive and play rough, but at the same time he attaches no emotion to that aggressiveness. The same way when brothers or friends play rough, especially in sports, but each other is not really trying to hurt the other person. They attach no emotion to their aggression.
Each student will learn natural aggression differently, but one of the big playing factors is to quickly get him hitting back so that he feels comfortable in doing so. If you wait till he simply gets upset and starts swinging, he’ll learn the wrong type of aggression. After awhile, it can be a hard type of habit to break in a student. Because I’ve learned natural aggression I can safely say I can aggressively spar with anyone without attaching emotion to that aggression.
Aggression also spans off to more intricate areas such as “how much” aggression. For instance, I believe there is such a thing as relaxed aggression, but I’ll leave that for another article.
Mixed Martial Arts – Days Six and Seven
Posted on | November 18, 2008
I’ve been pretty busy with work and some other personal things so I have had time to practice but not enough to post often. Anyways, here is a post that’s combined about last Tuesday(last Thursday was wet so we canceled), and Today(Tuesday).
Both weeks we worked on distancing and power. For distancing, we went with the focus pads. The focus pads are great for working on distancing with both the legs and the hands. There is that obvious sweet spot, for both the hands and the legs, right in between where you’ll be jammed because you’re too close or too far back and not able to apply enough power. We worked quite a lot on finding that spot, as well as going over routines that we can utilize at home to train our bodies in distancing even on the days we don’t have practice. For the legs, we do various kicks where we:
- Bring the knee up and hold for a second.
- Slowly extend our leg and perform the kick.
- Attempt to stop the kick right against whatever we are kicking at(punching bag, etc).
- Bring the knee back to it’s original position and hold for a second.
- Bring the leg back down to the ground.
This method allows us to be able to train our balance, strengthen our muscles, and enhance our distance judgment. The foot should always simply tap the object you’re kicking at, not rest against it. It highly helps your distancing ability because you can tell whether you’re too far back or not. Again, if you’re too close your leg will be too bent and you’ll be jammed or if you are too far back then if it was a real kick, there would be no power behind it. Make sure to work each leg, while switching up the type of kicks, so that you get the full experience.
To help us develop both our power and stamina, we worked on going all out against a heavy bag that another person can hold. The bag is quite big and sturdy so we don’t need to really hold back on it at all. We usually tend to do this after we’ve been going for quite some time so we are already warmed up, etc, considering our usual “class time” is roughly two hours. It’s a very simple concept though, we simply go all out for roughly 30 seconds or so, then it’s the next person. It goes back and forth from person to person(only usually two or three of us out there to rotate between), until eventually we’re so drained that standing is a task in itself. Even though this work out always kicks my ass, I love it because of how effective it is. Don’t mistake this for a misuse of energy, because this isn’t how we’d really fight. The exercise simply has one purpose, and that’s to raise one’s energy level cap. In a real fight, a lot less energy would be used and the idea would be to let the other person drain down their energy before you do, which doesn’t usually take long if they decided to try to go all out on you, as long as you can avoid the blows well enough.
Tags: distance > kick > martial art > Muay Thai > power > stamina > Training
The Limitation of Speed
Posted on | November 11, 2008
A vast majority of what people awe to when watching Martial Art movies is just how fast some of these guys can move. We can all agree that speed is definitely an attribute every Martial Artist has to have, but I believe too many people put too much emphasis on speed. Speed can literally be the downfall of some Martial Artists and the reason they never progress much further.
Bruce Lee was not only exceptionally fast, he was able to read his opponents movements on a whim, with very little effort.
“What’s wrong with speed?”, you might be asking. Well, speed has limitations. No matter how many years you practice, or how many hours you’ve spent on it, there is a limitation to exactly how fast you can get your body to move. Obviously, you can produce a speed so fast that it makes others awe in amazement because it’s purely much faster than the average speed, but either way it has a limitation.
People so often focus on speed and being able to throw a punch twice as fast as their opponent. Most people think that if they are way faster than their opponent then when the opponent throws a punch they can counter with their own punch and because they are faster, then their punch will hit first and they’ll win. In fact, they’re right, if you are that much faster than your opponent, you have a good chance of winning against other Martial Artists who think the same way. The problem is, to get to that speed requires too much effort, almost to the point that it becomes pointless. “What did he just say!? It’s pointless to spend so much time to become super fast and acquire The Flying Fists of Death!?”(Yes, that was made up 
) That’s exactly what I’m saying.
Rather than train to become faster than your opponent, spend that time learning how to read your opponent. If you can learn to read your opponent, you’ve already won the battle. There is no possibility of gaining a greater speed than to already know how, when, and where your opponent is going to make his next move. It’s quite simple to understand, yet very hard to get even decent at. Once you’ve been working(sparring, practicing, etc) with someone for long enough, you’ll eventually get better at predicting their movements if you practice reading them, but that’s quite easy to accomplish. The hard part is being able to read anyone, very quickly, because in a real life situation the opponent is not going to practice with you till you are able to read his movements. The skill will have to be able to be used on a whim.
No matter how fast my opponent can move, if I have the ability to read his movements, I’m already at a greater advantage. Don’t get me wrong though, if you have no speed whatsoever, then you’re going to be in big trouble even if you can read his movements. Just understand that speed has it’s limits. Speed is something that if you train hard all the time in sparring, shadow boxing, etc it will increase, even if at a slower pace than if you trained specifically for speed. Instead of spending all that time on speed though, use it to learn to read others. By the time you get to the point that you can read others decently, you’ll have already naturally gained speed from doing your other routines(again, sparring, shadow boxing, etc).
Every Day Martial Arts
Posted on | November 10, 2008
I stopped over to check out what was new at Ikigai a couple of days ago, like I normally do, when I stumbled across an article which is kind of about concealment of moves while out and about. Or maybe, rather, being “ready” and working on techniques while not at home or at a dojo of some sort. The article got me thinking, about how I already do that to a degree, but never really thought about it. I never really thought of it as something to tell someone to do as something to work on. I had always done it mostly out of boredom when walking somewhere, etc.
As I passed the ideas about inside my head, of what I normally do, I came up with some “routines” I already happen to do but also some more that I’d like to add to my daily practice. Here is a list of what I’ve already been doing, plus what I plan to do, combined into one list of 5 routines:
- Maintain eye focus while observing their body movements. The general concept is to never let your eyes leave them so that you can read them, while making sure to pay attention to all of their movements.
- Pay attention to their center line. I’ve recently posted an article about the center line theory and how important it can be. Try to keep tract of when their center line is open for attack, and closed for defense, which would require you to create an opening.
- Pay attention to their joints. Joints are a key factor in every Martial Art. If I happen to get the chance to throw a heavy blow with the heel of my foot to the inside joint of your knee, you’ll at least have trouble walking for a while.
- Pay attention to their intention. You always think that they have no clue about what you’re really doing, but what if they were thinking the same thing? Try to read others around you to simply understand them better, and figure out what’s really beneath the skin, so to speak.
- Pay attention to your surroundings. This is the final task that can become a bit difficult in busy areas. While you’re focusing on all the other goals and tasks, still make sure to be aware of your surroundings. Try to learn to handle listening to not only your own conversation, but maybe 2 or 3 at once. Make sure you’re able to “sense” where others are around you.
Eventually, all of these tasks will become routine in that you’ll do it everyday without thinking too much about it. In fact, a lot of times it makes me laugh. Why? Because I think it’d be funny to see the expressions of others if they knew exactly what I was thinking and planning in my mind as they spoke to me. Hide your intentions and you’ll be another step ahead of the game.
The Center Line Theory
Posted on | November 3, 2008
I’ve been busy for quite some time, so I haven’t had a chance to post lately, but I want to talk about what I’ve been working on while away. I want to talk about something everyone has: a center line.
Wing Chun highly focuses on the center line theory, and benefits greatly from it. The center line theory is fairly easy to understand, but can be quite troublesome to get the hang of. The idea is that there is a line that runs straight down everyone, from head to toe. That, in essence, is your center line. Everything should revolve around your center line while the opponents center line should be offset or disrupted.
For instance, your center line should always be facing the opponent, and as you move around your opponent, your center line should stay straight and aimed towards the enemy. Your punches should also extend from the center line. This can be hard to understand unless the concept is properly shown, but the reason behind it is quite simple: The shortest distance between any two points is a straight line.
The opponents center line should also be your target, in two ways.
- You should be attempting to disrupt their center line but maintain the integrity of yours. By this, I mean you basically want to off balance them or get to them at an angle. If your center line is facing them, but theirs is facing in a different direction, you’ve already gained the advantage and should make use of it.
- Aim for the center line with your attacks. Hitting your opponents center line will maximize the damage you do to him. Think of it this way: If you hit your opponent in the shoulder, his shoulder will simply give and his body will pivot, which will in effect lessen the damage he takes. But, if you instead hit him directly in his center line, your opponent is forced to take close to all(if not ALL) of your force directly as damage rather than being able to deflect it.
I just thought I’d share a little bit of information about the center line, which is used in many Martial Arts, but more highly focused in Martial Arts like Wing Chun. I’ve been practicing on keeping my center line and controlling or distorting my opponents center line. For the end of this article, I’ll leave you with my own personal example. A friend of mine was over at my place on the weekend and we were free light hand sparring with no pads. At one point, we had stopped and were analyzing a position in which our hands were grappled together and we both brought our knee’s up, but because of the angle of my knee to his, I had the advantage because I maintained my center line but just barely off centered his. His argument was that if it was done in a fast motion, and we both put strength behind everything, that one of two things would either happen.
- Our strength would cancel each other out and we would both remain standing
- Our strength would be close and so if I was able to get him to fall, we’d both fall.
Since he insisted so much that the center line wouldn’t matter and wouldn’t offset his balance enough, I decided to prove it to him. I told him to do the same exact thing we had just done, but only use strength and keep himself up or take me down with him if he had to. And sure enough, he hit the floor hard and I was left standing with full balance, simply laughing. To make sure he fully understood why what I did worked, I had him repeat the same thing on me, with the situation being the other way and what do you know, it worked on me as well.
Just mess around with the center line theory and see what works for you.
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