THE BUILDING BLOCKS...USING THEM THE RIGHT WAY

                                                           by Phillip Starr

     I recently had a discussion with one of my senior students about why the vast majority of karate and gong-fu styles don't do their forms and fight in the same way at all, and how correct, traditional training builds a “bridge” between those two aspects of martial arts.  These are two different subjects (although they're closely related), so let me discuss them separately.

Westerners (Americans, in particular) tend to:

• Reject anything that causes discomfort.

• Be hobbyists.

  

Now, there's nothing wrong with not liking discomfort. BUT some things in life do just that…they cause some measure of discomfort. And to wholly reject them out of hand so that we can always be cozy and comfy comes at a rather high price. For instance, our ancestors (not very long ago) had to make their own bread. “Too much work”, we thought...so now we have factory-made bread-which tastes nothing like the original at all, nor is it particularly nourishing.

Your grandparents (and my parents) endured the deprivations of the Great Depression, WWII, and other really tough times. There was plenty of discomfort and inconvenience to go around for everyone. They decided that their children would never have to suffer such hardships and the result was that we were brought up always being very comfy and cozy (most of us, anyway). And lazy. So, now we suffer the health (both physical and mental) consequences. We love “instant” things (like microwavable dinners and instant tea) as well as whatever is “new and improved”, which is rarely the truth.

Learning traditional martial arts is something that is often VERY uncomfortable, even painful! So, many instructors changed the way they teach and now advertise classes that are “Fun for the whole family!” Our martial arts forefathers certainly didn't go to training to have fun, nor did they expect it. Even today in Japan, you dare not let your instructor hear you say that you “had fun” in class! Believe me, you won't make that mistake twice...

And we love our hobbies. Certainly, there's nothing wrong with having hobbies, but when you come to regard your martial arts practice as a hobby and train in that way, it's a problem. Again, our martial arts ancestors definitely didn't think of training as a hobby! They didn't practice just once or twice a week; they practiced every day!

Then there’s the training problem…most teachers don’t understand or utilize routines like 3-step fight (if they use it at all) or 1-step fight. NEITHER OF THESE EXERCISES WERE/ARE MEANT TO TEACH YOU HOW TO FIGHT! Rather, they are designed to teach and sharpen certain things that will be of great help when you get to the actual fighting training.

3-Step Fight is rarely taught anymore in the West. The instructors think it’s too boring and fear that students will quit. Actually, it’s much, much more than that. First and foremost, it teaches you about DISTANCE (much more so than 1-step). Beyond that, it also teaches the fundamentals of proper TIMING and RHYTHM. Just how this was done is largely forgotten but it I clearly shown in my book, MARTIAL MANEUVERS.

1-Step Fight is intended to teach you how to properly apply the various techniques of your art. But if you have no understanding of what is taught in 3-Step, it’s really pointless. Too many schools nowadays skip 3-Step altogether, allow the students to practice 1-Step for a short time, and then jump right into sparring! This is one of the main reasons why martial arts in the West have deteriorated. Students start sparring within the first couple of months of training! I don’t allow it for at least a full year after they begin training; oftentimes, it’s longer than that.

After 3 and 1-Step have been thoroughly practiced, students are introduced to Freestyle develops fighting skill. 1-Step, which is the bridge between form and actual fighting. THIS is the practice exercise that develops fighting skill. I have posted several articles on this subject previously. Sadly, this marvelous training exercise is being tossed aside nowadays; students want to hurry up and practice Freestyle Sparring. In the past, most schools didn’t engage in Freestyle Sparring at all. They felt it was unnecessary for the development of genuine fighting skill and could lead to the development of bad habits and sloppiness. Freestyle Sparring didn’t exist until after WWII – the great masters of the past who we admire and who possessed extraordinary fighting ability NEVER SPARRED AT ALL! Huh. Go figure…

THE TRUTH OF THE ART OF WAR

 by Phillip Starr

Sun-Tzu was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher, and writer who lived during the Eastern Zhou period, 771 to 256 BCE. He is credited with authoring the book, “The Art fo War”; a military class that is now utilized by military forces around the world (it is even studied at academies in the U.S., such as West Point and Annapolis), and even Wall Street!

An important saying from this book is often quoted by martial arts teachers everywhere; “Ig you know yourself and your enemy, you will be victorious.” However, this is not the full saying; two crucial lines have been forgotten. The full precept tell us:

“If you know neither yourself nor your enemy, defeat is inevitable.

If you know only yourself or your enemy, the odds are even.

If you know both yourself and your enemy, you will emerge victorious.”

So what does “knowing the enemy” and “knowing yourself” really mean?

Knowing your enemy means a bit more than simple knowing who he is. It means knowing him in so far as combat is concerned:

• What is his objective; what is he fighting for?

• What is his disposition? That is, is he physically, mentally, and spiritually prepared and strong enough to engage you in combat? How determined is he?

• How far is he willing to go to ensure his victory? What sacrifices will he make? Is he willing to give up his life? What price is he willing to pay?

• What particularly vulnerable spots can you see in his posture?

• What tactics is known to use? Does he use them effectively? Are there any flaws in them?

• How well-seasoned is he? Has he done this before? If he was victorious, how did he achieve it? Did he exhibit any weaknesses/flaws?

• What are his strongest areas of expertise?

• What weapons does he possess? Which ones does he rely on the most? Are they adequate?

• How powerful are these weapons?

• How far can these weapons reach out and strike you? What is their range?

• What are his biggest weaknesses? Not just physical things, but also mental and spiritual.

  

And you must thoroughly know these same things about yourself. You mustn't What price will he willingly pay? Don't simply shrug and say, “Yeah, I've got it”; you must take time and study each of these items as they apply to you in depth!

Only when you know both yourself (very thoroughly) and your enemy can you hope to emerge victorious.

ARE YOU PREPARED?

 By Phillip Starr

For those who believe that the way they’re practicing gong-fu, karate, or taekwondo is providing them with real-life self-defense skills, I have a surprise.

You may be, and likely are, very wrong.

Actual self-defense may well be very different from what you imagine, and hence, train for. The first major consideration is DISTANCE. Almost all real self-defense situations occur at very close range; there’s no time (or adequate distance) to set up in a nice-looking fighting stance. Stand facing your training partner and stretch out your arm so that you can touch him. THAT distance (and often closer than that) is the distance where real self-defense happens. The attack comes out of nowhere…it’s very often preceded by a push or a grab, and then BANG! You’re hit. No time to back away or perform any fancy movements. So if you favor using really nifty-looking kicks, you’re in a very bad place. My friend, Master Seiyu Oyata (10^th dan Okinwan karate, dec.), demonstrated…walking up to his partner and stopping about 4 ft. away, he smiled and said, “This (distance) for sport, for fun”… Then walking up quite close to his partner, he said, “This self-defense!”

So your self-defense techniques should be practiced at this distance…from a natural standing position. You will quickly discover that freestyle sparring is NOT essential for developing genuine self-defense skills. It helps develop some things that are useful in self-defense such as timing, rhythm, and so on – but overall, it is of little use in real combat. Remember that our current version of sparring evolved from the culture of Japan, where many people once carried and fought with swords. There’s a considerable difference in “fighting distance” when you and your enemy are armed with 3 foot razor blades…

And when the attack comes, it comes in multiples. Nobody is going to throw a single punch and then stand there, looking into your beautiful eyes. The same is true of grabs. Punches are thrown in flurries (unless you break in and stop them). The head and face are the preferred targets.

There’s no need to try to land a decisive blow right away. You need to stop the attack long enough to give you the opportunity to do that. A solid slap to the tip of the nose (keeping the fingers loose so they can flop down towards the eyes) works very well. Not only is it very painful, but it causes the sinuses to go all off-kilter; the enemy’s eyes tear up instantly and he can’t see clearly…there’s pain and blood and confusion. And lots of time for you to deliver a deliberate, powerful strike…and it better be strong! And remember there are no rounds, no rules at all, no referees, and NO ONE is coming to help you.

Now, I’m not saying that things like 1-step, 3-step, and freestyle sparring are worthless. Far from it! But bear in mind that these are training EXERCISES. They foster the development of things you’ll need for real self-defense; a fine sense of distance, timing, rhythm, how to apply various techniques, and so on.

To become skilled at real self-defense, you have to train for it! And the single biggest consideration that practitioners forget about is DISTANCE. Nobody is going to stand 4-6 feet away from and move in to attack; real attacks begin at arm’s length OR LESS. Now train for it!

APPLICATIONS?

 by Phillip Starr

Okay...you've learned the application(s) of a particular movement in your form. So, what do you do now? Is that it? Is it over? I recall a instructor of Goju-ryu karate many years ago; I had shown him the application of a movement in his kata that had evaded him for years. He was appreciative and excited and later demonstrated it to his students...and that was the end of it. To the best of my knowledge, he and his students never practiced it again. They conducted class in my gong-fu school and I watched them to see what they did with applications of their kata.

And what they did is what I fear most people do; they excitedly practiced them, but only for a few minutes and then it was all over. This is not how it is to be done. The applications are there for a reason – so that you can learn and be able to apply these gems in actual self-defense. And unless they are practiced repeatedly, that's not going to happen.

Once you discover an application that you like, you need to practice it frequently, over and over...and you must envision its application whenever you perform the form in which it appears. Otherwise, you'll never be able to utilize it for its intended purpose.

WHAT MAKES IT WORK

 by Phillip Starr

It occurs to me that a great many, perhaps most, martial arts practitioners (including virtually all forms of pugilism and weaponry, from boxing to fencing) focus most, if not all, of their attention and practice on developments of technique rather than focusing on what actually makes them work. Naturally, beginning students must do this, but if you watch more advanced pupils, you'll see them obsessing over various minutae of various techniques to the exclusion of almost everything else.

Now, there's certainly nothing wrong with training to polish and perfect technique. BUT...of even greater importance is the development of what makes them actually work. I remember my teacher handing me a very sharp broadsword while he picked up a wooden replica. “If we were to actually fight with these weapons, which one of us would win?”, he asked.

That was clearly a no-brainer, even for a young teenager. “You would, sifu”, I replied.

We're not really gonna do this, are we?

“Yes”, he answered. “Why is that?”

Another no-brainer. “Because you know how to use this weapons much better than I do.”

Heck, he could have beaten me with a twig or even just a single chopstick. As time went on, I came to realize that his superiority wasn't because of his”weapon”...it was because he knew how to win WITH or WITHOUT a weapon. The condition of a given weapon (whether it was a chopstick, a sharp or dull broadsword, or whatever) didn't matter. He knew how to win...how to defeat me with a sword, stick, fist, or foot.

He'd mastered what I call the “Three Jewels of Combat”...Distance, Timing, and Rhythm. I've written extensively on these subjects and they're discussed in detail in my book, MARTIAL MANEUVERS.” So I'm not going to repeat myself yet again here. You'll have to go back and read the material on your own, AND THEN PRACTICE to refine and perfect them. For the rest of your life.

Currently, there's an interesting new combative sport called “light saber fencing” and it has attracted a very large following. There are numerous videos of competitions wherein players fight with what amount to expensive plastic swords, which can be used with one or both hands. For the most part, the players are not practitioners of any particular martial art; they're civilians” as it were, while some are actual fencers, kendoists, and so on. And it looks like it.

If you watch children playing at sword-fighting, you'll quickly notice a distinct lack of any real technique, and the two combatants are focused on “fighting the opponent's sword” rather than him. Of course, it's just children playing, but most adults who engage in this new sport are doing the same thing.

In swordsmanship, many people regard the Japanese katana as the best sword ever used for combat. Others disagree and point to Chinese or European sword, touting their reasons for their belief. And most of the time, they're wrong. It isn't about the quality of the sword that makes the difference, nor is the answer to be found in the technique(s) of a given weapon. The secret lies in the mastery of the Three Jewels.

The reason Japanese swordsmanship is so effective is because of their ceaseless training with the Three Jewels. Modern kendo bears scant resemblance to the kendo that was practiced into the 1950's; there is much less emphasis on the Three Jewels, and more emphasis on technique for scoring points and winning a match. In the old days (wherein kendo allowed for numerous grappling techniques), the focus was on how one would actually engage an opponent in a life or death struggle. The Three Jewels were empjasized very heavily.

In contemporary gong-fu/wushu, emphasis is on technique and “posturing” (posing and looking very beautiful). The truth is that even the best of such competitors would enjoy very short life-spans in actual combat, even with one whose technique wasn't nearly as pretty. When two swordsmen of days long past met to do battle, they faced their enemy in a relaxed but mentally and spiritually intense condition. There was nno unnecessary movement, no charging in with swords flailing...they remained still, focused entirely on the enemy and “feeling” his mind and spirit, looking for even a slight flaw (an opening). If one's spirit lagged or focus became distracted for even a second, the fight would be over.

This same approach is to be applied to hand-to-hand fighting. Without it, technique is pointless.

WHAT IS A MASTER?

 By Phillip Starr

Nowdays, I often hear many martial arts teachers referred to as “Master” so-and-so. That includes me.

In some cases, the title is bestowed upon someone who, having reached a grade of black belt, has continued to practice and/or teach for a good many years. I know several people who are/were just 2^nd grade black belts (for which they underwent rigorous examinations) who continued to practice or teach for another 20-plus years and they're now referred to as “Masters” or even “Grandmasters.”

Within some styles or organizations, once one has ahieved a certain grade of senior black belt (such as 5^th dan), one is labeled as a “Master.”

But what is a “Master?” To be honest, I don't know. In Chinese, it is called Dashih (大师), which translates as “Big/Great Teacher.” owever, such a term is never (in China) applied to a martial arts practitioner. In Japan, no one is ever referred to as a “Master” by native practitioners. Even some of karate's best-known, legendary kaarte practitioners/teachers were called, simply, “Sensei” (referring to them simply as a teacher), In Asia, honorific titles such as Master, Grandmaster, Supreme Grandmaster, ad nauseum, simply don't exist. A very few are known as “O-Sensei” (Great or Big Teacher).

The various flavors of upper-level practitioners (Master, Grandmaster, Great Gransmaster, Supreme Grandmaster Poobah) all originated in thr West.

So, what is a Master? I always regarded it as someone who has achieved supreme skill in his craft, who has attained a complete understanding of it, and who has pretty much learned all there is to learn about it. So that definition definitely eliminates me as a member of that obscure title; I'm still a a student, still learning, still seeking answers and knowledge. Always have been, always will be.

UNSPEAKABLE

 by Yang Shuangxing

My most senior student, Hiro Misawa, and I often discuss certain principles of the (internal) martial arts and we frequently come to the same conclusions.Many of the principles we discuss are not generally known or practiced by the martial arts community. Why this is true is due to several things:

• Many of the past masters of traditional martial arts were not well-educated people. In fact, some of them were barely literate. They couldn't explain why a certain principle worked; they knew that it just did. So, many of their students (who would become instructors themselves) had the same problem...they couldn't explain the “why” of something and some of them never really learned the principles in the first place (because their teacher didn't explain it fully).

• Almost all learning, from school classrooms to group training in a martial art, was done by rote (learning by watching and following along, over and over). In China today, it is still the same. Obviously, this is not an effective way to learn or teach. But it has been done for so long (since the time of Confucius) that it is pretty much carved in stone.

• The masters of the past knew very little, if anything at all, about physics. Or anatomy. So they couldn't explain what muscles and tissues were involved in a given movement, or why. Students were expected to try to “get the feel” of certain movements without knowing how the (internal) tissues were involved.

  

Many of them wrote down what they understood about various principles; some were put into the form of “songs”, but they're often mistranslated and subsequently misunderstood today.

• Then...instructors of various martial disciplines moved westward – to Europe and the U.S. And the problems were compounded; these hearty souls were trying to teach arts that were peculiar to their Asian cultures in a second language...English!

Not only that, but numerous concepts that were/are readily accepted in Asian cultures have no accurate English equivalent! To compound the problem, even instructors who spoke very good English (like mine) didn't have the verbal skills to accurately communicate certain principles and the “why” and “how” of them. This was and is usually because anatomical structures and how they work isn't usually a part of most English classes...

Another problem is that most of these principles have to be directly experienced before they can really be understood. They can't be taught on paper or even via videos. They require a “hands-on” approach taught by someone who can perform them skilfully (and there aren't many who can do that). Only by doing them correctly can one fully understand them. This would seem to be impossible, but it isn't. As my friend, the renowned master Hino Akira said with a big smile, “You cannot do it right until you do it right.”