Review of Kata Tenzen
in relation to previous blog. Things of
note: Tenzen was created for complete novices. It contains responses to all the common
assaults. It provides a continuum of
response from peaceful to very reactive.
Level 1: Peaceful Response; Level 2: Peaceful receptor with finishing
counters; Level 3: The ‘finish in one move’ (one punch kill) principle, but
with the full understanding that such a finish may not be possible and so having
the mindset to continue the defence through to a finish or opportunity to break-away
and escape.
Identified usefulness for a Level 4: Attackers executes
a very natural realistic attack in accord with what the kata expects but continues as if a real situation aiming for a
finish. Start by slowing the process for
safety reasons and turn the heat up as ability is gained. A further stage (and this applies to all kata) is to transcend the bounds placed
upon our defensive responses by the kata and do what is totally spontaneous and
natural. The thinking being that as our
experience comes initially from the kata,
we are programming ourselves to respond in a certain way. Any ‘natural’ response will, for the most
part, be identifiable with an aspect of the kata
learned and assimilated to date. This is
what we call ‘worm-holing’, knowing the kata
and their lessons intimately and being able to utilise any aspect from any kata, anyhow in the moment spontaneously
and without conscious analytical thought.
The old formal training of past years still constitutes
a millstone around our necks; it is that, or a reluctance to commit to an
attack for whatever reason. It is all
too easy to fall into the trap of feeding the defender with a staged and
unrealistic attack, allowing the defender to get away with not having to work
hard at his or her defence. Mistakes
like punching wide in anticipation of being ‘blocked’ to the side, stopping the
punch short or too great a distance to be realistic are still common mistakes. These things may be acceptable with beginners
initially but long term members should not be doing these things at all. Of course we are cursed with the health and
safety component these days, and the joy of giving someone a good sound smack
because they were slow to defend are largely gone. There is a fine line between the what I regard
as the good practice of getting as near to reality as is possible safely on the
one hand, and erring far too much the other way on the other. A lot of the problems come from the ‘traditional’
formal dojo practise of the
past. The facing each other formally,
bowing, taking up a long range kamae,
executing a formal punch, stopping short at too great a range, leaving the
punching arm in place for the defender to ‘block’ when he has finished his
sandwich… I totally accept that we are
engendering a certain ethical mindset through our training. Propriety and decorum have their important
places in our art but everything exists on a continuum and if there is decorum
there is also its opposite. A violent
assault ain’t decorous. Let’s get as
real as we can, accepting the different levels of competence and rules of
common sense and safety.
We also took a look a armed assault again for the
umpteenth time in the years that I have been training. I came to a conclusion a long, long time ago
that when faced with an assailant holding a bladed weapon (if you are ever
lucky enough to know before the event), get the heck out of there. There is a saying well worth remembering “Absence
of body beats presence of mind” and you had better believe it. I don’t care how clever you are, how many dan grades you have, how long you have
trained, a blade can mean permanent disablement or even death, and you only have to
make one mistake. The importance of not
being there cannot be over emphasised. OK
accepted, if I am trapped by an armed assailant I am sure not going to
capitulate to the seeming inevitable, there is much that can be done on both
psychological and physical levels, but I wouldn’t expect to walk away uninjured. First and foremost always comes break-away,
retreat. I have surprised more than a
few people during my life with the speed and enthusiasm with which I can run
over a short distance either away from someone or after them… i will also make the point that whatever I say, there are situational conditions to take into account, no one can predict what one will do before the event, it is too dependent upon too many things.
No comments:
Post a Comment