Is a cigar just a cigar?

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MikeK
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Re: maybe it isn't a cigar at all?

Post by MikeK »

JimHawkins wrote:
MikeK wrote: I think this is a problem with karate. We are corrected and in turn correct movements until they are "right" but it's in the abstract.
Mike,

You had told me after I shared some videos with you, that you thought what I do is also abstract... Yet to me the tools and mechanics are consistent.. To my knowledge we don't have any 'metaphor forms'..

Because I'm lazy I'm going to use a definition from Wikipedia...
An abstract object is an object which does not exist at any particular time or place, but rather exists as a type of thing (as an idea, or abstraction).


What I was referring to as abstract was the tendency of many in karate to perform movements without any connection to application, even when an application exists. We are perfecting the movement (abstract object) and not the actual technique (concrete object). It's even worse when people totally ignore that a concrete technique exists. (Something I don't believe Bill is doing, though I don't buy into how far he sees patterns).

Now to me, not being a WC guy, many movements in a WC form would seem abstract as I don't know the applications, drills and intent. Once I see the application though the forms didn't really seem as abstract as when I first wrote that.
I was dreaming of the past...
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JimHawkins
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Post by JimHawkins »

Okay well then it sounds abstract..

The forms for us are really just a catalog of the moves and tools... In no particular order.. Normally for no particular application.. It's simply a tool, shape, concept and motion reference book...
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: maybe it isn't a cigar at all?

Post by Bill Glasheen »

JimHawkins wrote:
I don't want to get into your interpretation.. It has nothing to do with my point...
I couldn't have said it better myself, Jim.
JimHawkins wrote:
If I want to ask Mike to clarify his position as stated then that's my business..
If you bring Mike up when trying to make a point to me, then you've made it my business. Was that appropriate?
JimHawkins wrote:
I am confident my point is clear...
Yep!

But in doing so, have you hijacked the thread? Who started the thread, Jim? If this is all about you making a point, should you have started a thread based on that point?

- Bill
MikeK
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Re: maybe it isn't a cigar at all?

Post by MikeK »

Bill Glasheen wrote:Bill simply stated a basic movement in Sanchin, and two specific manifestations of that movement in Seisan. Do you do practice the forms in question, Jim? If not, would it be that hard for you to investigate the specific sequences I stated? And if neither of the above are true, what is the basis of your persistent parsing with commentary in this thread?

After all these posts, you won't bother to comment on the specific examples I gave you. You're rejecting a hypothesis before considering any evidence. Worse yet, you're asking others to do your work for you.
Remember your audience Bill, which are various levels of Uechi folks and non-Uechi folks. You're on the internet writing to the unwashed masses, not a bunch of doctors from UVA who are advanced Uechi practitioners. :lol: 8)

Keep it as simple and non-technical as possible so the reader doesn't have to run to a medical, physics or music theory book to understand what you're trying to get across.

Show plenty of examples of what you're talking about. Not all of us have done or explored the Uechi Seisan, and that includes some Uechi kyu folks.

And like Vickie said, focus. Don't get side tracked with too many complicated analogies and metaphors. 8)
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: maybe it isn't a cigar at all?

Post by Bill Glasheen »

MikeK wrote:
And like Vickie said, focus. Don't get side tracked with too many complicated analogies and metaphors. 8)
Please see my post at the end of the second page. I spent quite a bit of time on it. It shows why I approached the subject the way I did.

- Bill
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

MikeK wrote:
I think this is a problem with karate. We are corrected and in turn correct movements until they are "right" but it's in the abstract.
I hear you.

Uechi Ryu karate has a "circular" approach to teaching principles and concepts. Sanchin is supposed to contain lowest common denominator principles and elements that are manifested in more specific sequences in Seisan and Sanseiryu. After passing through to the third and final kata, the practitioner is supposed to tie things together by going back to the simplest elements in Sanchin.

During the development, a student may be exposed to applications or ways of doing things. For instance in one camp I worked with George Shreiffer from Florida and the legendary Shinyu Gushi on weapon forms and Uechi kata. In that camp I picked up on some core body movement that I had also seen done in the Nakamatsu line of students. With George I could see specific movements in the eiku, and with a shoken scooping motion. With Dana I could see Nakamatsu's attempt to teach very basic core movement principles. To assimilate it and make it my own, I had to start at the abstract in Sanchin and get it down. Then I worked my way up through the Uechi kata sequence where I applied the simple elements in more complex combinations to create more elaborate movements with myriad specific applications.

It's the way this system works. I find the teaching method to be very valuable - particularly when all I need to do is point a student to one of a handful of principles of movement that they've violated. If I show the what (the principle) and the why (how it manifests itself in an application), then the student can go off on his/her own and fix things.

When the student approaches a new move and "gets it" because their basics are down, then I've succeeded in teaching them to teach themselves. That's the ultimate goal.

- Bill
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JimHawkins
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Re: maybe it isn't a cigar at all?

Post by JimHawkins »

Bill Glasheen wrote: If you bring Mike up when trying to make a point to me, then you've made it my business. Was that appropriate?
Right I should never bring Mike up... That's off limits.. :lol:
Bill Glasheen wrote: But in doing so, have you hijacked the thread? Who started the thread, Jim? If this is all about you making a point, should you have started a thread based on that point?
Well for the last two pages it seemed my point had something to do with your point.. However not being certain what your point is it's difficult to know for sure...

If cigar means a particular shape and mechanic in a form then my point does seem to be relevant..
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

Many years ago I had the opportunity to work with the legendary John Gamble - the strength coach at UVa. He was at one time the world heavyweight powerlifting champion.

John was adamant about not getting "cute" in the weight room. At the time people were swinging weighted bats, running with weights on the ankles, etc. with the idea that sport specific strength training exercises were the way to go. John felt very differently. While he did take the time to get books from me and see what I was doing, his "customized" weight training program for myself and my classes didn't look like punches, kicks, or choke holds with weights attached. They were the basics: bench, squat, power cleans, etc. with barbells and dumbbells. They employed complex methods such as periodization. But when doing a dumbbell press, you didn't worry too much about whether or not you were doing a punch.

Even when doing jar training in Uechi Ryu, you don't worry about anything more than picking up weighted jars with your boshiken hands and walking in Sanchin. It's simple. No applications need apply.

The application work comes later.

- Bill
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

Vicki

The pictures got your attention, didn't they? No wonder Madison Avenue employs the methods.

Of course there's the issue of whether or not they're ever able to sell a product...
chef wrote:
I apologize for having offended and made wrong assumptions, once again.

Am stepping away from the forum for a while.
No need to apologize.

Actually you've been one of many students who has seen my tear-it-down, build-it-back-up teaching approach to complex moves and applications. God knows I have enough problems trying to figure out if I'm doing things "right" myself without some method. Conveying that information to someone new and having them "get" it makes sound process even more important. And now that you are more and more becoming a teacher...

Picture "H" doing Seisan kata, or practicing applications in Seisan bunkai. You watch him go through from beginning to end, having difficulty at many points. Well if twelve mistakes are made but you can point to just 2 principles that caused those twelve mistakes, how powerful is that process? In the beginning you need to micromanage their learning and show them the connections. But eventually it takes just a handful of words to communicate a truckload of problems.

Sometimes students don't want that concept/principles approach. "Just tell me what I'm doing wrong!" I deal with that sometimes at work with programmers who want me just to tell them what to do rather than first explain the problem. And then farther down the road they make assumptions, and they goof. They goof because they don't understand the problem, or why we are approaching something a certain way. But a little more work on the front end can save lots of work on the back end.

If you start your teaching/learning right, you teach the student to teach themselves. Some teachers don't want that; they create dependencies. There is the illusion of getting a lot of "stuff" at first when they get lots and lots of applications to go play with. But a process which starts slower at first can sometimes lead to greater efficiencies and fewer dependencies down the road.
Give a Man a Fish, Feed Him For a Day. Teach a Man to Fish, Feed Him For a Lifetime.
- Lau Tzu

More importantly with martial arts... You can NEVER perfectly create "the problem" in the cooperative setting of a dojo or training field. Chaos (nonlinear math) teaches us that much of life consists of unique situations that can never be perfectly reproduced. You do your best. But ultimately you want the practitioner to be able to "think on their feet" so to speak, so they have both the confidence and the tools to solve the brand new problem of a very specific real-life encounter all by themselves. IMO, the student who understands principles (understand at the 10,000 repetition level) is better equipped to go freeform in this manner.

Application does need to inform basics. That's the reason for the "circular" approach to training in Uechi's style. But ultimately you want to see less and less of the "deer in the headlamps" as you present more and more new problems to the student. When they start to break out of the mold, then you know your job is done.

- Bill
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

Sometimes a circle performed with the body is something quite non-martial.

Anybody remember this scene in the first Karate Kid movie? When I saw previews, I thought the movie was going to be terrible. I was pleasantly surprised.

Karate Kid Lesson 1 (Wax on Wax off)

Circles in Uechi Ryu have many, many applications.
  • They are receiving/intercepting techniques.
  • They can be feelers in tai sabaki techniques.
  • They can be part of a low-brain flinch that subsequently brings the practitioner from unconscious to conscious application (as in an amygdala-level response to someone swinging something over your head).
  • They can be joint hyperextension techniques (neck, elbow, ankle, etc.)
  • They can be used in throws.
If you only knew how many hundreds of thousands of times (I am speaking literally) I've had to correct thousands of students for not keeping "the circle" on a proper plane, you would understand this brilliant scene from Karate Kid.

Washing and waxing cars amounts to non-martial circles. From the standpoint of the martial artist, a circle here is just a circle.

But if you get how we want that circle done, then it takes less communication to go in many different directions with that circle. And these different directions involve different applications, different force vectors, and different internal mechanics.

But the more complex we make "it", the more important it is for the student to understand that "the circle" must be done on a defined plane. Body whip motion? Sequential summation of movement? The circle must STILL stay on that same plane. Otherwise the application won't work.

This cinematic device was used to convey how farmers and fishermen could learn to be such good fighters. Repetition of simple motions can lead to much if the mind knows where to go with it.

Another cinematic device can be found in Seven Samurai. One of the samurai is discovered - and evaluated - by his wood chopping technique.

- Bill
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

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Post by Bill Glasheen »

Where did the circle go?

Nishio Aikido: Iriminage
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

Where is the circle?

Ushioro ate

For you Uechi Ryu practitioners... Do you see the tenshin move that we practice in the hojoundo? For you non-Uechi types, the circle is in second 1 out of 24.

No, we don't do tenshin zensoku geri in Uechi because we are facing a new bad guy from a different direction. We do the shift and circle as a prequel to any subsequent technique:
  • A kick or a thrust.
  • A dump as in the above sequence
  • A kick-like motion that bends the person at the knee from behind so you can put the arm around the neck in a Uechi-like elbow movement to do a lateral vascular neck restraint.
Wow... I just went from a circle, tenshin stepping, a kick-like motion, and an elbow thingie to the application of a lateral vascular neck restraint on an attacker.

But... but... That's not Uechi!!!

- Bill
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Bill Glasheen
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Post by Bill Glasheen »

I found this in Wikipedia under lateral vascular neck restraint.

Lateral vascular neck restraint

Why does that taller man look shorter than the kid? Well
  • He used a circle to intercept while moving.
  • He shifted his body around the bigger man.
  • He grabbed from behind and put his foot in the back of the man's knee. That broke his balance and "cut him down to size."
A.k.a. tenshin zensoku geri or tenshin kosoku geri in Uechi Ryu.

A.k.a Turn, "block" (Aarrgghh!!!) and "kick."

And then what have we here? Isn't that the proper elbow posture?

Image

Yep... I found that in Wikipedia under elbow "strike."

So... was that a circle "block", or is it just a circle? Is it an elbow strike, an elbow thrust, an elbow block, an elbow throw, a blood choke, or just an elbow?

Or maybe Dracula's Cape?? :evilbat: (with apologies to Rory)

Hmm... Maybe in advanced martial arts, it's a matter of context.

Can I get any economies of scale out of a generic approach when I practice?

Do I need to do a bench press any differently for karate than I do for football, or is the motion pretty much the same?

- Bill
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