Month: November 2012

From the edges to the center

Start by standing with your hands aiming forward. Have your partner walk around you and from time to time  push your arms as you keep breathing and work to avoid letting the push progress to the body. Keep walking and learn to keep moving freely while in contact and With your eyes and contact learn to sink the contact where there is no resistance from the standing partner.

Change roles from time to time and continue this drill while the once standing partner walks around the place and progress to standing and moving your arms drawing shapes as your stalking partner pushes them with the intention of sinking and creating movement in the body.

Progress to walking toward your standing partner first with arms at the sides and then with arms pointing forward as your partner uses all limbs to guide you from making body to body contact. Again work to see and feel once contact is made where you can work without using force on force which may end well or may not whereas working from freedom does not constrict you from the rest of the world ( for example your partner aids, nature ,the way things seem to others)

The work here is two fold. You work from one side to add movement where there is no awareness (density) in your partner or partners and from the other hand you work to stay free from resisting contact while doing your work freely. The focus is not on gaining the upper hand but on staying free. Be weary of work which lets you drift away in thought. It is not honest work which encompasses your whole. Any other practice is dishonest both to you and to your partners.

Accepting the ground

Start by laying on the ground and relaxing. Feel where the ground is touching your body and lift piece by piece off and back on the ground.  Have a partner work to pick you up off the ground and both of you work to keep moving and avoid excess tension. This means you don’t work hard or hold your breath trying to actually pick up the dead mass but work with the movement of both bodies to find where you can add to the movement instead of tensing against it. Work with tension for a while to understand what that gives you as your partner taps you where he feels the tension and either a third party or teacher to show where you become fragile for a limb or joint break due to the tension or unnatural extension and keep breathing and moving.

This drill will teach you to keep moving under tension and to accept the ground with less and less fear. There is a boon of knowledge of dynamic direction here free for all who do the work.

Do the work.

“Good” support

We walk with our feet on the ground. We crawl with our belly to the earth and we roll side to side no matter which gave contact first.

Sometimes and working honestly with unstable structures such as sticks with round ends or people you can find support you can use from what others consider resistance or obstruction. For example your knife strike was blocked by a forearm which is supported by the body (working the movement gives more than you may consider) so you can use the pressure not as an obstacle but as a drive to the other side of the body to come in. On the other hand, forgive the pun, you can add to the pressure of the forearm by pulling the defending arm to you and by doing so removing the emotional defense the person in front of you has and allowing him to either ingest the blade if need be while working or learn and become a humbler more aware person.

Another example is working solo with a sturdy stick with a rounded end. You sit or lie on the ground and while holding onto the stick you move your hands from the body to the stick to lift you to the upright and then descend again down gently. Learning to give just what the moment requires, no more and no less. Getting one thing right and sticking to it is a sure way to failure. Do no cling to success or your study will be fruitless.