In this online video class, we start with body awareness, tension and release and the shifting of mass and how this translates to more and more movement but without tension and excess.
Join me for more classes online and in person, here.
In this online video class, we start with body awareness, tension and release and the shifting of mass and how this translates to more and more movement but without tension and excess.
Join me for more classes online and in person, here.
Time is going by us all the time 🙂
To make ourselves more resilient and mobile at the same time, we can choose to take a simple breath in between to make things last longer.
Examples:
Start doing pushups. Pause for one breath on the top position between each push up and gain more awareness and time in the plank. Pause in the middle or bottom (without touching the body to the ground) and you will gain more lasting power and stability within movement.
Start standing and transition between standing and laying down with your arms not touching the ground at all. Pause for one breath and relax what does not need tension first in the up and down moments (when you are standing and when you are laying down) and then pause twice in between these two positions and again take a full breath to relax what does need tension and you will be teaching yourself the delta of need and exists in a very wide arch of positions. It is also fun to transition between muscle and structure power. It saves energy and gives us more ability at the same time.
Start climbing a rope or doing pull ups. First pause in the low and high positions and allow the body to maintain only the needed tension to preserve the position and then twice in between. The learning will be more intense as if is a power movement but you will be able with time to transition some of the tension from the active parts of the arms back and shoulders to the body and maintain a lower level of activation with the same work done.
Keep breathing and see you in class 🙂
There is a buffer between real violence and training and there has to be one to allow progress both mental and physical.
Many martial arts today rely on padded surfaces and body padding. This allows for higher throws in practice and greater force exerted in contact in striking and impact.
There is however also negative in this sport application. It is we do not know how to move our bodies on hard surfaces and most do not know how to strike and get struck with no padding. Bone and flesh.
Give yourself the gift of the hard floor and the wall.
Learn to place your body from standing up to laying down on hard ground first slowly and then with awareness and smoothness it will become faster naturally and you will gain a real world ability.
Stand in front of a wall ( A good one. Many crumble) and place your hand and then fist on it. Learn to push first and to sink second and allow the entire body to become one.
There is no limit except what we place on ourselves and hard contact allow us to open new awareness and ability inside us.
Start slow and start now.
Learn to roll safely and freely.
Work the progressions and focus on quality. The quantity will come with consistency of working the basics.
All the power in our bodies come out once punctured well. It is well illustrated in a crowd where we cannot pay attention to all individuals and must swim in streams of perceptions and assumptions.
We can grow as people from accepting and moving from this feeling of a small fish in the ocean. Step by step, we can open ourselves to our senses and clean our mind to work better in the great ocean of mankind.
Step by step, we climb the stairs. Enjoy the road. There is no end to the climb.
Solo and partner work complement each other. Here is a coupling of those drills that come to bring the rolling thunder of freedom of movement.
SOLOish
Partner
Enjoy and send me your requests and comments.
Sharon.
Here are three drills for better striking. Remember it is better to avoid getting struck than developing a thick hide. There is always a blade somewhere.
Enjoy the work so you keep doing it. That is a great “cheat” for life and keep your loved ones safe.
Drawing the blade can be a martial art like Japanese 居合 or a simple task we perform while preparing a meal for the family. Lets play with drawing in particular so we can better integrate it into the work.
Enjoy what you do. It smooths the rolling of the wheels.
It is evident that as we use our muscles and nervous system well, they get better and we move and work in better efficiency and effectiveness.
Let us use the same simple but not easy mechanism to improve our awareness to making choices (lead the chariot instead of being one of the horses) and making better choices.
We will use the methodology of constraint to improve our sight inward to the choices we make weather willingly or not and to improve our sight outwardly to understand that all choices are made up of several parameters and mini choices so we can adjust everything from the way we say Yes and No to our action under tension.
1. Stand with your back to your partner. Have them push you lightly from behind and breathe and move to avoid giving resistance to the contact. Cover the entire backside and then work with two contacts at once. This allows all involved to witness themselves going within to release excess tension and movement and opens the door to further understanding.
2. Lie down and have a partner push you with a foot. Repeat the contact five times and at each time, start to move along the contact from a different limb or neck movement. This opens the awareness to movement from the center and to awareness to more than the contact point.
3. Stand a step away from each other and send a limb to push or pull the other one at a time. Act to enfold the coming limb using each limb and head in turn and maintain that you always have choices.
4. Stand a step away from each other and facing away from each other. Reach out with a limb to repeat the previous game and maintain that you do not need sight to always have choices.
5. Stand side by side a step away from each other and repeat the previous game with now having the direction decided for you. Your partner gives you a direction of forward, backwards, left and right and as they move in, you must move in the prescribed direction as you maintain your freedom. This gives you directional compulsory directions in game and in life. Choices are always made. Make them yourself.
Enjoy the games 🙂
There are countless holds levers and ways to manipulate the joints. There are however a few ways to play with the body to bring our innate knowledge into awareness. That way we are able to create those on the move and without trying to force one way over the other.
Principles for the play:
Games to bring the natural awareness to the surface:
Avoid fast movement when not needed. Learning is about understanding and knowing, not about posturing as something we are not. Let the speed come to you.