Wonderful Article by Shinseidokan Dojo

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You can read Sensei Clarke’s article HERE, it triggered so many thoughts that I had to write this post. There are some things about today’s karate that also give me pause:

• Wearing the uniform and belt in public.
• Using karate as a promotional gimmick to sell karate as a cultural asset of the country.
• How far back does this actually go, it seems like a new trend but is it?
• Is it really just about ego or is this actually about increasing commercial driven income through karate and the flow of travelers/tourists, i.e., the tourist industry?
• Is it really about what we perceive as relatively recent changes toward egoistic behavior as a result of those foreign forces, tourist trades, as a reason and justification for such egoistic behaviors in the karate communities of Okinawa?
• Isn’t it actually a cultural thing for Okinawa and Okinawan karate leadership to take in, analyze, adapt and adopt then synthesize karate to suit their needs especially since that involves their very survival even if just economical in nature to todays way of life?
• Is big-money sport karate actually that new to modern karate? 
• Is it really for the best of karate and martial arts to allow any and all actions and deeds to promote and grow karate as a commodity in lieu of an actual cultural heritage way?
• Isn’t all this simply the changes that are natural to the human species that have allowed progress and growth while keeping such disciplines alive regardless of the changes due to modern influences, etc.? 
• Who is to say that what is currently occurring in the karate communities is actually shabby and shallow?

In truth, I can see and believe that such trappings existed as early as the 1950’s when my style/system was introduced to the Marines through their special services, i.e., now called Moral, Welfare and Recreation. I believe this because there are many stories of consistency that say simply those Okinawan karate-ka, after WWII, were hurting for ways to survive, to earn and feed their families and lo-n-behold the Marines provided, through contracts with SS or MWR, ways for Marines to learn this most mystical art of martial prowess called, “Karate.” 

While, in the case of a singular new form of karate creation, in my system and in those early days the stories told often from those “First Generation Students/Marines” they spoke often of how hard it was and how the need to find ways to support families was needed so it does not surprise me when karate became known that due to its disciplines fit perfectly with Marine ways contracts become lucrative. Those Marines involved in that style at the time actively promoted the Sensei toward those lucrative contracts that put at least one of his sons through University in Japan. 

There are many other indicators within the stories being told and the evidence demonstrated with black belts awarded in a years time along with inflated promotions that were presented with caveats that many simply ignored when leaving the island and returning home to the states. It becomes evident to me that the sport oriented commercialism of karate began then and in all likelihood early, i.e., late 1800’s and early 1900’s beginning with the educationification of karate to the school systems. 

Today’s karate shabby and  shallow situations are just the end results of earlier and ongoing profit commercializations that have changed karate for a long, long time. I even feel it as worse for my system or style because its naming and creation was so new to Okinawan karate, the newest of styles for the times, and belief that the creation is and was based not on the combative form of karate but the watered down educational version easiest to satisfy the customers requirements of all participants making their black belt before the end of the one year, approximately, tours of duty. 

I can say emphatically and with confidence that what I was taught in those first years of my system/style were the same requirements of those first generation pioneers of that karate and it has taken a lot of study, analysis, practice and training to find a more appropriate combative self-fense like reality based way that would actually be ineffective for sport and yet more effective for self-fense then what I got in the beginning those many years past. 

So, this is nothing really new but just more obvious, prominent and just plain denigrating to the nature and intent we believe karate to have once been of warrior like heritage. 

Hat tip (Ritsu-rei) to <Shinseidokan Dojo Blog by Michael Clarke Sensei> as the inspiration for this post.

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

Isshinryu Luminaries: There Can Be Only One

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Not long ago another Isshinryu Karate pioneer passed away, Harold Mitchum. It made me think of the list of those who were the first to bring home and pass on Isshinryu Karate - Don Nagle, Steve Armstrong, Harold Long, Harol Mitchum and Arcenio Advincula.

Of course, there were others but the light didn't shine all that bright on them. Their names don't trigger the memories like these mentioned few. 

They and their influence spanned the length and breadth of the great country from the Jersey shores to the dry heat of Georgia on to the sunny beaches of SAN Diego and up to the wet climate of Washington State.

These guys were universally known while others locally.

A combination of their students and those who followed created a family of Isshinryu Karate-ka that has spanned the entire globe.

It now comes glaringly obvious that those few first-gen luminaries of Isshinryu are all gone but one - Sensei Arcenio Advincula. 

Here is another fact of interest in that all the Isshinryu-Five were ALL Marines, Ohrah, Semper Fi!

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“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

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Creating a Style

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In essence all you need is a strong understanding of the fundamental principles that drive multiple fense methodologies using all the types of forces, i.e., spiraling, scissoring, carving, vibrating, and sheering, etc. This is a finite set of principled methodologies of force that are present and unchanged/unchangeable to every form of physical combative systems or styles.

I quote, “We humans exchange all sorts of information by the exchange of signals with each other, symbols we share in word form or in the nonverbal realm of eye contact, facial expression, tone of voice, posture, and gesture. It is an exchange of energy and information flow and it is this sharing that shapes how the flow is regulated.”

To create a style you merely have to put a unique personal spin on how you apply these principles methodologies of force to achieve your self-fense goals. You can add in unique terms and names and symbols that represent this uniqueness so that it appears and is perceived as something special, unique and different from what everyone else is doing. 

When I continuously study other Okinawan karate styles or systems I see differences yet when I look underneath I see exactly the same principles, senses and forces used to apply those different applications and techniques. 

If you want to win some competitive contest your gaol will always be, “To Win.” Yet, you may describe the strategies and tactics differently than your opponent yet in the end the underlying goal for both competitors would be, “To Win.” It is the same principle as I describe above, it is the creation of a book cover that is perceived and distinguished as “Different and Unique” but in essence the pages in the book all contain the same material or story. 

Humans want to be special, they want to be unique and they want that special uniqueness to help them stand out as to others so that they may achieve a higher status - all of this is about human species survival instincts and drives. In the end, there is absolutley nothing wrong with this but don’t fool yourself into thinking it actually makes you better, it doesn’t.

So, if you have a mastery of the fundamental principles of karate and martial arts self-fense, sport competition, combatives or just fighting along with the types and levels of forces and those pesky basic senses or sense systems to perceive, have ideas, perform idea/theory analysis to create through synthesis that cover page along with awareness, observation skills, accumulated creative action triggers and tapes so that you act appropriately to the facts of situations then go right ahead - create your own style!

Hat tip (Ritsu-rei) to <Shinseidokan Dojo Blog by Michael Clarke Sensei> as the inspiration for this post.

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

What Matters

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In modern karate, in modern martial arts and in modern self-defense programs, mostly, its about strength and often size. The canned rhetoric is, “You have to be stronger to win and you have to use your size to your advantage so bigger is better and bigger usually wins as well.” Such rhetoric is used throughout various physical disciplines and in general tends to be true, i.e., a larger opponent has the advantage and the stronger opponent has the advantage and a combination of the two assures success, victory or the win. So, what is this article about, it is about what matters. What matters more than size or strength - what matters is heart and heart comes from a variety of strengths often superior to both physical (muscle oriented) strengths and physical size. In short:

“Size doesn’t matter: Thick upper bodies and large arms might give greater strength, but they also make for an easier target and harder to conceal along with being top-heavy and less nimble. Bigger is not necessarily better; stronger is not necessarily better; strength is limited and often exhausted in the chaos of battle quickly leaving a more prepared adversary in a position of superiority.”

Size and Strength matter until the moment they no longer matter. That is the truth of it and that is the reality of it, reality often sucks that way. What matters is heart, heart is about attitude, ability, understanding and a mental state that perceives and distinguishes obstacles, etc., as merely challenges to overcome with ferocity, determination and perseverance. 

Your mind controls everything and that means seeing things out of the box and applying multiple methodologies both physical and mental to get the job done. Self-limiting to size and strength leave no room for more so creating a mind-state and mind-set unfettered by such restrictive thinking and obstacles, all self-imposed, creates an atmosphere where loss and defeat are allowed. 

What matters is heart and the ability to think while under great stress and often conditions seldom encountered outside of conflict filled with violence. Strength of character matters; the size of your thinking and analysis and creativity matters; the strength of personality matters; the size of your ability to understand and apply creative answers to unknown situations matter. Strength comes in many forms and size is not necessarily about the size of the mass of anything. Sometimes strength and size is more esoteric in nature and comes from a place hidden deep inside all humans, humans who know how to access the depth and breadth of human nature, ability and integrity of guts. 

Yet, most modern karate and martial disciplines assume and believe strong muscles and larger body mass are how one succeeds in practice, training and application toward self-fense. 

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

REVISITED: Kote-kitae (Karada-kitae)

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Kote-kitae is a mainstay of karate, at least in the one style/system that I am intimately familiar with but I often wonder as to its teachings and their benefits so I am going to try and theorize what that may entail.

Fist, why is kote-kitae a stand alone training tool? When I did some research years ago I found that the proper title for body conditioning is “Karada-kitae [体鍛],” i.e., “The characters/ideograms when combined in martial arts means ‘body forging; body discipline; body train.’ The first character means, ‘body; substance; object; reality,’ and the second character means, ‘forge; discipline; train.’”

“Karada-kitae (also known as "Kakie") is a common form of training used to strengthen and condition the body. It conditions the practitioner for close in fighting. The term consists of 'Karada' and 'Kitae' which means 'Body' and 'forge' which means to forge the body. It is intended to strengthen and toughen the body which includes the feet, stomach, leg and shin, and arms.”

Now, from this point on I once thought that karada-kitae, thus kote-kitae, means, “It teaches the student to maintain proper distance when engaging kumite. It also gets the student use to the idea of being unafraid of pain and being in close proximity to their opponent. Karada-kitae teaches you how to physically handle an attack and it also prepares you mentally.”

Recent studies, training and personal practice has got me to thinking that this interpretation and understanding may be flawed. In contests, competitions and sports proper distance exists but in self-defense, in a real fight of a more asocial nature, not so much. If you are targeted and attacked the chance you can take and maintain ‘distance’ as you practice in kumite and sparring is just seldom or not possible. In a more social monkey dance with adrenal stress-conditions involved seldom have I witnessed - personally and in viewing video’s of all sorts - either party assuming and maintaining distance. 

Now, as to the idea of pain and close proximity I can agree - mostly. That is why grappling and such seems more apropos to learning self-defense. When you are in the mix in a lot of cases, mostly, you will be so up close you can tell what they had for lunch. In a more predatory asocial attack you will in all probability not know what happened until you come too in the ER. Training for that seems to be one of the more important aspects of self-defense but what the hey, what do I know - I am being academic here although the three memories I have were about my actions after being attacked, etc.

Karada-kitae with its sub-practice of kote-kitae DOES NOT teach you how to physically handle an attack and it DOES NOT prepare you mentally for said attack, its processes and especially the after-effects and repercussions. Karate, Martial Arts and those Karate/MA self-defense programs are not reality based adrenal stress-conditioned training processes. Note: there are more and more adopting said reality based programs but not truly enough.

So, in a nutshell my previous concepts of karada-kitae and its four parts are not what I thought but then I asked myself, “What is this good for in karate regardless of sport or self-defense?” 

Shock Value: Most folks have never tussled in the back yard wrestling with friends or have participated in school-yard scuffles where blows are given and bruises, cuts and abrasions result. The first time someone is hit, truly hit, their brains lock up and they go into shock - the freeze. One of my maxims in karate for self-defense is this, “You have to hit someone and you have to be hit by someone.” Hitting speed bags is good, hitting heavy bags is good, hitting all types of makiwara is good but hitting another person is unique. We will, at first until you train for it, have a natural tendency to resist hitting another person. More so in today’s socially conditioned state, i.e., we are conditioned to scream, yell, spit and foam at the mouth but hit someone or, God forbid, be HIT - not so much. 

So, karada-kitae (with Ashi, Kashi, Fukubu and Kote Kitae) does have benefits such as teaching us what discomforts and pains we may encounter in a self-defense situation. The mind has to have an introduction and this is one tool to get you there. This does not condition you to deal with being hit, kicked, twisted, manipulated, scissoring, carving sheering with impacts, drives, pushes, pulls, throws and so on. Especially when the impacts hit those parts of your body not conditioned in karada-kitae.

Here is the crunch if karada-kitae, it actually focuses on and conditions the bodies natural armor AND it does NOT condition those parts of the body that are more vulnerable and sensitive to impacts, touches and other manipulations. You can’t condition those but if you use the body armor, conditioned in karada-kitae, along with movement and properly trained mind-state you have a pretty good chance provided you have other training tools involved - adrenal stress-conditioned reality-based hands-on training, etc.!

When “Multiple Defense Methodologies [actual tactics and attack methodologies of impacts, drives (pushes), pulls, twists, takedowns/throws and compression are best for stopping a threat (types of force applied such as spiraling, scissoring, carving, vibrating, and/or sheering forces.)]” are being applied properly using fundamental principles, emphasis on physiokinetics, don’t necessarily lessen in intensity and efficiency and effectiveness just because you conditioned your body with karada-kitae.

I also believe that the actual karada-kitae techniques of practice can teach incorrect application of principles simply because of how they are taught and perceived, as one of these practices that result in how to physically handle an attack and it also prepares you mentally.

Don’t mistake my intentions herein, karada-kitae has huge benefits as a tool to train the mind and body for the rigors of violence but it is only a novice preparatory prerequisite to more involved and intense types of training. In the end, you train with as many tools as possible to condition the mind and body toward as many eventualities as possible (you can’t train for everything regardless of what the SD teachers tell you).

The only real way to truly understand such things is to experience them directly and that is not advisable. It would be tantamount to telling the military to train in combat rather than train in training to prepare for combat. Training can take you far and deep into such things but there is still that one small step everyone has to take, especially in violence professions, the one that steps you across the road from being inexperienced to experienced. It has been described to me as the one, toughest, most difficult step ever taken by humans. 

Here are the four parts of karada-kitae:

• Ashi-kitae: the conditioning of the foot. This exercise is done by one partner while they use their instep of the foot to help condition the legs and shins of their partner.
• Kashi-kitae: the conditioning of the leg and shin. The partner uses the foot instep to strike the thigh and shin/calf area of the others legs. The switch sides to get equal conditioning.
• Kote-kitae: the conditioning of the arm or forearm.
• Fukubu-kitae: the conditioning of the stomach.

Something to consider and something to question in the next self-defense session. Oh, and ONE MORE IMPORTANT THING!!!

1. All this means that you should embrace the knowledge, gain the training experience and then FOCUS on reality so that you consider the importance of avoidance/deescalation over physical conflict even if justified in self-defense, etc.

Here endith the lesson I think!

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“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

Paying Attention

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• Why would paying attention be a post in karate Self-fense?
• In general, what do I mean by pay’ing attention?
• What results from the process of paying attention?
• How does cognitive functioning work in regard to paying attention?
• Can we multi-task?
• How does choosing what we are attentive of effect our paying attention?
• How do we redirect the attention of someone?
• How can we utilize such information for training, practice and applications? 

In the English language, we are said to “Pay” attention, which plainly implies that the process extracts a cost. Regarding cognitive functions: when attention is paid to something, the prince is attention lost to something else. The human mind appears able to hold ONLY ONE thing in conscious awareness at a time, the toll is a momentary loss of focused attention to everything else. 

In the cognitive functioning of our attentive minds there are always multiple “tracks” of information available, we consciously select only the one we want to register at that moment. Any other arrangement would leave us “Overloaded” and “Unable” to react to distinct aspects of the mongrelized input. For humans to handle multiple channels of information is to “Switch back and forth among them,” opening and closing the door of mindfulness to each in turn. 

Although it may seem that humans are concentrating on more than one thing simultaneously, that’s an illusion, we are just rapidly alternating our focus. Just as there is a price for paying attention, there is also a price for switching it. Each time we switch we lose about one half a second of focus, we experience a mental dead spot, called an “Attentional Blink”, when we can’t register the newly highlighted information consciously. 

When you can tell one is engaged in another task it shows that the a partner in communications is willing to lose contact with the information one party is providing to make contact with the other information, i.e., trying to talk to you and text at the same time. It tells us that one persons input is considered relatively unimportant. 

What we “choose” to attend to or away from reflects what they value at the time. The point of the influence process: whatever we can do to focus people on something - an idea, a person, an object - makes that thing seem more important to them than before. If someone leans forward (gets and moves closer), into the information - an embodies signal of focused attention and intense interest is perceived. Reducing the distance to an object makes it seem more worthwhile. 

Understanding how our attentive functions work helps explain a good deal of what works in martial disciplines as well as it is applied in self-fense. Another aspect is how attentiveness and its traits and effects and obstacles can be utilized to speed up our OODA looping in self-fense. Since we are unable to actually be attentive to more than one stimulus at any given time we can use such information to explain how tells work, how the feint can misdirect an adversary and how we can overwhelm an adversary’s mind to allow us a dominant position in self-fense. 

Information is power, knowledge is power and Understanding is the ultimate power because it is knowledge, understanding and the ability to apply it toward self-fense in karate and martial disciplines that makes for success, progress and continued growth. 

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

Stupid Shit

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Over the years I have been exposed to, witnessed and even performed some pretty stupid shit in karate/martial arts. Today, at age 60+, I have considered all sorts of things in karate and martial disciplines done in the past that has taught me that karate-ka/martial artists do some pretty stupid shit. Why do we humans do stupid shit. 

In this article I look at the act of sensei stepping/jumping on the stomachs of students doing floor exercises like sit-ups or leg lifts. Here follows some of the reasons given for this type of training.

• The only purpose I can think of would be to inspire you to strengthen your abdominal muscles …
• The only thing I could think of was that it will condition the body, because I have seen other martial arts (primarily on tv) where they would hit people hard in order to make sure their body is used to getting hit.
• i have been put though hard body training. which is what the old school masters used to help train the body to get used to getting hit and take pain. the main reason for this is that its theres an good chance that you well get hit. hard body well help you turn your pain into power.
• I suspect that yr instructor was stepping on yr diaphragm rather than yr abdomen. The diaphragm is a very thick, strong band of muscle that runs the entire transverse section of yr trunk. 
• the instructor is possibly using it as an endurance technique, basically just seeing how much the boys could handle. 
• the reason he stepped on us, just to show off the fact that he doesn't play around.

In the end, there isn’t any reason why one should or would allow another person to deliberately put their entire weight on their midsection, it just serves no purpose I can determine. 

As an inspirational tool to strengthen your stomach, well, not so much. As a program that requires strength, stamina, endurance, ability both mental and physical and a need to experience getting hit, etc., this does not add to that requirement nor does it benefit you when you encounter a hit or kick to the stomach. In this, sanchin works better to prep you and your body. I also advocate that to utilize your body and its natural armor you need to focus on moving and deflecting. To have the ability to have a hit or kick or standing of heavy weight on the stomach does not prep you for the fight. 

It does not train you to use sanchin dynamic tension and movement and deflection when encountering the chaos adrenal stress-conditions of fighting or defense in the fly and while moving, being moved, and along with things like surprise, etc. 

As to body conditioning the exercises you do along with dynamic tensioning and hands-on drills the stress your body and mind in a variety of ways with a variety of methodologies tends to train and stress your body to handle all kinds of variations that require strong muscles, tendons and other things that protect against grave harm, etc. 

Hard body training tends to focus on the bodies natural armor and that includes a focus on areas of the body that  are meant to be protection against violent actions be it hits, kicks or a car accident. The actual methods and targets best suited to end a physical attack or confrontation are not exactly the kind of areas on the body you want to expose to such training methods. 

Take the karate knuckles, when in the heat of an attack the chances that the adrenal stress-conditioned effects felt in the body to allow you to hit with the precisions, remember precision is one of the degraded abilities suffered in adrenal chemical dumps, necessary for effectiveness in ending an attack are rare even with experienced professionals. 

As to the diaphragm vs. stomach that is more of a misdirection of rhetoric to take the mind away from the original question toward benefits of such training methods. It is not about training in a manner that allows preparations and forewarning of the actions but rather about the body surviving surprised blitz like attacks that disrupt, unbalance and create havoc in the mind, i.e., causing a freeze and an OODA OD loop, etc.

Endurance techniques are great to train and build the body for strength, stamina and health, etc., but their true nature is to provide the body and mind enough so the energy of the attacked lasts long enough to remove themselves from the situation often in a manner of minutes. I have personally witnessed some who in training are far superior to others but in the clinch when a real attack happens they are exhausted and depleted of energy, power and force in a manner of minutes at most allowing a smarter attacker to be successful. In a nutshell, such attackers know way ahead of time that the attacked is going down and they are assured of success before the first blow is delivered. 

There is no reason that I can find anywhere as to the need for or benefit of stepping on the stomach. Now, as to jumping on the stomach, are you serious? Are you stupid to allow someone to do that? 

There is a lot more stupid shit out there than this simplistic example and when I come across more I will write an opinion piece on it here.

p.s. if you want to condition your abdominals for being hit there is only one way I would advocate, i.e., while doing leg lifts use your losely clenched fist to tap-tap-tap the stomach during the exercise. You feel the hit on the skin, you allow the muscle to flex a bit through the vibrations from the light hitting and you learn to use the dynamic tension of the exercise to prep you for when you do sanchin, i.e., tense the muscles, etc.

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

The Looky Loo Syndrome

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This involves what can hijack us from our conditioned responses, i.e., how certain aspects of life can hijack even the most serious and best trained professional. It is the trait that governs all species in survival including the human animal, us. It is referred to as the, “Investigatory Reflex.” 

In order to survive, all of nature needs to be acutely aware of immediate changes to the environment, investigating and evaluating these differences for the dangers or opportunities they may present. This is hard wired and so forceful that this reflex supersedes all other operations. So, when in the fight or in self-fense practitioners can be hijacked by the use of unknown and untrained situations and events and techniques, etc., that cause what is referred to as the freeze. 

Whenever a stimulus registered as a change around us, our attention flies to it. If a predator decides you are a target and they apply: Surprise, a flurry of blitz like pummeling about your head and shoulders, a quick and decisive crowding of bodies along with disorienting unbalancing and instant disruption of your structure you will find your mind, attention, being drawn to such methodologies and if your training, sometimes even with appropriate training,  with your attention fully, completely and totally focused on it. 

Lets say this, according to research “Rapid Changes in our Environment” tend to have a very potent effect on us. Our concentration can be pulled aside even with such mundane changes like, i.e., ever wonder why you walked into a room and suddenly forget why? It is possible that your recall is not diminishing but rather a possibility of a different and documented scientifically  reason for that lapse of memory, i.e., waling through a door can cause you to forget because of an abrupt change in your physical surroundings redirects your attention to the new settings and therefore disrupts your memory of it. 

In short, “Our bodily reaction to change is no longer called a reflex. It’s termed the ‘Orienting Response,’ and scores of studies have enlightened us about it.” - Robert Cialdini, Pre-Suasion

Just as another change in thinking, the orienting response extends to things like, respiration, blood flow, skin moisture, and heart rate. Doesn’t that sound familiar, i.e., how adrenal stress-conditions trigger huge changes in our bodies that also affect concentration, perceptions and how we distinguish and act accordingly? 

Take a moment next time you are out on the road headed toward some destination when suddenly the traffic flow slows and you find yourself doing the ‘looky loo’ at some traffic incident. You are working off the human species survival instincts of “Investigatory Reflex” and succumbing to our natural survival “Orienting Response.” Personally, I have tried to resist doing the looky loo and find the pull to turn and look at the incident almost irresistible. Herein lies another factoid that says, we are still connected to and driven by our survival DNA even if we think we live in a time and way that eliminated our exposure to death by Lion, Tiger or Bear.  

In self-defense or self-fense as I take it from Marc MacYoung’s explanation, we must train to what will cause us to investigate and orient and act, i.e., like explained in the OODA process of Colonel Boyd. Lets use a sport system to help explain and understand, i.e., boxing. 

Boxing, like many combative oriented competitive sports, relies on what is termed as, “Feints,” that draw an opponents concentration toward a investigatory reflex of “what the …” so that you are drawn away from one thing to focus on another while that original thing lights you up and knocks you out. I look at it as misdirection similar to what magicians use to fool you attentive processes toward something else while the original process goes on out of your perceptive concentration. 

This is also how I like to explain one facet of what karate-ka and martial artist refer to as a sub-principle called, “The Void.” It is that space between actions that can cause a type of manipulation of an adversary’s mind to focus on a trivial matter while a more serious event takes place. It is to shift a situation or perception to something else - misdirection. This use of void, the space between tempo, cadence or rhythms that triggers our investigatory reflex so that the shift goes to some feature, action or thing so that something else gets in before the brain can even experience it, i.e., observe, orient loop blocking a decision and action process. 

Boxing feints are this very process where the opponents attention is misdirected toward a danger that doesn’t really exist so as to hide the upper cut or some such that rocks the opponents world, knocking them down and out. The void or space or time lapse from original act to feint is about this very thing. Make sense? 

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

Evidence - Video and Personal

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Personal evidence is what we all perceive as witness evidence while video evidence is what ever filmed/recorded evidence presented. This regards viewing both video and/or witness because it falls under the principle of, “What is focal is PRESUMED causal.” In short, what is perceived by the witness or whomever views video effects what is perceived.

This doesn’t even take into consideration things like angles, sound, certain effects dependent on direction, angles and other such filming and perceptive principles. For instance, one professional tells people that when viewing a piece of video evidence to first watch it several times with no sound. Then he tells them they must find out if editing of any kind occurred. A bit like chain of evidence processes to keep the integrity of what is presented or given as close to reality as possible. We shall see that this reality is not always as accurate or real dependent on focal-to-causal effects and influences.

For instance, what the witness sees such as facial views, i.e., they see the face of one participant while they cannot see the face of the other such as if they were standing behind one subject and viewing the second subject over the shoulder of the first. This also changes as to perspective and perceptions when you view two subjects from the side, i.e., when you can perceive identical information of both subjects.

Now, add this same process of perspective to perception and interpretations when filming from behind one subject with the other in direct line but facing the camera or when the camera films the two facing one another from the side. Dependent on that perspective you will hear and feel, etc., different tones and content, etc., due to that direction and how it effects your perceptions to information - it changes your perceptions while actually remaining the same as to reality. For instance, if you are viewing over one’s shoulder the fact you can see the one subjects facts you will naturally and instinctively judge that information as MORE CAUSAL. 

“The tendency of humans to presume that what is focal is causal holds say too deeply, to automatically, and over to many types of human JUDGEMENT.” - Robert Cialdini, Pre-Suasion

If you, like many cell phone witnesses, were to record that situation with the two subjects from different camera angles, you would ensure that everything about that situation itself would be identical every time it is showed - FROM THAT ANGLE. This is why disparity always rises up when more than one video is submitted as possible evidence because it comes from different people who shot the video from different angles at different times with different time spans that add, subtract and change perceptions and perspectives as well as resulting judgements of those who view it. All this effects the person who is a witness. 

Yes, one person standing at this angle didn’t see a gun and yet another person who stood at a totally different angle did see a gun. Both are correct and accurate but angles and perceptions along with how they are affected by the personal biased beliefs of the videographer and witness effect that informations outcome. 

When you add in such human distinctions and perceptions along with beliefs and agenda’s, when you add in sounds and editing that often occur to meet the beliefs and perceptions of the person publishing whether as evidence or just social media attention gratification purposes, it means that it is not exactly foolproof. 

As Dr. Cialdini, and his studies along with research indicated, states, “Certain kinds of videotaped interactions are used frequently to help determine the guilt or innocence of suspects in major crimes” that this set of principles and effects become critically important. So many misunderstandings come from the emotionally driven reactions of perceived supposed reality that it drives how we act and in criminal situations lead to convictions, both socially in criminal systems, that can be found unjust. 

This is why the education and understanding of society is critical so we rein in our emotional reactive processes and stop to consider that video’s are not set in stone recordings of reality, they are just one perceptive view of a possible reality. It is best to collect a “preponderance of evidence” before judging!

Let me end this brief and terse article with one more example, i.e., interrogations - interrogations of suspects leading to false confessions that has come to light led to, “All interrogations involving major crimes to be videotaped.” Here is the conundrum, because we still assume a film/video is reality and truth, in practice, the point of view of the video camera is almost always behind the interrogator and onto the fact of the suspect. When the camera angle is arranged to record the fact of one discussant over the shoulder of another biases that critical judgement is toward the more visually salient of the two. 

“Such an camera angle being aimed at a suspect, lets not forget that the label suspect also influences the viewers to presupposed guilt, gives greater responsibility for a confession ( and greater guilt) to said suspect. This influence and presupposition comes regardless of whether the observers are men or women, college students or jury-eligible adults in their forties or fifties, exposed to the video recording once or twice, intellectually deep or shallow, and with previous information provided about the potential bias of video evidence due to the impact of camera angles, etc., this pattern the same regardless of being ordinary folks in the jury pool, to the legal professionals, or to the judges trying such cases.”

As you can see, just because a witness says so, regardless of their credentials and just because it is on film does not negate the possibility of false witness and confessions. But a bird in hand is far faster, better and easier to gain a confession then the extra effort and work to continue an investigation to find the real culprit especially as more time passing makes that more and more difficult. The pressures of management to get it finishes along with pressures to close and convict for a variety of reasons beyond mere guilt or innocence makes this even worse. 

It warrants all of us to take a breath, rein in our emotionally monkey brains and take a moment to allow all evidence to be gathered, analyzed and collated into real evidence before we judge anyone or anything. What if one day, out of the blue, you find yourself on the receiving end of such events and situations, wouldn’t you want a chance?

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

Trust - The Cornerstone of Survivability

Blog Article/Post Caveat (Read First Please: Click the Link)

Trust Defined: firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something; believe in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of; acceptance of the truth of a statement without evidence or investigation; the state of being responsible for someone or something; a person or duty for which one has responsibility; a hope or expectation. 

We talk about many things that are about survival, self-defense in particular on this blog, but seldom do I hear about trust. It seems that the aspect of trust is just assumed but in truth survival is about the trust that is created, developed and assumed by members of a group, a tribe if you will, where the hierarchal status traits of the group or tribe are set in a culturally created belief system toward the very survival of that tribe and its members. 

If the tribal members cannot establish and hold a mutual trust between its members the tribe will not survive. Even our modern families must have trust long before love or even likability, two important aspects of our species that allow for trust to exist. 

Lets get to brass tacks here since this is about karate and martial disciplines in self-fense. In most dojo, a tribe if you will, there is Sensei the Senpai then Kohai and within each is a level or grade that establishes status and levels of authority in regard to study, training, practice, experience and understanding that relates all members to one another. 

In a discipline of this nature where grave harm or even death are on the table then those who are members must have a level of trust with one another even in exposing themselves to harm or death in training and practice. If mistakes happen that is one thing but if an injury is incurred by one member due to the nature of the other then trust is lost or misplaced resulting in the two resisting exposure through future additional sessions of training and practice.

Look at the military and civil police, etc., disciplines where its members depend entirely on one another for individual and group survival where grave bodily harm and death are very real and possible in their daily work. You have to create that brotherhood between members where trust is the primary trait that binds. If not, then the tribe or group cohesive connectedness breaks down and survival is lost. 

As a side bit of information, humans only survive in small controlled groups like family and groups of families in tribes. There are limitations in the number where passing them results in a breakdown of the tribe or group in regard to its survivability. When social connections such as groups of tribes begin to gather and connect then something greater must exist, a trust is dominate but a belief system must exist that will bind all the different culturally driven tribal belief systems so they all can trust one another for the social survivability. 

Yet, we modern human animals seem to have lost that understanding and it may be due to quick instantly gratifying and satisfying social conditions and conditionings based on inaccurate and inappropriate understanding of our very species and survival. What a conundrum don’t you think?

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)

China Hand [唐手]

Blog Article/Post Caveat (Read First Please: Click the Link)

The name before the change to, “Empty Hand.” Both are pronounced the same but the two have the first character/ideogram that is different. The change came about only because of Okinawa’s drive to belong, to belong to Japan. It is understandable because in the sixteen hundreds the Japanese took possession of the island. The use of China Hand was to give due honor to the culture and country that helped the Okinawans develop their indigenous system or discipline of Te or Ti or Toudi. 

When ti, or simply the Okinawan language for hand, began to be morphed into a more diverse system they would call, “China Hand,” it might have been because the discipline is a synthesis of the Chinese discipline of boxing and that the use of the hand whether weaponized or empty is generic enough for a solid description. There may be other reasons and understandings of the what, when, where, how and why of the name but that is lost in history for there is little documentation prior to the eighteen hundreds on karate. 

When I first teach, as did my Sensei, a newbie to karate the first thing is, “How to make a fist.” Today, and more appropriately, giving honor to the discipline of China Hand I instead talk and teach about the hand.

The Hand: It is a wondrous device that allows humans to handle, manipulate and receive tactile information, etc. Open, closed or held in a variety of ways consisting of a bunch of bones, tendons, cartilage, nerves and covered by our largest organ - skin it is a very unique and wonderful tool. You can grasp, twist, spiral, shake and make it useful when the body mass is used. The hand is the very first thing thought of when hearing the term, “Karate.” For karate-ka of ever level the thoughts of karate fist and karate knuckles always comes to mind and is thought of as symbolic to the entire discipline. 

We can transmit and receive all sorts of stimuli through touch, tactile sense signals, but especially through the hands themselves. They are strong and yet susceptible to injury all dependent on muscles, tendons and their stabilizing ability along with conditioning ergo why karate also springs to mind the art of hojo-undo with specificity to the makiwara disciplines. 

I have spent considerable time and mental gymnastics to find a more appropriate term to symbolize the vasty-ness of karate-do and to date I have not found or discovered one adequate to the challenge. I admit that those who changed the name from China to Empty had a most difficult obstacle to overcome and feel I understand in part why they took the route they did. 

When teaching I always start with mechanics, such as holding out the hand and then demonstrating the various hand manipulations to form for various methodologies in applying power and force to a target - with just the hand. I always stress that the connection between the name karate and the use of the hands is not just the karate fist but a variety of ways the hand is used to apply methodologies with a goal of ending an attack. 

I also stress that using the hands involves principles, principles to be learned in stages through the kyu levels along side basics, drills, kata and much later kumite or fixed patterned drills. I tell them the hard-to-soft/soft-to-hard rules of using the hands and how the open hand is far more effective then the closed fist regardless of how it appears and feels otherwise to our sense and instincts. 

I explain how the fist is often a communications tool of the tribe where certain lessons and rules are enforced and punished and that the fist, especially the way it is constructed, was not meant to kill or maim but to communicate and enforce. When a tribe must defend against others outside the rules change and more often, almost exclusively, humans prefer to use weapons or what some might refer to as hand enhancers or extensions. I can refer to some of the violence professionals that through experience will tell you if a fight is on, whether they get involved is determined as to which tool is in use, the fist or the open hand. Fist, not so much but hand open - time to step in to stop grave harm or death.

We humans like things simple and nature programmed our brains, our minds, to work with simplicity for that is how we gain speed and trigger tapes fast enough to survive. If that fails, we die and our genes don’t get evolved and transferred to our children. It is quite simple in its complexities. 

See the graphics that follow for a view of the complexities and wondrous nature of the human hand then the next as it displays some of the karate hand techniques made in karate-do. 

Bibliography (Click the link)

“In order for any life to matter, we all have to matter.” - Marcus Luttrell, Navy Seal (ret)