Forms - Why bother?

[miked]

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-1765 ... hy-bother?

Here is my latest blog on forms.

Comments?

Regards,

Mike DeDonato
Los Angeles
mjdcgb@ca.rr.com
www.uechi-la.org

[Bill Glasheen]

If I have to describe what I now do with Uechi forms, it probably isn't expressed in your article.

It's been said that Kanbun rarely did a form from beginning to end when teaching. More and more, I'm gravitating to that. As I often say, good kata aren't storybooks; they are reference books. As such, you can take pieces and parts from them as you need, and use them in myriad kinds of drills and practice. So in this way, Bruce Lee really isn't doing anything different than a Kanbun-inspired traditionalist.

Just another perspective...

- Bill

[MikeK]

Reads pretty good Mike and an interesting subject.

Just to throw this out there:
After collecting a bunch and trying to squeeze applications from them I dropped them a few years back. I had a excellent training partner who knew more applications than I ever could learn from a kata, so they became a lot less important and withered away.

Currently I've been revisiting the Tai Chi that I was learning from a friend (we did very little form work and worked mosty push hands) and started looking into the various TCC forms. Right now to get my feet wet again I've been working through the Beijing 24 short form which I find enjoyable for it's movement and flow.
What really jumped out at me after making headway through the 24 form was how close it related to all the push hands work my friend and I did. It was so close that I could almost feel the pressure and then emptiness of my training partner right as I would do roll back or on the flip side press and push.
Now that's something I never found with karate kata which when performed as a whole always seemed to have some slight disconnect from the real world. I'm still not sure why that is.

[JimHawkins]

What really jumped out at me after making headway through the 24 form was how close it related to all the push hands work my friend and I did. It was so close that I could almost feel the pressure and then emptiness of my training partner right as I would do roll back or on the flip side press and push.
Now that's something I never found with karate kata which when performed as a whole always seemed to have some slight disconnect from the real world. I'm still not sure why that is.

Yes, I had much the same experience with my WCK..

Because one bleeds into the other so readily this allows the seeds planted in the form to naturally express themselves later in the alive work.. From there it takes root and begins to grow, augmented by applying in the drill and perfecting stand alone mechanics in the form...

A good example of the building block process seen in these arts..step by step..

[Bill Glasheen]

Now that's something I never found with karate kata which when performed as a whole always seemed to have some slight disconnect from the real world. I'm still not sure why that is.

I believe you said the same thing I said above, Mike, without realizing it.

By the way, I had a 2-hour coffee in Ashland with Ray Berry on Friday. We chatted about a lot of stuff. We'll likely be getting together this week to do some training where we'll be exchanging ideas about stances and such.

Ray talked a lot about doing stuff "in the air" vs. against people and things. He talked about borrowing the RMC football team's football dummy equipment for his students to hit on with their moves.

An entertaining read is the book Scuse Me While I Kiss This Guy: And Other Misheard Lyrics



Forms require that the individual get the context before (s)he can execute the movement with proper intent. Otherwise you're just kissing this guy.

- Bill

[jorvik]

Or " like a gerbil" by maddona

[MikeK]

I believe you said the same thing I said above, Mike, without realizing it.

Thanks for denigrating my comprehension skills Bill, but if you look at the time stamps on the posts it's more likely just a timing issue.

By the way, I had a 2-hour coffee in Ashland with Ray Berry on Friday. We chatted about a lot of stuff. We'll likely be getting together this week to do some training where we'll be exchanging ideas about stances and such.

Ray talked a lot about doing stuff "in the air" vs. against people and things. He talked about borrowing the RMC football team's football dummy equipment for his students to hit on with their moves.

Looking forward to hearing what you guys discussed.

Forms require that the individual get the context before (s)he can execute the movement with proper intent.

Right on the money Bill.

[maxwell ainley]

When the Japs first came to the UK , forms were seen mostly for the first time by most of us .

A lot of boxers among us could not make any sense from them ,apart from say shadow boxing ,also we had very little to go on by way of applications ,then Goju came along with more application .but before this ,lots were abandoning things for kick boxing .
We were told they [kata] were the soul of karate ,but we just could not see it .

Some were simply doing forms for the next grade ,any sparring did not reflect the kata or two man forms ,people were dancing around in boxer fashion ,stance/ transitional /sequental was not understood ,a problem I thought was; most were only training two nights per week ,plus there were just too many kata to learn ,then the idea emerged to engage a few in depth ,that made sense .
But most would not commit beyond the two times training per week I thought it still will not work ,how can you get depth on two nights per week .

We then took Sanchin on board training seven times per week inside two month we were down to five still working out ,out of around 80 packing in ,we wanted depth but most would not pay the price ,some were wimps ,some were just not cut out for one form in depth .

Lots went into deniel ,saying they would never be capable of fathoming the form ,we want instants ,takes too long etc.

[JimHawkins]

These days it's even more important to explain clearly why you do what you do.. Folks are more savi today and without a logical and clear connection of forms to fighting more folk are going to lose interest..

This is the same reason why many schools are dropping kata or doing kata but teaching kickboxing--they have the classical disconnect.. Folks "know" what kickboxing is, less so when dealing in the realm of kata...

Science informs us that whatever movements are trained should have a 1 to 1 relationship to application.. And many folks these days as it often was in the past will have a hard time connecting these dots...

[Bill Glasheen]

Science informs us that whatever movements are trained should have a 1 to 1 relationship to application.. And many folks these days as it often was in the past will have a hard time connecting these dots...

I'm not sure what you mean about the science part.

I personally go for a one-to-many relationship to application. The more I can get out of less and the less I have to teach in terms of basics and principles, the more I believe the lesson sticks and works in the field - for many reasons.

When I teach it, a circle is just a circle. Sometimes I want to intercept. Sometimes I want to ensnare. Sometimes I want to grab. Sometimes I want to joint lock. And sometimes I want to attack with it. But in the end, it's just a tool that I can use for many things.

There's one quite complex move in our system (nicknamed "hawk chases sparrow" by some) which presents many varied application opportunities for me. I wouldn't dream of limiting it.

The challenge then is figuring out how to practice such a move in a form in the most generalizable way. There IS a way to do that. Mostly it's the process of trying to extract the essence of many disparate moves and translating that into a study of movement is where the real synaptic epoxy begins to take shape. And it doesn't happen in autopilot. As I tell my students, you need to get over kata being anything sacred and untouchable. It's OK - and in fact encouraged - to take the pieces and parts out of the box and play with them.

- Bill

[JimHawkins]

I'm not sure what you mean about the science part.

It means very simply the movements trained in the forms should be the same movements used in application--a hammer is a hammer, pliers are pliers.. Use them however you like..but train them for what they are with the correct mechanics...

IOW: In the form we do it this way but in application it's done another way, does not compute.. The body "knows" what it knows from repetition, and if you want to perform a certain way you must train exactly that way, otherwise you have a disconnect... That doesn't mean things can't be broken down in the form into parts, but those parts must still be intact..

The body will not understand under stress that it must re-interpret and change what it has done thousands of times into something else.. Train how you want to fight because you will fight how you've trained--pretty simple stuff..supported by science..

[Bill Glasheen]

Jim

I couldn't disagree more.

First... Uechi kata don't work that way. What is your interpretation of Sanchin? (Hint - It is NOT a specific application form. It teaches principles of movement. It is the lowest common denominator of other movements in the system.)

Second.... Kanbun's entire system operates on parsimony. (Tomoyose describes the system as a narrow but deep body of water.) Simple moves have many applications. It is what it is. And it worked for Kanbun against the thugs in China.

Third... The original name Kanbun gave to his system - pangainoon - speaks to the dual nature of many techniques. A circle receives and a circle attacks. A boshiken thrusts and a boshiken crushes. A shoken pokes and a shoken grabs and rips. An elbow blocks and an elbow strikes or thrusts. A knee lift intercepts and a knee lift either knees or stomps. There's a yin and a yang for most techniques and applications. And sometimes they can be both at the same time (as in Seisan).

I couldn't disagree more about the application part. It is better to overtrain a small handful of simple principles and have the students apply them many different ways working with partners. Then rely on the individual to be like the tea in the teacup when facing a real world that you'll never quite be able to reproduce in the dojo lab. Teach someone to do many, many different things with simple approaches and they're better equipped to face something new that they'll never face in a controlled environment.

Been there, done that. It has worked for me in real life.

Been there, done that. It has worked for my students who have gone off and served their country.

Worked for my Goju instructor who both served in special forces and taught combat to Green Berets. And of course Goju and Uechi have a common origin. (He sought me out to learn Uechi Ryu.)

Whatever works for you is fine, Jim. I am not a Wing Chun expert. And I do know you like to argue!

- Bill

[JimHawkins]

I couldn't disagree more.

Of course you do (although I am not 100% sure you understand what I mean either) because this tends to violate your 'everything is everything else' theory...

Amazing in and of itself since sports science is crystal clear on this stuff..

You perform how you train..

You really want to take the opposing side of that one do ya?

I find your position (as I understand it) completely arbitrary.. You do throw in some truisms along the way to make this seem more reasonable, which IMO it is not.

First... Uechi kata don't work that way. What is your interpretation of Sanchin? (Hint - It is NOT a specific application form. It teaches principles of movement. It is the lowest common denominator of other movements in the system.)

I don't need to go there... Mechanics are mechanics, movements are movements... LCD or not..

Like letters in an alphabet are the tools, and like words are the movements.... "A" never means "C"; "B" never means an ampersand; Cat never means dolphin.... Or whatever you want it to mean....

Also there is the likelihood of inaccuracies in many of today's forms--another can of worms...

Suffice it to say there are others around these parts with long Uechi BBs who completely disagree with your 'metaphor theory' . But of course you know that..

Second.... Kanbun's entire system operates on parsimony. (Tomoyose describes the system as a narrow but deep body of water.) Simple moves have many applications. It is what it is. And it worked for Kanbun against the thugs in China.

Same can be said of ummm almost any style...

I specifically said there are many applications for a tool, movement, etc... You can even mix and match movements and mechanics.. I apparently say this in vain because you straw man my position anyway..

NEXT

I couldn't disagree more about the application part. It is better to overtrain a small handful of simple principles and have the students apply them many different ways working with partners.

Strawman all the way here again...

Who or what are you debating with? This is what I have always advocated.......... Although I could argue that only actions/reactions can be trained and principles are the sign posts that take you to your destination... More research needed here...

Whatever works for you is fine, Jim. I am not a Wing Chun expert. And I do know you like to argue!

Neither of us needs to be an 'expert' in any style to realize that you perform how you train..... It is a 1:1 relationship..

Kata movements should use the same mechanics as are used in application or as close as possible... This does not in any way mean or intimate that there is only one application for a given movement, sub-movement or tool.... In fact the reason one's forms change over time is because they begin to more closely resemble one's actual and personal performance!

Mike called it correctly:

IMO the more contrived or clever the bunkai the less likely it's an actual martial technique.

IOW the more disparity there is between any element of training and the reality of performance the more problematic is the learning, yielding less than optimal results...

It's that simple and apparently you like to argue too... I however like to stick to what was actually said and meant...

Train how you want to perform; because you WILL perform how you train..

Anything that contradicts the above is severely misinformed IMO.. The founders of classical styles did know this.. But when TMA folks 'sell' ideas contradictory to this most basic training truth it only serves as fodder for anti TMA to trash *us* Traditional Martial Artists...

[Uechij]

Excellent post Shaolin!

[Bill Glasheen]

I'm not convinced you're disagreeing with me, Jim. This happens sometimes in these threads. People start talking past each other.

You perform how you train..

You really want to take the opposing side of that one do ya?

Nice try.

I find it fascinating that you're accusing me of using strawman tactics when you've just engaged in the same above. I don't claim your characterizations. If it makes you feel better, keep bashing the strawman.

Re-readd what I posted, Jim. In another thread, Rory got on here and stated that he shared my position on this. He approaches martial arts the same way, albeit from a different style (Sosuishitsu Ryu Jiujitsu). Rory however comes to our camps, so there is an opportunity for him actually to work out with many of us.

You should get him to show you "Dracula's Cape" some time...

You're welcome to come to my Uechi classes, Jim, where I can show you what I'm talking about. As a specific example, I don't think you'd know hawk chases sparrow in Uechi kata if you saw it. And I'm assuming you don't practice our kata. Otherwise we could get into specifics.

- Bill