INTRODUCTION

Just to give you an indication of the method to my madness. From here on, I plan to be delivering “seminars” which are in part me experimenting with pedagogy to refine my idiosyncratic thoughts in real-time – but this is with the broader goal of providing what I personally believe to be the “why” of the movement patterns and thereby informing the “how” of the techniques

What I am NOT doing is teaching how to move through the curriculum specifically. That may be an unintended byproduct, but it isn’t my goal. Nor is my goal to create a true training environment. A training environment should be one where training is the focus: that is rote repetition and mutual exploration among the students on the mat. That is what I think the essence of training should be and that should also constitute the majority of our time on the mat. Grinding the art into the body via healthy vigorous interaction under the guidance of the senior student leading the class. I entrust that to all of you.

For the broader benefit of the students I would hope that the majority of time is spent showing kihon waza – with an emphasis on proper foot placement – keeping the knees bent in a balanced fighting posture – precise articulation of the hands, etc. In that way the students will hear what to do and begin to see how to move.

I don’t plan to focus on the kihon – although it may be used as a necessary starting point or counterexample. Rather, I am trying to focus on the “universal lines” as Kenpo would call it – and add the concepts of tempo, beats and in essence showing weaponized fighting with and without the weapons. This will take us afield from the “standard’ curriculum in order to deepen our appreciation and understanding.

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These posts are all linked inter-textually to facilitate making connections among concepts and techniques. They are all meditations of the interconnectedness of the movements in an attempt to simplify our understanding: to remove the unessential.

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The banner image is Janus, the tutelary god of time, beginnings, transitions, and doorways. The Romans well understood the dangers of liminal states.