My week in Martial Arts: July 3rd to July 7th

Hi All

This week I managed along with Lun to get to two lessons and get to teach the beginners of one. By the way hop over to Lun’s blog to read a story about trouble we had in the old fish and chip shop and his other comments. I speak for Chinese Chip shop owners past and present, you wouldn’t believe the b.s that we had to go through but it’s nice to talk about our “victories”.

A work colleague of mine Wellington who is an Aikido instructor sent me this interesting paragraph from an essay written by Jet Li.

“The system today is not as complex as it used to be, when everybody had to compete in broadsword, spear, straight sword, cudgel, and empty-hand forms. Why, in our day, we had to learn all of the Eighteen-Arms*, internal styles, external styles, everything. That was our curriculum. Nowadays, if you want to go to the Olympics, you learn the compulsory forms, and that's it.”*

Jet continues...

“I don't want to say either system is better or worse. I can only tell you that the physical quality of the athletes has improved -- and continues to do so steadily. Why is it that new world records seem to be set every year? Because training has become more scientific. Athletes have access to better nutrition, better vitamins, better doctors, sports psychologists, etc. These factors have helped develop the potential of the human body through the medium of sport.” *

But then Jet Li talks of the inner cultivation that Wu Shu can provide and that modern Wu Shu Martial Artists are not provided with that in their training. I guess its all depends what you want from the Martial Arts. But I understand what Jet Li is saying as it is not in your soul there is no way you can perform amicably (as Wu Shu is a performing Martial Art). This inner cultivation in my interpretation is passion, heart and creativeness. He mentions everyone doing the same thing and were all like “robots” and no one had their own “flavours”.

I believe people should all have their own style to suit them. If there is no passion about there is no point, if there is no heart to it there is no effort and creativeness is down to individual. But is this really what inner cultivation is? I like to invite people to put their own views about Jet Li’s comments. Thanks to Wellington for the comment in the first place.

Back to the lessons, Monday went to the gym and did some weights.

Tuesday, well I was too buys at work to go and explain to Danny that I have made a decision to leave Capoiera. So I phoned him. But the problem was it was very hard to tell him over the phone. So I didn’t quit Capoeira just yet. But like I said he is an awesome guy to train under and I highly recommend him.


Wednesday my brother and I went to Karl Tanswell’s Straight Blast gym. It was awesome we work on the jab and we had some additional tips from Jon one of the senior guys. Afterwards we went to Steve Powell’s JKD Class we did a load of energy drills called Hubud but the awesome thing about it was that Steve was encouraging as to put some live stuff into it rather than a regular hubud drill.

Steve also gave us some great views on Martial Arts which made a lot of sense. As with all my instructors there is absolutely no b.s especially with Steve who will tell you the truth. So what were these views he told my brother and I about? Well join his class and you will find out!..:)

On we Friday went to Warriors Eskrima class.and had a great lesson. Instructor Simon asked if I was going to see Elaine at the weekend. I replied yes ( in which I had a great weekend down Weston Super Mare and Wells) so Simon replies “OK I’ll try and knacker you out”. In which he almost did as we did some circuit training but luckily Gaz and William attended so Simon asked Lun and I to teach them so that Simon can teach Ray and John. We taught William and Gaz some double stick drills, we have taught a couple of the drills to them before but one we haven't. It was cool that they were keeping up with each other as we taught them the drills separately. Another rewarding thing is watching them to the drill and thinking to yourself that you taught them. But then again it’s down to the individuals to pick up and maintain the skills, so Gaz and William did awesome which made me quite happy.

So a good week in the Martial Arts. Thanks for reading and enjoy the pics.

Kit
*WuShu past and present by Jet Li read the rest here