This is Dangerous to YOUR Training

Alright.  Strap in, kids because this is gonna be a bumpy one.

There is a huge problem that affects many people training in martial arts today that needs to be addressed because it is severely inhibiting their progress and skill.  It applies to fitness training as well, so if you don’t train martial art read this with whatever type of training you do in mind.

Here’s the issue

I like to call it the “oh, I know that already” syndrome.  Otherwise known as, the “he’s not teaching anything new” syndrome.  Over the past few years this problem has been running rampant.  Don’t get me wrong here, we all like to learn new things in training.  It makes it exciting, keeps things interesting, and helps us focus by giving us a sense of progressing.  I’m not saying that learning new techniques, ideas, tactics, strategies is a bad thing, not at all.  It’s when the process of accumulating all those shiny new *things* becomes the ultimate focus and goal of your training that we start to have a problem.  It’s when people begin to think that because they have been taught something once or twice (or even 10) times that they “know” it already.  You may have seen it.  You may have practiced it a few times.  You may think you get it.  But you most certainly do no know it until you own it.  And owning it is a long, long process of working on the skills you have been taught, literally hammering them into your body until they become a part of you.

Budo is a constant process of refinement.  This means you must spend tons of time in the trenches working on the basics (Basics Ain’t So Basic- see post here).  We all understand the analogy of building a house on sand.  The foundation is soft and constantly shifting which means the structure itself cannot be built very high or it will come crashing down.  I am eternally grateful to my teacher, Jack Hoban, for pushing me to build solid taijutsu foundations very early on in my Bujinkan martial arts career.

A really great example that comes to mind

Back in the day, for those of you who have been around long enough to remember, we used to train in a rundown and dingy YMCA in Asbury Park, NJ.  The room we had there was huge.  High ceilings with metal fencing covering the windows, plenty of mat space, and a lone heavy bag way in the corner.  Off of the main room was a much smaller enclosure we called the mirror room.  This room was probably used for an aerobics class once upon a time and was covered wall to wall in mirrors (thus the name).  The mirror room had one purpose and one purpose only.  Train San Shin No Kata over and over and over again until every movement was as close to perfect as possible.  We would do this for 45 minutes to an hour at least one class a week for months and months on end.  Now to be perfectly transparent here, I must admit that there were times I’d walk into that old Y and think to myself – oh dear God, not this again! :o) – However, looking back on it now I realize just how important and precious this training was for me.  It was a rare and unique opportunity to really build the groundwork for all the later training that was to come.  Thanks to all that time spent in the mirror room under Jack’s watchful eye, to this day my body knows exactly where it is in space intuitively, and  if my alignment is incorrect or my structure even slightly out of balance.

Without this type of intense training and focus on the foundational work of your art you cannot do the higher level training.  Or, perhaps a more accurate way to state this is that you can mimic or imitate the higher level skills at a superficial level, but you do not own them because your training castle has been built upon a foundation of sand.

Enjoy learning new things, but spend the time strengthening your foundations.  Do the work.  Explore the movements.  Play.  Train hard, but train well.  The study of budo is infinite, so don’t worry, we’re all equally as far from the end.

Jon

Jon Haas, "The Warrior Coach" has been training in Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu for more than 25 years and is currently ranked as a Kudan (9th degree black belt) under Jack Hoban Shihan. He has also trained in Okinawan Karate, Tae Kwon Do, Russian Systema, BJJ, Krav Maga, as well as Internal Martial Arts of Yiquan and Aiki.He is a certified Underground Strength Coach-Level 2, a certified Personal Trainer as well as founder of Warrior Fitness Training Systems. In 2008, Jon wrote the book, Warrior Fitness: Conditioning for Martial Arts, and since then has created numerous other online training and coaching programs helping people around the world become the strongest, most capable versions of themselves!

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