Teaching and learning

The other day I have a person approach me and wanted me to teach him the tricks of self-defense. As he put it himself. Like it just was a question of learning a killer movement he could use anytime.

It's not the first time people have asked me to learn them or their children or better half to learn self defense. It could be soooo nice - they might need it one day. What happens is a typical "dance" of words back and forth about what they should learn and how much time they are to spend and so on.

But really gets to me, is that people want to" teached". They don't want to learn, but be taught. They say "teach me", and wait to taught. The expectations that showing them the ropes will automatically give them the skills to defend themselves, besides the fact that movement can't by the majority of people be master by just watching. The other part of teaching is the passiveness or argumentativeness approach that many times are shown by these "teach me students". Non of which give learning a possibility, because learning is the responsibility of the person that wants to learn. You can't learn if you are not motivated to it.

Motivation can be made by the teacher, opening up the student to learning. But the students that really learn into the core, are those that are motivated by themselves. They will suck it all up and give it a try, no matter if its fun or boring. They will endure hard training and push themselves. They will in the end own their own experiences from their own motivations, and in such be part of that person for the rest of their life. And since were talking self-defense; this kind will go much further than "teach me" students.

In a sense, and not always knowing it, the self motivated student takes responsibility of learning, or you could say that the person is self driven from their own needs, and will get the teaching to fit.

So teaching is something the teacher does, while the student learns.The teach can only open up to options and possibilities that enhance the possibility for the student to learn. But the learning process itself is souly the students "job".

Testing wisdom

I've been doing Martial Arts(MA) since 1978. Through time I've meet a lot of people  students, friends, teachers, coaches and MA people who are not any of these. But all of them have influenced me, and in a sense made me what I'm today.

Some of them were self centered others willing to share and give with out thought. Some the toughest I've ever fighted, and others so soft you barely could look at them with out them creeping over to a corner.

But it's easy to pick out the extremes, much more harder is picking out were the small stuff that doesn't your training. To see the teacher that uses terror to keep his pupils in line is easy, but the teacher that keeps students by "You just have to do this 1000 times, and you'll understand" is harder.

Experience through repetition is important, but being able to tell a person upfront what is expected as a result. Otherwise the student doesn't really know if he's working in the right direction. Worst case were the teacher keeps teaching without talking , the student might learn to do the technique the correct way, but understanding it completely differently. So when the student one day becomes a master and starts to apply his "wisdom", the application of it may be catastrophically, in worse case sending his students to get maimed or killed in a violent confrontation. A way of always ensuring your understanding and application of what you've learn is to test it. The test could be competition fighting or trying the technique/concept in real life.

Understanding how to test techniques or concepts become important when training with teachers or coaches.
Test can vary from just understanding body movement over to trying the technique in a scenario, over to hearing the teachers/coaches reason of why things are done as they are.

Your experience and who and what you are really will define your own tests.  This also shows how important it is to know yourself; on a mental and physical level. Your technique will look differently throwing a person that is lower than you, then the other way around. If a teacher can't get you to handle the difference, there is a great chance that they really can't help you at all.

There is a catch to being critical to what your learning, and that is your entering an era which you haven't got any experience, and it can be difficult to evaluate the value of it upfront. So sometimes you just have to throw yourself into it, and take a chance and see what the results are. Depending on how much time your using mini test /evaluations can be made along the line.

Starting MA back in 1978 had me doing alot of kata's, countless repetitions, religious influence, mediation, far eastern mystic, totally submission to teacher - never questioning, eating the "right food"," thinking" the correct thoughts and so on. Some of the things I wouldn't let my students do today, either because it's totally wrong or just the "learning" takes to long compared to the time it takes to "learn" it. While others I will push them through, but I will tell them why I do it. giving them the fundamentals to understand, and be able to "test" if what they are doing works.

This is really letting students learn how to learn through "testing", and not just doing techniques.

Agression

Just had the great pleasure to participate in one of Europa’s best Martial arts seminar, with really inspirering Martial art masters. One of these, Sensei Steve Barnett, work our group with aggression growth. Not working on becoming aggressive, but to use your built in aggression. Letting it become a tool and motivation for handling violent situations. But also a tool for learning that side of yourself and learning how to use it, and not let I be something that just pops up and you have no knowledge and control over.

Aggression is an emotion, just like many other emotions like joy, sadness and so on. Learning how to handle emotions are a natural part of life. Like it is unnatural to suppress any feel, and might lead to emotional problems in the future.

There are people that believe that aggression is wrong, and must be suppressed. A thought that aggression destroys, and is not something that builds and helps create relationships. But violence already has defined that building and creating something good, isn’t a part of what’s going on. Some people think that meeting violence by non aggression, will negate violence or at least minimize it. And in some cases it just might, but really depending on the scenario. Working with aggression isn’t about the situations that can be handled by non-agresssion, but being able to use aggression in situations were that is the solution. The person who decides which reaction will stop the violence is the attacker; his mind set, his goal and expectations. This is a blog entry worthy by itself.

Knowing your aggression is balancing your self between your different emotions. It also make you more aware of what you are feeling, and can take action on it. A good read about listening to you emotions is “Gift of fear “ by Gavin DeBecker. The faster you can catch up on your emotions the faster you can react on them, and that is the key. You can react on them. You don’t have to be a slave of emotions, but learn to listen and then do as you want.

So as you can let joy overwhelm you at a birthday party or a weeding party, you can let aggression help you out of a situation with a knife wielding mugger.

While thinking about it, take a look at a friends blog about aggression and “no-mind”. It’s worth a read: http://kojutsukan.blogspot.dk/2012/10/mushin-no-shin.html