Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Introduction to Fancher's Street Edge: Self Defense Systems


We had an excellent seminar at the school last night taught by 4th Degree Black Belt Instructor Mr. Tim Fancher of Columbia, MO. Mr. Tim Fancher has over twenty five years of martial arts experience training and teaching the cutting edge of combat technique and knowledge. As a professional personal protection specialist he teaches seminars around the country and has been featured many times on both radio and television as an expert on the subject. His experience as a police officer, security professional, and martial arts instructor informs his unique and assertive approach to staying safe in any dangerous situation.

Attendees of the seminar were taught a variety of techniques including -

  • Defenses against Straight Wrist Grabs using strikes against vital targets
  • Driving Takedowns from 12 o'clock against Straight Punches
  • Defenses against Rear Bear Hugs using Groin Grabs and Piston Striking
  • Techniques for Controlling and Transporting a Subject using Wrist Locks
Mr. Fancher also discussed Key Concepts for preparing for and surviving violence. After that, the seminar ended with a study of Pressure Point/Pain Compliance techniques. Each of these techniques was practiced against specific, vulnerable targets such as the Mandibular Angle and the Hypoglossal Nerve on the opponent with the intent of changing their position or compelling behavior.


Mr. Fancher emphasized the importance of preparing for the engagement beforehand, with the right mental attitude, visualization, and physical training. There was plenty of body work and repetition, allowing each of the students to perform their techniques with energy and resistance. The techniques and intensity he brought to the seminar gave each of the students an expanded toolbox for identifying dangerous situations, and for defending themselves and others.

We look forward to seeing Mr. Tim Fancher again and continuing to benefit from his unique approach to personal protection. Mr. Fancher offers both private and group lessons in Fancher's Street Edge:Self Defense Systems, and can be contacted at http://www.facebook.com/Streetedge and timothyfancher@gmail.com.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

New Research Shows Meditation May Have Possible Long Term Benefits

From CNN’s Dan Gilgoff:

Can people strengthen the brain circuits associated with happiness and positive behavior,  just as we’re able to strengthen muscles with exercise?

Richard Davidson, who for decades has practiced Buddhist-style meditation – a form of mental exercise, he says – insists that we can.

And Davidson, who has been meditating since visiting India as a Harvard grad student in the 1970s, has credibility on the subject beyond his own experience.

A trained psychologist based at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, he has become the leader of a relatively new field called contemplative neuroscience — the brain science of meditation.

Over the last decade, Davidson and his colleagues have produced scientific evidence for the theory that meditation — the ancient eastern practice of sitting, usually accompanied by focusing on certain objects — permanently changes the brain for the better.

“We all know that if you engage in certain kinds of exercise on a regular basis you can strengthen certain muscle groups in predictable ways,” Davidson says in his office at the University of Wisconsin, where his research team has hosted scores of Buddhist monks and other meditators for brain scans.

“Strengthening neural systems is not fundamentally different,” he says. “It’s basically replacing certain habits of mind with other habits.”

Contemplative neuroscientists say that making a habit of meditation can strengthen brain circuits responsible for maintaining concentration and generating empathy.

One recent study by Davidson’s team found that novice meditators stimulated their limbic systems — the brain’s emotional network — during the practice of compassion meditation, an ancient Tibetan Buddhist practice.

That’s no great surprise, given that compassion meditation aims to produce a specific emotional state of intense empathy, sometimes call “lovingkindness.”

But the study also found that expert meditators — monks with more than 10,000 hours of practice — showed significantly greater activation of their limbic systems. The monks appeared to have permanently changed their brains to be more empathetic.

An earlier study by some of the same researchers found that committed meditators experienced sustained changes in baseline brain function, meaning that they had changed the way their brains operated even outside of meditation.

These changes included ramped-up activation of a brain region thought to be responsible for generating positive emotions, called the left-sided anterior region. The researchers found this change in novice meditators who’d enrolled in a course in mindfulness meditation — a technique that borrows heavily from Buddhism — that lasted just eight weeks.

But most brain research around meditation is still preliminary, waiting to be corroborated by other scientists. Meditation’s psychological benefits and its use in treatments for conditions as diverse as depression and chronic pain are more widely acknowledged.

Serious brain science around meditation has emerged only in about the last decade, since the birth of functional MRI allowed scientists to begin watching the brain and monitoring its changes in relatively real time.

Beginning in the late 1990s, a University of Pennsylvania-based researcher named Andrew Newberg said that his brain scans of experienced meditators showed the prefrontal cortex — the area of the brain that houses attention — surging into overdrive during meditation while the brain region governing our orientation in time and space, called the superior parietal lobe, went dark. (One of his scans is pictured, above.)

Newberg said his findings explained why meditators are able to cultivate intense concentration while also describing feelings of transcendence during meditation.

But some scientists said Newberg was over-interpreting his brain scans. Others said he failed to specify the kind of meditation he was studying, making his studies impossible to reproduce. His popular books, like Why God Won’t Go Away, caused more eye-rolling among neuroscientists, who said he hyped his findings to goose sales.

“It caused mainstream scientists to say that the only work that has been done in the field is of terrible quality,” says Alasdair Coles, a lecturer in neurology at England’s University of Cambridge.

Newberg, now at Thomas Jefferson University and Hospital in Philadelphia, stands by his research.

And contemplative neuroscience had gained more credibility in the scientific community since his early scans.

One sign of that is increased funding from the National Institutes of Health, which has helped establish new contemplative science research centers at Stanford University, Emory University, and the University of Wisconsin, where the world’s first brain imaging lab with a meditation room next door is now under construction.

The NIH could not provide numbers on how much it gives specifically to meditation brain research but its grants in complementary and alternative medicine — which encompass many meditation studies — have risen from around $300 million in 2007 to an estimated $541 million in 2011.

“The original investigations by people like Davidson in the 1990s were seen as intriguing, but it took some time to be convinced that brain processes were really changing during meditation,” says Josephine Briggs, Director of the NIH’s National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

Most studies so far have examined so-called focused-attention meditation, in which the practitioner concentrates on a particular subject, such as the breath. The meditator monitors the quality of attention and, when it drifts, returns attention to the object.

Over time, practitioners are supposed to find it easier to sustain attention during and outside of meditation.

In a 2007 study, Davidson compared the attentional abilities of novice meditators to experts in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. Participants in both groups were asked to practice focused-attention meditation on a fixed dot on a screen while researchers ran fMRI scans of their brains.

To challenge the participants’ attentional abilities, the scientists interrupted the meditations with distracting sounds.

The brain scans found that both experienced and novice meditators activated a network of attention-related regions of the brain during meditation. But the experienced meditators showed more activation in some of those regions.

The inexperienced meditators, meanwhile, showed increased activation in brain regions that have been shown to negatively correlate with sustaining attention. Experienced meditators were better able to activate their attentional networks to maintain concentration on the dot. They had, the study suggested, changed their brains.

The fMRI scans also showed that experienced meditators had less neural response to the distracting noises that interrupted the meditation.

In fact, the more hours of experience a meditator had, the scans found, the less active his or her emotional networks were during the distracting sounds, which meant the easier it was to focus.

More recently, contemplative neuroscience has turned toward compassion meditation, which involves generating empathy through objectless awareness; practitioners call it non-referential compassion meditation.

New neuroscientific interest in the practice comes largely at the urging of the Dalai Lama, the spiritual and politial leader of Tibetan Buddhists, for whom compassion meditation is a time-worn tradition.

The Dalai Lama has arranged for Tibetan monks to travel to American universities for brain scans and has spoken at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, the world’s largest gathering of brain scientists.

A religious leader, the Dalai Lama has said he supports contemplative neuroscience even though scientists are stripping meditation of its Buddhist roots, treating it purely as a mental exercise that more or less anyone can do.

“This is not a project about religion,” says Davidson. “Meditation is mental activity that could be understood in secular terms.”

Still, the nascent field faces challenges. Scientists have scanned just a few hundred brains on meditation do date, which makes for a pretty small research sample. And some scientists say researchers are over eager to use brain science to prove the that meditation “works.”

“This is a field that has been populated by true believers,” says Emory University scientist Charles Raison, who has studied meditation’s effect on the immune system. “Many of the people doing this research are trying to prove scientifically what they already know from experience, which is a major flaw.”

But Davidson says that other types of scientists also have deep personal interest in what they’re studying. And he argues that that’s a good thing.

“There’s a cadre of grad students and post docs who’ve found personal value in meditation and have been inspired to study it scientifically,” Davidson says. “These are people at the very best universities and they want to do this for a career.

“In ten years,” he says, “we’ll find that meditation research has become mainstream.”

From CNN.com

Kicking. It's not just for kicking anymore.

The kenpo curriculum attempts to offer a complete catalog of combat motion. It has literally dozens of different hand techniques, well over twenty different kicks,  strikes with the knees, the elbows, the forearm, the back of the leg, even the wrists. You learn tackles, takedowns, throws, and falls. Traps, locks, chokes, and strangulations. You even learn how to hurt your opponent using THEIR body.

In short there's a wide range of grappling and striking techniques, both circular and linear. Almost anything you could think of, using almost every part of your body, to hurt, injure, maim, or kill an attacker. Kenpo has it.

But it's up to the student to train the material. And most of us rely on our kenpo self defense technique practice for the bulk of that training. And that's great, because the techniques give us a context within which all these movements take place, and they allow us to see first hand how the human body reacts to applied force.

But the self defense techniques are heavily weighted towards upper body basics, and unless we supplement that training with pad and bag work, we end up with fast, accurate hand technique and sloppy, uncoordinated kicks.

Which is precisely why we should all spend more time practicing our kicks. In the air. On the shields. On the body. Because the only way to get better is to train more. 

But the benefits of training our kicks go far beyond just improving our kicking technique. Every time you execute a front kick you are engaging a long string of heavy, powerful muscles. And doing so burns calories, increases muscular strength, improves balance, and increases flexibility and range of motion. Kicking also incorporates a number of minor secondary movements such as pivoting the supporting leg, turning the torso, and flexing the abdominal muscles. It's a whole body workout, and you'll see the results all over your kenpo.

You see, when you practice kicking technique, you learn more about ground leverage, and rotational energy, and snapping and thrusting, and back up mass. And all those lessons translate directly into your hand techniques.

So the more you practice your kicks, the better your kicks will be. The better your punches and handswords will be. The better your neutral bow will be. The more effective your throws. You are learning a complex, interconnected series of physical skills, and the more you train any of them, the better they all become.

Getting good at martial arts is a matter of improving a hundred skills one percent at a time. You're laying the foundation for your future performance with every drill, every repetition, every kick. Make it a strong foundation, and you will build a mighty fortress.

Drills -
Beginner: Practice each of your kicks on the heavy bag ten times, each leg, for each of the letters in F.A.S.P. Form, Accuracy, Speed, Power.

Intermediate: Practice "three hit kenpo" using only kicks and sweeps.

Advanced: While sparring, Student A uses only kicking techniques and sweeps. Student B uses only hand techniques and grapples. Alternate.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

We Call it Offensive Defense

Most people call it sparring. But what exactly is sparring?

Well, first let's establish what it is not. Sparring is not self defense. It's not a real fight.

Instead, it's a competitive sport activity. It has rules, and judges, and specific allowable techniques and targets. The arena has boundaries, and there are time limits, and a set number of opponents. In self defense, there are no rules and nothing can be predicted. In sparring, every possible aspect of the engagement is accounted for and controlled.

In short, it's a game.

So why play the game? Especially if we are training for self defense? What possible use can there be in engaging in this activity if it doesn't match the parameters of our expected combat scenario?

Imagine a tennis player. They play a specific game on a specific size court with specific size racquets and specific rules. But is there anything they can learn from playing table tennis? Or racquetball? Or badminton? Those games are completely different, but they incorporate similar concepts involving ball spin and placement, racquet position, and court awareness.

For us, sparring serves a similar purpose. It isn't a real fight, but it can help us to learn and practice many combat skills which overlap with self defense. We can learn about environmental awareness, and striking combinations, and fighting while moving. We can see, and feel, what it is like to have someone hunting us, trying to hit us, trying to put us down. We can practice our techniques and our basics against a real, resisting opponent, and learn just what it takes to hit someone who doesn't want to be hit and what it takes to keep them from hitting us when they really, really want to.

That's why we spar. Because it may be a game, but it's a useful one. And it's a lot of fun too!

There are dangers associated with sparring as well which we must avoid in order to get the most out of it's practice. First, we must always remember that the rules which apply to sparring do not apply to self defense. In sparring, you can't kick your opponent in the knee, or punch him in the spine. Perhaps more importantly, he can't do those things to you. But in self defense, there are no judges to step in and put a stop to the engagement if you end up on the ground with multiple opponent's kicking you in the head and back. Training only for sparring will leave you unprepared both physically and mentally for self defense.

Second, sparring is alluring. The competitive nature, the accolades and trophies available to the athletic performer, all these things have a natural attraction to some people. And a certain kind of student can reach this point in his training and become lost. For some, competitive sparring is the end of the road. They enjoy the activity so much that they never learn to move beyond it, and in not progressing they miss out on all the glories which follow. Every step of your journey in the martial arts will be filled with wonder. Never doubt that the next lesson is greater and more awesome than the last. Such is the way with sparring. It is fun. It is exciting. Which is what makes it attractive to so many. But it is only a step in the journey, not the end of it.

Sparring is an intermediate drill. It is designed to teach specific skills to the student which are applicable in the wider arena of self defense. It is a testing ground, and a classroom. Learn to value it for what it has to offer. Learn to respect the dangers associated with sparring and to avoid the pitfalls that may slow your progress. Avoid unhealthy comparisons with your classmates and focus on your own journey. Learn to fight like a warrior, with courage and humility.

Because the greatest lesson sparring has to offer is that sometimes, we lose the fight. Sometimes we face bigger, stronger, tougher, more skilled opponents. When that happens in the school, we get a chance to try again. When it happens in the street, we may not.

So train hard. Fight well. And get better every time you step on the floor.

Drills -
Beginner: Practice two and three hit combinations against pads, shields, and the heavy bag. Try to incorporate linear and circular striking, kicks and punches, and inward and outward motion. One strike is easy to defend, multiple strikes are progressively more likely to succeed.

Intermediate: While sparring, Student A chooses one yellow belt self defense technique. Student B attacks with the specific attack for that technique and two other basic strikes. Each time they receive the appropriate attack Student A responds with their chosen technique, while sparring normally in response to the other two basic strikes. Alternate. Continue with each of your techniques.

Advanced: Carefully incorporate standing grappling techniques, leg kicking, takedowns, and ground fighting into your sparring.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Beginners: Relaxation and Communication

When you first step on the training room floor, it can be an intimidating experience. You're surrounded by strangers, wearing strange and uncomfortable clothing, and everyone seems to be speaking another language. It takes time to become comfortable with this new environment.

You will hear your instructors talk about relaxation. Relaxation is the key to speed. Relaxation is the key to flexibility. These aren't just lessons about your technique performance. Every lesson you learn in the studio has applications beyond the physical. If your mind is tight, (kime), you will hear less and learn slower. Instead, you must learn to cultivate the flowing mind, (mushin). Then you will be open to knowledge, and you will learn to love your mistakes, because they will contain new lessons.

Communicate with those around you. Ask questions. Learn names. To misquote Samuel Clemens, "familiarity breeds comfort." It's scary to get hit by strangers, it's less scary to get hit by your buddies. Let your instructors and your training partners know where you are at physically and mentally. Everybody's training experience is better when there is clear communication. Voice your concerns, and be generous with your praise. Never be afraid to ask for help. If you see that someone has a great front kick, ask them to show you how they got there. Someday new beginners will be asking you.

Every Master, of every skill, was a beginner once. The only difference between you and them is how many times they showed up to class.

Drills -
Beginner: Next time you're at the school, take a moment to close your eyes and feel the energy of the room. Try to sense the atmosphere of the space and make it your own. After all, it's your school too.

Intermediate: Take the time to attend a beginner class every once in a while. You'll be an example to the new students and you'll get to see just how far you've come in your own training.

Advanced: Help the beginner students with their material. You wouldn't be here without brown and black belts who pulled you up behind them. Now it's your responsibility to pass on the knowledge you have gained, just as it has always been. Master to student, hand to hand, for thousands of years.

Great Smoothie Recipes for the Health Conscious

Shouldn't that be all of us? Anyway, here are some great recipes to make delicious, healthy smoothies. They're a great way to start your day!


Banana - OJ Shake
1 Banana
1 scoop Protein powder
1 cup ice
1 cup OJ
1 tsp Stevia Powder
=====
309 Cals, 56g Carbs, 2.3g Fat, 22g Protein


Strawbery - Banana Shake
1 Banana
5 small Strawberries
1 scoop Protein powder
1 cup ice
1 cup OJ
1 tsp Stevia Powder
=====
312 Cals, 58g Carbs, 2.4g Fat, 22g Protein


Tropical Delight Shake
1 Banana
1/2 cup fresh pineapple
1/4 cup Fresh Mango
1 scoop Protein powder
1 cup ice
1 cup OJ
1 tsp Stevia Powder
4 oz Plain Yogurt
=====
356 Cals, 80g Carbs, <5g Fat, 27g Protein

For added variety, try tossing in a half cup of blueberries!


Full breakdowns on ingredients:
---------------------------------
Designer Whey Protein Powder - Natural Flavor
Calories = 90
Carbs = 2g
Fat = 1g
Protein = 19g

---------------------------------
Strawberries, fresh
Serving Size: 5 small (1" dia)
Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 2.5 g
Dietary Fiber 0.8 g
Calories 10.5
Total Fat 0.1 g
Saturated Fat 0.0 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.1 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 0.4 mg
Potassium 58.1 mg
Total Carbohydrate 2.5 g
Dietary Fiber 0.8 g
Sugars 0.0 g
Protein 0.2 g

---------------------------------
Blueberries, fresh
Serving Size: 0.5 cup

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 10.2 g
Dietary Fiber 2.0 g
Calories 40.6
Total Fat 0.3 g
Saturated Fat 0.0 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.1 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 4.4 mg
Potassium 64.5 mg
Total Carbohydrate 10.2 g
Dietary Fiber 2.0 g
Sugars 0.0 g
Protein 0.5 g

---------------------------------
Banana, fresh
Serving Size: 1 medium (7" to 7-7/8" long)

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 27.6 g
Dietary Fiber 2.8 g
Calories 108.6
Total Fat 0.6 g
Saturated Fat 0.2 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.1 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 1.2 mg
Potassium 467.3 mg
Total Carbohydrate 27.6 g
Dietary Fiber 2.8 g
Sugars 0.0 g
Protein 1.2 g

---------------------------------
Orange Juice
Serving Size: 1 cup

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 25.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.5 g
Calories 109.6
Total Fat 0.7 g
Saturated Fat 0.1 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.2 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.1 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 2.5 mg
Potassium 473.1 mg
Total Carbohydrate 25.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.5 g
Sugars 0.0 g
Protein 2.0 g

---------------------------------
Mangos
Serving Size: 0.25 cup, sliced

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 7.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.7 g
Calories 26.8
Total Fat 0.1 g
Saturated Fat 0.0 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 0.8 mg
Potassium 64.4 mg
Total Carbohydrate 7.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.7 g
Sugars 6.1 g
Protein 0.2 g

---------------------------------
Yogurt, plain, low fat
Serving Size: 0.5 container (4 oz)

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 8.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.0 g
Calories 71.2
Total Fat 1.8 g
Saturated Fat 1.1 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.5 g
Cholesterol 6.8 mg
Sodium 79.1 mg
Potassium 264.4 mg
Total Carbohydrate 8.0 g
Dietary Fiber 0.0 g
Sugars 8.0 g
Protein 5.9 g

---------------------------------
Pineapple, fresh
Serving Size: 0.5 cup, diced

Amount Per Serving
Total Carbohydrate 9.6 g
Dietary Fiber 0.9 g
Calories 38.0
Total Fat 0.3 g
Saturated Fat 0.0 g
Polyunsaturated Fat 0.1 g
Monounsaturated Fat 0.0 g
Cholesterol 0.0 mg
Sodium 0.8 mg
Potassium 87.6 mg
Total Carbohydrate 9.6 g
Dietary Fiber 0.9 g
Sugars 0.0 g
Protein 0.3 g


You only get one body. The battles we face every day in the arena of health and fitness are far more likely to kill us in the end than a mugger's knife or an assassin's bullet.

"No one dies from old age alone, but rather...worry, tension, and the will to die...these are the killers."

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Intermediate/Advanced Class: Lock Flow Drill

In intermediate class Tuesday we discussed finding and applying locking techniques against our opponent. With that in mind, the following video briefly discusses applying grappling techniques to the pattern contained within the technique Sword of Legend.



Practice the flow with your training partners and see if you can find other places to insert grappling techniques into your striking patterns.

Drills -
Beginner: While performing your techniques on the body, alter each of your basic strikes to basic grabs. Pay attention to targets and angles of attack. Practice both pulling and pressing with each grabbing technique.

Intermediate: Practice alternating lock flow drill with a partner while striking opponent with off hand.

Advanced: While performing your techniques on the body, look for opportunities to insert grappling techniques. Once you've point referenced to a grappling technique point reference out of the grappling technique and into a different self defense technique. Continue to completion.

Ground Fighting: Student A in Mounted Position attacks Student B with straight punches. Student B defends by grabbing Student A's extended punch and countering with the Straight Armbar (juji-gatame).

The First Four

Entrapping Circles, Entrapping Elbow, Concealing Strikes, Fallen Sword

The first four techniques.

These techniques begin your study of Kenpo because they are the structural foundation upon which all of your study of self defense motion will be applied. They may seem simple, but within that simplicity lay the keys to the kingdom.

In a self defense situation, you can be struck or you can be grappled. The attack will come from inside your arms, or outside your arms. And you can respond with either a strike, or a grapple. This is the entire universe of empty hand self defense. All unarmed combat situations can be defined by these three parameters. We will see later why it is so vitally important to understand these categories and their self defense applications, but first let's explore how the first four techniques you learn teach this important lesson.

Technique Yellow One -
Entrapping Circle
Attack - Left close grab to TOP of right shoulder from three o'clock
Defensive Maneuver - Left Pinning Check coupled with Right Arm Clockwise High Zone Clearing Motion
First Counter Offensive Maneuver - Right Wrap Around Arm Lock to Opponent's Left Elbow

In this technique we are GRAPPLED, the attack comes from OUTSIDE the arms, and we respond with a GRAPPLE. The defensive maneuver prevents the near arm from striking and protects against any punches thrown from our opponent's off hand. The counter offensive maneuver repositions the opponent for follow up striking.

Technique Yellow Two -
Entrapping Elbow
Attack - Left close grab to FRONT of right shoulder
Defensive Maneuver - Left Pinning Position Check to Opponents Left wrist coupled with Right Arm Counter Clockwise High Zone Clearing Motion
First Counter Offensive Maneuver - Right Downward Elbow Trap to Opponent's Left Elbow

In this technique we are GRAPPLED, the attack comes from INSIDE the arms, and we respond with a GRAPPLE. The defensive maneuver prevents the near arm from striking and protects against any punches thrown from our opponent's off hand. The counter offensive maneuver repositions the opponent for follow up striking.

Technique Yellow Three -
Concealing Strikes
Attack - Left Extended Grab to TOP of Right Shoulder from three o'clock
Defensive Maneuver - Left Pinning Check to Opponent's Left hand
First Counter Offensive Maneuver - Right Upward Obscure Handsword Strike to Opponent's Throat

In this technique we are GRAPPLED, the attack comes from OUTSIDE the arms, and we respond with a STRIKE. The defensive maneuver prevents the near arm from striking. The counter offensive maneuver creates a Predominant Pain Focus and shifts the Opponent's weight behind his center, limiting his mobility and striking power.

Technique Yellow Four -
Fallen Sword
Attack - Right Straight Step Thru Push to High Center of Chest from twelve o'clock Defensive Maneuver - Step back with Left foot to Right Neutral Bow First Counter Offensive Maneuver - Right Inward Block to Opponent's Left Radial Nerve

In this technique we are STRUCK, the attack comes from INSIDE the arms, and we respond with a STRIKE. The defensive maneuver moves us out of our Opponent's immediate striking range, while the counter offensive maneuver damages the first closest major weapon presented by our Opponent.

You will see these three parameters in every unarmed self defense technique you learn. In Sword of Destruction the STRIKE comes from OUTSIDE and we respond by STRIKING. In Securing the Storm the STRIKE comes from OUTSIDE and we respond with a GRAPPLE. in Broken Arm the GRAPPLE comes from INSIDE and we respond with a STRIKE.

The reason it is so important to learn to break down a combat situation into as few parameters as possible has to do with how the human mind works. Beginning with “On the Rate of Gain of Information” in 1952 by William Hick, studies over the last fifty years have shown that as the number of possible responses increases, the time required to choose amongst them also increases, even if all options are equally correct. This requires us to limit the possible number of responses to each possible stimulus in order to be effective.

Understanding the importance of limiting and defining the situation, the student then categorizes the possible permutations as described above.

If attacked from the front, the defender must control space. If attacked from behind he must reposition one or all of the principal actors in order to best approach the encounter.

If grappled with, the defender must avoid being grappled to an inescapable position. If struck, he must avoid being incapacitated by the blow.

If grappling in response, he must grapple his opponent to a disadvantageous position. If striking, he must incapacitate his opponent, through trauma or force.

This is one reason why you begin, from your first lesson, with simple two and three move techniques that teach you each of these parameters, and how to apply them. Study your yellow belt techniques, and as you progress look for similarities between them and the more advanced material you will learn. Take this simple lesson to heart and you will never have to say, "I don't have a technique for that."

Drills -
Beginners: Student A attacks from twelve o'clock with either a push or a grab. Student B defends with either a push or a grab. Alternate.

Intermediate: Student A attacks from any direction with either a kick or a lock. Student B defends with either a kick or a lock. Alternate.

Advanced: Student A attacks from any direction with any attack. Student B defends with a combination of alternating strikes and grapples. Alternate.

Ground Fighting: Student A attacks with strikes. Student B defends with grapples. Switch. Alternate. All positions.