Year: 2014

From Shiro Kuma's Blog by kumafr

In my dôjô we me have a new member watching every class, it is a human size skeleton*.

I decided to add this as part of our understanding of body movement. Each class is the occasion to show the students how a technique should be done. When they see the bone alignment, the joint logic, the technique begins to make sense.

骨 (Kotsu) regroups the secret principles introducing any of the ryûha but it also reads as bone. Maybe because these principles are the “skeleton”,  the foundation of the system.

Because we all have, at first, a sport educated vision of the martial arts, we miss the key point: which is to break the balance of the opponent. Thanks to the skeleton in the dôjô, the students are now able to visualize, in real size, the possible angles and the amount of leverage that can be applied to the joints at the skeleton level, therefore it is easier for them to get the technique correctly.

The typical fight in feudal Japan between two samurai implied the use of the Yoroi. The Yoroi protecting the body from the ferocious blows of the enemy **, it is obvious that hitting the flesh of breaking the bones was not feasable. But if hitting the body was hardly possible, taking the balance by using the bone structure was easy. By locking the body inside the Yoroi and by manipulating the joints, it is easy to get the opponent off balance. A fight in feudal Japan was mainly about bringing the opponent to the ground in order to finish him before he could stand up.

Trying to hit the muscles or to break the bones is sport.
Understanding the laws of balance by integrating the knowledge of bone positioning and angles is budô.

So don’t fight the flesh, but fight the bone structure. We are learning Budô not sport.

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*you can get one on amazon for about a 100€
** the Yoroi was primarily designed to fight the yari
Basics:  http://budomart.eu/index.php?id_category=24&controller=category&id_lang=1&p=2

From Shiro Kuma's Blog by kumafr

In French we have a saying that goes “pourquoi faire simple quand on peut faire compliquer”, which translates as “why making it simple when it can be done much more complex”.

It is often used when we are facing situations where things are done in a useless complex way. I often think about this when I’m watching the students trying to copy a movement I just did.

The Japanese have also a term for “simplicity and complexity”, and this is 繁簡, hankan. Funnily it reads the same as 反感, hankan: animosity, antipathy, or revolt. In order to survive a fight you have to be relaxed and move with simplicity.

The bujinkan movements are based on simple principles and not on fixed and complex forms. This is done in order to give us some freedom in finding the right solution to an unplanned situation. When we enter into the survival mode of action, only simple things are available. Because of the stress generated by a sudden attack the brain is frozen and thinking or analysing are not possible anymore.

Only simplicity 質朴 (shitsuboku), will work because it is natural, simple, and does not require a conscious mind behind it to put it into action.
Complexity, 複雑性 (fukuzatsusei), on the contrary, is the result of a thought process and will lead nowhere, except maybe to your own death.

In order to achieve simplicity*, one must train it on the mats. And this training is done through long repetitions of the Bujinkan basics. Once the basics are ingrained, the body and the mind are united and our moves are done without thinking in a simple manner.

Now  when students try to reproduce a movement, they often make something very complex because their abilities are hindered by their lack of strong basics. When basics are mastered, the body will move with simplicity and adapt freely to the situation at hand.

In your next trainings, try to find the simplest way of doing things. And remember this kaname:

A simple movement doesn’t require strength nor power.
A simple movement is relaxed and cannot be preconceived.

Shitsuboku leads to mastery, fukuzatsusei to nowhere.

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* simplicity is an important aspect of Shizen. A new dvds series covering the Shizen theme of 2006, will be released for Christmas at http://www.budomart.eu

From Shiro Kuma's Blog by kumafr

During my last class I discovered that one of the most difficult thing to teach is to be so relaxed when fighting that you can move any one of your arms or legs independently.

We were doing some “battlefield” situation applying Okyô.   Both opponents where attacking in Yoroi with a Tachi in Katate. Blocking and absorbing the attack, with the left arm protected by the Yoroi, each opponent was trying to hit the other with his sword. Rapidly the situation got stuck as the two bodies were forced against one another.

In this type of realistic situation there are no uke but two Tori.

Because of the close distance, applying a nage waza is the only logical possibility. We decided to train Okyô a nage Kaeshi.

What surprised me the most is that the one trying to do Okyô was so stiff in his reactions that he couldn’t do it and was often sent down to the ground by the supposed uke.

In this type of encounter there is a solution and it is to relax the right arm and to let go. This sudden relaxation creates a counter tension that sends the “thrower” to the ground.

What I understood is that because many practitioners do not have the ability to relax one part of the body (here the right arm), they cannot do the technique. They are like a 2 wheel drive vehicle.

On the contrary when you relax and become able to do it, you can do different things with any one of your limbs. You become a 4 wheel drive vehicle having each one of its wheels dealing with the ground in a various manner.

If the Yoroi is the car then your limbs are the wheels. The Yoroi is strong and united. And this unity of action is reinforced by the multiplicity of the moves of the limbs. You have to teach this ability to yourself and develop this partial relaxed attitude while caught in the middle of a heavy encounter.

You have to turn your body into a 4 wheel drive vehicle. Try it and see if your level of skills makes you a 2 wheel drive it a 4 wheel drive vehicle.

Once again Ninpô Taijutsu is 一体数多い (ittai kazûoi), “unity in multiplicity”.

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Okyô can be found here: http://budomart.eu/index.php?id_product=30&controller=product&id_lang=1

From Shiro Kuma's Blog by kumafr

Basics are the foundation of your taijutsu and without them you will never develop what sensei calls the  “natural movement”.
One of my friend and student, recently attended a few seminars in another country. He was amazed by two things. First the majority of the teachers were developing beautiful movements with no power and no strength. Then the students were copying these nice movements.
But then he discovered that even though he was not a student of these teachers, his strong basics allowed him to adjust and to understand what was being demonstrated. The other participants on the contrary, and even if they could mimic what was shown, we’re totally unable to get these movements through their own taijutsu.

This cosmic trend in the Bujinkan has been on for some years now,  and we begin to see how bad it impacts the student’s abilities to survive in a fight. The majority of Bujinkan practitioners will be really surprised the day they have to defend themselves with these nice but weak cosmic movements they have been taught at the dôjô and during seminars.

As sensei put it last August, you have to train your strength when you’re young to be able to use the “no strength” at a later and higher stage of your budô development.

Please put some real training back in your budô studies, improve your basics, and create strong foundations before you begin to move at the cosmic level.

Real fight is fierce, it’s not nice. Panic and fear will slow down your brain and your reactions, and when panic comes, only your ingrained basics will give you a chance to survive.

Strong basics are the only thing remaining when the rest is gone. A nice waza studied in the dôjô with a complacent partner will get you killed in a real encounter. “don’t try to apply a waza in a fight, you would lose” said sensei a few times in the last twenty years.

Teachers this is your responsibility. Please teach mainly basics (together with advanced movements) and stop focusing exclusively on the cosmic moves as it will kill your students. Remember that basic moves will eventually turn into cosmic moves, it’s a natural process. Don’t force nature.

If you don’t teach correctly, your students are like lambs entering the butcher shop, and a nice “baa baa” will not stop the butcher from killing them.