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ISSUE #323 GUIDED CHAOS NEWS
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| | | What I Learned from the New Combative Movement Immersion Seminar Video
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| By Ari Kandel, GC 4th degree, Internal Self Defense, Boca Raton FL
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Recently
I posted on facebook.com/internalselfdefense a brief review of the new
Combative Movement Immersion Seminar video, available for sale now at
Attackproof.com. In the review, I wrote, “I feel that this video more
than any can really help ADVANCE anyone's training.” Well, the next
morning (Sunday), I proved myself right. (Don’t you love when that
happens???)
After attending the seminar live, my main take-aways
had been: How do we do contact flow better, for deeper and faster
learning? 1) go slow, 2) zen out, 3) move like Tina.
This
was all accurate (especially the “move like Tina” part, reinforced by
my most recent visit to NY), but there was more that I had missed,
either due to the sheer volume of information shared or my own tiredness
and lack of focus.
Some things emphasized in the video that I kinda missed in person are:
1) The primary importance of being absolutely unavailable
2) The importance of the “descending parabola” in all stepping and shifting
3)
The fact that John’s ability to move people comes from his sensitivity
to angles where people aren’t balanced, NOT from applying a lot of
pressure
4) If it requires effort, it’s bullshit (to quote John directly)
5)
We have to be completely liquid and structure-free, except for the
split second of the drop where the structure exists between the root
point and the enemy like a flash of lightning and then vanishes. |
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Regarding being unavailable:
In
the “unavailable yet unavoidable” mantra, unavailable comes first. If
you are available to the enemy’s strikes/pressure/manipulation, you give
up control of your own body, preventing you from making your own
attacks/pressure/manipulation unavoidable by the enemy.
A problem
is that many students, in their misplaced desire to skip to the
“unavoidable” in contact flow by landing strikes and taking balance,
cheat and deceive themselves on unavailability. They’ll accept pressure
and obstacles to press forward with their own attacks, erroneously
thinking they sufficiently “absorbed” or “mostly avoided” the training
partners’ movements, or their balance was “good enough,” or some other
justification for allowing themselves to be available. Unfortunately
this is setting them up for failure. Under real conditions against
bigger/stronger/faster enemies, being too available can be fatal as
movement, impact and penetration are magnified. As with other Guided
Chaos ideas like balance and looseness, it behooves us to “overtrain”
unavailability so that it’s most likely to be maximally available to us
under duress.
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| I
recall Tim saying back in the day, “The board doesn’t lie!” He was
referring to the GC wobble board used to challenge students’ balance.
His point was that the challenging balance situation created by the
board made it difficult for students to lie to themselves about their
availability and balance. If a student allowed herself to be available
to pressure/striking/leverage during contact flow on the wobble board,
she’d fall off the board. Nothing nebulous about that! A similar effect
can be achieved by practicing contact flow on one leg.
So on
Sunday morning, with two private students, I did just about all my
contact flow standing on one leg (and encouraged the students to do the
same, short of overly fatiguing their legs), focusing on unavailability.
Guess what? It worked! Not only was I able to be far less available,
but it seemed my unavailability was infectious. Both students for the
most part were far less available than usual, even when they stood on
both feet. Cool. |
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The
power of integrating the descending parabolic movement into all
movement cannot be overemphasized. I felt it first hand Sunday morning
each time I briefly switched from flowing on one leg to flowing on two,
while being mindful to use the descending parabolic path in each weight
shift and step. It enhances unavoidability and penetration while also
enhancing unavailability as better balance and looseness are maintained,
reducing available structure. Rather than move the whole skeleton
directly into the enemy with a straight weight shift or step, using the
descending parabolic movement allows the body to “melt” into the enemy
without structuring—or so it feels on each end. Need to play with this a
lot more until it becomes the norm, as it is for John.
As
with unavailability, we need to be far harsher on ourselves to move
each other via sensitivity rather than via effort and pressure. It’s too
tempting at times to apply JUST A LITTLE MORE pressure to take a
training partner’s balance. Unfortunately, that temptation sets back our
training. Adding pressure reduces unavailability and unavoidability,
increases structure and commitment, reduces sensitivity and generally
increases our vulnerability while conditioning our mind to accept that
more muscular effort is a good thing. Bad news all around! Having the
patience to move slowly and experiment with low-effort angles and
changes may not produce as much instant gratification in terms of
immediately affecting our training partners, but it will pay off
big-time as we gradually learn to feel how we can disrupt things with
minimal effort and pressure. Using the wobble board and/or standing on
one leg can help with this as well, because use of excessive
pressure/structure/effort is immediately punished by loss of balance. |
| There
is WAY more to unpack from the 4-hour-plus video, and way more that
I’ll have to overhaul in my own training and movement habits beyond a
single successful morning to get on a better path. Hopefully though I’ve
communicated how valuable it can be to have some of John’s deepest
lessons and demonstrations available to you on video. No, I don’t think
you can easily “learn Guided Chaos” from scratch exclusively via video.
Hands-on contact with experienced teachers is invaluable to ensure you
and your training partners are on the right track. That being said,
careful study of video lessons, especially one so dense and deep as the
Combative Movement Immersion Seminar video, can most definitely
supercharge and advance the training of any dedicated practitioner.
My recommendation is redoubled: save up and GET IT!
▼ ▼ ▼
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INCLUDES 2 BONUS Chapters shot AFTER the seminar!
WANT IT RIGHT NOW?
► Get the ON-DEMAND DOWNLOAD for just $95
- No waiting, no shipping fees!
- Watch immediately...or you can download to your device (after purchase, go to https://digital.guidedchaos.com/library and on that same page, there are links to apps for downloading).
- Works on computer, tablet or smartphone
- Nothing to break, scratch or lose (just re-download)
► ...Or, Get the 3-disc DVD for $125
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