The bad tooth is to the far right. Ouch!

Regardless of how advanced in self defense or martial arts you are, you deal with fear. All of us deal with fear. Period.

How well you deal with your fear is what separates the survivors from the cannon fodder.

Those that train with me or at Magic City Dojo know that I am a fan of Tony Blauer and his research on the psychology of combat and self defense.

One of the main principles that he writes and teaches is fear management. How to understand, manage, and work through your fear.

Fear can have a debilitating effect on your performance in any situation. Not just a threat to your physical being. You can fear a mugging, failing a college exam, blowing a job interview, moving to a new city, ending a bad relationship, or having a wisdom tooth extracted.

That last one was my situation this past Thanksgiving weekend.

I started with a mild toothache on Monday. It didn’t really get any better or worse on Tuesday. Wednesday started out the same and gradually got worse through the night. Wednesday night I barely got any sleep. Thanksgiving day I woke up from the pain. It was bad enough to give me a tension headache and even made me nauseated. It sucked!

As a kid, I hated going to the dentist…with a passion! Mind you, this was probably 15 years ago at best. It was always an awful experience. Dental medicine has certainly progressed in that time, so I was told. I had not experienced it myself directly. The F.E.A.R. was still there. But, the direct experience of the pain outweighed my F.E.A.R. I had to see the dentist and take care of the problem.

The Self Defense Connection

Tony Blauer has a couple of acronyms to explain F.E.A.R.

F.E.A.R. = False Expectations Appearing Real

F.E.A.R. = False Evidence Appearing Real

From what I have viewed from Coach Blauer, the most succinct way of expressing this in terms of self defense is as follows:

Ask yourself honestly…are you afraid of a knife? Think about that for a moment.

Do you own a knife? If you have a kitchen, you probably own at least one steak knife if not several types of cooking knives. So, you don’t really fear knives. You fear a knife fighter…right?

Say your martial arts teacher, someone you trust with your life, is holding a live blade. He is an experienced knife fighter; he has the means and opportunity to seriously hurt you, but you implicitly trust him. So you don’t really fear a knife fighter. You actually fear getting cut.

Have you ever cut yourself with a knife by mistake? I certainly have. Sure it hurt, but it wasn’t that bad. You actually fear getting cut in a life threatening way.

How many of you said yes to the first question, “…are you afraid of a knife?” If so, the issue is with understanding what your fear really is.

Say you’re facing a buff, athletic guy that is pissed at you for whatever reason. He says he going to kick your ass into next week. Are you afraid? No? Maybe? Probably? Yes?

What actual evidence proves that he can do what he says he can do? Maybe he hurt someone else. But that was someone else. What is the proof that he can hurt you? What is the scientific evidence? Has he hurt you before? If  the answer is no, then what is your F.E.A.R. based on? If the answer is yes, what is the evidence that he is capable of  doing it again?

The fact is that there is no evidence or proof until it actually, physically happens. So, in reality, your F.E.A.R is your own ego projections of what you think will happen to you. Before the incident, there is no proof!

In the Dentist’s Chair

I finally got an appointment the Friday morning after Thanksgiving. Sitting there in the dentist chair, the thought’s raced through my head:

“This is going to hurt for days on end. The actual tooth extraction is going to be so painful. This is going to suck so bad (the false expectations/evidence), but I have to do something. I can’t deal with the evident pain I was actually experiencing from the toothache (the proof).”

My F.E.A.R. wasn’t anywhere near the phobic level, but it was there.

Then I remembered the F.E.A.R. acronyms. I controlled my breathing and got calm and focused. I gave myself positive self talk. There is no proof that this is going to be unbearable. I told myself that the experience would be a piece of cake. Positive motivation. In Coach Blauer’s terminology, I had gone from the victim mindset to the victor mindset. Rather than feeling threatened, I chose to feel challenged. I was going to conquer this experience!

The Evidence

In the end, it was in fact a piece of cake! No real pain at all. A little minor soreness that Friday night. I didn’t even need the pain meds that they prescribed.

The hardest part was the post extraction maintenance. Don’t spit. Don’t drink through a straw. Swish gently with warm salt water X amount of times a day for the next 7 days, etc. More of an inconvenience than anything.

Conclusion

The next time you are experiencing F.E.A.R., take a breath and ask yourself, “What am I really afraid of? What is the evident proof?” Are you psyching yourself out, or are you psyching yourself up?

What have been your experiences? Leave your story in the comments.

For more info on Tony Blauer, F.E.A.R. Management, PDR (Personal Defense Readiness), and S.P.E.A.R., please visit www.tonyblauer.com 

Kaitlin-san after metsubushi practice.

I’d suggest doing all this over a sink, maybe outside. Last time I did this, I saved the egg innards in tupperware and made a bunch of scrambled eggs for me and my friends.

1. Buy one or two dozen eggs. (2 dozen pretty much guarantees you’ll be able to practice each technique a couple times, and probably have some left over to share with those who don’t have enough or to have some fun after it’s all done.)

2. Take a pin or an unbent paper clip and put a small hole on one end of the egg.

3. Make another hole on the other end of the egg, but make this one a little bigger.

4. Over a sink, blow through the small hole to push the yolk out the bigger hole. If you’re going red in the face and nothing’s happening, make both holes a tad bigger – you may not be getting enough air in or the bottom hole may be too small for the yolk.

5. Rinse out the inside of the egg so none of the egg residue sticks to the powder.

6. Set the hollowed, rinsed-out egg back in the egg carton to dry.

6b. On drying: Allow at least a night for the eggs to dry, preferably more. Better to give it more time than necessary than have wet baby powder that doesn’t work well. That being said, I’d suggest letting them sit for a few hours and then flipping them over. If anyone else has tips on drying methods, please leave a comment.

7. Once you’ve got all your eggs emptied and dry, it’s time to fill them up with baby powder! Standard baby powder works fine; you can use scented powder if you want. Puts lots of nice smells in the air, haha.

8. First, put some tape over the small hole. It’ll get messy very quickly if you don’t.

9. This is Rebecca Morrow’s clever method for getting the baby powder in:

Get a 3×5 notecard and make your little funnel.

10. Pour the baby powder inside the funnel and, using a bo shuriken, pencil, or other thin item, stir the baby powder around so it actually goes down into the egg.

Using a notecard funnel and chopstick to help fill the eggshell with powder.

11. When it looks full, shake the egg a little to get the powder to settle; if there’s still room, add more powder.

12. When you can’t get anymore powder inside, set it back in the egg carton and tape up the top hole.

13. Repeat until they’re all done. You’re ready to go!

Finished metsubushi with convenient carrying case.

Editor’s note: Please be sure to wear eye protection and a dust mask for safety in training!

If anyone has additions, alternatives, or corrections, please post them in the comments section.

Better men than me have already written about it.

But this morning, I saw the image below in an email that came yesterday, but I didn’t see it until today. So, I decided to share…

Image created by Brian Niemann.

The Japanese Sword

Of course there was the excellent training we participated in. But there were also fun stories shared, new friends and connections made, and an inspiring show of support from the people in the Bujinkan.

Our seminar host was Shihan Phil Legare, 15th dan in Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu, founder of the Bujinkan Taka-Seigi Dojo and Shinken Taijutsu.

I’ll give a moment by moment account of the weekend, but first here is a little background info about Shihan Lithgow:

Shihan Mark Lithgow

Shihan Lithgow has lived in Japan longer than any other gaijin studying the Bujinkan martial arts (more than 25 yrs). You will see him almost every Sunday under the Kamidana training and translating for Soke.

In addition to his Bujinkan training, Shihan Lithgow also has studied Shinkage-ryu kenjutsu (swordsmanship of the “New Shadow” school) as well as kyudo (way of Japanese archery) for many years.

Because of his long residence in Japan and extensive study of Budo, Shihan Lithgow is in a unique position to see how Hatsumi-soke’s budo and the Bujinkan have evolved over the last two or three decades. This gives him insight to be able to guide the rest of us in our own training.

Left to right: Shidoshi Mike Tucker, Shihan Phil Legare, Ergin Esirgemez, Shihan Mark Lithgow

Koppo

Friday night’s training started with a quick talk about “koppo.”

On one level, koppo refers to koppojutsu. Most folks initially think of koppojutsu as “bone breaking skills.” But on a deeper level, koppojutsu refers to the use of your skeletal alignment to give structural integrity to your taijutsu.

On an even deeper level, koppo refers to “bone.” This is in the sense of the bone of your taijutsu or the core of your taijutsu.

If we were to take a cross-section of our thigh, our femur bone would be at the core of the leg.

So in essence, one of the major themes of the seminar was about developing your core. And of course, the koppo of budo lies in the kihon (fundamentals). The bone of your taijutsu must be solid before adding the individual stylistic features. Without solid bone in your taijutsu, all your techniques will be limp and weak.

Jinchu

Another key point of study was “jinchu.” Jinchu means “center of man.”

Most often when we refer to jinchu, we think of the kyusho of the philtrum.

Jinchu in this sense meant the direction of your centerline and structure for strength. The strength referred to here is not brute muscular strength, but in the natural strength contained in your properly aligned skeletal structure.

These two concepts, koppo and jinchu, were the bone of the seminar.

Friday Night

Shihan Lithgow wished to see the current bone of our taijutsu by having everyone simply run themselves through kihon happo several times.

Then we broke down the movements of ichimonji no kata and hicho no kata. The breakdown of the movements came from Shihan Lithgow reading his copy of the Tenchijin Ryaku no Maki in the original Japanese.

One unique thing about this was that his copy specifies the kyusho (weak point) to strike in the techniques.

Again the emphasis was on being aware of your jinchu and koppo in the techniques.

After training, Shihan Legare had set up a nice reception for those in attendance. It was good to get to talk with old friends and make new friends (shout out to the Boston crew!).

We relaxed with a couple of beers at the hotel bar after the reception.

I always encourage folks that attend seminars to join in the dinners and post dinner drinks. One reason is you get to know the people you train with. Another is that you will often learn something important that wouldn’t normally come up during the actual training sessions. Shihan Lithgow talked a little about the other arts he’s practiced (kyudo and Shinkage-ryu) as well as the concept of shu-kei-ko.

Shu-kei-ko

Lately in the Bujinkan, folks have talked and written about the shu-ha-ri training model.

• Shu = learn
• Ha = variate
• Ri = depart

The progression is linear.

Shihan Lithgow talked about shu-kei-ko.

• Shu = learn
• Kei = practice
• Ko = create

This progression is cyclic.

Preparatory Training

We continued with breaking down kihon happo according to the Tenchijin Ryaku no Maki. We began with jumonji no kata again with special awareness on the koppo and jinchu concepts.

Then we started in on sword training.

Wearing the Sword

Shihan Lithgow showed different ways to wear the sword.

• Professional method: wearing the sword on the left hip so that the koshira comes into alignment with the solar plexus. This would be the equivalent of a police officer with a nice holster for his pistol.
• Ronin method: wearing the sword on the left hip, but with the tsuka a little to the left of the left hip. This would be the equivalent of the young punk that stuffs his pistol down the back of his pants.

The Sageo

How to tie the sageo (cord) of the sword varies from school to school.

Some schools simply sling the cord over the saya (scabbard) so that it hangs freely between the saya and the left buttock. Other schools wrap the sageo around the belt in front of the right hip joint. The advantage of these methods are that you could easily remove the saya to use it as a weapon or simply discard it so that it doesn’t hinder your movement.

Another method is to wrap the sageo around the saya and belt on the left hip several times. This somewhat immobilizes the saya so that an opponent couldn’t easily remove your sword or push the saya forward preventing you from drawing the blade.

Yet another method would be to simply carry the sword in your left and so that you can draw the blade with the right hand and discard the saya quickly. This would also allow you to move the weapon freely in close quarters.

Te no Uchi

Te no uchi literally means “inside the hand.” This refers to the grip.

Each school has it’s own te no uchi, but the form Shihan Lithgow showed us was just simply logical and practical.

The point was to align the skeleton properly to provide structural strength to support our actions with the sword whether it was in kamae, cutting, or blocking.

The details of the grip he showed were contrary to what I (and probably most others in attendance) had originally learned.

One additional detail I’ve noticed from using this te no uchi, is that it also prevents the blade from wavering during a cut. Keeping a straight cutting line is very important in tameshigiri (test cutting).

Sword Training

Shihan Lithgow showed us three basic blocking methods with the sword on Saturday. That’s about it. I think we spent about an hour on each method. But this established an important teaching/training point: not to collect a bunch of sword techniques, but to develop some bone, some koppo, in our kenjutsu.

On Sunday, Shihan Lithgow taught some more subtle movement with sword technique. The movements were fairly straight forward on the surface appearance,  but the details were intense. The focus required to move correctly and develop the bone of the technique was brain frying!

Kamae

Shihan Lithgow spoke about some concepts on kamae; particularly on the idea of threat and bait.

Take daijodan no kamae for example. Daijodan no kamae means “great upper level posture.” The sword is held in both hands and raised above the head ready to strike down.

The threat is a 3 foot long razor blade ready to cut you down. The bait is the opponent’s left wrist.

This can also be applied to taijutsu postures as well.

No Wasted Lines!

I think the essence of this concept is that when making a cut, you cut a target line rather than a specific target. This way if the opponent changes in a certain way, you may not cut the neck, but you’ll cut the wrist. The specific target may change based on the distance, but the cutting line stays the same.

And there should always be the ability to stab at the end of a cut. No wasted lines!

Raffle for Shihan Greg Heeg

Shihan Legare arranged for a few items to be raffled off at dinner Saturday night to raise money to help out Shihan Greg Heeg, 15th dan.

Shihan Heeg has been going through an extremely fierce battle with cancer.

The raffle raised $3000 to go to Shihan Heeg and his wife, Colleen to help pay medical expenses.

A huge thank you to all that helped with this effort!!!

In Conclusion

As I wrote above, the point was to develop some “bone” in our movement, not to collect a few sword techniques. In fact, I think the actual number of sword techniques we learned was around 8 (kihon happo again???) techniques.

I think anyone that came to collect techniques probably wasted their time, money, and effort. Those that came to improve the bone/koppo of their movement got much more out of the seminar. I know I did!

So, I highly recommend that if you have the chance to train with Shihan Lithgow, definitely do so!

Shidoshi Silvio Herasme and Shidoshi Tucker

There you are…having a drink at your favorite pub, minding your own business. You turn to look around the room to see which TV is showing the big game. And your elbow accidentally bumps some guy’s beer and spills it all over his girlfriend.

The guy is 6’4” and solid muscle. It’s obvious that he’s in great shape. He’s covered in tribal tattoos and wearing his favorite TapOut shirt. Oh boy. He probably trains in some kind of fighting system. And…he’s really pissed!

You immediately apologize and offer to pay their bar tabs. But that’s not good enough. This guy wants to teach you a lesson you’ll never forget.

Can you survive a fight with this guy?

For the girls…

It’s late. You’re getting off work or out of your night classes. You’re walking to your car in the parking deck when suddenly you’re attacked.

Your attacker is bigger and stronger than you. His teeth look rotten and he looks like he hasn’t bathed in a year. He’s grabbing at you and describing the sexually perverse things he’s going to do to you.

Can you escape the situation?

The Cold Hard Truth

Most people that call themselves martial artists have likely never been anywhere close to having been in a real fight. The chaos, the fear, the adrenaline, the pain.

It doesn’t matter if you took a self defense course once. Some training is better than none, but if you don’t practice consistently, your skills will deteriorate.

It doesn’t matter what your martial arts belt rank is. Your opponent doesn’t know your rank. Even if he did know your rank, he probably wouldn’t care and could actually make that his motivation to pound on you even harder.

It doesn’t matter that you train in a 900 year old martial arts style that has been tested and proven on the battlefields of ancient Japan. The better question is, “Have you been battle tested?”

Opponent Factors

In the Bujinkan, we have this concept of Shin Gi Tai Ichi (unification of spirit, technique, and body). We usually think about this only in regard to ourselves, but this also applies to your opponent.

Is your opponent:

• unmotivated? (ceases aggression at first sign of resistance)
• motivated? (willing to put in some degree of effort)
• highly motivated? (hell bent on getting what he wants no matter how much you resist)

Is your opponent:

• unskilled? (fights wildly with no control, balance, or effectiveness)
• skilled? (sort of knows what he’s doing; probably been in a few fights)
• highly skilled? (great deal of training, practice, and experience)

Is your opponent:

• in poor shape? (overweight, looks soft, or injured; smaller than you)
• in average shape? (average jogger/weight lifter)
• in very good shape? (athletic, buff, or bigger than you)

Think about this for a moment. Which opponent are you training for? Most, not all, but most martial arts training is geared towards resisting an unskilled attacker.

Motivation is the most important, but often the most ignored factor. Most self defense courses are designed to deal with a partially motivated yet unskilled attacker. This is fine. Most opportunistic criminals fall into this category. But what about a highly motivated attacker?

Which opponent should you be training for?

Note that her shirt says, "I Void Warranties."

Scott-san's warranty has been voided!

What Kind of Martial Artist Do You Want to Be?

If you’re serious about your budo, then working towards being highly motivated, highly skilled, and in very good shape should have been your answer to the above question.

Yet how many martial artists actually do that? Especially with the motivation aspect. This is why the ancient martial arts masters always wrote that spirit is more important than technique.

A Dose of Reality

Most of what is passed off as martial art is closer to martial fantasy or at best, martial theory.

Your teacher says you can knock out a man with a certain technique. How do you know? Have you actually knocked someone out with that technique?

Have you practiced sword skills yet never performed tameshigiri (test cutting through rolled and soaked rice straw mats with a live blade)? What is the real evidence of your skill?

There is a lot of talk about how you would fight in yoroi (Japanese armor), often commenting about how the additional weight (about 65-80lbs) of the armor changes your techniques. Have you actually trained in armor, or even worn armor? How do you know how the armor will affect your techniques?

From Theory to Practice

So how do you test your budo to see if it will work in a real situation?

Obviously, you can’t go out getting into fights just to test your martial arts. But you can train these aspects of Shin Gi Tai Ichi. This is where budo and daily life connect.

• Shin (spirit / motivation): Do things that require courage. Do things that require you to tap into your spirit to accomplish. Examine your life and find the things that you’re anxious about doing. Then start doing them. Of course, be smart and safe about it. Start small and build up. Discover your confidence.
• Gi (technique / skill): Find a good teacher that has an eye for reality and incorporates that into training. Use your own experiences or fights you’ve witnessed to evaluate the credibility of the techniques you are practicing. Drill your techniques repetitively while gradually increasing the energy and intensity.
• Tai (body / fitness): Work to get into shape. You don’t have to be in shape to begin martial arts training. But if you really expect to survive a real fight, you need to be in decent shape. You should at a minimum be able to run and sprint (towards the fight for cops and military; away from the fight in civilian self defense).

Magokoro (sincerity)

It’s not necessary to always train at full speed, full power intensity. That just leads to injury. But if you’ve never been in a real fight (or at least engaged in some hard and fast contact training at some point in your life), you may be in for a rude awakening.

Magokoro is not just sincerity in terms of sincere intentions, but also in sincere evaluation.

You have to use your own best judgement when it comes to choosing a teacher. Can he take you to where you want to go in your training? Be sincere in your evaluation and choose wisely.

Think critically and honestly when examining your own personal ability. Do you over estimate yourself? Do you under estimate yourself? Make an honest assessment.

These points are not just valid for your budo, but also for your daily life.

Ultimately, you responsible for your own training, safety, and survival. No one else. This is connected to true freedom.

What are your thoughts? Post your comments in the box below.

The more freedom you have, the less security. The more security, the less freedom. It’s a spectrum, and you can’t really have all of both. You must decide for yourself what level of each is acceptable to you.

In certain high risk situations, security should take precedence. Bodyguarding, PSD (personal security detail), Department of Corrections, zombie apocalypse, etc. But that also means that you need to do what the security team tells you so that they can do their jobs more effectively and keep you safe.

Or you can fore go the security team, do what you want, when you want, where you want. There is more freedom, but you are now left to your own devices to secure your own safety. Do you have the power to protect yourself? The more powerful the opponent, the more powerful you must be.

And you must bear that power with responsibility.

So, it is a balance. And this applies to any entity. Individual, family, organization, community, nation.

The danger is when one person, group, or organization decides to tell you what level of freedom vs. security you may have without your consent.

Freedom is not free. If you have freedom, then there will always be someone trying to take it from you. Maybe piece by piece. Maybe completely in one fell swoop. But freedom is not free.

Freedom is a delicate thing and must be protected.

If you want to keep your freedom, then often you must fight for it. Whether through debate, through protest, through education, or through violence. You will have to fight for it. And it will cost you something. It will certainly cost you time and effort. Sometimes it will cost you blood.

Want the most of freedom and security? Then you must take responsibility for your own personal freedom. You must take responsibility for your own personal security. You must take responsibility for your own personal training to empower yourself to have both!

What are your thoughts? Please share in the comments.

He talked about several martial arts concepts, but really emphasized the concept of connection.

“Cherish your connections!” he said.

As with everything in budo, there are multiple layers to what is taught and practiced.

Shihan Masse’s statement for us to cherish our connections is not only in terms of our connections to our friends, family, and colleagues, but also our connections to our opponents.

Daily Life Connections

The message as it relates to connection in terms of your relationships with the people in your life may seem quite obvious on the surface. But as you already know, surface value (or “face value”) is not always representative of the true substance underneath. Thus there is the saying about not judging a book by it’s cover. This is also connected to kyojitsu tenkan ho (the connection between perception and reality; falsehood and truth).

One of the most important reasons that you study budo is to strengthen your connection to reality. Your connection to the Truth. Connecting to the truth of things requires magokoro (sincerity).

This doesn’t necessarily mean not lying to others. It means not lying to yourself.

Magokoro: "sincerety" or "pure heart." Calligraphy by Shihan Masse

Connection or Attachment?

What’s the difference?

Your connections enrich, strengthen, and improve your life. Your connections are based on and live in the space of freedom.

Attachments are different. Attachments enslave you.

For example: the difference between keeping a romantic relationship because you love and enjoy sharing your life with your partner through your connection to each other…

or

…keeping a relationship with someone that isn’t the best match for you because of a fear of being alone.

Do you enjoy a coffee now and then (connection), or are you addicted to caffeine (attachment)?

Be sincere with yourself and take appropriate action.

The Combat Connection

There are several ways this relates to your training. Here are just a few:

• Technique: Sticking to the prescribed form of a technique no matter what is actually changing with the opponent or environment is an attachment and could get you killed. You have to stay connected to the timing of change as Shihan Masse said a few times. Stay connected to the changes so that you can change with them and survive. This takes training and practice.
• Weapons: When you first begin training with weapons, the tendency is to focus solely on using the weapon. The weapon is all you see, so in turn, you miss the changes and lose your connection to your taijutsu. Keep yourself connected to your taijutsu, then naturally, the weapon also becomes connected to your taijutsu. Then you survive. Again, this takes training and practice.
• The opponent: Being connected to your opponent will let you change as needed and survive. When you’re attached to your opponent, you try to force control over him; try to force a technique. When you are connected to your opponent, he tells you everything you need to know about his intentions. This is connected to how Hatsumi-soke uses his sight and vision during a technique. Once Hatsumi-soke is connected to his opponent, he doesn’t need to look at him.

To reiterate Shihan Masse’s message, “Cherish your connections!”

In combat, your connection to your opponent can save your life. And your personal connections to those you love make your life worth living.

Please share your thoughts in the comments.

PS. Many thanks to Shihan Masse for coming out and teaching! Also, thank you to Shidoshi Jerry Wideman for hosting the seminar. And finally thank you to everyone that came out and trained.

"Look eye! Always look eye!" - Mr. Miyagi

If you have seen The Karate Kid (the original movie), you will undoubtedly remember the wise old karate sensei, Mr. Miyagi telling his student Daniel-san to “Look eye! Always look eye!”

Well, not necessarily. At least not in martial arts.

In fact, in Japanese culture, excessive eye contact is considered rude. And being rude to people, regardless of culture, is probably not the smartest thing to do if you are trying to avoid getting into fights.

So where exactly should you focus your eye contact in a violent combative encounter? And are the eyes reliable?

Effects of Adrenaline and Stress on the Eyes and Vision

When you are faced with violence, your body goes into freeze, flight, or fight mode. Adrenaline is dumped into your bloodstream to give you extra energy to survive the situation.

Adrenaline causes several different effects on your body systems. For the sake of this post, we’ll only focus on how it affects your eyes and vision.

• Pupil Dilation: Your pupils tend to dilate in order to allow more light to enter and create a brighter picture of the threat. This allows your brain to receive more info about the threat to improve your chances of survival.
• Tunnel Vision: You lose your peripheral vision and retain your central vision. This can be dangerous because while your central vision is focused on the primary threat, you may not see secondary threats, weapons of opportunity, or possible escape routes. Some people even experience increased visual clarity in their central vision.
• Loss of Depth Perception and Near Vision: Under extreme stress, threats may appear closer than they actually are due to loss of depth perception. Also, things that are nearby may become more difficult to see clearly.

It’s important to know that these effects typically happen when your heart rate reaches about 175 beats per minute while under the influence of adrenaline. You won’t have the same effects by raising your heartbeat through exercise alone. Without an actual threat, real fear or stress won’t bring the same adrenal effect.

Because of the above factors, it’s important to learn specific training methods that will lessen the effects of adrenaline and stress to your body systems. You can also decrease these negative effects by maintaining a healthy body; especially your cardiovascular system.

Levels of Training

Where you direct your eyes also depends on what level you are at in your training.

• Beginning Level: When you first learn a new technique or movement, there is a tendency to look directly at the body parts associated with the application of the technique. For example, when learning a wristlock, there is an unconscious habit to look at the hand the wristlock is being applied to and forgetting about the possible threat of the opponent’s free hand. This act of looking can also cause subtle shifts in body posture and mental focus that can cause a technique to fail.
• Intermediate Level: Once the mechanics of a technique are learned, you should focus your vision on the overall opponent. Specifically, you should look at the opponent’s shoulders. Punches and hand attacks are often too fast to try to watch with your eyes. His shoulders can give you movement indicators to help you more quickly detect what kind of attacks he is throwing.
• Advanced Level: If you are familiar with the Bujinkan, you’ve probably noticed that Hatsumi-soke rarely looks directly at his opponent. There are several reasons for this. The most basic reasons are that he’s scanning for multiple attackers, weapons of opportunity, or environmental factors such as obstacles and escape routes. There are deeper reasons that we’ll look at in a moment.

Hatsumi-soke

Special Situations to Consider

The adrenaline/stress factors and basic ideas of where to center your visual focus are all based on the idea that you’ll actually be able to use your eyes to gather information about your opponent and tactical situation – even if your vision is somewhat impaired. What about situations where your eyes and vision are even more compromised?

• Environmental Factors: We’ve already looked at the idea of scanning for multiple attackers, weapons of opportunity, obstacles and escape routes.
• Rear Attack: Your eyes will be of little use if your opponent attacks you from behind with a bear hug or gets behind you while in a grappling situation.
• Temporary Blindness: What if the sun is in your eyes or your night vision is compromised in a low light/nighttime scenario? What if sand or even sweat gets in your eyes? If you wear glasses, you could lose them in the heat of conflict. If you are punched in the nose, it’s likely that your eyes will tear up and blur your vision.

Using a hanbo to escape a rear bear hug. (photo by Claude Hupp)

Psychological and Spiritual Factors

So what about those deeper reasons on why you should train up to the level of not looking directly at your opponent? These are for psychological and spiritual factors. You can’t rely solely on physical attributes if you’re physically compromised (sun or sand in your eyes) or if your opponent is stronger, faster, and tougher than you. You’ll have to find an advantage on the psychological and spiritual levels.

• Opponent’s Fighting Spirit is too Strong: They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul. If your opponent’s fighting spirit is stronger than yours, then you could be frozen by it through looking into his eyes. The next time you are training, and your partner is a little overwhelming, try not looking directly at him. Go slow and be careful.
• Your Spirit is Stronger than the Opponent’s Spirit: On the other hand, if your spirit is stronger than his, you could look into his eyes to dominate his spirit and psyche. This is very important in a self defense situation before physical action takes place. By looking directly at your opponent, you send a subtle signal to him that you refuse to be a victim. This alone can often end an attack before it begins.
• Direct your Intention: Another reason to not look directly at your opponent is to conceal your intentions. This way your opponent has less information to read what you may try to do. Conversely, you could look and position your physical posture to send a false signal of intent to the opponent. Professional fighters often look low (opponent thinks a low kick is coming) but actually kick high to catch their opponent off guard.
• Use your Intuition: Seeing is not always believing. You probably remember Luke Skywalker training blind with Obi-wan Kenobi. “Your eyes can deceive you. Don’t trust them.” You have to learn to trust your intuition as well as train all five of the physical senses to take in information about possible threats.

Pre-contact Indicators

I know you are familiar with what is commonly referred to as a “sucker punch.” An extremely practical way for you to use your eyes is to know what to look for before a physical attack begins. We’ll go into more detail on this in another post, but here are a couple of simple things to look for.

• Emotional State: Is your potential opponent agitated? Have you seen him previously exhibiting aggressive behavior? Is he under the influence of alcohol or drugs? Is his speech aggressive, hateful, or threatening? These could be indicators of an impending attack.
• Hand Placement: A common phrase among law enforcement circles is, “The eyes may be the windows to the soul, but the hands will kill you.” Watch the person’s hands! That’s worth saying a second time. Watch the person’s hands! If you can’t see his hands, then assume that he may be hiding a weapon of some kind. This is why police officers command suspects to show their hands.

Often there is a pretext to an attack. You can go to YouTube and research videos of police patrol car dashboard cameras and CCTV security footage and study the indicators preceding a sudden attack.

Jishin Kappo

Jishin Kappo is the skill of seeing/reading your opponent’s spirit. Does your opponent have a strong spirit or a weak spirit? This skill only develops with training, practice, and experience.

One way you can practice this skill is to try reading people’s emotional states. Perhaps you’ve walked into a room and things just felt tense and awkward. Then later you found out that some of the people in that room were in a heated argument just before you entered. Learn to listen to that. Learn to cultivate that skill. Try to sense if someone is happy, mad, sad, excited, bored, being sincere or hiding something.

Training Exercises

So what is the moral of the story here?

The moral is to use your eyes and vision, but avoid becoming dependent on them. You have to learn to perceive rather than just see. Perceive with your entire being. Physically, psychologically, and spiritually. And the secret to doing that is training.

Here are some ideas for your own training.

• Blindfolded Training: To adapt to the possibility of your vision being temporary impaired, try grappling blindfolded. Gradually add in some striking and training weapons. Start very slow and increase the difficulty as your skill improves.
• Scenario Training in Low Light Conditions: You can try scenario specific training in low light. These could simulate scenarios such as an intruder in your home at night or an angry drunk in a poorly lit bar. Think realistically and creatively to come up with your own scenarios to work through.
• Simulate Tunnel Vision: One good exercise to see how debilitating tunnel vision can be is to train slowly while wearing a Halloween mask. Get a mask that allows for clear central vision, but obscures your peripheral vision. If the mask covers your nose and mouth, be sure to cut out large openings to allow for labored breathing. When you are under stress, your heart rate and breath rate will certainly increase. Be sure that you can breathe freely.

You should only try these training exercises and drills under qualified supervision. Always have a third party not directly involved in the drill or scenario to act as a safety officer. You may not realize how hard you may be training with a partner when added stressors are in play. Your safety officer’s commands are final. If anyone thinks that safety is becoming an issue, they may stop the exercise.

What experiences have you had in training or in actual situations? How was your vision affected? What kind of drills have you come up with to facilitate your training in this area? Please let us know in the comments.

We’ve also received initial word that the UAH Bujinkan Dojo in Huntsville was mostly unaffected.

There are sketchy reports coming from Tuscaloosa Martial Arts. Most folks have checked in safe. Some have reported damage. Still no word on whether their training facility is still there. The dojo was in direct line with yesterday afternoon’s tornado.

The tornado that ripped down 15th Street in Tuscaloosa yesterday afternoon.

Please keep praying for all those affected by these deadly storms. Please do what you can to be of service to your neighbors and community. That is what Budo is all about.

If you know of places to volunteer to help out, please leave a message in the comments.

ADDENDUM:

Per the radio reports just issued,   ANYONE on the Birmingham Water System,
ALL WATER MUST BE BOILED BEFORE USE!!!

Please take care to avoid drinking contaminated water and ice!

ADDENDUM 2:

For the moment this is only for western Jefferson County along the Cherry Avenue and U.S. 78 corridor; Pratt City, Forestdale, North Smithfield, Graysville, West Jefferson, Adamsville and Brookside.

The concern is potential contamination due to backflow (from loss of pressure), but there has been none as of yet.