John San here has kindly submitted a write up about the Cheltenham Karate Seminar that was run on Saturday!
So, a karate seminar based on hand-techniques; it sounds like a scary prospect doesn’t it?! In fact it was a really fun learning experience and all partner based.
Tim-san and Richard-san changed our approach from trying to learn hand-techniques by rote and instead took a look at what makes them work. We worked each technique back from the contact point; what Tim-san called ‘where we interface with the opponent’!
This change of focus on to the target area immediately improved everyone’s technique! After working through the techniques for each grade, the pace would then be heated up by Richard-san; and we really drove them home.
For me, martial arts have never been purely about self-defence; I’ve always been interested in the ways that the body moves. I’m always amazed at what we can do with it, the shapes it can take and the flow of movement that really feels so artistic, and makes you feel so good. We were shown on Saturday the importance of correct delivery of the hand-techniques; but not in a static way. Getting the right part of the hand to the right point on the target makes the body take the correct shape and we must move to make it so. The seminar ended up with several exchanges of partners as we took it in turns to attack and defend. Those two and a half hours raced by and I’m sure everyone gained a new perspective from the experience; I know I certainly did!
The focus and concentration required adds a whole new spiritual element to what we were doing. It’s difficult to explain I suppose, but all of this together gives an intense joy experienced not only by me, but judging by the smiles I saw around me both during and at the end of the seminar, by all of the other students!
If you weren’t there, you missed a doozie and should be asking ‘When is the next one sen?’!
John San