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How Students Should Approach Learning Martial Arts Knowledge is knowing why you are doing something; Wisdom is knowing why you are not doing something else. Part III: Basics and Kata So what exactly are Basics and Kata? Simply put, Basics are the codified techniques of a style of Martial Arts. It's the place you always go back to in order to grow in your comprehension and expansion of yourself and your abilities. You may learn (and should learn) many techniques and combinations of techniques that you feel are not in your Basics--but if you look close enough, you'll see that for the most part, everything is an expansion or extension of your Basics. Kata is the codification of your style's Basics and expansions of Basics placed in a routine that the student can use to master technique, hone one's mental and spiritual application of the physical techniques, and allows you to then practice and perfect on your own when others are not around to help you. Martial Arts study is a process of moving forward and backward and forward again. You have to know this and accept it. Period. Those who don't grow become angry when they can't do something today that they could last week. Stepping backward is the only way we and our Sensei can take a critical look at ourselves and help us to improve. That being said, here is another important concept that you have to accept with grace: Your Sensei will teach you the facets of a technique today that he will later alter. First, your Sensei is human. He may catch a mistake today in how you are executing a technique that he didn't catch earlier. Second, he may have seen you struggle with a technique, allowed you to practice and perform it for weeks or months, then one day, see something "click" inside you that will allow for the correction to be given and integrated into your person. Third, in his own growth as a student (whether he's a San Dan or a Ju Dan, a True Sensei is always a student, always learning), he may have found a way to dimensionalize the technique to the greater benefit of the technique itself as well as the student. The only way to truly learn is to truly understand. Knowledge is knowing why you're doing something; Wisdom is knowing why you're not doing something else. When you are taught a technique; when your execution of the technique is being "tweaked"; when demonstration of the technique is different from how you may have been taught or believe to have been taught it earlier, you must understand the various facets and purposes of it. This is not only a requirement for developing a technique toward excellence, it is also your right as a student to understand it to your most complete ability--your most complete ability today, and your most complete ability as time passes and you grow with the technique. If any technique is a kaleidoscope of possibilities, then knowing why and how to utilize it in its many augmentations is very important; knowing how and why not to utilize it in many ways is even more important. Most people teach from a position of "how to"; how not to not only helps us learn to not fail, it is also an important path toward "how to." As a child, we were all asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" When we said "I don't know," the wiser people told us to figure out all the things we don't want to be, and what we'll be left with is things we might want to become. But there is also the process of teaching. Healthy instruction can only be a process; those who teach a concept and move on, never to revisit or reexamine what they have taught fail us in teaching us how to dimensionalize ourselves and our learning. The process, however, is not an easy one--for the Sensei or the student. A True Sensei will allow the student to question his instruction, and some have the humility to allow a student, to a degree, to challenge his instruction. You have a right to say "But you told us to do it this way a month ago," or "You said we do this because of one thing, and now you're saying that's no longer valid." Most of the time, your Sensei will have a reason for teaching something one way, then altering it later. Or, as said earlier, being human, he may have left something out that he recalled at a later time. Once you have an answer, if you don't understand it, ask for help. After a second answer, if you are still struggling, either wait until after class, or try to work it out for yourself, then come back and ask. The dojo is not a Democracy; even the gentlest of Sensei must take the reins of the class firmly, for a class without discipline is a class without learning. Once the Sensei feels he has satisfactorily explained something, it is time to move on. He has the responsibility to teach many, not just one or a few. You must ask and challenge with humility and respect for your Sensei and your fellow students. Basics and Kata are a lifelong commitment to improvement for the committed student. For one such as this, the path to perfection can only be a goal. Though "perfect" is not attainable (at least to the humble student), it is something that can be visualized. Between the points of beginner and perfection are the concepts of expert and mastery. To become expert at a technique or Kata, there must be diligence in learning, honing, critiquing and assimilating. This process can take years, but it is attainable. When I have deemed a student expert at a Basic or Kata, I will let them know--that their mechanics, artfulness and visualization have come together and that they now own it. Mastery is the point where these are done so fully, intricately, powerfully, gracefully and realistically that those on the outside almost see or sense the presence of the attackers the student is visualizing in their mind's eye. If this was not possible, there would never have been attached the word Master to one who performs their Art at this level. It doesn't mean perfection or that they can stop working at it and improving it; it means that one has become Renshi ("one who has mastered himself") with their technique, and now must work toward Kiyoshi ("one who has risen above others"). It's 30 - 40 years of dedication for those who truly earn these titles, but reachable for anyone who wishes to give this much of themselves to their Art. A blade of grass does not think about growing; it just grows. Though the elements around it may affect its life, nothing affects its internal life force for its growth. Therefore, tomorrow, the blade of grass will be greater than it is today, but this does not detract from the greatness it holds today, for today it can only hold what time has brought it to this point. This is the way of the Sensei, and hopefully, of the student. The Samurai code was not born first; it was what was born from and evolved from the way of the warrior. In other words, the mental and spiritual facets of the code were brought forth from the technique--how it is used, why it is used and why and when it is not used. This created honor, integrity, humility and morality, which led to philosophy and spirituality. This, as applied to technique, is what created the Samurai. The Samurai and its code cannot exist without one another. If we pursue the learning of our Martial Art with the heart and spirit of the Samurai, we may not win all of our battles in life, but we will never fail.
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