Some Youtube Clips

Just letting you all know that if you go to this link to Youtube, you can see some clip bits from some of my DVDs/tapes. Most of the material is more advanced, which is to say not as important as the basics, but you may find it interesting.

Ideal In A Nutshell

Along with politics and religion (and I suppose any human discussion), martial arts is fraught with controversy. In martial arts, arguments over what's workable or necessary or what is a likely street scenario splinter into various camps. We'll examine some of these points of view, but my instructor, Dan Inosanto, put the ideal general skill set in clear perspective. He said to be well-rounded combatively, you would want to have some understanding of offense and defense at the kicking ranges, punching ranges, some grappling skills, know a bit about edged weapons, something stick length, and in terms of physical qualities, appropriate strength, some endurance, some pain tolerance, and the final thing he said it was good to have was luck! That being said, the good news is that you don't need to be tremendously skilled or well rounded to improve your odds in many combative scenarios. The most important tools, i.e. anything you use, are not acrobatic or exotic, just efficient. A kick to the knee is not something that takes years to make effective or maintain. This is not to say that high kicks can't be effective, but clearly they are more labor intensive to develop and I would rather use that time to cultivate more important skills. Or read a book for that matter.
To be continued...

Awareness and Fear Of Looking Afraid

So many potential confrontations may be avoided, first by awareness (relevant to both men and women), and second by not worrying about looking afraid (more relevant to men). In the first case, just paying attention to our environment, (who is around us, if someone seems to be following us and so on) can preempt finding ourselves in an unwanted scenario. Of course the awareness is useless unless we act on it. For example, if it seems you are being followed, then rather than just dismissing it as being paranoid, going into the nearest business and seeing if the person/s in question keep on moving down the street or not, and if there's a bouncer or doorman at a bar or restaurant, then actually letting them know your concerns is not a bad idea.

In the second case, if some knucklehead on the street is acting like an ass towards you, rather than responding in kind, responding to it in the most neutral way possible can often lead to nothing more than being annoyed. As one of my instructors said, "Someone can call me anything they want, as long as they aren't trying to get physical with me." The problem is that guys don't want to appear cowardly and that can lead to unnecessary trouble.