Martial Skill and Learning!!!

[Leimeng]

~ Reading multiple comments on the skills and knowledge levels of various of teachers bought me to a point of contemplation on this topic. There are many questions and ideas to be considered in this.
~ What do you use as your basis for knowledge of someone else’s skills? How do you verify the skill and claims of another individual?
~ Is your information from hearsay or from actual experience?
~ Are you using your own knowledge and understanding of an event or idea to base the other individual’s talents?
~ What do I mean by all that gumbo jumbo?
~ When I first started learning math in grade school, (many many many moons ago) I think that it challenged me a lot. If someone tried to show me algebra it probably would have been very difficult for me to even follow or understand as something based on math. However as I progressed in my math studies it got easier and easier for me to pick up the concepts.
~ Another example is learning foreign languages. The most difficult language to learn is the first one (your native language). The next language seems hard because you are trying to consciously compare that new thing with your native tongue. Each additional language you learn gets easier and easier until you are at number four or five where it is just a matter of a little practice and exposure to that language and you can get it. (I speak from experiance.)
~ What does any of this have to do with martial arts? When we first start to study martial arts of any sort it takes a while to re-coordinate our bodies to do the things a good martial artist can do. We first (usually) develop flexibility and strength while learning simple coordination. Our first ‘forms’ are painful to learn and memorize the movements. ( I speak as a normal mortal, not some superstar jock.) We watch a student with two more years (or two months) experience and wonder in amazement at the things they can do and understand. Our thoughts are just hopes that someday we will be half as good as that individual. Does anyone relate yet? Then after a while we finally get it and it starts to become easier and easier to absorb multiple corrections and sequences with no ill effect. What was it that caused the change?
~ Why should we care about any of this? The point is that we need to recognize that a skilled martial artist can learn a form or system very quickly. I had an instructor in Korea (Shaolin type) who could watch a form on video-tape ONCE and perform the entire thing near flawlessly with good power and all the essentials and minor details correct. I was impressed. Then I saw him go to a tournament in the US with his students and when he had returned to the school with his students, he showed them every form that had been performed in the tournament, along with a break down of strengths and weaknesses. Then he went over each fight that each student had competed in on a play by play basis. This was two weeks after the tournament and he had no copy of the tape. (I got a copy later to check it and he was 99.99 for 100!)
~ This is an important point. A skilled martial artist with decades of experience and mastery of one or more systems is going to pick up a new system in a very short time. That is why a lot of the old masters will not demonstrate their stuff in front of anyone. They don’t want to give the secrets away.
~ I heard a story once about an instructor from Taiwan who commented on Hsing I Master Hsu Hongchi. He stated that one had to be very careful in doing anything around Master Hsu or his students because if they saw it or felt it once they had it.
~ I am not near that level of skill and my guess is that it will take a while for me go get there. I do not doubt that there are people who can watch or feel something once and get it.
~ The points that I am trying to make are these: The ability to learn new material is based at least partially on your mastery of other material. The more other material a person has, be it language, science, theology, or martial arts, the easier it is to pick up new material. If a person has a demonstrated skill that they claim or other people claim they picked up in a week or less, it might be best to give that person the benefit of the doubt.
~ Just some thoughts to chew on for a while.

Peace

Sin Loi

Yi Beng, Kan Xue

Sin Loi’s Calvanistic Martial Arts: My martial skills suck! Your martial skill sucks! We must work harder so we suck less!!!

[IronFist]

Originally posted by Leimeng
[BI had an instructor in Korea (Shaolin type) who could watch a form on video-tape ONCE and perform the entire thing near flawlessly with good power and all the essentials and minor details correct. [/B]

That's amazing. I'm the opposite. I'll watch a technique in UFC like 10 times and be like "how'd he do that?"

Haha I suck.

IronFist

[No_Know]

And yet there seems to be preferences. Your basic concept seems O.K. But it is not necessarily an absolute. The language thing...there might be sound groups that are for me to get, hard t or in which to be fluent.

And there might be actions I do not like and might not want to Learn. While in general people Can do/learn much if not almost anything. There is design limitation which might prevent one getting something.

"...Then after a while we finally get it and it starts to become easier and easier to absorb multiple corrections and sequences with no ill effect. What was it that caused the change?"

Adaptability--This does that. I would like it to do that. So, I will do this.

"~ What do you use as your basis for knowledge of someone else’s skills?"

Accumulated awareness of various perspectives of what is the nature of various skills/moves and how theoretically (appropriately applied) opitmally (best) they should be.

" How do you verify the skill and claims of another individual? "

Weight of their step. Length of their stride. Lean when they stand. Musculature apparent (breasts, tiger's mouth, forarms triceps, deltoids,quadraceps, latsimus, calves, cleavage, ribs visible under chest). Curl of their fingers. Hang of their arms. Whiteness (clearness) of the eyes. Words that they use. How they use their words. Torso design/shape. How they pause as they think what to say. The tilt of their head. Where they look when they talk. How they move when they speak. Gestures they make. Correctness of and how similar to what I understand a movement~ is supposed to be (the correctness of the nature of their movements).?.

I rely on my assessment and do not seek verification.

"~ Is your information from hearsay or from actual experience?"

It has become my concept that these can be indicators of skill/time-in.

We adapt what we are told, To our experiences. And the theoretical blends with the database of noticed passed, to better asses new situations. And do it right the first time, eventually.

"~ Are you using your own knowledge and understanding of an event or idea to base the other individual’s talents?"

My awareness is the awareness of others also. We learn from our parents and school teachers and on-the-job. We cannot always be shown first. We are told. And can be appropriate with comprehension.-ish

I listen(ed) to what standards are for things. I compare everything considered to the standards I understand there have been, relevantly.