Rhythm and Cycling: Expression of Combat

Everything in life has a rhythm.  Things rarely operate in free form, as if a step by step reaction existed.  Let’s compare Horticulture sciences to human combat.  Plant growth involves several processes independent of each over, which are affected by each other, and work together productively or counter productively.  Each vascular plant uses a certain soil PH range for maximum absorption of nutrients.  Macro nutrients have a hard time existing within low PH soil; Micro nutrients have a hard time existing in a high PH soil. Sunlight is obviously converted, and temperature separately affects the gas cycling and conversion process.  More carbon dioxide accelerates plant growth, and the increased foliage converts the gas at an increased rate.  Too much of one macro nutrient such as Nitrogen blocks the uptake of other key high use macro nutrients such as Potassium and Phosphorus, and burns the nutrient receptors.  The roots themselves need access to their own gasses, and require completely different nutrients to thrive.  Sugars and starches feed mitochondrial bacteria, which have a symbiotic relationship with the root system, converting and assisting with nutrient uptake and a barrier to prevent disease.  All of these individual mini processes are what determine the end result; if any one reciprocal system fails or is removed the plant will weaken and die.  This is an example of energy cycling and response to variables and circumstance.    

In combat as we deal with any type of pressure from an opponent, we are forced into a given response.  If we stagnate our response, the opponent will simply answer by adding more focus and intensity in the same effective direction; moving towards a kill or finish.  It doesn’t matter if they are attacking with gun fire, a 100% effort takedown, or simply crushing body pressure.  This transition ends within 1-3 moves.  A late answer is not an answer, but a desperate response.  If you lift your head up at this point, you are finished. In every expression of combat there are angles, contact points, rhythms, and speeds. When someone attempts to settle, and you shift their end point of that movement, you force them to move again.  As you continue this interaction, and are able to intelligently continue until you are actively in a 5-6 move sequence, it is easier for one of you to relent and stop the sequence at a loss.  If you are the one providing the pressure, you have just gained ground on your opponent.  An inexperienced opponent is finished within three progressive moves, and a tired or mentally exhausted opponent is finished within 1-3 progressive moves as well.  We must dictate pace and direction at the first stanza, and of course attempt to regain our power position if at any time it is lost.  This is almost a separate conversation.

In military combat, we often attempt to have 2-3 force multipliers in our favor against a single enemy grouping.  We (Alpha team) move defensively, and attempt to pin down the opponent with a huge volley of fire.  The enemy cannot get up to fire back without being killed.  The volume of fire has nothing to do with killing the enemy!  It is a distraction.  We use a second fire team (Bravo) to sweep in from the side and assault through the objective.  The Alpha team shifts fire away, and eventually lifts or stops firing after Bravo has eliminated the target. 

 In Mixed Martial Arts or full contact striking in general, the less you do to your opponent, the more they will fire back and hurt you.  At a certain point in the fight as you ideally gain ground, a shift in combat is felt, and you have hen pecked your opponent into survival mode.  Although you are less likely to be hit, all further movements by your opponent are out of desperation (and dangerous).  You still cannot stop the initial pressure that caused this state, and you carefully finish by taking your opening. 

I’ve faced some tough and well know athletes in grappling competition, MMA fights, or on the training mats. There are people that will take you into deep water quickly, if you let them.  They are so dangerous that you can feel it, and they are flowing between one near finish to the next.  If you attack in a fast consistently variable and focused pace, some of these talented players will stop attacking altogether; as you begin to poke holes in their defense.  Eventually the danger relents, and you become the dictator of pace.  By not giving them this respect, and forcing them into a different frame of mind, the sequence becomes yours.  Your opponent gives a predictable reaction based on what you falsely tell them is coming next, and a few steps later a finish presents itself.  This scenario is very similar to dealing with other types of pressure.  The seconds we continue past the point of mental and physical fatigue and continue purposeful effort allow us to edge our opponent into giving in just a little more. 

The longer a striking sequence or active take down attempt is allowed to continue, the greater the odds that it will end with a successful finish.  Some of the most talented fighters can be broken faster than a less talented fighter.  It’s simply one of the realities of being human.  The more outstanding you are in regards to working outside the average performance range of an athlete of any kind, the more complex of a problem you present. Remember, your attributes are unique to you; and no one other than you can truly know you completely (even that is reaching). 

You are more likely to finish a stranger than you are a training partner, and the opposite is also true.  In combat we are forced to read people at an accelerated pace, and what we determine breeds comfort or fear of the unknown.  What is the variable that I cannot allow to happen?  Obviously this is a consumptive mindset, but is the obvious question when you are unable to answer the questions posed by your opponent.  You must survive, and move into a situation where you can attack again.  There is no pause or special moment, but a redirection in the defense that allows for a redirection into an attack.  That is why an active defense is the only real defense, and the only lifeline you will have until the very end. 

When somebody is going for a specific goal and not mixing up their attacks, you must pay attention.  They may be moving 100% in one direction, or maybe 80% in one direction and 20% in another.  80% double leg, 20% snap down.  80% double under pass, 20% knee through pass; 80% double leg, 20% over hand right or jab.  Which attack are you going to focus on defending more?  80-100% is the question you answer when your opponent is going for a desperate move.  You must stop the momentum of the attack, redirect them, and actively start your attack.  That’s what ends this sequence.  A tired or desperate opponent thinks in fewer moves, a probing fighter commits to less moves, an opponent actively attacking is probably combining 2-3 moves at percentages of 40, 60, and 80%.  All of this determines your commitment to each reaction, which dictates how much energy you expend throughout each transition.  This is the determining factor in your energy cycle, in response to energy expended for a specific goal, and waste.  Any amount of energy expended at the wrong time, or an overreaction of force based on the percentage of exertion of your opponent is energy removed from your energy cycling and percentages of return; also known as diminished returns.  In each situation of combat, you are giving and receiving all sorts of consuming feedback, forcing reactions, reacting to questions posed, and stepping that much closer to the finish.  The next move is yours. 

Limitations?

A question no one has really answered is what type of student or learning style has the greatest benefit from a particular type of training or drilling?  Think about the analogy I wrote about in the previous blog post.  “During your first four years”, is what I wrote.  Well I’ve trained with twenty one year old black belts who have been training for four and a half years!  I could then mention Saulo Ribeiro and Baby J Penn who achieved their black belts in three and a half years, but then we would miss the point completely.  I am going to theorize that the right instructor can accelerate a student by identifying their learning style and using that teaching methodology to answer their questions specifically.  We show and describe techniques to a large group, but when you go to each training group you specifically adjust your teaching style to match the student.  This is coaching.  

Don’t get too excited.  This does not account for more than 20% of your journey, as you are the limiting factor.  How’s that for invisible jiu jitsu? Now let’s talk about ego.  The ego has you sitting back during drilling, because you “did the move”.  The ego tells you to miss class because you are tired, because you won’t perform well and will likely be submitted. The ego has you privately rebelling against your instructor’s guidance and instruction, because you think you know better.  It is important to know if you are even in a good training environment.  If you befriend a few people, and don’t like change, you may not leave that gym.  The time and dedication to educate yourself about the sport, lifestyle, and hobby will allow you to differentiate quality of instruction.  If you are in the wrong environment, it’s important to move on.  The determining factor in personal growth is you. In every gym there are the social butterflies, the close minded one trick pony, the work horse, the show up once upon a time student, and “the natural”.  It’s rather awesome to see a micro republic of social dynamics.  Each behavior is stemmed from a specific motivation.  Sometimes the chatty Kathy feels they are above drilling, that they successfully performed the move.  Maybe they don’t want to fight or grappling anyone. The close minded know they do some things well, and other things not so well.  They will funnel you into their comfort zone, or will simply not participate.  The once upon a time training partner tells themselves quite often why they can’t make it to training.  Each of the above responses is fear based, as if to protect the ego.  Not cocky or ego centric, but over protection of ego.  Kind of like the Freudian super ego in excess, or jiu jitsu anxiety. 

The only way to grow is to step outside your comfort zone, for the sake of it.  Maybe you choose to wear an easy to grab gi, knowing full well that your training partners will make you pay for it.  Today you accept an invite to train with a more experienced training partner.  Tomorrow you compete.  Let go of the outcome and you achieve the next stage.

Visual Interpretation: Kinesthetic Response

There are several articles in the works, but today I was inspired by another blog that goes completely against what I’ve been talking about.  It seems like every day someone is sharing an article, blog post, or youtube video showcasing various concepts and ideas.  There are some pretty good ones demonstrating transitions I must say.  In an article I read today there was a consistent biased theme based on the author’s visual perspective!  He labeled jiu jitsu a visual art, and stated that it could only be learned visually, and must be instructed only in that way.  If an instructor used that methodology, they would have quite a few students struggling over time.  The article had some good points, interlaced with black and white reasoning.  Before an emotional reaction, followed by an opinion, we must first measure our ego; which could be considered the invisible fuel behind certain emotional responses.  Right now there is an expansive discussion on inner game, invisible jiu jitsu, and it seems everyone wants to be a subject matter expert.  It started with a Rickson seminar, a youtube interview, and finally some Roger Gracie adage. Now people with less than three years of experience are writing about it and creating themed websites.    

I’m not going to explain invisible jiu jitsu.  It’s quite possible this grey concept describes a whole host of complexities that by description alone add to the mystique of high level practitioners.  The power of jiu jitsu is not force fed to you by association lineage, your instructor’s competition success, or from the branding on your gi.  Your journey is not unlike that of a human baby, and many of the issues and roadblocks are self induced; you may or may not have a guide that can see them too.  During your first four years, distractions from core technical goals are a common limiting factor.  You really do need a smaller amount of strait to the finish line techniques, and they must be very tiny chains based on reactions and off balancing techniques.  Two different answers for each positional escape question, three answers for each submission question and one answer for each submission escape question.  Once you can do this consistently without technical distraction, picture a blue belt with stripes.  When your answers to posed questions naturally bleed into another answer into your own posed question, in that moment you are a functional purple belt.

I would like to think after so much time you would begin reading your opponent and increasing the percentage of time when you accurately and automatically know where your opponent’s weight is distributed.  This factor plus movement and their perceived objective determines your next reaction and offensive action.  We now have a conceptual goal.  As we grow in jiu jitsu, our ability to successfully read that element of your opponent’s movement dynamic increases.  Now we insert these concepts into drilling, numbers, and how instruction even works.  There is so much written about progression through repetition, and many good ideas have come out of these schools of thought. 

We obviously grow or improve when we “drill” something.  I would bet slight variations of drilling effect each player differently.  Often times when we drill something dry and repetitive past a level of proficiency, we start developing nuances and adjustments that help define our later game from that position.  This comfort allows you to discover the leverage points through contact for Kazushi or off balancing techniques.  When you can feel it, when the elements of jiu jitsu align, comfort builds energy at the Psychological level.  We are talking about Kinesthetic conditioning, and developing through touch.  This allows our potential fastest reaction, faster than your visual potential.  Smooth is fast, and fast is smooth; something often preached during MOUT training in the Army.  After the fight begins, when you touch my low hand I sprawl.  

There is a training technique theorized by Pavel, the famous Russian conditioning expert and Kettlebell enthusiast called “Greasing the Groove”.  The theory is based on the body’s electrical system, and states that with more frequent exercise of a given type before the point of failure will gradually condition the body to increase the threshold for work with less perceived effort.  At a certain point it may take far less energy to perform a given technique, plus the state of memorization; not “muscle memory”.  This explains proficiency at a late blue belt level, but not mastery.  The variation strategy game is separate, off balancing is separate, but later connected to and applied to the game of variables.  This allows the setup of the question and you provide answers to the questions posed by your opponent.  A single theme added to your game can be experimented with at the lower level which provides that specific experience that you will later apply permanently to your game.  Perpetual movement facilitated by Kazushi = acceleration.  

Learning from the Faux Pas

Throughout our life experiences, we sometimes come across a dedicated field that is of no interest to us.  Maybe hearing a book titled “Zen of underwater basket weaving”, or “Trends of Pottery Barn: The West Virginia Edition” causes a prickly sensation that builds uncomfortably up your spine; unconsciously lifting the fine hairs on the back of your neck. To even consider reading such a title would cause an overwhelming sensation of dread that leaves you hyperventilating consistently into a brown paper bag.  Ignoring the above extreme publications, today we are going to discuss a variation of cross references in which we use the lessons learned in one craft and apply them to another.

The twelve step program: a proven system used by Narcotics Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous, and almost anyone else trying to quit doing anything.  Are there different books?  No, it’s the same book.  Every time they read the book, they interchange the words that are right for them.  Alcohol can become drugs, food, purging, or OCD comfort rituals.  This has nothing to do with what we are going to discuss today, but is an example of how you can use one concept and bridging it to another.  It’s simply a successful model. 

This article is about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu or grappling, but the concepts can be applied to many different things in life.  I do it every day.  I myself use a mix of wrestling, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Judo, and Sombo; but they are conceptually similar, and our goal is to use a completely different concept to help us grow in a completely different area.  In this model, we are going to use Brazilian Jiu Jitsu which is often described as human chess, and discuss it using the mental processes of actual Chess.  In a far more complex medium, as it relates to chess, the greatest players operate in sequenced numbers.  Let’s discuss a few ideas, and eventually will delve into strategy.           

Heuristic rolling or training: Taking the art of problem solving and practicing in a controlled situation.  In Jiu Jitsu posing probing questions, and using a variety of techniques and methods to test certain moves and variations, and to unearth useful information about the position.  Dave Camarillo calls it Lie detection.  Awesome concept, dare you to use it in other areas of your life; or practicing verbal jiu jitsu.

Gambit: A volunteer sacrifice of an opening.  The fake or perceived Faux Pas, and often ends in a check mate in a semi technical two or three move finish in a submission fight.  At the higher levels, they are thrown out casually, and through “life detection” we ignore or respond to these actions.

Convergent Thinking: Working out the precise moves when we already know what to do.  It is linear and one-dimensional.  This is where I think people get stuck with drilling or practice.  Once you reach a certain level of proficiency in a single type of movement, you need to move on with a Divergent transition game where you practice sequences that allow you to advance but also react to road blocks.  This takes you to purple belt and beyond, but ignoring that it is required for successful fighting and competition.    

Divergent or Lateral Thinking: Multidimensional thinking, not bound by circumstances, open to sudden shifts in context of combat or situation, and drawing upon unexpected moves or movements and accessing resources creatively to solve complex problems.  End game?  There is no end game, but this is a solid goal past basic proficiency.  To develop a game or string of messy techniques and using them as an approach will end in your defeat.  Convergent < Proficiency< Divergent

These are a few concepts to think about.  In what way am I learning, practicing, and applying?  Each has levels, not bound by rules or ideas, and different timed applications. The next move is yours.