this past weekend I attended a martial arts seminar at the New York Athletic Club in Manhattan. The seminar was hosted by the New York Athletic Club, meaning I got to spar with some of the best fighters in the world. I was impressed (I am not a big fan of the sport). The seminar included a 3 hour seminar, a 5 hour practice, and a 2 hour tournament. It was a great seminar. It was well organized, and I learned a lot.
The seminar was hosted by the New York Athletic Club, meaning I got to spar with some of the best fighters in the world.
The first time I saw these guys fight was at the NYC Open. I was so impressed by them that I decided to check out the seminar. I was a little disappointed to see that they were just a bunch of guys who were trying to make a living off of fighting. I would have loved to have seen the same guys that I saw at the NYC Open actually practicing.
The problem with many martial arts classes is that they are taught by people who are more interested in training to win a fight than in actually learning what they are doing. In fact, the instructors are the ones who teach the fighting. This is the case with the New York Athletic Club seminar. The guys who are actually learning the art of fighting are the ones who are training just to stay alive.
This is why many people who are training in martial arts do so in small groups. This is the case with the students at the NYC Open. The reason the teacher is the one who teaches is because the students in the group are the ones who most likely will fail. In fact, it is the students who are doing the fighting who are the ones who should be teaching.
The only thing that is holding this system back is the belief that the average student is the one who will fail. This is not true. The student who is most likely to fail is the one who is most likely to succeed. Why? Because he takes the time to learn. It’s not just that the individual does not actually remember what the teacher is saying, it’s that even if they do remember, they will still be unable to apply what they have learned.
This is a key point that I like to point out to students who might get this question. What you are trying to teach, is a “particular skill.” Like many other skills, there is no such thing as a universal skill. The individual has their own unique skill set that they can only master through experience. As such, the individual can only be taught by someone who is already a master of the specific skill. Think martial arts.
The concept here is that you can only really teach a martial art by actually being a master of the art itself.
This point has been made many times in previous articles. I feel it’s important to make it clear that martial arts is not the same as combat sports. Combat sports are about the application of rules to a specific activity. Martial arts is about the application of rules to a specific skill.
Combat sports are a way of physically exercising an ability, not a way to learn or improve that ability. Martial arts is a learned skill, and martial arts is an acquired skill. Just like a baseball, karate, boxing, and judo are all learned skills.
