The Outcome Of The Battle Depends On How You Handle Weakness And Strength!

The out come of the battle depends on how you handle weakness and strength.
This phrase was uttered many years ago by a great martial arts master.
What did he mean by this? As we know there are many differences between one person to the next. Size, strength, agility, determination and training can vary widely between people. When deep in battle, your success depends not as much on you weakness or strength but on how you use it. In other words “It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog”! Spirit, again! But more than spirit, how do you use your strengths? Strength can be a great asset but it can also serve to make the person overconfident. If strength was all important then the strongest person would always win. If strength always won then there would be no place for martial arts because they would be totally ineffective. Then Royce Gracie would have never won a single match because he was always outweighed by his opponents. Royce Gracie and his family, almost single-handedly started the MMA craze because they believe in their martial art. They new they could use their opponents strengths and size to their advantage. Royce faced men, who looked they just walked out of a bodybuilding competition and outweighed him by 50 pounds and Gracie would make them summit or suffer a torn up elbow or choke them out. Simply stated, Gracie used his opponent’s strength against themselves.
Sometimes, using a bull fighters type of move and simply getting out of the way is best. Aikido and jujitsu depend largely on simply getting out of the way. If a car was coming at you, you would get out of the way. If a bull is running at the bullfighter he is going to get out of the way (or lose). Actually this is the main objective of a Bull Fighters performance. This is also of course, the only way he will survive! Hence, if a 200 lb man is running at a 150 karate dude, what should he do? Certainly not stand in front of him and punch or kick him. There’s a scientific formula that states, (I think), “a body in motion in motion, tends to stay in motion, unless acted upon by an even greater and opposite force.”
Any kid who ever dammed up a stream found out that water will eventually push that dam over unless you give it somewhere to go. Such as a spillway. It is fairly easy to divert water but it is difficult to stop it for long. Water will always take the easier path but it will always keep pushing. Force is like water in motion, it has a direction but it can be diverted rather easily, but to stop force you must overwhelmingly over power it.
Karate teaches not to catch and stop a punch but rather, to block or divert it. Most martial arts, teach some sort of throws, take-downs or joint locks and all of these simply involve taken opponents movement and changing it’s direction, or by pain compliance making them go where you want them to go.
Simply stated, during the act of throwing, a person attacks and then get’s thrown.
They are going into the other persons space.
Often times the opponent will land exactly or close to where the Martial Artist was standing.
In other words they yielded their space and changed the direction of the force and put them right in the place that they wanted to go but not exactly in the condition that they wanted to be in.
In other words, learn well how to use others strength, movement, size and unique abilities to their detriment and you can change what may otherwise be a bad outcome for you into a bad situation for them.
Training and understanding is the key!
Written by:
Sensei Perry Culver 6th degree Shotokan Karate, 1st degree Syu Sin Do (pressure points & joint locks)
Chief Instructor of Culver Karate Club in Connellsville, PA 724-626-KICK (5425)