Category: self defence

The Slow Fire: Training Beyond Fear, Thought, and Survival – Part 3

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 10 min read | 190 views

Thoughts Are Weather, Not Orders

Cognitive capacity is largely determined by bodily state. Beyond certain parameters, your emotions push, but your body’s resources can’t sustain the pressure. That is, unless you are a suitable vehicle for this energy. In terms of martial arts and self defence, developing ones body through martial arts is a method of stress distribution and energy regulation. In this way the martial artists does not suffer stress but is able to transform what would be stress one person into an enhanced possibility within themselves.

Motivation energises the system, but regulation prevents depletion.You can shift the balance from a sudden reaction to danger, which brings a kind of explosive overwhelm based on limited perception and a cognitive representation, to a more grounded and body based response. You can do this by working with breath, posture, movement. This can be done without changing thoughts at all. There may still be thoughts going on, but the contents of the brain in terms of images, sensations, and thoughts is minimal and does not disrupt your attention.

In traditional martial arts, they did not bother thinking in term of just becoming smart or technically trained. Technical details which are stored in the brain as short term memory are not the same as working with the long term neural networks. The short term memory is often an attempt to represent what is deeply understood, often poorly. On the other hand, working with an externally structured pattern and replicating that is a good way to start but after a certain point it is just recalled knowledge, rather than an expressed intelligence.

“You can look at them and use them if you want, but that’s different from imitating these surface expressions.”

In fact, many of the masters of the past urged us to ignore our thoughts and treat them as superficial, passing like the wind. You can look at them and use them if you want, but that’s different from imitating these surface expressions. There is a lot of wisdom in this, because according to martial arts thoughts are not to be enshrined or suppressed, they are just passing events, like the weather to simply observe rather than take orders from.

We think that in some way if we are strong, determined, motivated, that this will bring guaranteed health and confidence. However, it is necessary to develop your system in such a way that it thrives on what it creates in its own way, rather than relying on outside happenings and events. You then develop a strong sense of discipline and internal motivation, which when developed in the long term, brings its own kind of unique prowess to everything you do. Then, rather than because you have undergone some kind of short term competence training and recalled some impressions, you are able to generate something of substance.

So why wait for this teacher or that training method to come? Grow them from within, according to a stable platform and they will naturally develop. A fighter who engages with the their own thoughts or those of others simply hesitates and loses timing. Thus, martial arts historically trained practitioners to let thoughts arise and dissolve without engagement, keeping perception grounded in posture, breath, and the environment. Then, the benefits of training occur without changing thought content. On the other hand, you can be extremely motivated and full of technical skill but still dysregulated. Confidence from surface level competence is fragile. Confidence from a deeply held and formidable structure is stable. This is true competence.

True prowess comes from developing a system that can self-organize, self-regulate, and self-generate. In many ways, mental health is not dependant on the thoughts floating around in your head. Instead, how you engage the nervous system’s capacity to regulate attention, emotion, and action independently of transient mental representations and passing thoughts is the way foreward.

So, what I’m talking about is not just winning a fight, a match, or just getting fit. This is bricks and mortar stuff, where what you grow is inseparable from what you yield. Your thoughts and emotions might bring rain with them, which actually causes growth. rather than removing these, let them do as they will non judgementally. When I say non judgementally, this has been corrupted and can easily lead you to becoming judgemental about everything and fixate on certain things. What I mean is for you yo develop a no mind mind set.

Tomorrows skills are todays crops, which require uncertainty and contradictory conditions, like any dynamic environment in order to thrive. Thoughts, like rain, may feel disruptive. But rain feeds the soil. If the ground is stable, regulated, structured, and integrated, rain produces growth. Understand this, so that there is an interconnection between what you do and how you are, rather than letting thoughts govern action by default.

When you perform intrinsically meaningful activity, that means there is no external motivation. Yes there are external things happening, but there is no carrot and stick. If there is a thought, then there is a thought. Either way, you act as needed, not according to the thoughts going on in your head. This requires a certain clarity, and a lack of distortion of the mind. When there is no distortion, perception and attention occurs faster than thought because it happens unimpeded. It is not that you must have some thoughts and ideas to have attention. There can be attention and perception unattached to thought. In such a state, response becomes immediate, efficient, and fluid — not because thought is suppressed, but because it is not obstructing perception.

So what drives this process of perception without thought? It is simply that you remain fundamentally engaged with the activity, whether or not there is any reward or motivation. It is not that there is no thought happening. Action is not independent of thought, but it is not governed by it. Just as the crops grow without being destroyed by the rain and wind, you too grow as conditions wash over you and you continue in your growth. Growth requires diverse conditions, and thought is a necessary part of this. True development does not occur in sterile mental silence. When engagement is steady and distortion is low, the system reorganizes itself over time. Then, growth becomes continuous and perception led.

Thoughts and emotions gain a dominant influence when regulation is lost and identification occurs. Action then becomes repetitive and rigid. Thoughts then become compulsive and identity forming, rather than just informational or integrated. Mindfulness helps without changing thought content precisely because your activity is not identified with thought but with action and perception. So participation in thought becomes a vonantary process. Then, rather than your work being rewarded by relief from hardship or effort, the process is the product.

“When there is no inner bargaining, that reduces stress load and there is greater yield.”

When you voluntarily become the effort, rather than the result of some reward, this is the same as saying there is no identification with thoughts. There is no transaction, nothing in it for you. and yet, this kind of action improves mental health and wellbeing without disputing existing beliefs or relying on transient motivational states. That means there’s no pay off. When there is no inner bargaining, that reduces stress load and there is greater yield.

Why Survival Is a Terrible Default Mode

If training constantly triggers survival responses, the practitioner becomes good at panic, not endurance. So don’t drag yourself through the process just to get to the end result so that it is over. Staying grounded and centred, rather than dispersed, and in a no mind state, these are all instructions for staying out of survival mode unless absolutely necessary. Training should bias the nervous system toward modes of action that support sustained effort rather than emergency mobilisation. This means that every moment of engagement is life sustaining and stabilising, rather than survival based. You then continuously ride the wave of your own unfolding success, whether you win or lose. This all develops your ability to sustain effort without collapse, and your capacity to sustain this is a consequence of the time you have spent cultivating this process.

What you need to do is to find what uniquely inspires you. You do not need to spend hours practicing skills superficially to be a good martial artists. You will only become a technician that way. When you spend intimate time on all aspects of life, such as the meditative side, how you work, how you recuperate around training these martial arts skills, then you will become better as a result. So you can do minimal physical practice, in a disciplined and sustainable way, whilst spending time away from training. Then, all of your activity enhances the way you are. This is not the same as being lazy with training. When you become much more susceptible to growth and development, rather than just training to constantly triggers survival responses, your growth is ensured. Then, you are involved with everything rather than just a few hours of intense training at the physical level.

Fear Is Not the Enemy

Effective training prioritises sustained, regulated effort over short-term survival reactions, allowing action to arise from structure and perception, instead of cognitive overload and thought. So the idea is to get as involved in everything more broadly, just as you would with certain formal martial arts and self defence training. Then, you become fearless, because there is nothing you are not competent and involved with. This is the same as saying you are all inclusive. When you become excessively fearful, it is natural to want to dominate others and exclude them. So in dominating others, this is just a different way of identifying with fear.

When fear exceeds a person’s capacity to regulate it, the nervous system does not simply remain afraid. It seeks resolution. Domination is often a compensatory strategy for uncontained fear. This is why fear-based societies drift toward domination even when intentions are good. This is yet another example of how thoughts about activity are not the same direct perception and action. When fear cannot be carried, due to weakness and corruption, it is imposed on others. The way to handle fear is to neither deny it nor act upon it, but to work on self regulation and strategies to impede its amplification to an out of proportion state.This brings mental clarity. Clarity means the mind is not distorted by excessive narrative, emotional amplification, or self-referential fixation. Then, fear can exist without needing to control others or becoming reduced by it.

Excessive thoughts often fuel fear. So thoughts are not the source, they are fuel. When you don’t engage thoughts, you allow the fear response, which is primarily physiological, to run its natural course.Fear does not require thought to operate, and can easily become amplified and out of proportion if you allow if to command you. Fear is not the enemy, nor is it the master. By relying more heavily on becoming grounded and robust, you remove cognitive amplification of thoughts. Let fear pass through you, and you are liberated from it altogether.

Epilogue

What we call resilience may have less to do with toughness and more to do with efficiency. Systems that force people into narrow modes of functioning increase stress by design. Practices that widen the circuitry—through movement, posture, breath, and individualised development—allow the same pressures to be sustained with far less cost. This means you shift to heightened attention, without the noise and distortion. This is true of martial arts, and elsewhere. The question may not be how much stress a person can endure, but where that stress is allowed to go, as well as how you relate to a given situation. When you are able to self regulate and engage continuously, response becomes immediate, efficient, and fluid. Not because thought is suppressed, but because it is not obstructing perception. Then you do not comment on the rain, you just continue growing.

The Slow Fire: Training Beyond Fear, Thought, and Survival – Part 1

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 8 min read | 174 views

Ultimately, the only thing that will make you thrive in your practice, is that you ensure everything in your entire system benefits from your training. This is a long term investment, rather than a short term effort. Most forms of training involve practice according to some dominant method. The type of method changes according to the prevailing dogma, and the times we live in. For example, people might learn according to visual instruction, experiential learning, or some other method. This is ok for instructional purposes, but in the end it just leads to cliche moves and predictable cadences.

There are many ways that people learn. This is according to a variety of factors. For example, if someone is under some kind of stress, then they learn one way best. If they are more regulated and in a flow kind of state, then they learn best in another kind of way. Because the survival circuits were highly active in most people throughout much of human history, there was a strong preference for learning styles which spell everything out for you. This allowed for clean resolution. However, when one develops other centres of the brain, for example when they become older or have formed different connections, there is a need for a different style of learning, one that encourages more creativity.

Depending on the type of person, different pathways need to be taken into consideration For some, alignment to a given method is natural. Their way of thinking, perceiving, and learning happens to fit the dominant method. For others, success requires adaptation: developing a cognitive or behavioural quality that is not their natural strength. For some, there is no immediate acquisition and memory of facts. There is a more slow distribution after a sustained engagement, much like when one mediates and releases energy more slowly rather than all at once. When you can master sustained engagement, remaining present, you can find things easier and yet you perform better in many ways.

Ancient Training for Modern Stress

“If development were truly centred on human potential, there would not be a handful of learning styles. There would be as many methods as there are nervous systems.”

When one becomes meditative, there is a slow release of energy which buffers the stress response. This energy is sustained by all sorts of environmental and internal factors. Let’s say there is an environmental stimulus, which produces one unit of energy. For arguments sake, we will say that this one unit of energy can enter the survival circuits of the brain and produce a sudden explosion of activity which creates a fast and rapid response. When localised into the hara centre, the body’s centre of gravity, this same unit of energy is able to maintain and distribute energy more efficiently than if it were to enter straight into the survival pathways. This is of course simplified, but it makes it so you are able to capitalise on stress rather than be depleted by it.

Everybody has a unique capability, which if it reaches its potential, will over time produce unique qualities. So if you want to develop to your full potential and stature, you need to invest in this unique quality. Developing your uniqueness requires a qualitatively different kind of engagement. However, because people have not generally explored this, they think they should fit a dominant model dedicated towards produce pre determined outcomes. Over time, this produces a subtle distortion. People often become competent at what they are least suited for, while their more potent potential capacities remain underdeveloped or invisible. If development were truly centred on human potential, there would not be a handful of learning styles. There would be as many methods as there are nervous systems.

A key assumption in many systems is that the same stimulus produces the same response. Human physiology tells a different story. When an input enters the human system—whether information, pressure, threat, or stress—the outcome depends heavily on where that input is processed. An environmental stressor does not exist in isolation; it is interpreted through specific neural pathways shaped by biology, conditioning, posture, movement, and experience.

Why Stress Is Not What Happens, but Where It Lands

If a stimulus primarily activates survival-oriented circuits—those responsible for immediate threat response—the energy produced is fast, intense, and costly. These pathways are designed for short-term emergencies, not sustained effort. They burn quickly and deplete resources. So, if you want to focus on self discipline, and long term development, you are not primarily looking to bolster the survival circuits. Less is more in that regard.

Other neural networks operate differently when compared to the short term survival circuits. They are slower to activate but far more energy-efficient once engaged. In addition, they can be engaged for long periods without causing a depletion or energy and draining you of resources. This is the reason for the development of the more meditative exercises in martial arts traditionally, rather than just a focus on self defence in emergency situations. Then, if you need to you have more energy in an emergency, once a certain amount of energy is cultivated and refined, it is already available to you because you have cultivated it yourself.

Let’s say you react to an emergency situation with aggression. There is a sudden explosion of energy, much like taking off and sprinting to the finish line. There is a certain development of coordination, precision, and enhancement of health, but the units of energy are depleted quickly so there is no sustained long term development. There is no containment for it to become incubated and develop. This is fine in children for example, who have an abundance of energy quite naturally all the time. However, particularly as one ages, there is a need to become more efficient and intelligent about energy utilisation.

As one ages or becomes more concerned with efficiency over competitive edge, it is necessary to distribute and maintain energy, so that it can go further. This is entirely unnecessary of course if the goal is just to use up energy and dispose of it, as though it were of no value to cultivate.

So when one engages in their training with a grounded posture, sinking into the stance and focusing on the breath, one maximally engages the Hara Centre and diaphragm quite naturally. This enhance the aspects of the system which rise slowly and build steadily, with economy in mind. These systems support endurance, coordination, sustained engagement, and integration. The same “unit” of energy can be expended immediately, like a sprint, or slowly and sustainably, like a marathon. The stimulus has not changed. The pathway has. Depending on the pathway, you will take a certain kind of journey.

Stress as a Distribution Problem

“The same stimulus which causes stress can be sustained in different regions of the system, so that it becomes refined and evenly distributed rather than localised and isolated.”

In term of martial arts, stress is not simply about reacting to outside events. When you become malleable to the environment, instead of suppressing much of the system and just developing the survival circuits, you become more integrated with it. The same stimulus which causes stress can be sustained in different regions of the system, so that it becomes refined and evenly distributed rather than localised and isolated. From this perspective, stress is not simply about localised intensity within a short time frame. It is about distribution across a longer time frame.

When pressure is taken exclusively into the survival centres of the brain, the system narrows. Perception tightens, breathing shortens, posture collapses or becomes rigid, and energy expenditure rises sharply. This is effective for immediate escape, particularly in the absence of more tactical and refined methods. But it is inefficient for learning, performance, or sustained confrontation and engagement.

“When breathing shortens, the amygdala and the hypothalamus become more active, and you tend to become more emotionally reactive.”

For example, when breathing shortens, the amygdala and the hypothalamus become more active, and you tend to become more emotionally reactive. However, when you sink down into the posture, absorbing the load of the situation into the boys centre of mass, this signals stability and control to the brain. This makes you more fatigue resistant, as well as more aware of the whole body. Stress can be viewed as anxiety or fear inducing, but it can also be viewed as a kind of beneficial pressure. When handled properly, this pressure becomes a distributed process of self regulation, rather than one of narrow attention and localisation at the level of the survival areas. You are then able to benefit from anything that comes your way.

When stress is distributed through posture, breath, and movement—when it is “sunk” into the body rather than held in the head—the load is shared. Energy use becomes slower, steadier, and more economical. This is not metaphorical. It is mechanical, neurological, and biochemical.

From Shock to Strategy: Harnessing Fight-or-Flight into Surged Clarity [Part 4]

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 7 min read | 183 views

The mind should be clear thinking and you should remain aware. In this way the quality of your behaviour rises to such a level that you are able to act properly without turning the power up to the max suddenly. When adrenaline then hits, it is just a bonus.

Any martial artist will tell you that power comes from a relaxed state. This is because there is a steady current which is working as it is, rather than needing any kind of external stimulation to get it going properly. So the mind should be clear thinking and you should remain aware. In this way the quality of your behaviour rises to such a level that you are able to act properly without turning the power up to the max suddenly. When adrenaline then hits, it is just a bonus. Put differently, your behaviour is at maximum capacity without being artificially high in any one dimension. It is for this reason that when it hits the fan, the martial artist is already doing something intelligent when they get an additional boost of adrenaline.

Let’s say you have a pair of speakers. If the speakers are high quality, you can clearly hear them at volume level 30. Another pair of speakers needs to be turned all the way up to 100 just to hear what’s going on.

Most of us grew up with the idea that stress helps us perform. But this only allows you to act in specific ways at an high level. For example, however you are get’s amplified in some way. Let’s say you have a pair of speakers. If the speakers are high quality, you can clearly hear them at volume level 30. Another pair of speakers needs to be turned all the way up to 100 just to hear what’s going on. They are low quality, and one dimensional in terms of sound At the same time, there is a lot of unpleasant noise and interference going on with the bad but loud speakers. On the other hand, all of the supply lines and working properly in the quieter set of speakers, not just one or two circuits. Because of that, you get a balanced, regulated, and natural sounding output. It is the same thing in martial arts.

When there is a love for whatever you are doing, and the reflexes and basic fundamental skills are there, I think you can perform a lot better and with less emotional volatility. This love for what you are doing replaces the need to become dominant over others and increase the voltage in a volatile way. For example, when you love what you’re doing, dopamine release becomes tied to mastery and meaning, rather than external reward or reaction to external stimulus. This will at least bring down the need for craving stimulation from the sudden onset of environmental cues, in order to get the system up and running properly.

In terms of martial arts, rather than hyping yourself up and glaring at people insistently, you can disarm somebody completely by the way you are. You can walk through the situation rather than feeding it. Then, the simple act of remaining physiologically relaxed and disciplined is enough to diffuse hostilities instead of butting heads and puffing your feathers. This is known as fighting without fighting. Even if for some reason there is still a great need for external stimulation, or you are addicted to certain behaviours, building a solid foundation for internal reward systems can greatly reduce this need over time.

You should act before such thoughts arise by having everything within your gaze and fixating on no detail in particular. This is how the way you look at people can influence your physiology and theirs.

You should not think “That guy is staring at me, I must act”. You should act before such thoughts arise by having everything within your gaze and fixating on no detail in particular. This is how the way you look at people can influence your physiology and theirs. When yo are broadly aware but not reactive, you can then shift the gaze seamlessly so that you don’t cause other people to see you as some kind of hostile competition. When you remain aware before some kind of emergency situation arises, you do not need to suddenly boot up. You only need to do this if your system is switched off or has collapsed for some reason. If you are steadily active, you not only are better at defending yourself, you are better able to absorb the energy of the situation so that you and it are one and the same.

Flowing Into Strength: Stability Through Continuous Awareness

A dead and inert tree would simply be blown over by a gust of wind. A strongly rooted and vibrant tree would absorb some of the energy from the wind, sway with it, and its roots would even benefit from the pressure exerted upon it by getting stronger.

When you overall system is balanced in in tune with the environment, there is a completely different response to emergency situations. First of all you are not shifting from zero to one hundred. You are also better able to withstand pressure. Let’s use the example of a tree. A dead and inert tree would simply be blown over by a gust of wind. A strongly rooted and vibrant tree would absorb some of the energy from the wind, sway with it, and its roots would even benefit from the pressure exerted upon it by getting stronger. In the same way, the martial artist sinks deeply into the posture and absorbs the energy of the situation, remaining flexible in body and mind.

The thing to remember is that when these self defence systems were devised, life expectancy was low in most cases. For example, in China life expectancy was around 32 years old as early as one hundred years ago. Obviously, the Chinese systems were developed well before this, when life expectancy was even lower. In other words, the kinds of survival responses needed when life was much harsher was a lot different to what is needed today. So martial arts in the modern day must be viewed in this context.

Conditions today are not as tough as they were in the past. Although we have learnt to complain about everything, there is not such a need for constant survival mode all the time. At the same time, if you don’t look at how things were done, you don’t have the drive to do better. For example, there would be no need to live well if you didn’t take care of the need to survive. In fact, living well is built upon a good foundation of survival which is proportionate to need. The tree grows out of a mixture of turbulent environmental factors as well as a steady supply of life sustaining energies. In the same way, the martial artist is able to empower themselves through turbulence as well as energy cultivation, which are always linked.

If a tree was in survival mode all of the time, there would be no flowers fruit. The survival aspect is the foundation, the root. There’s a lot of digging around and feeding going on there, at the root level. So the survival instincts can be seen as a moving foundation, rather than a secure structure which is fixed. The secure structure, which is fixed, is built once there is a strong foundation for survival to happen, which is fluid. So in order to fix yourself strongly, you must remain fluid yet immoveable.

From Shock to Strategy: Harnessing Fight-or-Flight into Surged Clarity [Part 3]

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 5 min read | 155 views

Previously, we looked at the need for the martial artist to maintain a certain level of activity across the brain as a whole. This means the survival circuits won’t get overpowered more than is needed. A stressful situation will not power the pre frontal cortex, but it will take away resources from maintaining it properly. Remaining aware before the event, and in a certain state of attentiveness, will enhance the pre frontal cortex. This means it is already up and running, ready to be stimulated by fight or flight.

The experience of stress can easily cause you to lose impulse control and to disregard the consequences of your actions, if the pre frontal cortex is off completely. The pre frontal cortex is just one example. In reality, this is just one region which is important among many. However, because activity here is related to enhanced awareness, this means you are already acting more holistically overall if there is activity there. If not, you are less able to read subtle cues or even broadly assess the situation totally.

If your broader awareness and overall system is more regulated, then you are more online than if you are functioning in a limited way. Then, your amygdala doesn’t get hijacked making your other systems go dark by acting in an all or nothing way.

If your broader awareness and overall system is more regulated, then you are more online than if you are functioning in a limited way. Then, your amygdala doesn’t get hijacked making your other systems go dark by acting in an all or nothing way. When you are functioning more holistically, there is simply no need for the amygdala to scream out and trigger an over zealous response because you keep to an even keel. Then, you are better able to respond totally, rather than partially but in an overhyped manner.

if there is a sudden intensity of adrenaline, and over time a pattern builds up repeatedly, then you start to associate such happenings with powerful activity. However, over time this records the integrity of the system overall. On the other hand, if you remain warmed up but not over heated, ready but not reactive, you train the system to stay regulated. This means that even under pressure you respond in a more measured way. You are then able to think on the move, react without flinching, and move more dynamically in general in response to danger.

In terms of calm, it is only the mind which should be calm, so that you don’t clench your jaw and shoulders. Such clenching leads to too much tension. When there is a surge of adrenaline, there is a rigidity and sudden tension within the physiological pathways. This is why they should remain free of tension first of all. This initial onset of tension can lead to becoming frozen in place, so the idea is not to be filled with tension before this freezing happens. This freeze happens so that you can momentarily stop and assess, rather than become immobile.

When you remain dynamic and switched on fully, you instead get heightened awareness and clarity. These pathways too can become flooded if they are active.

People who remain aware and switched on spend far less time in freeze states. When one becomes frozen, emotional flooding follows as a compensation for being frozen and mobile. So the idea is to limit this flooding. When I say limit the flooding, I mean limit the flooding to specific regions, so that your energy overflow’s across a larger reservoir. When you remain dynamic and switched on fully, you instead get heightened awareness and clarity. These pathways too can become flooded if they are active. This means you get powerful activity with minimal panic setting in, which is associated with emotional volatility. This is because the panic get’s drowned out in the larger context, which your awareness gets drawn to.

Different patterns of behaviour create different effects. If you remain razor sharp and clear without burning out, then this creates a sustainable pattern.

Remaining aware and sustainably attuned to the flow of the environment, one is able to feed the same pathways which are said to cause panic with a different kind of energy and rhythm. This creates an entirely different pattern of short term and long term behaviour, which is more like a sustained current than a sudden voltage. Different patterns of behaviour create different effects. If you remain razor sharp and clear without burning out, then this creates a sustainable pattern.

Staying Lifted: How Martial Artists Can Avoid the Post-Surge Crash

When there is not such an extreme shift during fight or flight, your energy also does not crash down to rock bottom afterwards so drastically.

If, during an emergency situation, the energy goes up from an already high level of functioning, this means there is less of a sudden shift. So the idea is to maintain a certain level of attentiveness and awareness at all times. When there is not such an extreme shift during fight or flight, your energy also does not crash down to rock bottom afterwards so drastically. So after the event, you land much faster to a baseline state because it is already higher than normal. This is the work of the martial artist, to keep their energy within certain parameters so that they are not impacted by drastic shifts so much. in this way, if you get heightened, you don’t crash and shut off completely afterwards.

From Shock to Strategy: Harnessing Fight-or-Flight into Surged Clarity [Part 2]

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 7 min read | 163 views

The body does not distinguish between overload or inertia, the quickest way to boot up the system is through the survival circuits.

In the previous post, we already looked at how fight or flight is expressed differently for different people. In order to reclaim fight or flight so that it is a more focused power, one thing is to remain switched on, but not hyper vigilant. If you are switched off completely, there is no hope of doing much of anything meaningful. To compensate for this off state, the amygdala will be overloaded the moment an emergency situation presents itself to you. in fact, the emergency response can happen due to overactivity or under activity of one’s attention.

Let’s say you were zoning out and then suddenly a certain situation triggers your fight or flight response. You would go from zero to one hundred just like that. On the other hand, if you were hyper vigilant over something, anxious about it even, then fight or flight would happen out of that. So there can be an unwillingness to prepare properly, creating a deficit, or there can be a total lack of awareness. In either case the void of energy needed to mobilise for action will be filled by the survival circuits so that you become primed for action. This can be helped by harnessing other aspects of the system, such as awareness, so that fight or flight happens to that too, not just the survival circuits.

This has nothing to do with psychological misinterpretation of threat, the biological response to the void is very real. If you are under powered, fight or flight hypes you up. If you become one dimensionally aware of only your own immediate physiological needs, then this constriction of awareness creates an artificial sense of emergency. So the only way out is to remain aware of more than your immediate needs, the bigger picture, whilst remaining in a balanced state as much as possible.

With something as simple as catching a ball, you could jump out of your skin and fail to catch it if you were switched off or too tense. The body does not distinguish between overload or inertia, the quickest way to boot up the system is through the survival circuits. This explains why people who get struck by inertia end up in a similar state to burnt out people. If higher intelligence fails, which involves wider awareness and sense perception outside of immediate needs, survival takes over. If there is no survival instinct, fight or flight kicks in and fills the void also. This is simply the quickest and most efficient way for your system to get things going, which has worked throughout history.

Under powered or over powered, it just means lack of overall balance and nature takes over.

There needs to be a certain level of survival activity for there to even be a heightened intelligence, or a greater well being. This is important, because if you become either overpowered or too dim, the survival process initiates to prevent collapse or a vacuum being created. Under powered or over powered, it just means lack of overall balance and nature takes over.

It doesn’t matter whether it is the mind or emotions, if there is a deficit somewhere, the brain tries to keep up in the most efficient way, by reacting and powering the survival circuits to give you a boost. At the same time, this boost has its own consequences. Boredom turns into irritability, and emotional outburst often follow overindulgence. In other words, excess has its costs, and when something as costly as a survival reaction kicks in, there are usually deficits later on in terms of energy.

It is possible to make yourself in such a way that you supercharge aspects of yourself which generate the best returns. That way, you benefit from any kind of high energy state because you are ready for it.

Mental burnout leads to inactivity, in the same way as lack of purpose leads to restlessness. In other words, overactivity and under activity are two sides of the same coin. However, it is possible to make yourself in such a way that you supercharge aspects of yourself which generate the best returns. That way, you benefit from any kind of high energy state because you are ready for it. If you are adequately prepared, you are not caught out and surprised, you process everything clearly and act accordingly. This involves planning and preparation, and applies to sport as well as emergency situations. The idea is to think clearly, but not overthink, whilst acting as needed rather than underacting.

Gracefully catching a dangerous hammer being thrown at you uses the same internal wiring as flinching away from something desperately. The quality of expression is different in both cases, and they cannot happen ate the same time.

Rewriting the Reflex: Overlaying Mastery onto Instinct

If there were a hammer being thrown at you, you would be injured by the thrower if you were unprepared. Gracefully catching a dangerous hammer being thrown at you uses the same internal wiring as flinching away from it desperately. The quality of expression is different in both cases, and they cannot happen ate the same time. This is the reason for the beautiful forms which have arisen in martial arts. They wanted to capture this beauty in order to develop a different kind of energy within a survival situation. This enhanced energy could then be used just as potently as a desperate survival response within life threatening situations. This is why there was always an insistence on discipline and striving for more.

If the sprinter did not warm up, they would be able to produce the same power in a different way. None except the essential pathways for running quickly would be active. This would lead to diminished performance in the long term even if they got through a race or two without injury.

So there is no problem for someone who is ready to catch or even juggle a hammer. This is because they have prepared themselves, like a sprinter prepares themselves for a race by warming up the neurological pathways before hand. This turns a reflex action into an expression of self mastery. By warming up and getting ready beforehand, the sprinter is able to run gracefully as well as effectively, without overthinking or trying to warm up whilst running the race at the same time.

If the sprinter did not warm up, they would be able to produce the same power in a different way. They would be running in a desperate state, trying to warm up, prepare, and run the race all at the same time. This type of race can only be run in a state of reactivity, rather than complex and dynamic planning and execution. the survival response traditionally spreads resources thinly, so that nothing can be done optimally. None except the essential pathways for running quickly would be active in the purely reactive state, and these pathways would be doing the job chaotically and inefficiently. But they would get it done in a messy way. This would lead to diminished performance in the long term even if such a runner got through a race or two without injury.

Let’s say you become tired and irritable, and then someone annoys you in some way. All of a sudden you get flooded with adrenaline and kick off about nothing. If there is a steady supply of energy to those pathways which can become overreactive, such as the amygdala within the brain, then these sites do not race from zero to one hundred as soon as it kicks off. This involves activating others site’s, so that the adrenaline does not flood into one active place but across many pathways. For example, if there is activity of the prefrontal cortex, as well as other regions, then you end up in a more balanced and regulated overall state when survival kicks in. This leads to a more intelligent response, creating a greater sense of balance across several areas. Because of this greater intelligence, you are able to exert more and more control over your situation.

From Shock to Strategy: Harnessing Fight-or-Flight into Surged Clarity [Part 1]

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 6 min read | 84 views

It is said that the enemy can be held at bay and under control only by superior clarity, which becomes a skill and a form of strength. Then, even when the enemy is in front of you, their onslaught can be withstood.

You’ve probably heard people say in martial arts “Stay calm under pressure”. The moment you become reactive and powered by stress, you are liable to do something stupid. You also become very forceful immediately. However, when you decide on a clear intention, which you stick with unwaveringly, you organise the mind beforehand. with this clarity in mind, you are not trying to organise, fight off, and adapt all at the same time. The idea is to not be too reactive to the immediate presentation of things, or too under active, but to remain balanced.

You want the lights to be bright enough to see, but not so overstimulating that you forget to even breathe. This is what happens when the system fires up all of a sudden, certain faculties get diminished whereas others supercharge. It is said that the enemy can be held at bay and under control only by superior clarity, which becomes a skill and a form of strength. Then, even when the enemy is in front of you, their onslaught can be withstood. Reactivity to the situation brings one kind of strength. On the other hand, when you bring superior organisation and clarity of thought to the situation, this brings another kind of energy and strength entirely.

Stress triggers activity in the amygdala, the brains survival region. The survival circuits themselves are not designed for intelligent activity, but to initiate fight or flight. in terms of evolution, superior sense comes after survival has been ensured. When it comes to brain functioning, intelligent functioning can only be achieved if the survival circuits are kept within certain parameters. In other words, in an all or nothing survival response, it is beneficial to have some investment in intelligent action. Otherwise, you might over react for no reason other than because this is the only investment you have set in motion.

The work of the martial artists is to maintain their survival instincts within certain parameters, and constantly adjust and attune themselves to the situation as it unfolds in front of them. This means they do not get over reactive or under reactive. For example, when one succumbs to inertia, it is a good idea to do some training and activity. This need not be physical activity, it could simply be making more of an effort to remain attentive and switched on to the environment. Otherwise, without ramping up the system in some way so that it sits within certain parameters, you may be triggered into reactivity by outside events more than is necessary. On the other hand, when one becomes over stimulated, it is a good idea to sit and bring agitation levels down.

Fight or Flight as an Empowered State

The fight or flight response happens in everyone, but it is expressed differently depending on how you handle your own internal situation. If you keep yourself properly maintained, in a balanced and coherent way, then you are able to process everything clearly and take effective action. At the same time you get an injection of energy. Then, there is a good balance between attention and processing, which then gets powered up. You then know what’s going on properly, and you are in a better position to respond accordingly instead of simply reacting. When danger comes, you are then hit with less psychological shock because you see the whole picture clearly, and you are more stable. Let’s see how this works.

If you can grow and swell with the situation as it unfolds, expanding when needed without bursting your banks, you can learn to benefit from high pressure situations.

A person who relies on getting hyped up and stressed at the last minute, is fragile the moment things don’t go their way. Take the example of the boss who leaves everything to the eleventh hour and then bursts into a fit of activity. What should have been done over several hours is done all at once. This is because they have not prepared themselves optimally. On the other hand, if you can grow and swell with the situation as it unfolds, expanding when needed without bursting your banks, you can learn to benefit from high pressure situations. In many ways, this involves broadly assessing the situation without multi tasking and spreading yourself thin, as well as remaining aware but not hyper vigilant. You are then not trying to do everything at once, and do not become hijacked by the survival circuits of the brain. Instead, you remain dominant over the survival circuits, putting them in their rightful place, because other features of the system get powered up.

In terms of martial arts, if you remain balanced you are then much less likely to make poor judgements and make the situation worse. When you keep yourself balanced and regulated, the situation is in your hands, and you can use such situations as a tool for your own development, making better decisions. The additional adrenaline of fight or flight is then like a ball being thrown to you, which you absorb into your hands. Rather than the ball bouncing out of your hands before you absorb it, or fumbling about with it, you just take possession of it. Instead of being taken by surprise, there is a sense of anticipation. At the same time, too much calculation and overthinking actually causes people to miss the ball entirely.

The mind is able to declare that just about anything is a threat to survival, making you unnecessarily reactive to external situations. The survival response is not conditional upon their being an actual serious situation. This explains why people who overthink things, even small matters, can easily blow them out of proportion or miss something vital, even though they become very insistent or forceful. The vital thing they miss may be quite subtle but can make a big difference in the end. This is why it is important to remain attentive and aware of the situation as a whole. Then, you can see that which is not obvious, expanding your sense of the whole as well as the yet unknown. In this infinite game, you carry on noticing more and more in life that you previously didn’t get, broadening your consciousness.

Circulation of energy, and equalisation of pressure. Reaching the unlimited.

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 8 min read | 105 views

At the heart of martial arts philosophy lies the principle of becoming like a circle—a form in which pressure is equal at all sides, allowing energy to circulate freely and function to become unlimited. This symbolic and practical concept is rooted in how energy, structure, and pressure interact within the human body.

According to martial arts tradition, true upward movement and expansion only occur from a stable foundation—the Hara or lower abdomen. Like a bubble that starts as a flat surface and expands outward, the body must have a grounded base in order to build symmetrical energy. If the base is unstable, energy cannot rise or distribute evenly, leading to imbalance and dysfunction.

According to martial arts tradition, pressure only builds higher and develops evenly if it starts from a solid base. Otherwise the energy cannot mix with enough internal matter in order to have a stable enough foundation to properly build upward momentum. This mixing of energy and matter occurs in the Lower abdomen, or the Hara Centre. This is what it means to “Move from the centre”. It is like how if you build a house on a lopsided platform, structural weaknesses eventually happen because you cannot distribute the pressure well enough from a stable platform. 

So the soap bubble starts by being compressed flat, a potentially energy, like a flattened diaphragm. Compression creates a potential energy of its own

As with a house, the base of the martial artists is minimal and flat. Curvature happens when the structure elongates. It is like how with a soap wand, the film is always flat until it is filled with air. Filling it with air increases its overall surface area. So the soap bubble starts by being compressed flat, a potentially energy, like a flattened diaphragm. Compression creates a potential energy of its own. And then it eventually spreads as it is filled with movement energy, which travels up. This is essentially what martial arts is all about. We will come back to the bubble analogy later.

Becoming rounded

The idea is to become like a circle, so that any pressure which happens externally is matched by the internal pressure and is equal at all sides.

As we looked at earlier, when the bubble expands its surface area goes from flat to three dimensional. As the bubble fills with air, this creates a curvature. This creates a spherical shape. Another way for this curvature to be initiated, or equalisation of force, is for it to happen externally. As pressure is added to certain points such as in the hands or elsewhere, or if the body is pushed and pull in many directions, this creates an increased surface pressure. The idea is to become like a circle, so that any pressure which happens externally is matched by the internal pressure and is equal at all sides.

When a small insect lands on a bubble, creating small curvatures on the surface, this increases the outside pressure. This increases internal pressure as well because the polar forces in the water content try to equal out this curvature made by the small insect. If the bubble were not round, then the pressure inside it would not be the same at every point of the surface. In terms of martial arts, it is possible to stimulate internal pressure by adding external pressure. When one becomes like a circle, they become balanced, and there internal pressure matches the outside. This idea is behind the theory of acupressure.

Expansion of the Bubble

When we breathe efficiently, increased tension and a pull in several directions creates an overall expansion. This expansion allows the structure to take in more content, such as air. For example, the diaphragm is domed shaped so that there is equal pressure across all sides. The base of the diaphragm is flat and wide, particularly when one inhales, and like any foundation it is compressed. This means it is able to create a potential energy of its own.

Whether pressure is stimulated internally or externally does not really matter. It is about linking external and internal activity, which act upon one another. It is pressure which holds the expansion of energy together. Otherwise there is just stretching and laxity. Energy expansion within this stretching moves us towards growth.

Water and Circulation of Energy

When we talk about hydration, it’s not just in terms of consuming water. We are also talking about circulation and distribution of water. If you breathe, you can breathe deeply by using the abdominal muscles and intercostals, or shallowly with just the upper lungs. In other words, you can breathe from a stable foundation or not. Breathing works to enhance circulation of blood and other forms of energy around the body. When you increase this flow, then there is a smooth functioning and even distribution of energy. However, functioning can become impaired for several reasons.

For example, the abuse of steroids can enlarge muscles by increasing the consumption of energy within certain neurochemical transmitters. This increases water retention there and the firing rate of the surrounding neuron’s, as well as the neuron’s size. This can lead to over stimulation and lack of circulation. This can cause a person to become excessively yang, or of a fiery temperament, because their energy proportions become out of balance. 

With steroid abuse, people often experience low general well being with high emotional volatility. Water can be used to hydrate the joints as well as other areas of the brain and body. This requires circulation and balanced distribution of energy. This can be difficult to achieve if the neurotransmitters become over stimulated in certain local areas, such as around particular steroid hormone sites. 

From limited functioning to the unlimited

In cases of limited by highly volatile local activity around such sites, the survival circuits of the brain tends to become a dominant factor in behaviour. This high pressure within limited pathways leads to heightened fight or flight response. This is because the brain naturally assumes that with limited functioning one’s survival is threatened. This is ok in an emergency, but an emergency is not supposed to keep you on high alert for longer than necessary. The way to bring this down at all other times is to become more flexible and fluid, as well as more rounded as a person. Rounded means equal distribution of pressure. 

If energy is going only one way, rather than going back and forth, then it is only natural that one’s survival instincts will kick in.

When resources are scarce, a person will tend to become more survival orientated and become reactive. Another way of looking at this is that when someone’s survival pathways get chronically over stimulated or enlarged, they tend to view everything as a competition. This eventually leads to a loss of balance, and burn out. It also leads to feelings of insecurity, because energy becomes excessively outward bound rather than self sustaining. If energy is going only one way, rather than going back and forth, then it is only natural that one’s survival instincts will kick in. Being stuck in a survival mode prevents wider circulation of energy, and constrained energy leads to limited functioning. This creates friction. It takes a lot of energy, functioning in a limited way, to become survival orientated all the time. When one becomes like a circle, they move without friction, even over uneven terrain.

Wider circulation of energy is a way to preserve your health rather than just survive. Survival is important, but the eventual aim of martial arts is to increase energy circulation within the wider circuits of the brain and body which promote health, well being, and maintenance of energy. This requires work. Unfortunately, today many people do not engage in the level of work necessary to keep them healthy. They either under do it, or over do it. Just as when you overwork for too long, under work can lead to limited functioning and prolonged activation of the survival circuits. In both instances the survival circuits kick in because you are functioning in a limited way. This leads to reactivity rather than balanced response.

In such an emergency situation, if you are balanced, you are able to act in an unconstrained way, even if there options are limited.

In terms of martial arts, when you get the balance right between work and maintenance, you are then better able to choose when and how to act effectively in an emergency situation. In such an emergency situation, if you are balanced, you are able to act in an unconstrained way, even if there options are limited.

Sweating is a good way of cooling the system down. Athletes sweat more than the average person because they are efficient at cooling themselves down. If you retain heat and do not manage to cool yourself down, then this is another way the survival circuits are likely to get heightened. Ideally, if you sweat predominantly from the head, this is considered better than all over the body. This is because in terms of energy it is considered a good sign that the energy is traveling upwards and exiting at the top like a hot spring. It is usually a sign that there is enough upward transmission of energy.

To become like a circle is to embody balance, symmetry, and responsiveness. It is to distribute energy and pressure equally across the whole system, allowing for unlimited functioning in body, mind, and spirit. This is not just a physical shape but a living principle—a way of being resilient, fluid, and whole in the face of life’s pressures.

Oscillating Force in Martial Arts

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 4 min read | 102 views

“Energy transfer occurs as an
oscillation of dynamic energy”

If you perform a strike in an oscillating manner, the impact is often as though you were landing on the ground and absorbing the gravitational energy through your body. The only difference is that the impact is being absorbed through the striking limb. This means you can spring off of the opponent as well as stop them in their tracks with impact.


When you use an oscillating force, the energy you send into the opponent does not fully dissipate out of you and into them. It oscillates back and forth which gives you the ability to immediately spring into some other action, much like when you bounce a basketball on the floor and you dart off somewhere. This kind of rebound action is possible with the basketball because you send energy into the ball, which moments later is then reabsorbed by you after it hits the floor. When you correctly judge where it will go, you get into position and wait for it. It’s not that you lose the ball and gather it back again losing you momentum each time.


In martial arts, and elsewhere, a certain transformation of energy takes place from stored energy into movement energy. We call these different manifestations of the same force “oscillatory” energy. In martial arts, you hit the opponent or target and then re-position yourself during that moment when the energy is transferred into the target briefly. This frees you up for a moment to seamlessly transition into the next phase of action without having a large amount of stored energy to shift. This happens all at once without having to having to gather and reestablish yourself at each step, if it is done properly.


“A punch or kick is simply an inductor
which initiates the potential energy”.

In basketball, there is a moment when the energy transfers into the ball and away from you physically. This means it turns from stored energy to movement or dynamic energy. Nothing is lost in this process. The energy is conserved and remains constant throughout the oscillation back and forth. For example, in martial arts you hit the target, and this same energy from the impact is then released back into your own system when you pull it back. This involves a certain perception which is felt during the impact of a strike and which continues after.When the martial artists feels and anticipates this felt recoil after the initial impact, they align themselves physically to take full advantage of this energy before it dissipates.


When you launch a kick, it is not that you just passively shape the foot to brace for impact. You should find that your foot or fist shapes itself spontaneously to the angle it lands on the target, just as it would if you were to jump over a fence and land on an uneven surface. Your ankle might have to adapt spontaneously to land on terrain that could either be softer or more uneven than expected, for instance. This would be automatic if you were alert and ready, and would minimise injury.


You wouldn’t want to land on just the ball of your foot if you were to absorb heavy impact, because the ankle would likely get sprained. You would want to transmit this force through the entire system and align the body accordingly. Here you are not looking to unload energy into the ground. If you are preparing for an almighty crashing impact, it is best to use the entire surface area of the foot properly and absorb gravitational energy in such a way that it does not damage the ankle. This is just one example.


In martial arts, you are not looking to strike the surface with a part of the foot or hand and just unload energy there. Only in a very rudimentary sense are you doing this.


The strike you are doing, whether this is a punch or kick, is simply an inductor which initiates the potential energy. When it comes to striking a target, you are simply shaping the striking limb so that the energy is transferred effectively throughout the entire system as a whole. This energy transfer occurs as an oscillation of dynamic energy.

Total Involvement in Self Defence

Posted on Last updated on by joeharman8 | 6 min read | 100 views

“it is possible for the brain to distort the situation when it becomes flooded and overthinks the situation. This should not happen where possible.“

The important thing is to remain in a state of total awareness. Keeping the hands up in a state of unawareness is just going through the motions. Even if you cover your face with your arms, peek through your guard with at least one eye. That way, you can see what’s coming next. If your guard obscures your vision completely, you don’t know who is around you, or what they are going to do next. It is for this reason the hands hands should be fluid and used in many different ways.

Putting the hands in the way of the opponents face or body runs interference on them. This creates a series of diversions. These can be fidgety movements with the hands and body, which divert the opponents attention away from you being attacked. Much of the activity involved in fighting has to do with distractions and misleading the opponent, rather than creating any kind of definitive outcome.

If you need to, you can simply stick your hand in their face. If you distract them with your hands by grabbing out at them or poking them in the eye, this buys you time to run off. This is a kind of strategy to find an opportunity to make your escape. It is not that you want to poke them in the eye just to cause harm or for any kind of outcome in particular. 

The enraged opponent always attacks meaninglessly. Meaningless aggression is one of the most powerful ways to attack. The opponent is distracting you with meaningless yet dangerous attacks. This is the basis of their power. You do not need to try and understand this in any intellectual sense. If some wild animals are howling in the night, preventing you from sleeping, you do not need to decipher what they are saying or doing. You just keep out of their way and keep a barrier between yourself and them. We know that wild animals make noise. 

Act to put a stop to the situation, or distance yourself from it, as and when required.

Just as a boxer sends out a series of feints to make the attacker back off or stop, the individual defending themselves does the same to buy themselves an opportunity to escape. A moment is all you really need. Wild attackers rarely know why they are doing what they are doing because they are acting largely unconsciously. This does not prevent them being effective. If you respond to the situation with total conscious awareness, rather than turning it into just a thought process, you are able to become more toally involved in the situation.

Nobody made the planets round. This is just the way nature made them. It didn’t require any kind of building process. In the same way, nature endowed us with the capacity to intuitively respond to urgent situations so long as we remain aware and pay full attention to the process consciously. Just as the planet is rounded by nature, we too become rounded and balanced by becoming totally involved. We can become aware of this or not. Like the planet itself, it is possible to be at it twenty four hours a day, by offering yourself to the process of ceaseless development and conscious awareness of this process.

Most fights happen because somebody who is acting out of a need to dominate others in some social situation goes up against another person who wants to deliver them justice. Who is wrong and who is right is just a matter of opinion. Two such individuals will naturally gravitate towards each other unless they are not in the same room. This is why it is always best to leave the situation if you can, even if you think you’re in the right. Never trust what you think about survival situations, just see them for what they are. You can only think logically by comparing yourself to another. Instead it is better to cut through this and act totally rather than as one side against another. That is the whole meaning of sacrifice, to commit to the wholesituation and act from there. It is only though bypassing limited thought processes and committing totally that something else more powerful happens. At the same time, such an act of total commitment creates the best possible conditions for the thought process to happen most clearly.

You need to focus when the danger becomes imminent, but also remain aware of the periphery. Where are the exit doors? Does the opponent have any friends waiting nearby to help them? When the opponent is very close, you become very heightened and reactive. Due to the intensity of the situation, blood rushes to the brain. This is usually accompanied by a fight or flight response. 

If the brain gets flooded with hormones and blood, the body can become drained. If this happens for prolonged periods, then over time distortions happen within the system. In this way it is possible for the brain to distort the situation when it becomes flooded and overthinks the situation. This should not happen where possible. Maintain an awareness of your stance so that you do not lose all the energy from your body. Then it can communicate intelligently with the brain. This is one important reason why it is important to focus on the Hara Centre, the body’s centre of gravity,and maintain equilibrium. Maintain a certain pressure and energy there by locking into the centre. 

It is often important to move off centre to avoid an attack, whilst at the same time re directing its energy. For instance, you can step outside by pivoting on the front leg as the rear leg steps around the back of yourself. This takes you out to the side. The front leg stays where it is as the rear leg steps outside of the opponents line of attack. You can either grab the opponents arm, or thrust it away with the palm. It is as if you are kneading dough. You do not slap the dough but you sink the palm hand into it, gripping it somewhat whilst at the same time applying a kind of pressing force down and away from you. This redirects the opponents force against their own equilibrium. The idea is not to dissipate this force but to make it oscillate back and forth from your own centre, linking you to to the target. This prevents you becoming too drained of energy, and allows you to use the opponents force against them.

Snake form Martial Arts: Flow and Alignment of the Neck and Head

Posted on by joeharman8 | 4 min read | 119 views

The forward rotation of the cervical spine, such as when punching or reaching forward, is a smooth and continuous motion enabled by the spine’s natural curvature and structure. This motion, centered around the cervical spine, allows the head to pivot forward naturally without abruptness, whilst maintaining proper alignment and balance.

To ensure fluidity and reduce strain, the head should lift subtly during this forward rotation, with the crown extending upward as if drawn by an invisible string. This symbolism of the string has been used in Tai Chi practices, as well as in Yoga. In Yogic tradition, this energy strand is referred to as Brahmarandhra, which describes a passage that is both an emitter and receiver of vertical energy. Physiologically, this upward lift of the head counteracts compressive forces, promoting a graceful motion that protects the spine and supports posture during activities like martial arts practice.

The curvature and the natural S-shape of a human spine, permits smooth and continuous motion by evenly distributing mechanical stress and allowing flexibility. For instance, when a person walks, the curved spine acts as a spring, absorbing impact and facilitating a flowing, rhythmic gait. Similarly, in martial arts, the flexibility of the spine enables the warrior to move gracefully and adapt quickly to changes in direction, enhancing their agility and smoothness of motion.

In nature, as well as in engineering, we see how structures are formed according to certain curvature rules. A tube or the flow of air and water naturally creates or forms a curve shape, flowing smoothly and continuously. Like the gentle arc of a river meandering through a valley or the streamlined shape of a wind tunnel, there is a tendency to avoid abrupt bends that would disrupt harmonious movement.

A water pipe with smooth, gentle curves resembles a snake standing upright, maintaining a flowing, uninterrupted path of ascent. Sharp bends would disrupt the flow of the water pipe, causing turbulence and dissipation of water pressure, much like a snake’s movement would falter if forced into abrupt angles. Similarly in martial arts, if you rush to abrupt conclusions unnecessarily, this apparent short cut can diminish one’s energies.

When you read a step by step guide on how to do a punch, it is as if there are only two or three stages to it. A step-by-step process is characterized by distinct, incremental stages, where each step represents a deliberate transition from one stage to the next. It involves pauses or plateaus between steps, allowing time for adjustment, assessment, or realignment. This is often necessary in the short term in order to learn certain rules. In a real life situation, you often do not have this kind of luxury to stop and pause. In contrast, a curvature is a continuous flow, marked by seamless, unbroken change that transitions fluidly without sharp stops or abrupt shifts. This is how the warrior trains in order to become infinitely adaptable and absolutely focused.

Curvature represents a dynamic process where each point is influenced by the momentum and trajectory of the preceding points, creating a smooth and uninterrupted evolution. This is in fact how one evolves, not in a step by step linear way. While the step-by-step approach emphasizes clarity and order, the curvature embodies fluidity and adaptability, often reflecting processes that evolve naturally rather than being consciously segmented.

Because much of the practice of martial arts involves conscious expression of subconscious energies, there is need to bring conscious awareness to this quality of continuous and adaptable expression of energy. The body can become a vehicle for this expression, or it can impede it. It is for this reasons that the symbolism of the snake, as well as the flow of water, is used in certain styles of martial arts to emphasis the quality of flexibility and continuity in spite of obstacles.. 

The hissing sound of a snake is produced by the steady, controlled release of air through its glottis, creating a smooth and continuous flow of sound. This is analogous to the snake’s movement, where its muscles contract and relax in a wave-like pattern, allowing it to glide effortlessly and without abrupt stops. The consistency of the hiss reflects the same principle of fluid motion, where unbroken flow ensures efficiency and minimal resistance.

Sound and Form [Part 1]

Just as a snake’s body seamlessly adapts to its surroundings while moving, the martial artists also learns to use the breath and body to create an energy form analogous to that of a snake.

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