I talked to my teacher for a spell last night...we had a really good conversation about this very thing.
He said, "Martial arts is about the male ego. Even if we have a school with nothing but females, it becomes their version of the male ego."
I don't want people to get the wrong idea here...it's not sexist the way it was told. It's just that very male based ego tends to surface when dealing with martial arts.
Carbon,
On the wrist lock/intercept note....it all depends on what the scale is of things. If someone is looking to end the situation and they take your wrist from you (with a level of permanancy) it's over. I'm sorry...but pain tollerance out the yang won't save you from that type of damage. I've had outside wrist locks (omote gyaku/kotogaeishi type) that have knocked together the ends of my forearm bones at the elbow...and that was training. To even attempt, regardless of pain tollerance, that one could deal with that amount of damage and continue to go onward is silly....I think that is why people are bringing up the fact that you haven't trained being a factor.
As a side note, no damage was done to my arm...which shows an incredible amount of control....yet at the same time being on the edge of crippling.
On the topic of intercepting punches. Well, lets look at what it takes to remove yourself from a powerline. A fist, typically, is no wider then five inches. A vertical fist even less. That's how much one has to move to be out of the line of fire. It's physics. If one takes their fist from where it lies, closes the distance and fires out, that's a much greater path of motion then moving your body 4-5 inches to not get hit. What's more important, not getting hit or "intercepting the punch"?
Let's talk about boxing. Boxers are *very* difficult to deal with on a hand to hand level. They are very fast in how the deliver strikes....they spend their lives punching. So let's look at the downside to boxing (there is always one to everything). They strike with taped hands to prevent injury and more times then not have 8-16 ounces of padding to go even beyond that. You have no idea how many boxers I've seen break their hands in street fights. Beyond that, boxers punch from the hip/shoulder/spine rotation. I'll leave that one as is..
The only way the MA could ever win was by doing leg attacks since a boxer isn't prepared for it.
That statement alone explains volumes about how much you truly understand of real combat.
Either way IMHO sticking to a single style and atleast learning it like you know english would be more beneficial.
Hands down, I agree. Oftentimes, though, it takes someone searching a great deal to find an art that "fits" and takes them to a better place in the world. I spent a decade myself.
doesn't mean I'm talking about teh fantasy kung fu movies. I was thinking about the stephen segal movies since he is aikido or whatever his style is that he does a ton of locks and throws and that they look fake yes and he is usually fighting drunk people I know :0
