No Limitations!

[Brian R. VanCise]

Here is my latest blog entry on The Instinctive Edge!
My hope is that you get a little insight into what we do!

 

[Xue Sheng]

Brian

Thanks, I needed that more than I can tell you.

Xue

 

[tshadowchaser]

no limitations thinking is a great way to keep people motivated and seeking new methods of learning
Good article Brian

 

[Flea]

Sign me up. I'll take it!

 

[seasoned]

Cool, I like this element of allowing each individual to rise to their own level of desire.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Thank you all for the positive feedback as I always appreciate it!

 

[Flea]

Here's another thought:

Maybe it's my noobiness shining through, but I thought that was the way it ever was with MA instructors and classes. I haven't met too many instructors, but they've all been unanimous in this attitude. Every student is free to explore MA in the way that's most meaningful to them, as long as they're polite and pay the bill on time. :wink1:

Isn't this the standard attitude? And if not, then why? Personally I wouldn't want to work with a teacher who insisted that my personal goals were somehow not good enough and I had to get with his program. That would be insulting, and I can get insulted on my own time for free.

Am I missing something here?

 

[jks9199]

Sadly, there are plenty of instructors out there who jealously guard their students, and don't want them so much as looking at anything else out there. I've even seen it within my own system, where people get knowledge and just won't share it -- even to the point of deliberately teaching things incorrectly so that nobody else gets that element.

I do want to know somewhat about what my students are getting into if they look at other systems. Generally, it's up to them -- though if I know there're problems with a particular school or club, I may steer them away from that one.

In addition to schools guarding students as potential paychecks, or hoarding knowledge... some instructors are simply afraid to let their students discover how much crap they've been teaching. So someone who's teaching a bogus "Koga Ninjitsu" system they learned from a mysterious old guy who lived across the street when they were a kid won't want someone to train with a legitimate Bujinkan or Jinenkan or Genbukan instructor, not even for a clinic... And some are just afraid to have students learn something they don't know themselves...

 

[Flea]

Oops! Double-post.

 

[Flea]

Thanks. I guess that's the human factor, isn't it? There's nothing warrior-like about that, it's childish. What a shame.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Here's another thought:

Maybe it's my noobiness shining through, but I thought that was the way it ever was with MA instructors and classes. I haven't met too many instructors, but they've all been unanimous in this attitude. Every student is free to explore MA in the way that's most meaningful to them, as long as they're polite and pay the bill on time. :wink1:

Isn't this the standard attitude? And if not, then why? Personally I wouldn't want to work with a teacher who insisted that my personal goals were somehow not good enough and I had to get with his program. That would be insulting, and I can get insulted on my own time for free.

Am I missing something here?

Sadly, there are plenty of instructors out there who jealously guard their students, and don't want them so much as looking at anything else out there. I've even seen it within my own system, where people get knowledge and just won't share it -- even to the point of deliberately teaching things incorrectly so that nobody else gets that element.

I do want to know somewhat about what my students are getting into if they look at other systems. Generally, it's up to them -- though if I know there're problems with a particular school or club, I may steer them away from that one.

In addition to schools guarding students as potential paychecks, or hoarding knowledge... some instructors are simply afraid to let their students discover how much crap they've been teaching. So someone who's teaching a bogus "Koga Ninjitsu" system they learned from a mysterious old guy who lived across the street when they were a kid won't want someone to train with a legitimate Bujinkan or Jinenkan or Genbukan instructor, not even for a clinic... And some are just afraid to have students learn something they don't know themselves...

Although I agree there can be another less insidious or dishonest reason.

My Taiji Sifu, when I first started training with him asked me (he did not tell me) to stop training anything else. At this point he doesn't much care what I train. My Sanda Sifu asked me to make a choice between Sanda and Xingyiquan, but did not care about taiji because I had been doing it for so long. He (my Sanda Sifu) did not see how I could learn both Sanda and Xingyi at the same time since I was new to both and they did not approach fighting in the same way. My taiji Sifu was thinking a similar thing; he did not understand how I cold do anything other than taiji and still learn how to do it and use it correctly.

 

[jks9199]

Although I agree there can be another less insidious or dishonest reason.

My Taiji Sifu, when I first started training with him asked me (he did not tell me) to stop training anything else. At this point he doesn't much care what I train. My Sanda Sifu asked me to make a choice between Sanda and Xingyiquan, but did not care about taiji because I had been doing it for so long. He (my Sanda Sifu) did not see how I could learn both Sanda and Xingyi at the same time since I was new to both and they did not approach fighting in the same way. My taiji Sifu was thinking a similar thing; he did not understand how I cold do anything other than taiji and still learn how to do it and use it correctly.

Absolutely... but the instructors with reasoning like that, I've found, aren't going to forbid you or hide stuff -- they'll ask you not to, and tell you why. They'd probably be fine with going to a weekend seminar somewhere, so long as you come back and work with them on the material, for example. That's how I am. I encourage my students to go to some things... and when the come back, we work on it together. After all, I can't always travel myself, and it's a way I can keep up with what's going on.

 

[Bruno@MT]

We are 'strongly encouraged' to learn multiple things. By default that is jujutsu because it exists within Genbukan as well, but other arts are definitely encouraged as well.

The only exception is that we are not allowed to train with or be member of other ninjutsu organizations. The illegitimate ones are shams and we do not want to be associated with them. The legitimate ones are of course perfectly valid orgnizations, but that is where the things become political. IIRC Bujinkan and Jinenkan have similar restrictions.