Realistic Training !!

[DWeidman]

And Ronnin, despite your recent PM to me where you called me, among other things, a mental midget, I am repeating my question on your claims of training in the Bujinkan. I was not the one to first raise that possibility, but the more you post and the way you evade and react, the more I am coming to their way of thinking.

He knows of the BJK guys in the area -- and knows enough about them for me to assume he is legit as an Ex-BJK guy at this point.

Anything else?

-DW

 

[Don Roley]

Well Dan, so far he is reacting more like some of the guys like those from the Saito ryu and less like real practicioners. And finding out about the guys in SoCal is not that difficult if you are in the area. So my instincts are going off. The following is kind of one of the things that sets it off.

I am not saying I don't understand why we do the things we do, and I also realize that we do a lot of things where in time the truth behind it reveals itself, I have infact written many essays on the subject of the hidden purpose,

Dan, are you aware of any hidden moves, etc in the kata? It sounds like Ronnin is not only aware of them, but written many essays about them despite being in the Bujinkan for only two or so years.

And considering just how nasty some of the folks we have run across, and how they have tried to be deceptive, it is a valid concern. I have said it before, when people start won't even say who their teacher was, it is time to treat them like they were lying. So far, we do not know the name of whoever Ronnin claims to have taught him.

At first I just thought that Ronnin was being young, egotistical and stubborn about doing things like writing essays on hidden stuff after only two years, leaving a teacher even though (according to his story) he was not learning anything bad, etc. Now I am not so sure. It is more about how he is unwilling to answer questions than anything else that sets off the alarms.

So, I think it safe to assume that he is not and never has been a Bujinkan member. Just that should be easy to prove. The only reason I can think of him not wanting to is that he is being decietful. If he really wants us to believe he was a Bujinkan member, then he can. If he does not care enough to prove it to us, then he does not care enough to complain when we treat him as if he was not.

 

[DWeidman]

Well Dan, so far he is reacting more like some of the guys like those from the Saito ryu and less like real practicioners. And finding out about the guys in SoCal is not that difficult if you are in the area. So my instincts are going off. The following is kind of one of the things that sets it off.

Fair enough. Like I said -- he seems to know enough about the local guys... so it appears legit at the surface. I haven't met him yet though... will let you know what happens when I do.

;-)

-DW

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

In other words, are they the end result and we should be looking at how they got there rather than what they are doing now? Seems a valid point.

I know that Hatsumi's classes are geared for advanced students, even thought it seems that few people bother with the basics before showing up. But I have been dealing with a few shihan here and they ahve been giving me advice and instruction on what the work for at the basic level. It really is a great learning experience and I advise everyone to spend more time with the shihans rather than only go to class with Hatsumi.

Some of the things they say they did in the early days, as well as the reasons why they did them and why they don't do them are very informative.

When anyone makes it to Japan they would be very wise indeed to train with as many Shihan as possible. That would of course be on top of going to all of the classes taught by Hatsumi Soke. (lot's and lot's of training)

 

[stephen]

When anyone makes it to Japan they would be very wise indeed to train with as many Shihan as possible. That would of course be on top of going to all of the classes taught by Hatsumi Soke. (lot's and lot's of training)

To be honest, I go to Soke's to be inspired. I go the the Shihan to actually learn. Soke is just too over my head.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

To be honest, I go to Soke's to be inspired. I go the the Shihan to actually learn. Soke is just too over my head.

Stephen you are not the first person or the last to ever say that. I have been standing next to a Shihan and they asked me what did he just do? If you have not experienced it and you practice Budo Taijutsu then I would really, really implore you to get to Japan and experience training with Soke and the Japanese Shihan.

 

[saru1968]

.....it would be logical to follow their example in order to mimic what they are doing.

But is that not the entire point.. from the 'Top' we are being told not to train certain ways because it creates bad habits. This seems straightforward to me. If the object is to get 'where' they are, should we not be following that advice?

I wonder how many of those that train would argue the point at Honbu with Soke or the Shihan? or indeed start doing a bit of sparring when they really should just be following the advice given.

 

[DWeidman]

I wonder how many of those that train would argue the point at Honbu with Soke or the Shihan? or indeed start doing a bit of sparring when they really should just be following the advice given.

I wouldn't argue the point. But... I think for myself, thank you very much.

YMMV.

-DW

 

[saru1968]

I wouldn't argue the point. But... I think for myself, thank you very much.

YMMV.

-DW

Are you saying that by thinking for yourself you disregard the advice of your peers and those that have gone before you?

Nothing wrong with wanting to do your own thing i suppose or thinking you know better, you life i suppose but i'd hate to waste years training a certain way and then be told it was all wrong especially if you were told this beforehand danny.

 

[Seattletcj]

Then I do not understand why you study Bujinkan and claim to teach it.

Honestly. I think it is only natural that we try to be like the guys at the top of our art.

I guess I'm not getting my point across well.
My goal is not to become profecient in dojo-jutsu. I do not want to do what the seniors in Japan do. What they do is teach advanced concepts. That is not my goal .
They are very good at what they do. That is why I said , it is important to define exactly what they do. If your goal is to look like them, then yes mimic everything they do.

Here is a relevant article that may clarify my position:
(BTW, I dont see this as gospel. But I do think it makes some very interesting and important points.)

Why doesn't everyone train Alive?"
by Matt Thornton

Over the last several Years I have made a point in my classes, articles, videos, and seminars around the world, to preach the message of ‘Aliveness’. I made this my primary objective because in the very moment of the understanding of what Aliveness is comes freedom from the ritual, hierarchy, and nonsense that is Martial Arts. When a person actually understands what Aliveness means they are from that point forward immune to ever being deceived again, at least within the realm of Martial Arts. So essentially, Aliveness is the truth that sets Martial Artists free from the lies and deceptions of the ‘classical mess’.
It has been my experience that once a person gains an understanding of Aliveness, the next question is usually, "Why doesn’t everyone do it this way?" "Why do others persist so adamantly in training methods, progressions, and ritual, that serve no purpose, and are simply ‘dead patterns’". "Why do people still feel so attached to dead patterns?" I hope to answer this second question in this article.

 

[jks9199]

Then I do not understand why you study Bujinkan and claim to teach it.

Honestly. I think it is only natural that we try to be like the guys at the top of our art.

And Ronnin, despite your recent PM to me where you called me, among other things, a mental midget, I am repeating my question on your claims of training in the Bujinkan. I was not the one to first raise that possibility, but the more you post and the way you evade and react, the more I am coming to their way of thinking.

I'd have to wonder the same thing. I look at how my instructor moves, how his peers move, I look at how his instructor moves, and I look at how I move. I see how far I've got to go...

If I didn't want to look like them when I fight... Why would I be there? If you want a pepperoni pizza, you don't go to a Japanese steak house or a tire store! You go to a pizza parlor. If you don't like what you see the people at the top levels in your art are doing, or you don't like the training in it -- why waste your time there?

Why affiliate yourself with them, if you don't think they've got something worthwile? Or do you think that what you've got to offer isn't substantial enough without their weight behind it? In that case, it seems to me that you've got a choice to make. If your going to clam to be doing Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu -- you have the obligation to do that. Not something else. If you're going to do something else, you need to give it a different name.

Let me use Brian VanCise for a moment. In his Instinctive Response Training, he tells you up front what inspired it, where it came from, and basically how it's NOT BBT. When he teaches BBT -- I'm confident that THAT is exactly what he teaches -- NOT IRT, or anything else.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Let me use Brian VanCise for a moment. In his Instinctive Response Training, he tells you up front what inspired it, where it came from, and basically how it's NOT BBT. When he teaches BBT -- I'm confident that THAT is exactly what he teaches -- NOT IRT, or anything else.

That would be correct!

However, I am just a novice in Budo Taijutsu and thereby need training from my seniors in the art. Definately we are blessed with great seniors in Michigan like Shihan Michael Asuncion, Shihan Yost Fulton, Shidoshi Bart Uggucioni and more. Even then all of us endeavor to get to Japan as much as we possibly can to train with Soke and the Japanese Shihan. I am looking forward to my next trip! (hopefully next July or August

)

 

[Seattletcj]

If I didn't want to look like them when I fight... Why would I be there?

Thats the point of the article posted above actually.
I dont care how I look when I "fight". IMO if you have very solid basics and can perform using these basics, then what you look like is a natural byproduct. Unfortunatly looking a certain way seems to be the goal of many, while performance is assumed to be a byproduct.

My end goal is not to become a great dojo-jutsu practitioner. It takes immense skill to be a high level dojo-jutsuka, yes. That is just not my goal.

it seems to me that you've got a choice to make. If your going to clam to be doing Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu -- you have the obligation to do that. Not something else. If you're going to do something else, you need to give it a different name.

ROFL Thanks for the ultimatum. :rofl:

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

I really think that Budo Taijutsu is such a broad art and can easily handle lots of different pracittioners with different backgrounds and even some modified training methods. (It already does this) Each person in the end has to find their own way. Having said that clearly having a link and getting the feeling from Japan is important and to most essential. The easiest way to do this is to train with people that regularly go to Japan or make the trip yourself. Both of these allow you to get recharged and refocused on your training. Just some thoughts on the matter.

Personally I enjoy seeing other peoples opinions even when I may not agree with them. It always gives one food for thought!

 

[Grey Eyed Bandit]

I do not want to do what the seniors in Japan do.

Fine. Then there's nothing stopping you from getting out, if you aren't already. Pardon my French.

In response to you article on Thornton, I'll say this - if the bottom line is that you can't rely on eye pokes, biting, clawing and groin attacks to save your neck on the ground, then I heartily agree. Furthermore, I'd like to put in a quote from a conversation between "Salty Dog" and "Crafty Dog" from the Kali Tudo dvd:


Crafty Dog: Well, it goes back to...there's this certain famous student of Guru Dan Inosanto, I think we'll refer to him that way, those who know who he is know who he is, those who don't...it doesn't matter. And...people kept coming to me saying that "so-and-so says that Guro teaches is a bunch of BS, a bunch of dead patterns, and what do you think??"

He's an articulate guy, and he was famous for doing that stuff that Guro Inosanto teaches really well, and he's really quite impressive at it, so when he says it's no good, it carried a lot of weight with a lot of people. So they came to me, and it got me thinking, and I come to a different conclusion than he does, a very different conclusion. He's certainly free to follow truth as he sees fit, but he's also using it in how he markets himself in the martial arts world...'I can do that stuff, so when I tell you it's no good, you really know it's no good'. And that seems to me to be...inappropriate, and I think that as the years go by that will occur to him as well.
But the question remains...it's the same question we got with the first series - where's the sombrada, where's the hubud, the thrust-on tapping, all these drills that people associate with the Filipino martial arts, and a lot of people were looking at our videos and saying 'see, that proves that that stuff doesn't work', or 'that proves the Dog Brothers don't have technical skills, they're a bunch of sweaty, smelly, psychopaths with sticks'. And at the same time, all of us who went deeper, and have the better results in Dog Brothers do have depth in that, and we were just doing the DVD conversion of the 'Power' tape, and there's that carenza that we opened with with you [Salty Dog]...a lot of dead pattern training to produce the skill setting that is so impressive today. And so, it's an interesting thing, we addressed it a little bit in the first series, Wild Dog was saying 'where's the technique that these people aren't seeing? There's a tremendous amount of finesse, and there's a tremendous amount of technique in everybody in Dog Brothers. It's just that it's happening really fast, and if you don't have any contact experience, you won't know what you're looking at'.

And I think that's right, I think you see the skills developed by sombrada when Chris Clifton, True Dog, fights with staff. He gets into mid-range and he just knocks the bejeezus out of people because he's just more fluid and more flowing and more alive, because of the time he spent developing those skills. Not only those reasons, he's also a hell of a fighter and he brings a lot of other things to the party as well. But I think that we really do see the art there, and to the people who take our fights as proof that that's this is the more flowery stuff and that's the more cultural side to the art...I say know, it really does produce the skills, but you also have to get in there and mix it up, and that's where I think this certain famous person has profoundly missed the boat...because he was so good at that stuff he expected to just sort of waltz in, and...ta-dah, and...no, it doesn't quite work like that, you've gotta spend some time, and you've got to look in the mirror when something goes wrong, not elsewhere."

 

[jks9199]

Quote:
it seems to me that you've got a choice to make. If your going to clam to be doing Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu -- you have the obligation to do that. Not something else. If you're going to do something else, you need to give it a different name.
ROFL Thanks for the ultimatum. :rofl:

Maybe it's the medium interfering with the message...

It's your decision. I just personally feel it's only fair that if you're going to use the name -- you have to stay within the bounds of their teaching. I teach bando, as it was taught to me by my instructor. I stay faithful to his teaching; I don't go out and graft judo or something else into it. It's my understanding that there's a lot of room for personalization in the Bujinkan; that's great. But if you wander too far afield, you stop doing what they are.

Let me make a comparison with cooking. You can take a cake, and add all sorts of stuff to it, "package" it into different numbers of layers or use different frosting, and it stays a cake, right? But -- at some point, if you change it enough, like, if leave out flour and sugar and use ground beef and ground pork instead... It's not a cake anymore. It's meatloaf. If you offered someone a slice of meatloaf as being the same thing as a slice of cake... Most folks are probably going to think you're a little nutty, right? Same thing with martial arts. Once you stray far enough from the teachings of the "home" or "base" system -- you're into something different. For some systems, you don't have much room at all. In others, there's lots of room. But you still have to stay within the overall bounds of the base, or you're doing something different.

And I'm not saying that one is better than the other, any more than meatloaf is superior to chocolate cake. It just depends on what you want. But giving meatloaf when you offer cake -- that's where I think there
s a problem.

 

[Ronnin]

I really think that Budo Taijutsu is such a broad art and can easily handle lots of different pracittioners with different backgrounds and even some modified training methods. (It already does this) Each person in the end has to find their own way. Having said that clearly having a link and getting the feeling from Japan is important and to most essential. The easiest way to do this is to train with people that regularly go to Japan or make the trip yourself. Both of these allow you to get recharged and refocused on your training. Just some thoughts on the matter.

Personally I enjoy seeing other peoples opinions even when I may not agree with them. It always gives one food for thought!

I think you hit it on the nose. Each person finds thier own way. That's the wonderful thing about this art. Exploration. People who say "no you're not doing it right because you feet need to be angled 3 inches more" are just nit-picking. Don't get me wrong, we need to know the basic of the basics, we should be corrected, but at some point i think each person come to realize, this is how it works for me. Then build on that. And if a teacher is just nit-picking ( in your opinion ) then find one that fits you.

 

[Seattletcj]

Maybe it's the medium interfering with the message...

It's your decision. I just personally feel it's only fair that if you're going to use the name -- you have to stay within the bounds of their teaching. I teach bando, as it was taught to me by my instructor. I stay faithful to his teaching; I don't go out and graft judo or something else into it. It's my understanding that there's a lot of room for personalization in the Bujinkan; that's great. But if you wander too far afield, you stop doing what they are.

We are drifting here folks. I never said I graft things into or change anything. This was not the debate at all.
This is a straw man.

The seniors in Japan are great at what they do. Period. If you study the art you need a link to them, and regular training from them or someone linked to them. Yes !
But...
My end goal is not to be really great at demoing the complexities of the art in a very specific and controlled environment. Neither is it my goal to look a certain way.

Thats all I'm saying. If that warrants all of the cries to "just quit" or "join the ufc" as many are saying in public and via pm then.....wow.
I have apparently upset many people here. Sorry about that.

:2xBird2: :cheers:

 

[makoto-dojo]

Hello everybody,

I just wanted to say thanks for the conversation. I was going to reply more, but I just don't have the time to do it right. Sumimasen... I will be getting even more busy soon, and also this thread is really more about the bujinkan than Takamatsu-den, so anything I say is really limited in relevance.

Have fun, don't take things so personal and keep an open mind maybe all parties will be wiser as a result, maybe everyone will help everyone else understand themselves a little more.

And, maybe not.. But I remain an optimist

Sincerely,

 

[DWeidman]

Well Dan, so far he is reacting more like some of the guys like those from the Saito ryu and less like real practicioners. And finding out about the guys in SoCal is not that difficult if you are in the area. So my instincts are going off. The following is kind of one of the things that sets it off.

Now I am not so sure. It is more about how he is unwilling to answer questions than anything else that sets off the alarms.

So, I think it safe to assume that he is not and never has been a Bujinkan member. Just that should be easy to prove. The only reason I can think of him not wanting to is that he is being decietful. If he really wants us to believe he was a Bujinkan member, then he can. If he does not care enough to prove it to us, then he does not care enough to complain when we treat him as if he was not.

He came to training today. He knew the bow in ceremony -- and he warmed up with the San Shin (without fumbling) -- alongside us, simultaneous... He moved well enough to remove any doubt.

That should kill this particular issue.

-DW