Refining Gross Motor Skills

Refining Gross Motor Skills

Many new schools have sprung up that will make you a master of real combat arts in 48 hours or less. No I am not kidding, check out the Internet and see for yourself. I’ve talked about this before so you can assume that it bugs me. Why? Because I hate to see people scammed, and I also would hate to see you attempt to defend yourself with any of these new-found techniques. The human body, by design, can only move in so many ways. It is after all a mechanical contrivance, complete with hydraulic and electrical systems, animated by a life force that you may call a spirit, soul, etc. Despite that life-force it still has certain limitations.

I will readily admit that the human body is ingeniously designed with self-healing properties, redundant systems (for most functions) and a computer the likes of which none has been able to fully duplicate. And yet for all of its marvels, knees and elbows still only bend one way, the neck can only swivel safely so many degrees, and there are certain critical organs that must remain inviolate if we are to remain alive. We begin life with very limited mobility and coordination and travel a long path to refine our motor skills.

Refining what is referred to as Gross Motor Skills is only possible through endless repetitions. You did not learn to walk by standing up one time and heading across the carpet. That once wonderfully complicated, nearly insurmountable task, is now a part of your gross motor skills. Its "just" walking. Once you have a child you rediscover how incredibly difficult walking is, all over again. Or maybe you have been seriously injured, or lost a limb and have to relearn the process of "just" walking again. No one can teach you to walk again in two days, and no one can teach you refined fighting skills in two days, or two weeks. It may take you two months or years, but not two days. You will not absorb and master complicated self-defense techniques with one repetition. I really hate to burst your bubble but that is not how learning takes place. You know it, and I know it, but the people selling 48 hour self-defense classes do not seem to know it! Why is that?

If you fail to master their self-defense or combative skills curriculum in one weekend these same people will tell you not to worry because in a "real fight" you can only rely on your gross motor skills. Gee, is this a different reality than they were supposed to be teaching me in the 48 hours of Reality Based fighting? What the heck, when you came to class you already had those gross motor skills, kicking, biting, arm twisting, and eye gouging! But now you have spent a lot of money and call it reality based ground fighting. You already knew how to run away, so what exactly did you get for your money? I’ll let you answer that question.

You can refine your gross motor skills to higher and higher levels to where eventually techniques that you could not perform after dozens of tries become natural, instinctive movements. This won’t happen in 48 hours. It won’t happen because you spent a lot of money or attended one seminar. It will only happen if you spend the time, however much time it takes, to find perfection through endless repetitions.

Let me give you an example of how you can tell you are making progress. Sometimes when Gwynne and I are working on a new technique I will throw a punch or kick from an odd angle or using interrupted timing. Without a moments thought, she blocks or sweeps away my attack. She doesn’t have to launch into her fighting stance or engage some ancient mental mudra, she just moves. Its not the technique I wanted but I caught her off guard or attacked while she was pre-occupied. It doesn’t matter her block was in place and my attack was foiled. Her natural defense is the result of countless repetitions, not a weekend seminar or a ninety-minute videotape. The important point to recognize is that her natural reactions are not the same gross motor skills she started with 12 years ago.

There are no shortcuts in the learning process other than limiting the number of techniques you learn. It is better if you only have four techniques and practice those four thousands of times, rather than have thousands of techniques and practice them only four times. But I guess deep down you really knew that didn’t you. Go find a good teacher and spend a few years with him or her.