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Iron body training, what is it purpose and relevance in self-defense, combat and fighting? Is it a practice with the agenda of egoistic impressionists goals or is it actually effective in protecting out bodies against the physical violence in conflict? Are these practices more about entertainment and confidence and testing the limits of human physical and mental endurance?
Physics of the Universe rule. We as humans can do things to enhance those physics to stretch them a small distance but physics are physics. The real question is this, “When using a dynamic tensioning of the body along with other body-like armor aspects does such conditioning actually work?
The answers are both yes and no, in other words it depends. When you understand the striking arts you understand that they were meant to be a socially driven communications skill where appropriate violence to establish certain hierarchal rules for survival are involved rather then grave bodily harm or death as would be a goal of combat.
A question I find necessary to answer all of these questions and the many more that will arise as others chime in on the subject is, “Can you make use of the results of body conditioning, i.e., iron body sanchin dynamic tensioning, in the chaos of a hand-to-hand combat or the monkey dance of social mutual fighting or the predatory process or resource attack requiring self-defense.
Lets focus on the most critical form, i.e., the predatory process or resource attack requiring self-defense. This is something we cannot predict and if it is enacted against us it means we are in a state where the predator has a high probability of success in his attack. It can involve total and complete surprise so to achieve a dynamic body tension of the iron body sanchin condition cannot be triggered unless the victim has trained appropriately to make that type of trigger one coming from the, “Unconscious learning to encode procedural memory as a type of implicit memory so that the encoded knowledge of triggering dynamic protective tension as executed by the stimulus of a physical attack, etc. Will our brains trigger procedural memory and is that trigger associated with the type of surprise, damage, balance disruption and a total loss of structure, i.e., structure by the way is necessary to achieve good dynamic tension in that instance. etc.
In a nutshell I would venture to guess that the possibility, as a rare ability, will be possibly be a 1 chance out of 100 it will be successful while the other 99 mean no success even with luck. The odds seem daunting so back to what is the real reason and benefit of Iron Body Training of karada-kitae of karate?
Please note that most of the body conditioning is to condition the natural protective aspects of our bodies as it is best suited for a direct attack, a social attack model for social monkey dancing where grave bodily harm or death are not on the table except as it might apply toward accidents. If one simply changes the dynamics of the physics involved even the hardest body conditioning can be overcome. If one trains using the appropriate multiple methodologies along with the underlying and supporting fundamental principles such body hardening can be bypassed.
In truth, if one has a strong body and understands that the probability they will encounter a predator with this kind of knowledge and skill is very small their efforts in body hardening will actually be of benefit and will be available as long as the realty based training also exists.
So, lets accept that body conditioning toward the proverbial iron body state is beneficial in creating the body armor necessary to mitigate effects from force and power of an attacker. Then we have to ask ourselves, “What degree of conditioning is adequate to achieve this goal?” In my short time and experience I have practiced such body conditioning and observed others do the same but sometimes to what I would believe as, “Extreme.”
A good example is the one where Gung Fu professionals put on a demo where one proponent stands on his head, does a leg split exposing his sensitive area to another proponent with a large, long, round piece of wood. The second then strikes with the wood to the others, “wood,” breaking the round piece of wood. The one being struck then rises up to stand, bow and walk off with no signs of injury, etc. Is this extreme and more of a demo “Performance” rather than a necessary achievement in body hardening? In the end it is a personal question each who undergoes body hardening must ask of themselves.
In my case, extremes were not practiced and the limits I set on myself were adequate wherein injuries were avoided, mostly, and the long term repercussions as I continue aging in my winter years are not present and problematic. Take heed and decide for yourself because it may or may not be beneficial in self-defense. As a challenge and a test of endurance, etc., it can be a great teacher but still you must know when to stop or limit yourself for the price in the end may be pretty darn high.
We won’t even go into the subject of proper training methods, models and applications, that is a whole new obstacle in and of itself.
Bibliography (Click the link)
I am still cringing at just the thought that someone may have actually done this (I still remain skeptical when I see such photo's).
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