Blog Article/Post Caveat (Read First Please: Click the Link)
Recently the discussion on kata became about how kata are, stress ARE, combat techniques or self-defense techniques as if they were the applicable techniques one MUST use to apply skills in self-protection, combat and/or competition. Is this true, not exactly and you are already wondering how that can be because after all YOUR SENSEI said it is “so.”
I have written a few articles on what I think we derive from kata and the technique-based aspect I explain as a means to teach other skills like principles and methodologies but I need to go a bit further to ensure a better understanding because as I also wrote “words matter.”
Yes, kata are a means to teach us something and that something is more than mere technique-oriented techniques because those techniques that are explained as bunkai are also just tools, i.e., not applicable techniques but a means to teach us various principled-based ways to do things that are related to “practical reality-based multiple methodologies in an efficient, proper and effective way.
Kata are the fundamental floor plans to karate as a means of self-protection AND kata are a prearranged set of movements chained together into patterns simply because that is how our species learns things and then retains them and then begins to translate and transcend them into something a bit more applicable in a practice and useful way.
It is transitional space or separation that we must leap across to make it work and that is where things begin to get interesting as you can imagine. Once you disassemble the patterns of kata you begin to “play with them” in an analysis of those moves with no one end skill attached. It is this hands on analysis that leads our creativity toward a more robust manifestation of creative skills that work in the heat of violence because those basic patterned movements will NOT get the job done.
It is Ouyou that is the term that describes this effort to transcend mere kata into something creative, inspirational, spontaneous, efficient and effective practical use under the gun firing adrenaline, danger, and the potential of grave harm or death out in the reality of the world in conflict and against the violent nature of a predatory person.
Most of today’s kata has lost that thread from disassembly and analysis toward a transition into practicality in creative and chaotic situations and dangers. It is that moment when we can analyze, interpret, create kata patterns and moves into practical effective use for particular situations involving conflict and potential violence.
So, when next you begin to take apart your kata, think kata/ouyou much like you think of the complimentary but diametrically opposite yin/yang concepts. They are meant to be one while holding fast to their own separate identities thus giving birth to one again much like the concept of yin/yang being one then separating to their opposites and then coming back together as one, but different.
Kata without the full spectrum of kata/ouyou is often referred to as merely “dancing and prancing about” rather than achieving the reality of appropriate defensive/protective skills. Stop dancing and get to it, kata/ouyou!
Now, lets add to the mix for more clarity… think about omote/ura!
For reference and sources and professionals go here: Bibliography (Click the link)
No comments:
Post a Comment