Acu-rate

Acu-rate

    The other night I watched (now, don't laugh) Kung Fu Killers (originally titled Kung Fu Jungle), a homily of sorts to the martial arts genre.  This is not the classy shows of The Grandmaster or the Ip Man series (based on true parts of history), and nor is it the stuff of the late Bruce Lee.  And just to clarify, I am not at all trained in such self-defense techniques.  But for some reason, I have always been fascinated by these moves and movies, even as a child watching the swordplay of samurai movies such as Zatoichi (the movie remake is worth watching).  The recent film above blends many of these styles in a combination of slow-motion and too-fast filming (on the set of Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon, he was supposedly told to purposely slow down his strikes because the viewing audience would think that the actions were fake and that the actors were falling down without being struck).  As Lee says in the movie (when one of the characters breaks a board in front of him with his fist), "Boards don't hit back."

    But that was again, back then.  Yet something still fascinates me when I watch a higher quality of such action and I've been thinking that it might simply be the accuracy part of it all.  We spell the word --accuracy-- with two "c"s but put it into the word acupuncture and one of the "c"s drops out.  Acupressure, acupuncture...both target specific points in our bodies.  As one of my friends (a martial arts instructor for over 30 years) told me, our bodies are a series of "electrical" connections, the energy flowing through as steadily as a busy freeway; but have an accident or some blockage and the body function slows down.  Acupuncture and acupressure targets these blockages and allows the "traffic" to flow smoothly again, but only if done accurately.  I can testify to this when I slipped on the ice and irritated a disc in my neck (I was unable to look upward or all the way to each side).  Once the acupuncturist pinpointed the right disc, my problem disappeared.  Granted, not all acupuncturists are as good or as talented (mine happens to believe that both Eastern and Western medicine can work together and as such, she became a registered MD in both Germany and China, and is now currently registered with NCCAOM (there are many acupuncture schools and certification groups of which NCCAOM is one).  But for my mother, a series of several sessions to a different acupuncturist did little to reduce her pain (her acupuncturist has been practicing successfully for 45 years and had helped my wife with her back); but just as with doctors, discovering the exact source of the irritation or pain is often a guessing game or one of eliminating possible symptoms one by one.  Pinpointing where it hurts (as we're often asked while in the doctor's office) can be as broad as a lower back or as specific as a tiny needle point.

    For many martial artists, especially those highly skilled in the finer arts, the show of strength and flexibility is often just the initial stage of their training (Bruce Lee said that in a real fight one would never kick anyone higher than the knee for it would expose your own body to a counterstrike); the real training for the physical part from what I have been told (for martial arts is really 50% physical training and 50% mental training), is learning the finer points, the nerves and tendons.  Cut the power or block the flow and the strength of the arm or leg doesn't matter.  A small finger poke or a tiny one-fingered knuckle to the right point can be enough to bring down the person twice your size.  Think of hitting your funny-bone and how it puts your arm out of sorts for a few seconds; in a fight, the hitting of those and other points would continue.  Accuracy...difficult to perfect and attain.  Place a sword in your hand and those points are magnified even more for accuracy (this was exemplified in the movie Hero, one of the most visually striking and colorful films of the last decade).  There is also a belief in moving your energy --qi-- a mindful practice in itself (and often used by eastern healers to redistribute one's energy and again get the "flow" operating smoothly).  It is a new way to watch such martial arts films, the actors (the majority of them champions in their own sport, be it ju-jitsu or Thai boxing) carefully choreographed; but to see their precision strikes slowed down, the deflected punch, the arms blocking a leg kick...the mental acuity (one "c") to see the broader picture while aiming for a tiny point -- block, strike, block, block, counter.  Three seconds, repeat.

    Some say that those who are quite proficient in such arts enter a new world of sorts, a place where movement is slowed down (much as what often happens when an accident unfolds in front of you unexpectedly).  My brother had this during one class he was taking in his younger days, a person walking by and throwing a glass soda bottle into the room, the bottle shattering against the floor as the students heard the running footsteps.  But the instructor quickly stopped the students and asked them what they had seen and almost all answered with some version of the person peering in or just seeing the the person's hand or just hearing the glass shatter.  But for the instructor, he told of a bottle almost floating into the room, the movement slowed down to a point where the glass soon to hit the floor was no surprise at all, no sudden movement or sound, only the floating bottle. 

    Perhaps I am over-analyzing all of this, that the bottom line is that I am simply enjoying this form of entertainment as some might enjoy a Tarentino film or an outdoor concert.  But I do feel that the way one views things tend to change as one grows older.  Nowdays I seem to watch more the fluidity of the movements, the counter-grabs and the eyes never leaving the opponents face, the footwork, the anticipation and alertness.  It is all now a sort of ballet to me.  And yes, perhaps that child in me is still flailing arms and doing pretend high-flying kicks; but the me now seems to more appreciate the creativity of the human body, the quick reactions, the flowing with (and not against) momentum (a basic tenet of the art of aikido).  Perhaps it is the me looking back and realizing that the wild Bruce Lee child is no more and that I am now looking the other direction, a student of sorts now gazing the other direction.  All of the views are likely there for all of us...the child, the student, the instructor.  It is just a matter of where and how one looks.