| Whether you study Karate, Aikido, or that rare | | | | slower and starts looking at what he is actually |
| Wudan Art from Faroutistan, speed is vitally | | | | practicing. |
| important to the martial arts. If you are going to | | | | This intermediate level is worked on by all of the |
| accomplish anything in freestyle, you must be faster | | | | hard artists, they spend hours doing their forms and |
| than your opponent. Even in the doing of your kata, | | | | studying how to be efficient in motion, and it |
| speed gives a certain expediency that is necessary | | | | eventually slows down to a virtual study of Tai Chi |
| to the successful martial artist. | | | | Chuan. Whether the student engages in actual Tai |
| That said, there is another side to speed, a side | | | | Chi, or just slows his movements down so he can |
| which embraces the entire martial arts and is the | | | | best analyze and correct them, is beside the point. |
| mark of your progress over the decades. This is a | | | | What is important is that the student is looking with |
| side which relates to the speed of the art you are | | | | awareness, not just doing mindlessly. |
| practicing, and the speed of what is happening inside | | | | Awareness you see is an a funny item. Anybody can |
| your head and in your life. I am talking about the | | | | become aware through the simple process of looking. |
| speed at which you do your art. | | | | Thus, this thing called awareness is free, and it is the |
| The beginner is blown out by the fun of the martial | | | | point to all life. |
| arts, and he races breakneck through his forms. He | | | | Without awareness life could not be. Or, one could |
| spends hours tweaking his form, studying the angles | | | | say that life is relative to the degree of awareness |
| of his limb so as to maximize speed of launch. Usually, | | | | that the looker builds. Thus, the value of the martial |
| this process takes about three years, but it can take | | | | arts, as they go at ever slower rates, is that they |
| longer, or lesser, depending on the individual and the | | | | create more and more opportunity for looking. |
| art he is studying. | | | | The above being said, I do not recommend ceasing |
| Remember when I remarked about spending hours | | | | your studies of speed until you, personally, have |
| going over your form? This is the beginning of the | | | | reached a point which is satisfactory and obvious to |
| middle student, this is where he first starts to | | | | you. Live quick, go fast luxuriously, for you should |
| understand that the art is more than just good times | | | | give full throttle to all stages of learning the how to |
| and gotcha, but a real live window into the soul and | | | | of fighting, even and especially if you are studying a |
| potentials of humanity that were hitherto undreamed | | | | rare martial art. One should not easily surrender youth |
| of. This is the start of developing self awareness, | | | | to old age. |
| and this is where the student first starts going | | | | |