subject: How to shift your martial art skills onto the fast track [print this page] A lot of training where you repeat mistakes and bad habits doesn't bring you very far. You may have heard about the saying: the right practice and training improves your technique and brings you forward. This is certainly what you need to do. How about we build on this fact and incorporate another step and take our skills to a whole new level? We add a feedback system, where we actually see how we progress, evaluate and do the necessary corrections towards perfection of our technique. It is a tool, which allows us to compare objectively our skills with others, in particular if you competing in tournaments.
It is no magic pill or a substitute of what you are doing, read on to find out.
In class you receive feedback and corrections from your sensei and higher grades which is an excellent start. But now it is up to you to take this advice and use it to advance your skills.
Here is a little challenge; we are all human, which can mean, that we fall back (more or less) into our old habits. The truth is we have to condition ourselves and consciously work on the right technique over and over again until we develop the right habit and then built on it.
If you are serious about your martial art and want to achieve your goals and results faster, you can't get past a video log.
Start to document certain techniques, combinations and Katas. Most cameras have a date/time stamp as well as audio. My advice: use it! Speak any comment onto the video. No pen and paper required! How good and easy is that. Once you watch yourself in the video, you see how others see you (Oh, I thought I am better than that). Now you have an excellent tool to analyse your technique and do the necessary correction for improvement. Do this on a regular basis over a longer period to break bad habits or just for improvement and progression of your art. After all, we all have cameras; this is an opportunity to put them to good use. Here is a video of myself in our backyard practising one of my grade Katas.
How to shift your martial art skills onto the fast track
