Adrenaline, or adrenal response, can be a double edged sword
during an altercation.
Adrenal response is sometimes referred to as "fight or
flight" syndrome. The decision to fight or run will depend on individual tendencies.
This means that adrenaline taps into our basic survival instincts.
While this can be a benefit, it can also be the Achilles
heel of self defense techniques.
Human basic survival instinct usually reverts back to
"gross motor movements". This means that the part of your brain that
controls fine movements is temporarily overridden.
Why is this important? Most martial arts training is taught
in a very predictable manner. This results in low pressure training that doesn't stimulate adrenal response. The closest thing some martial arts have to
"real" pressure is sparring or competitions.
Sparring and competitions have rules, referees and in most
cases safety equipment.
Although MMA competitions do not use much safety equipment, there
are still rules to protect the fighters. And, you can quit before any real
injury occurs.
The problem with sparring and competition is you can
psychologically prepare for the event. This allows for partial adrenaline
control. MMA competitors talk about being amped up and adrenalized before a
fight, yet they have had months to prepare for a fighter they were assigned to
fight.
It is drastically different when the fight is not scheduled
and the opponent is a random attacker on an otherwise ordinary day.
If you want to see what happens to a MMA fighter when they
become adrenalized all you have to do is watch the first 3 UFC competitions.
These examples highlight what happens when fighters cannot control their
adrenaline. You will witness accomplished martial artists resorting to
"swim" type flailing of arms (gross motor movement) premature fatigue
and an inability to effectively process attacks and defend. You will also see
what happens when a calm methodical fighter can control his adrenaline and win.
Adrenaline can help summon super human strength in an emergency;
however, it does this by pulling the blood in from the extremities as part of
survival response. Without the ability to control the level of adrenaline, this
strength will be short lived and result in premature fatigue.
It is essential to learn how to control adrenal response in
order to take advantage of the increased strength and reflex speed. This is
done through repetitive movement, training your fine motor movements to respond
under adrenaline – repetition, repetition, repetition.
Knowing that adrenaline must be controlled is a step in the
right direction. This combined with understanding the function of adrenal
response allows practitioners of self defense to prepare for the unexpected.
Fear not the 1000 kicks practiced once, but the one kick
practiced 1000 times.
Siu Lum Canada is Winnipeg's Shaolin school. We teach the Siu Lum style of kung fu. Our training revolves around real life situations and real life solutions. There is no question that we will not answer.
Watch our video and get a glimpse of what we do at Siu Lum Canada.
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Email us at siulumkungfu@gmail.com
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