I first learned about the importance of strength through ads in the back of old comic books. The bully kicking sand in your face, Charles Atlas, and the need to lift big hunks of iron would save your life. Why, lift enough of those clanking plates and roles would be reversed, you suddenly could do the bully to the bad guy, the girl would love you, and life would be grand.
Then, as life proceeded, I found out that many people considered weight lifters a bit empty in the head. Weight lifters were the new bullies of the world, they were the ones kicking all the sand. And, heck, they even started taking drugs to make themselves bigger and badder.
The truth behind lifting weights is, of course, not entirely as I have portrayed it here through my youthful and naive observations of life. It is true that you have to lift weight; you have use muscles if you are going to gain the benefit of muscles. But, there are alternatives to lifting bars weighted with immense plates of iron that are much more efficient, much less dangerous, and, in this writers opinion, a heck of a lot more fun.
I began studying martial arts in the sixties, and I was unaware that, with my practice I was really lifting weights. I was doing with the martial arts was lifting the weight of my body and throwing it around in a manner that was much more efficient and far reaching than simple weight lifting. The competence of motion, the ranges of motion I was experiencing, it was building my body in ways that I had never imagined.
A few decades into my practice, already realizing an enduring health and physical conditioning that was far beyond my oxygen tank toting, walker using compatriots, I heard of body calisthenics. These were simple exercises that brought home the theories I had been practicing without realizing it through the martial arts. Furthermore, I wasn't experiencing health problems, the muscle to flab syndrome, injuries to muscles and joints that unreal stress can achieve.
Interestingly enough, I had started doing the martial art known as Tai Chi some years previous, and had discovered what I called Suspended Strength. When you hold a limb up for a while, moving it slowly, this is suspended weight, and this practice increases strength without increasing bulk, which is good if you want to develop physical, and mental, attributes specific to the martial arts. So, to coin a nifty sounding phrase, I was doing Extreme Suspended Weight Body Calisthenics.
The truth of this whole matter of weight lifting and body motion, however, eluded me until I injured myself. I suffered a separated shoulder, and I was reduced to rehabilitation, and I started doing light Yoga postures. Here was something slower than Tai Chi, in which I suspended strength even longer, and I began doing something that moved me into ever higher realms of fitness and martial arts ability. I realized that true strength is increased more by the channeling of awareness through the body than anything else.
This is the key to the whole mess, you know, for the body is a device in which energy is stopped, blocked, not flowing, no matter how much weight somebody might lift. By doing yoga postures, adapting them to my martial arts practice and realizing that the increase of awareness was loosening energy flows, I began to experience the wellness and true strength that the body is capable of. Karate and Shaolin Kung Fu, Tai Chi and Yoga, life is made whole by the increase of awareness, and I recommend this sequence of motion to non-motion to all who wish to find true strength through the martial arts disciplines. - 31373
Then, as life proceeded, I found out that many people considered weight lifters a bit empty in the head. Weight lifters were the new bullies of the world, they were the ones kicking all the sand. And, heck, they even started taking drugs to make themselves bigger and badder.
The truth behind lifting weights is, of course, not entirely as I have portrayed it here through my youthful and naive observations of life. It is true that you have to lift weight; you have use muscles if you are going to gain the benefit of muscles. But, there are alternatives to lifting bars weighted with immense plates of iron that are much more efficient, much less dangerous, and, in this writers opinion, a heck of a lot more fun.
I began studying martial arts in the sixties, and I was unaware that, with my practice I was really lifting weights. I was doing with the martial arts was lifting the weight of my body and throwing it around in a manner that was much more efficient and far reaching than simple weight lifting. The competence of motion, the ranges of motion I was experiencing, it was building my body in ways that I had never imagined.
A few decades into my practice, already realizing an enduring health and physical conditioning that was far beyond my oxygen tank toting, walker using compatriots, I heard of body calisthenics. These were simple exercises that brought home the theories I had been practicing without realizing it through the martial arts. Furthermore, I wasn't experiencing health problems, the muscle to flab syndrome, injuries to muscles and joints that unreal stress can achieve.
Interestingly enough, I had started doing the martial art known as Tai Chi some years previous, and had discovered what I called Suspended Strength. When you hold a limb up for a while, moving it slowly, this is suspended weight, and this practice increases strength without increasing bulk, which is good if you want to develop physical, and mental, attributes specific to the martial arts. So, to coin a nifty sounding phrase, I was doing Extreme Suspended Weight Body Calisthenics.
The truth of this whole matter of weight lifting and body motion, however, eluded me until I injured myself. I suffered a separated shoulder, and I was reduced to rehabilitation, and I started doing light Yoga postures. Here was something slower than Tai Chi, in which I suspended strength even longer, and I began doing something that moved me into ever higher realms of fitness and martial arts ability. I realized that true strength is increased more by the channeling of awareness through the body than anything else.
This is the key to the whole mess, you know, for the body is a device in which energy is stopped, blocked, not flowing, no matter how much weight somebody might lift. By doing yoga postures, adapting them to my martial arts practice and realizing that the increase of awareness was loosening energy flows, I began to experience the wellness and true strength that the body is capable of. Karate and Shaolin Kung Fu, Tai Chi and Yoga, life is made whole by the increase of awareness, and I recommend this sequence of motion to non-motion to all who wish to find true strength through the martial arts disciplines. - 31373
About the Author:
Al Case has taught martial arts for 4O years. If you want to sample a little of his strength through a free ebook, go to Monster Martial Arts.
