This conversation brought up two memories I had of training experiences that involved intent.

The first was when I was in Japan for training with Hatsumi Sensei at the Tokyo Budokan in Ayase. We were working on slipping inside two punches using our position to off balance the person then take them down on their back.

Sensei cautioned us not to have the intent of doing the technique or of even trying to avoid the punches because it would be too slow. He told us to instead find safety by creating space (kukan). Learning to create this space he said leads to the ability to do what he did with Mr. Hayes when he had Mr. Hayes throw a punch at the back of his head many years ago.

I’m not going to say I understand completely (or at all) what Sensei was saying but the feeling I got was that people were thinking too much. And were too intent on doing “it” right instead of being safe. I think somehow intent creates the kukan that allows you to control the attacker. But it was definitely easier said then done.

The second was in Boston for advanced black belt training with Mr. Hayes.

Mr. Hayes was teaching intent concepts within a Kuki Shinden Ryu sword technique. It was amazing to see people literally just fall into the place where Mr. Hayes was waiting with his sword.

What struck me most was the physicality of it. You couldn’t just think it and hope it would work as many of us found out.

You had to have succeeded at making the physical technique work before you could attempt using intention. In fact your uke had to have succeeded at making the defense to that technique work and you the defense to the defense. Mr. Hayes spent an entire session the day before teaching that to us.

These memories lead to the question; “Why do you think that projecting and hiding intent is a skill worth developing? Or, more specifically, what are its uses?

I wanted to answer this earlier but couldn’t find the right words. At the seminar with Mr. Hayes I got an answer “Competence” not yours but your opponents. How do you defeat an opponent that is better than you?

The example Mr. Hayes demonstrated showed this well. You wouldn’t need to project and hide your intent if the opponent wasn’t well trained. The physical technique would be more than enough to finish them off. But…

What if they’re better than you? How do you still survive?

Thinking about how Mr. Hayes built the instruction over the weekend from simple physical, to more and more advanced physical, to projection of intent I would suggest if you want to learn how to project and hide intention, learn how to throw a punch.

Learn to throw a punch that uses taijutsu not muscle (another subject covered at the seminar). Learn how to cover yourself as you do so there are no openings in your punch. Learn how to coordinate your breathing with this movement to create relaxed power. Learn how to focus on your target so well you can move right past their defenses. Learn where to throw your punch so the person can’t see it.

Learn these and all the other principles necessary to make your punches unstoppable. Then when you intend to hit someone with it they’ll move and you can hit them with your other hand.

Dennis
Shinobi Martial Arts
95 Plaistow Road, Plaistow NH

We were having an interesting conversation about intent, what it is and how it is used in our art. We’d all like to be able to say, “These are not the droids you are looking for” and have it work but intent is more than just what you are thinking. It, like everything in our training, incorporates body, mind and spirit (energy).

One of the difficulties when dealing with intent is that it is very difficult to get accurate feedback to see if you are doing it correctly. If the drills you are doing are not set up very carefully you can think yourself doing things that you are not.

We are lucky that Mr. Hayes has already taken care of that for us and we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Ninja Volume One, chapter six and Ninja Volume Four, chapter five have an entire collection of drills for intent that can keep you going for years.

I’ve been doing them for over two decades and continue to learn more each time I do them with no end in sight. If you’re looking for ways to learn intent these are a very good place to start.

One of the students asked if there was one of these that I liked more than the others or had greater success with.

When I first started training I could have chosen an exercise I liked more than another. I could have picked the technique or element I liked practicing more because I believed it was going to help me to get “it”.

But now after many years of training and teaching at BMAC, with my training group and now at Shinobi Martial Arts, I finally got the idea that there is not a single answer. There is no “magic pill” that will make me understand.

The exercises for intent Mr. Hayes put in the books are a system of training that were put in there in a particular order for a particular purpose. Just like the curriculum for To-Shin Do was created as a training system not just a collection of techniques.

Techniques are not things you do they are learning tools designed to help you discover a principle. Together, they form a training system, which leads the practitioner to certain understandings and capabilities. They change you.

Dennis
Shinobi Martial Arts
95 Plaistow Road, Plaistow NH