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See everything, do not look at anything: the applications

As we seen in the past articles (read The overall view: see everything, do not look at anything and What we need to develop the overall view) the overall view is a fundamental skill for any kind of practitioner:

In self-defense – To see what happens around us (unexpected aggressors, etc.)
In sports competitions – To hide our intentions to the opponent (feints, etc.)
In military contexts – To maintain even an ample scenario under our control (the windows of a building, etc.)
In daily life – Even driving a car, a bicycle (etc.) to be able to effectively manage a large line of sight can be a life-saving attitude
…

An exercise to improve the overall view

Starting from the basic practice of the Hanging Speedballs (read Basic tools: the Hanging Speedball), let’s see a good exercise to develop the overall view.

Preparation

What we need for this exercise:

Let’s hang 2 elastic ropes (one at our right and one at our left)
Let’s add to the end of the elastic ropes 2 tennis balls (inside a small bag)
The 2 balls should near the height of our center of gravity (not necessarily the same height)
In terms of distance, the 2 ropes must be positioned so that, if inclined, they can easily touch us
Let’s position ourselves between the balls but going backward enough to be able to see both the balls
The balls must be respectively at the 2 ends of our line of sight
Let’s tilt the head 45° downward and let’s look at a point in front of us (as much central as possible)

How to execute the exercise

How to perform the exercise:

Let’s make the ropes swinging in our direction asymmetrically (first one and then the other)
Let’s never move our eyes from the precedently designated point
Let’s try to effectively hit the balls before they reach us (kicks, punches, etc.)
We can freely move one step to the right, left, back and front
If we fail to hit, we have to channel the strength of the ball
If we fail to channel the strength, let’s parry it
If we fail to parry, let’s try to not be hit
Let’s try to handle all the oscillations and not skipping any lap

Variants

In its most advanced version (only for advanced / experts):

The tennis balls may be replaced by 2 hanging sticks parallel to the ground (very dangerous, read Advanced exercises: the swivel hanging stick)
The tennis balls may be replaced by 2 practitioners that attack (before in a symmetric and schematic manner, gradually, “freely”)

A note by Master Kongling – Two things: first, in this case, we do not use the speedballs because they are bigger and more easy to be caught; second, this practice, even in its basic version, is good for intermediate / advanced practitioners, counterproductive for beginners (it can slow down our pace if we are not used to dynamic target reaching).

Final notes

This exercise is very useful because:

As for the speedball’s one, it self-adjusts according to our speed and power
It teaches us not to look to our targets and this way to do not telegraph our intentions to our opponents
It helps to familiarize with the extreme (but unfortunately common) idea of facing more opponents (read How to fight with more than one opponent at the same time),
It stresses our spatial intelligence (read The most important skill in combat)
…

In-depth articles

Shaolin training for reflexes – An ancient exercise to develop good reflexes
Avert dangers: the concept of constant attention – An application of the overall view

Questions

Reply in the comments and share your experience:

Can you manage the two targets without interrupting your flow?

Author: Master Kongling

Founder of 6 Dragons Kung Fu.

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