The Two Muscles in the Martial Arts!

There are two ways of using the muscles in the martial arts
One is to use the muscles,
the other is to not use the muscles.
I know, sounds like zen double talk.

The first method is to tighten the muscles,
specifically upon impact.

The second method is to ‘empty’ the muscles,
to just flow energy through them.

When I first began training in 1967
I was taught to use muscles,
to ‘focus’ the muscles by tightening
everything at the point of impact.
When I went to the Kang Duk Won
(not American KDW)
I was taught,
and mostly through experience and not words,
to tighten only the fist.
Eventually I stopped tightening the fist entirely,
merely sticking the bones of my arm
into the opponent’s body.
This required almost no muscle.

There are several things to be understood here.

If you tighten the muscle energy doesn’t flow through the body.
This leads to inefficiency,
energy loss,
and so on.

It is important to go through the tightening of the muscle phase,
lest you don’t understand what a punch really is.
This is why TCC sometimes doesn’t work,
the student doesn’t understand the reality of combat.
If the student does understand the reality of combat,
TCC is one of the better and more effective arts out there.

The ‘unbendable arm’ (Aikido)
is the best example of an ‘empty arm.’
Or an arm through which energy flows.
Aikido doesn’t develop this for combat,
but rather uses it almost as meditation
and for show.

I use the ‘unbendable arm’ in all movements.
I move my slightly bent arm with only a bit of
expansion and contraction.
The less I move,
the more ‘flow’ I create,
the more subtle are my movements,
my power,
my effectiveness.

When adapting the ‘unbendable arm’
to arts such as Karate,
One MUST understand how to sink the weight,
how to push with the legs,
how to turn the hips,
and how to move all body parts in harmony
so as to strike with the entire body weight.

I still have snap,
but it is subtle,
and designed around the delivering
of the whole weight of the body
into the target.

By developing the ‘complete energy’ of a strike
into the ‘no energy’ of a strike
one loses his tendency to be jumpy,
to respond with violence,
and attains a very calm mind,
one that doesn’t set up fights through mental attitudes.

The odd thing is that this sounds like mysticism,
but it is really hard core science.
It just goes beyond the ‘Newtonian’ science
we have been raised on.

Hey,
Happy Thanksgiving!
Take advantage of the time off
to do extra work outs,
and don’t forget to check out
my books on

How to Fix Karate:
A Karate Training and Workout Book
(Two Volumes)

(There is a version with five hours of video
but you have to hunt for it on Amazon)

And don’t forget to give me five stars!

Have a great work out!
Al

Don’t forget to check out the interview
https://anchor.fm/dale-gillilan/episodes/S1E10—Al-Case-e12e3np

‘The Last Martial Arts Book’ has 12 ratings for 5 stars.
(There is a video version of this book with no stars yet)
My two yoga books have 9 ratings between them for 5 stars.
‘The Book of Five Arts’ has 8 ratings for 5 stars.
‘The Science of Government’ has 7 ratings for 5 stars.
‘Chiang Nan’ has 6 ratings for 5 stars.
My novel, ‘Monkeyland,’ has 5 ratings for 5 stars

That’s a lot of good ratings
so hopefully you’ll find the book that works for you.