Instantaneous Adaptation!

Suro Jason Inay recently posed an interesting question, “is repetition truly the mother of skill, and if so, who is the father?” This brings up the larger question of what does it take to create skill? Or, to continue the metaphor, what is the genealogy of skill?

In the Inayan System of Eskrima there are five key elements which are, in order of importance:

Technique
Timing
Fluidity
Speed
Power

Repetition does help to develop all of these elements, but only to a certain extent. Anyone familiar with Ivan Pavlov is familiar with the idea of the “conditioned reflex” and the extremely simple explanation of this is that, with repetition, a person can be made to respond in a certain way to a certain stimulus.

Technique is often memorized through rote and then becomes reactionary much the same way that saying, “bless you” after someone sneezes is born more of reaction than conscious politeness. It is done because the mind has been engineered to do it.
Timing also develops with repetition, but again only so far. The mind and body learn the timing of the drill and can easily fall into the pattern that the drill has established but whether the mind truly understands the method is up for conjecture.

Fluidity comes from repetition smoothing out the rough spots of the technique and the timing. Fine muscle movements become common for the body and what was once a jagged boulder has become a smooth ball. Korg the Caveman has created the wheel.

Speed follows only after the previous three elements have become second nature. Executing a drill at high speed without the first three elements would lead only to disaster for all parties involved. General George S. Patton is quoted as saying, “a good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.” This may work well for massed infantry with armored cavalry and artillery support but it does not function quite as well for training and development. Fast, uncoordinated, unpolished training will create an uncoordinated, unpolished fighter. Speed with no control is worthless.

Power is last, and rightly so. I am, by virtue of years of training, a powerlifter. Much like speed, power is in need of focus in order to be useful. Many heavy-hitting boxers have lost bouts to faster, more skilled opponents. Repetition helps to develop all five of the key elements, but something is still missing. Something that makes a good fighter into a great fighter. Something that changes a stick-swinger into a true Eskrimador. That missing piece is Understanding.

A parrot may learn to say “Polly want a cracker” but does the parrot truly know that it is named Polly, what it truly means to want, or what a cracker is?

Understanding does not come easy, it is elusive and troublesome on the best of days. Each person has their own path to Understanding and the most difficult aspect of being a teacher is trying to make Understanding happen. To compound this difficultly is the fact that most teachers do not have a full grasp of Understanding themselves. I will be the first to admit that I have only had a few moments of Understanding over the years and those have come from the obsessive study of theory. To me, everything has a theory behind it and if I can learn that theory I will be that much closer to Understanding. As Eskrima practicioners we must strive to learn more than repetition.

We must learn not just the What and the How, but the Why. The Art has to become part of more than just our conditioned reflex. The Art has to become us and we have to become the Art. Repetition is the mother of skill. Understanding is the father.

Without Understanding we are bastard parrots.