Victor Smith
Blue Belt
Is more Kata better, sure it is, it of course depending on one's needs.
I've known good Isshinryu practitioners who had no interest in doing more than Isshinryu's 8 empty hand forms and never tried the 6 weapons kata.
I've trained with instructors who've trained in 400-500 Chinese forms. In fact in the 80 or so empty hand forms in Faan Tzi Ying jow Pai (Norhtern Eagle Claw) one form Lin Kuen has 50 rows of techniques and may well be more complex than the entire body of Okinawan karate. As I understand it though the Northern Chinese arts build on each other and as you move into the more advancing forms you discontinue the earlier ones. You have to perform their basics correctly from the earlier sets in the advanced ones, so you spend your focus on advancing all the time.
With the exception of choosing to train in Isshinryu, and likewise choosing to study Yang Tai Chi Chaun and other Chinese forms to become a more knowledgable judge, I've never sought to study forms with anyone else. On the other hand it was explained to me if you are a black belt you don't say I can't, and training many places with many friends I've probably studied close to 200 kata, kuen, hung, sets and forms, and practiced most of them for several decades before I made senior choices.
I never tried to teach what was shared with me to my students, simply because it was outside of their need. I choose to visit those dojo and in turn trained, and if that meant learning another form so be it, I had no right to say no, I was a guest.
Of course many of them were variations of forms, Variations of Seisan, Chinto, Bassai dai and so forth. That made it sometime easier.
I never trained with anyone, ever who worried about mastering anything. Kata or tools, not endings. Your body keeps changing, inreasing its potential, your knowledge moves forward, you age, slow, learn new tactical doctrines....
I once remarked to the instructor who studied many hundreds of forms that I can't do it all, I was doing too much. His reply, it's not what you retain, it's what you experience that is important. If you have the opportunity and follow it, you gain deeper understanding of what others are doing. That is the key.
Those who can do, that's just it, nothing more.
I do understand great performance, the mastery term can be used, but it doesn't last. That great performance is a result of decades of movement, forwards, backwards, sideways, and when you see it, you have no idea what would be the answer 10 years later either.
It's neither the kata or the bunkai which is the answer, imo.
The goal is to have the knowledge and unerstanding how to tactiacally set up an attacker so your technique moves through them, interrupting their wa.
the pleasant pefection.
I've known good Isshinryu practitioners who had no interest in doing more than Isshinryu's 8 empty hand forms and never tried the 6 weapons kata.
I've trained with instructors who've trained in 400-500 Chinese forms. In fact in the 80 or so empty hand forms in Faan Tzi Ying jow Pai (Norhtern Eagle Claw) one form Lin Kuen has 50 rows of techniques and may well be more complex than the entire body of Okinawan karate. As I understand it though the Northern Chinese arts build on each other and as you move into the more advancing forms you discontinue the earlier ones. You have to perform their basics correctly from the earlier sets in the advanced ones, so you spend your focus on advancing all the time.
With the exception of choosing to train in Isshinryu, and likewise choosing to study Yang Tai Chi Chaun and other Chinese forms to become a more knowledgable judge, I've never sought to study forms with anyone else. On the other hand it was explained to me if you are a black belt you don't say I can't, and training many places with many friends I've probably studied close to 200 kata, kuen, hung, sets and forms, and practiced most of them for several decades before I made senior choices.
I never tried to teach what was shared with me to my students, simply because it was outside of their need. I choose to visit those dojo and in turn trained, and if that meant learning another form so be it, I had no right to say no, I was a guest.
Of course many of them were variations of forms, Variations of Seisan, Chinto, Bassai dai and so forth. That made it sometime easier.
I never trained with anyone, ever who worried about mastering anything. Kata or tools, not endings. Your body keeps changing, inreasing its potential, your knowledge moves forward, you age, slow, learn new tactical doctrines....
I once remarked to the instructor who studied many hundreds of forms that I can't do it all, I was doing too much. His reply, it's not what you retain, it's what you experience that is important. If you have the opportunity and follow it, you gain deeper understanding of what others are doing. That is the key.
Those who can do, that's just it, nothing more.
I do understand great performance, the mastery term can be used, but it doesn't last. That great performance is a result of decades of movement, forwards, backwards, sideways, and when you see it, you have no idea what would be the answer 10 years later either.
It's neither the kata or the bunkai which is the answer, imo.
The goal is to have the knowledge and unerstanding how to tactiacally set up an attacker so your technique moves through them, interrupting their wa.
the pleasant pefection.
