Training with Women

[Peacedog]

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[Bhassler]

Hmm. Disappointed? I see my students as being full of potential, and it's a bit painful to see them just close up and retreat behind untested imagined limitations without even making an attempt.

By definition, potential is that which is latent, not that which is actualized. If they knew how to act upon it for themselves, then they would already have 'it' (whatever it is) and wouldn't need you. Sometimes it takes a more circuitious route than just saying "do it!"

[JusticeZero]

Sometimes it takes a more circuitious route than just saying "do it!"

Such as? The things I have trouble with mainly are floor movement; the best equivalent I can think of would be in teaching an Aikido class, and having a large number of female students come in day after day and refuse to learn common rolls and breakfalls because they believe it to be physically impossible for them to do.

[DeusTrismegistus]

Sometimes it takes a more circuitious route than just saying "do it!"

Such as? The things I have trouble with mainly are floor movement; the best equivalent I can think of would be in teaching an Aikido class, and having a large number of female students come in day after day and refuse to learn common rolls and breakfalls because they believe it to be physically impossible for them to do.

Do you break the movements down into small easily digestible parts?

So when teaching a break fall you can do a jumping breakfall where you flip yourself over onton your side or back, or you can gradually intrduce the idea and work up to that. Many people won't be able to jump over onto their own back at first but if you work up to it before they know it they are doing it fine.

[JusticeZero]

Yes, it's just that some of the parts apparently look intimidating. Usually it's au that's the trouble, and that's basically a cartwheel - and there's some very digestible versions that don't even get completely off of the feet. Queda de rins is also a troublemaker; I teach that against a wall, but when the surface to do it on goes horizontal, some tend to balk. Pretty much any inverted movement can be a problem.

[Ron Panunto]

I attended a Baji seminar and zeroed in on a cute young lady. We got to talking about stances and I showed her a typical stance from Chen taiji. She said that was not a good martial arts stance and then kicked me straight in the balls to prove it. Needless to say, my participation in the seminar was minimal - that kick in the balls hurt for a few days. But damn -she was good looking!

[Chris McKinley]

Sounds like you should have kicked her in the vajayjay then K'd her TFO and stuck a Post-It on her forehead saying "Nice tits". Maybe then she'd learn that injuring a man's groin isn't comedy nor part of any symbolic gesture of gender politics.

[Ian]

Sounds like you should have kicked her in the vajayjay then K'd her TFO and stuck a Post-It on her forehead saying "Nice tits". Maybe then she'd learn that injuring a man's groin isn't comedy nor part of any symbolic gesture of gender politics.

the internet abounds with videos of women 'pranking' men by hitting them in the grouch. there's one where the woman leads the man to believe she's going to give him head, then punches him in the sack. another one where the woman kicks the man square in the spuds as he's doing heavy barbell squats. clearly unacceptable.

[Darth Rock&Roll]

In the typical environment one finds in todays gyms, I can't be bothered training with a woman when it comes to martial arts. It's a waste of my time and it's a waste of hers.

If it were a amateur ranked boxing woman or a pro, i probably wouldn't be involved anyway as those circles get closed fast by trainers and promoters and I'm just a shmuck that likes to work out.

There's a lot of reasons.
Not to be rude, I just refuse to be PC about it.

[Bhassler]

Sounds like you should have kicked her in the vajayjay then K'd her TFO and stuck a Post-It on her forehead saying "Nice tits". Maybe then she'd learn that injuring a man's groin isn't comedy nor part of any symbolic gesture of gender politics.

Dunno, man. If you go to a MA (as in fighting) workshop and then approach someone like you wanna be their best friend and start spouting some shit about how you do it differently in your style and all it's great benefits it's not unheard of that they would decide to test it right then and there. And, by all accounts, she was dead on that it was not a good stance for fighting.

Would people view it differently if it had been an old Chinese man kung fu master who nailed him?

[Chris McKinley]

Bhassler,

RE: "Would people view it differently if it had been an old Chinese man kung fu master who nailed him?". No, I would have hospitalized him just as much. There simply isn't a valid excuse for taking a surprise shot at a vital target on someone. It might be different if that person said, "Hey, if you think your stance is so great, let me test it...I'll kick you in the groin and if you can prevent it, you'll have made your point." It doesn't matter if it's at a workshop or just walking out of a downtown restaurant, taking a shot like that against someone who knows what they're doing could very well get you killed.

[Dmitri]

injuring a man's groin isn't comedy

Well, that depends.

[Bhassler]

Sometimes it takes a more circuitious route than just saying "do it!"

Such as? The things I have trouble with mainly are floor movement; the best equivalent I can think of would be in teaching an Aikido class, and having a large number of female students come in day after day and refuse to learn common rolls and breakfalls because they believe it to be physically impossible for them to do.

Do you break the movements down into small easily digestible parts?

So when teaching a break fall you can do a jumping breakfall where you flip yourself over onton your side or back, or you can gradually intrduce the idea and work up to that. Many people won't be able to jump over onto their own back at first but if you work up to it before they know it they are doing it fine.

Adding on to what Deus wrote, there are two approaches that I might use.

One would be to find out why they feel like they can't/don't want to do it. Do they honestly think it is impossible for them? Are they afraid of looking weak or stupid? Is it just too complicated for them to visualize? If they've ever seen Capoeira before, they should have some idea of what it entails-- so they must be there for a reason. (If they're just there to pick up men then blow 'em off and forget about 'em.) As often as not you may find that the reason they're there in the first place is tied closely with why they think they can't accomplish what you're asking.

The second and more concrete approach (and the one I favor) would involve successive approximations of what you're trying to accomplish--I'll give an example with the caveat that I haven't done any Capoiera in a long time; I teach movement professionally so the method is sound but you may have to make alterations/changes as you work with people and see what works and what problems arise.

For an Au I would start with esquivas, negativas, and a sloppy meia lua de compasso. Esquivas get them low to the floor and moving laterally, negativas just get them more comfortable on the floor, the meia luas get them with their hands on the floor rotating with one foot in the air (that's why it can be sloppy, I just want the basic components-- right now I don't care if it would work as a kick/defense or not). After that teach them a baby queda de rins, where they put their hips on one elbow (I call it 'posting'-- don't know if there's a capoiera term for this), allowing them to keep both hands and feet on the floor. If you can get them to progress from there to balancing with their knees on their elbows that'd be great, if not, don't worry about it. Then put it in a sequencia (ginga, esquiva, meia lua, negativa). When they can do that, have them do just half the meia lua and add the baby queda de rins in the middle, come out of the baby queda, finish the turn and do the negativa. Then go back to the first sequencia and have them do it lightly for speed. You can add a hop to the meia lua (it's really not even a meia lua any more at this point, but we don't really care about that) where they gently hop from the standing leg to land on the kicking leg as they turn. Keep the kicking leg low and just hop at the very end. Again go back to the first sequencia. Some people will be able to go into an au in place of the meia lua here, others can just stick with the first sequence and come back to it another day.

The beauty of it is you never have to tell them they're going to do an au. Just keep 'em moving and playing. Relax and have fun (if you're not having fun they won't either). Now if someone is really bad (say they can't even do a negativa), then you can break down the negativa the same way, except you use a combination of warm-up type exercises, stretches, and bastardized gingas. You just gotta get creative. More experienced people can benefit by exploring the movements in ways they haven't before, so they'll start to see more jumping off points from one movement to another. Once you have methods for your common basic movements/problem areas, you can walk people through the basics and let them work with it on their own while the rest of the class does something else. If you can just encourage people and let them feel successful, often times they're pretty happy working stuff out on their own and feeling like they've accomplished something.

Really it's just learning to apply your malicia to teaching. If they can't/won't learn it like you want them to, then trick 'em into it! Of course, there's also the very real risk that when you start teaching this way you gain something in the art and you lose something else. At that point you have to decide what you're all about relative to Capoeira and you may decide that you want to go back to conventional methods of practice and just don't want to teach folks who can't keep up on their own. That's perfectly fine, and you'll be able to say "This is not the right place for you" and have no regrets.

[Bhassler]

Bhassler,

RE: "Would people view it differently if it had been an old Chinese man kung fu master who nailed him?". No, I would have hospitalized him just as much. There simply isn't a valid excuse for taking a surprise shot at a vital target on someone. It might be different if that person said, "Hey, if you think your stance is so great, let me test it...I'll kick you in the groin and if you can prevent it, you'll have made your point." It doesn't matter if it's at a workshop or just walking out of a downtown restaurant, taking a shot like that against someone who knows what they're doing could very well get you killed.

Fair enough-- I guess I was responding to the colorful nature of your first response rather than the underlying message. For myself, I take it as an interesting lesson; if I kicked at your groin (or any highly trained person's) thinking it was funny and (for example) got my ankle and my face broke in the process, it's not like you would have done it out of vengeance-- it's just your training. Neutralize the initial threat (break ankles) and then assess (why'd you do that for?). So if someone kicks me in the balls by surprise and nothing happens to that person, it's more a reflection of my poor training than anything else. Certainly that type of reasoning doesn't hold up in a legal or ethical sense, but personally I find it quite useful in a pragmatic way...

[JusticeZero]

Hmmm... I'll have to play with that one and see if it works. Right now I don't have any students of that sort; the two I have *actually* can't au as both have atrocious upper body strength, but they happily try and crumple to the ground if asked. Thank you for the idea!