Is it a good idea to flow with your opponent?

[johnwang]

Flowing with your opponent may be a bad idea because you may fall into your opponent's trap. The reason that your opponent

- kicks your groin because he wants you to drop arms and expose your head.
- punches your head because he wants your to raise your arms and expose your groin.
- bites on your leg because he wants you to step back.
- Pushes your shoulder because he wants you to borrow his force and spin.
- Sweeps you because he wants you to escape that leg sweep and shift weight.
- ...

How do you not to fall into your opponent's trap? How do you lead the fight and not allow your opponent to lead you?

[JusticeZero]

By proactively creating the traps; know where everything you do looks vulnerable, and make strategies to accomodate that. By having defenses that don't open gaping holes every time you try to defend somewhere else. By flowing to places that aren't as immediately expected. By having more complex responses available to you than 'block, then stop to evaluate'.

[Ben]

How do you not to fall into your opponent's trap? How do you lead the fight and not allow your opponent to lead you?

It takes a lot of practice. I think flowing with the opponent is good but thats what I'm use to. If you're opponent can hit/kick/hurt you then you've already screwed up.

[Ian]

Good to flow with your opponent, because otherwise you're tense and even more vulnerable to his attacks.

However, don't give him any control. So for example:

"Pushes your shoulder because he wants you to borrow his force and spin."

Don't flow with your whole body. Just flow with the affected area, i.e. your shoulder.

The result is you're still in a good position to attack.

[johnwang]

Good to flow with your opponent, because otherwise you're tense and even more vulnerable to his attacks.

Your opponent side kicks at you chest, if you want to flow with him then do you move back or move forward? How about round house kick? Which direction should you flow with him?

[C.J.Wang]

If your overall skill plus height and weight are superior to your opponent, there's no need to "flow" with him. Just move in, acquire the dominant position, and finish him off.

Flowing is more important against a superior opponent because he can counter or stop your moves by force, skill, or a combination of both. This is where adapting, changing, and flowing comes into play.

[Bhassler]

Your opponent side kicks at you chest, if you want to flow with him then do you move back or move forward? How about round house kick? Which direction should you flow with him?

Depends on the situation, but a side kick is travelling towards you but also up, since your chest is higher than his hip. So if he kicks with his right leg you can turn your chest to your right and lift his leg up higher with your right arm. If you want to be mean, step in with your left leg at the same time with your left foot and block his left leg and throw him down. This is a SC move, right? It is flowing with the opponent because you are not trying to stop the momentum of his kick, you are using it to your advantage. It also adheres to the principle of breaking a horizontal force with a vertical force. If he is flexible/strong/balanced and tries to pull his leg back, just keep hold of it and shove it back into his hip (also works better if you trap his back foot).

For the round house, again if he kicks with the right leg somewhere towards your torso, you can move in and step forward with your right foot. Borrow the force of his leg on your left side to help propel your right side forward. Step your right foot behind his left and use your right hand to push his chin up and back. In Wudang martial art, this is called "Sun Facing Scissor Hand" or something like that, because your hands move your opponent in two directions so he flies into the air facing the sun.

Of course there are other options as well. From what I've seen, SC guys yield and borrow a lot in their counters-- some people call this flowing with the opponent.

[Chris McKinley]

Flowing with an opponent is not the same thing as simply reacting in an "if he does A, I do B" kind of way. That kind of paint-by-numbers fighting philosophy will make you readable, predictable and beatable as fast as anything else you can do. Flowing with him means you aren't limited to a single fixed, and therefore predictable, response.

[RobP2]

Your opponent side kicks at you chest, if you want to flow with him then do you move back or move forward? How about round house kick? Which direction should you flow with him?

Diagonal?

Forward, backward, absorb it or smash it.

But set answers don't take into account any of the variables of a situation. But again I suspect we are talking about different circumstances - ie "martial arts duel" vs real life

[BruceP]

How do you not to fall into your opponent's trap? How do you lead the fight and not allow your opponent to lead you?

I've not been in very many real fights but some things worked well in retrospect:
-Break his rhythm
-Shorten his extension
-Pre-empt his movement

There's no 'squaring off' in most real fights. They are violent and chaotic affairs that happen too fast for mortals like me to have a real-time overview of the action. He either gets the drop on you, or you on him, but anything can happen after that.

"Hey, buddy, you got the time?" "Hey, buddy, you gotta smoke/light?" "Boy, bloke, gotta a dollar for ice-cream?" At least you got a warning. Sometimes you don't get that luxury. Then what?

[Qin'sEmporium]

Flowing with your opponent may be a bad idea because you may fall into your opponent's trap. The reason that your opponent

- kicks your groin because he wants you to drop arms and expose your head.
- punches your head because he wants your to raise your arms and expose your groin.
- bites on your leg because he wants you to step back.
- Pushes your shoulder because he wants you to borrow his force and spin.
- Sweeps you because he wants you to escape that leg sweep and shift weight.
- ...

How do you not to fall into your opponent's trap? How do you lead the fight and not allow your opponent to lead you?

You flow with an opponent in such away that takes space away from him - so that he can not counter you. If he can counter you, then you are not 'flowing' correctly, but merely misunderstanding 'flowing' as moving at the sametime, in the same direction, within close proximity - this is not 'flowing'. flowing is dynamic and destructive....

[DeusTrismegistus]

Flow is something you do, regardless of what your opponent does. "Flow with" is kind of misnomer IMO. Does a river flow with the mountain? Not really. It flows over it and through it and around it.

So you should be able to flow by yourself first. Then you can flow in relation to an active environment.

You should always be flowing, the direction isn't that important really. I would consider it flowing with a side kick if you step in and stuff it before he can extend his leg, or if you press the kick down while stepping in or any other direction. Its still flowing whether you step back or to the side or forward what is important is moving from one position to another in a flowing manner.

Now it gets difficult in describing what a flowing manner is because I think most people would say that flowing is not stopping, which I disagree with. If you are flowing you have a speed and rythym very similar to keeping time while playing music. The footwork, body movement, and limb movement need to be on the same page too. The whole body is then flowing together.

Now if you have a discernable rythym then an opponent can take advantage of that. This is why you should then learn how to hit different notes, use off beat strikes and change tempo. This way as someone adjusts to your timing you change it on them. But if you can't keep a simple tune you can't play a symphony. Too any people try to jump right to the symphony first.

Music has a lot of similarities with fighting IMO.

Now yielding and giving to pressure is another thing altogether IMO. You can flow without yielding but I am not sure you can yield without flowing.

[johnwang]

IMO, flow is not the same as yield. If your opponent punches right arm and you push his right shoulder back, that's interrupt and not yield. May be "flow" is not a proper word to use here.

"if he does A, I do B" can be interpreted as "If he opens, I'll enter through his opening". In the PM system, it's called "fill up the leak". It can also be as simple as "if you punch me, I'll kick you (my leg is longer than your arm)" or if you kick me, I'll deflect your kick and then punch you (you cannot kick me while I'm holding your leg)". It can be principle approach and not necessary have to be technique approach.

[DeusTrismegistus]

IMO, flow is not the same as yield. If your opponent punches right arm and you push his right shoulder back, that's interrupt and not yield.

Exactly. You can interrupt and still flow.

So I would say to really be flowing with your opponent it is a matter of continuously acting and reacting with respect to your opponents movement and position.

[Chris McKinley]

I also think that something that needs to be clarified is that flowing with an opponent does not mean letting him set and pursue his agenda. A constrictor snake will flow all over your shit, but he definitely has his own agenda as to what he'd like to have happen. A mongoose will flow completely around the movements of a king cobra, but the little bastard is definitely willing to go on the offense against the snake. There's nothing necessarily passive about flowing.