Good habit, bad habit

Sifu Greg was correcting me the other day about keeping my elbows in when doing the two-person drills and also looking at the target area I'm striking towards (the center-line) because I have a bad habit of looking down (which makes my body lean forward; needs to be straight). Being the perfectionist I am I immediately thought "Damn! I'm doing it wrong!". But then I got over it, realizing of course that this kind of "attribute training" takes time to make it become a characteristic of your body. But what Sifu Greg said about habits is something my Sensei has said to me countless times before. Which got me thinking about what makes a good martial artist. And I thought: Martial arts is about skill building like any other activity that utilizes the human body; the "skill" you are training for is fighting (that's arguable of course). The better you are in your foundations, the better you'll be when you build upon those foundations. Just like a sturdy house. I play drums so drumming is always a good analogy for me. I have crappy drum habits. Yes I'm functional on a drum kit; I can hold a beat. But if the tempo becomes fast, my arms tend to cramp up. Plus I slouch on the seat, which makes it hard to breathe easy. And my fingers lose control of the stick more easily because of bad grip. To some people, I might really sound like I can play well. But I know my limitations on a kit because I know that unless I really train out those bad habits, there's only so much I can build on my house before it all comes crashing down on me. So good structure equals good execution of the learned skill.

The learning is just never-endless man.

Elbow SMASH!
- Hiji Até