Guided Chaos

Recently, I've been (again) practicing the drills from the book Attack Proof by John Perkins while on hiatus from dojo practice (which by the way, has gone on for like... two years straight now?). The book claims to be The Ultimate Self-Protection Guide. No kidding. We know how true that is... marketing wise.

Aside from that markting hyperbole, IMO the book itself turned out to be quite good as a training resource. It opens with the standard personal safety precaution guide, then moving on to what amounts to WW2 style hand-to-hand combatives techniques (which don't take too many pages to explain, simple as they are), and then on to the meat of the book: the drills.

Aaah, the drills. Of all the training reference books I have (which is not many), this book contains more drills than I can shake a stick at. And they're mostly silly.

Silly as in Scott Sonnon's FlowFighting drills. Silly as in Vladimir Vasiliev's Systema drills. Silly, but you as hell won't dare call them silly right in the face (at least, you won't dare call Mr. Sonnon silly, right to his face or behind his back, but I figured every one else is game). But for the most part, I find them quite true to their purpose.

Though like most training resource, you'll find the book citing claims that the drills will make you the self-defence badass, in the short term the drills do develop the attributes that Mr. Perkins deemed most useful for self-defence situations: Freedom from fear reactivity (quoting Scott Sonnon on this one), looseness, body-unity, balance, and sensitivity.

You can find reviews of the book from various sources on the net.

Though Mr. Perkins extracted these drills from his self-concocted Martial Art of Ki Chuan Do (a name that's somewhat non-sensical), he is quite generous in that these drills don't actually just work for Ki Chuan Do. I daresay it works for all MAs (as claimed by the book), as the main thread of the drills is to develop Guided Chaos, a concept of movement that I believe is true for self-defence situations. It even works for the uninitiated, using the simple WW2 combatives techniques. The problem is, as always, finding the place to practice and partners, and slowly building your inventory of various pads.


Remember I said that I've been (again)...? Well, I used to practice the drills on my own, but then during dojo practice I would find myself instinctively countered any attack with rush in followed by a palm heel uppercut to the jaw or a palm heel hook to the temples. Not good, since mostly those counters connected when I'm partnered with new trainees. Now wonder not many trainees return for the next class after partnered with me (oops!). Consciously refraining myself from using those counters usually got me in trouble when later in the session I was partnered with my peers (where successfully I would just freeze and look like an idiot for taking the shots). Hoo boy.


Lately though, in my (rarely) bimonthly training visit to an affiliate dojo (mostly the same guys, just different venue and training focus), I find myself ever so lacking during free practice. Thus, the logical answer is to practice more in that focus. But...

Just but, I heeded the illogical, and re-open the pages of Attack Proof.


Well, that's just me.

Keep safe.