brutal brown belts

Lee Southward wrote: you have a bare ego, is that like a naked ego, i think one of my students, well 2 actually like naked egos.(michael miester and steve handford),maybe they have a desire to see a naked ego

infact krystyna if your out there dont you like naked egos

Lee Southward wrote: you have a bare ego, is that like a naked ego, i think one of my students, well 2 actually like naked egos.(michael miester and steve handford),maybe they have a desire to see a naked ego

All I got to do to see a naked ego, is look into a mirror... or at my instructor on mondays :-D

Michael Meister wrote: All I got to do to see a naked ego, is look into a mirror... or at my instructor on mondays :-D

at your instructor on mondays................wow and what a naked ego that is............you must be blessed to be able to look at a naked ego as fine as that one...

Lee Southward wrote: at your instructor on mondays................wow and what a naked ego that is............you must be blessed to be able to look at a naked ego as fine as that one...

It is quite hard not getting overwhelmed in the beginning, but after a while you get used to it...

Lee Southward wrote: infact krystyna if your out there dont you like naked egos

it's not so much that i like them, i'm used to them, i'd have to be, i seem to attract them. they're not entirely a bad thing though, so i guess we could say yes i do like them.

Michael Meister wrote: It is quite hard not getting overwhelmed in the beginning, but after a while you get used to it...

good answer............well done

Krystyna McGurk wrote: it's not so much that i like them, i'm used to them, i'd have to be, i seem to attract them. they're not entirely a bad thing though, so i guess we could say yes i do like them.

as ive said to michael...............damm good answer

Lee Southward wrote: as ive said to michael...............damm good answer

i thought so, and that's before breakfast too, fear my mental prowess

Er . . . it does involve beer, right?!

Budd Yuhasz wrote: Er . . . it does involve beer, right?!

of course, silly question..............

is there any brown belts out there who would like to defend against the brutal brown belt theory...?

I'm a brown belt and I work to use as little force as I can, regardless of who I'm working with. I think as to your generalization -- it's going to depend on the dojo/environment. If the brown belts are a problem at your dojo, then it's likely a top-down issue that needs to be addressed.

Budd Yuhasz wrote: I'm a brown belt and I work to use as little force as I can, regardless of who I'm working with. I think as to your generalization -- it's going to depend on the dojo/environment. If the brown belts are a problem at your dojo, then it's likely a top-down issue that needs to be addressed.

good answer............why address it it gives us all something to laugh at, and it isnt just my dojo , ive trained from england to germany and almost all the brown belts ive seen are the same, there is the odd exception.......you sound like you one of them

Krystyna McGurk wrote: it's not so much that i like them, i'm used to them, i'd have to be, i seem to attract them. they're not entirely a bad thing though, so i guess we could say yes i do like them.

you write like you talk, but at least this way, I can follow you.

Serious answer.

In my expirence, a brown belt is just starting to "get it" and that often leads to an ego inflation, followed by the type of "brutality" described here in this thread. I mean, after years of not being able to get stuff to work consistently, of being corrected every time you grab a senior, endless belt tests and repetions, the stuff is finally starting to make sense and you can start to open up. The training wheels have come off, as it were, and you want to see what this machine can do. A certain amount of this is, in my opinion, not a bad thing, so long as no one is injured or pushed to far in the practice. Can't stress this enough. Hard practice, with some slamming and banging is good. Hard practice, with long lasting pain and injury and juniors who are afraid to work with the seniors is a whole 'nuther kettle of fish.

However, if the brown belt student has a sensei and sempai who are providing good feedback and modeling proper behavior on the mat, the "wild oats" period should be short lived. The brown belt should be following the example of his/her sensei, who should be working to build folks and provide honest, ego free feedback, without the need to inflict pain.

When I was a brown belt, I was arrogant and thought I was the bee's knees( a trait which stayed with me well past my brown belt, alas). It was a stage that I had to work through, and a lot of it came from a lack of confidence in my abilities. As I trained with folks from outside of my small pond, and continued to realize the depths of my ignorance (assisted at times by some very convincing reality checks, from both my seniors and my juniors, designed to illustrate just how little I really knew) I stopped thinking I was a big fish, and started to get back to training for mastery. I think I am actually a better person and aikidoka because of the expirence.

So, in short, it's a phase, a stage of growth, that very few folks totaly avoid. S'ok to play a little rough at times, but no one should ever be hurt because of it.

John, that's way too serious an answer for the 'humor' section. Don't make me show you my bare ego . . .

Why correct the problem? To address mut's questions, well a few reasons:

1) It can generate a false sense of accomplishment (look at me beating up on the people that don't know as much as I do -- wow!). Though I don't really condone it, Tony Wagstaffe was right in that sometimes these jokers just need an arse kicking to learn not to make assumptions on or off the mat based on what they 'think' they know -- other than that they need to train more.

2) It does very little to transmit the skills/character of an activity other than the idea that people higher up the chain can abuse you (though, this can also apply to yudansha, fraternities, corporations and boarding school upperclassmen).

3) Unlike in schools with full-resistance randori/sparring, it perpetuates the notion of 'compliant invincibility', ie. you are as tough as I allow you to be, rather than, I'm trying to do this & and you're trying to do that -- this time you got me, but maybe next time I'll get you.

Sometimes, it's just an issue of having a paradigm within your aikido that allows the student (and I'm not talking about jiyuwaza with big, telegraphed train-track attacks) the opportunity to meet the senior on more equal footing. Sometimes, it's the senior just being enough better than the junior that the junior is able to more quickly cross the gap in skill -- which then pushes the senior to improve . . . it has a lot to do in how the transmission of skills are set up.

'Course, I've been in situations outside my dojo where someone 'senior' to me has tried to change up the game (vis a vis strikes and grappling) to preserve their own image of the pecking order -- I'm okay with that, too . . .

I blame the ninja, Budd, they must have taken over my account and then subsequently vanished in a puff of smoke and serious advice.

Like your point # 3 btw, thats a real weakness of being a brutal brown belt, and a real reason to quash it. I dare say that points 1 and 2 stem from that false sense of invincibility.

/smoke bomb

/vanish

[inside joke]

John, I know you didn't just throw a Pilates ball at me . . .@#$@!!

[/inside joke]

/Stewie Griffon

Victory is mine!!!

/Stewie Griffon

/Homer Simpson

D'oh!!

/Homer Simpson

oh baby...you are definately ok with that Budd...

Best,
Ron

Heck, Ron, my head's big enough already!! Just ask John . . . You ain't so bad, yourself, btw, I'm jealous you got to go play this past weekend (and bummed I wasn't able to go play in VA the last couple of weeks) . . .

That's it, I need to clone myself (although, if I remember the Sci-fi show where they did that, it didn't work out too well) . . .

Michael Meister wrote: you write like you talk, but at least this way, I can follow you.

pfft, i'm easy to understand, and it that supposed to be a dig at me or something?

Budd Yuhasz wrote: John, that's way too serious an answer for the 'humor' section. Don't make me show you my bare ego . . . Why correct the problem? To address mut's questions, well a few reasons: 1) It can generate a false sense of accomplishment (look at me beating up on the people that don't know as much as I do -- wow!). Though I don't really condone it, Tony Wagstaffe was right in that sometimes these jokers just need an arse kicking to learn not to make assumptions on or off the mat based on what they 'think' they know -- other than that they need to train more. 2) It does very little to transmit the skills/character of an activity other than the idea that people higher up the chain can abuse you (though, this can also apply to yudansha, fraternities, corporations and boarding school upperclassmen). 3) Unlike in schools with full-resistance randori/sparring, it perpetuates the notion of 'compliant invincibility', ie. you are as tough as I allow you to be, rather than, I'm trying to do this & and you're trying to do that -- this time you got me, but maybe next time I'll get you. Sometimes, it's just an issue of having a paradigm within your aikido that allows the student (and I'm not talking about jiyuwaza with big, telegraphed train-track attacks) the opportunity to meet the senior on more equal footing. Sometimes, it's the senior just being enough better than the junior that the junior is able to more quickly cross the gap in skill -- which then pushes the senior to improve . . . it has a lot to do in how the transmission of skills are set up. 'Course, I've been in situations outside my dojo where someone 'senior' to me has tried to change up the game (vis a vis strikes and grappling) to preserve their own image of the pecking order -- I'm okay with that, too . . .

please tell me this is still the humour section.........?

Lee Southward wrote: please tell me this is still the humour section.........?

'Course it is . . . can't help it if you brought up a topic worth legitimately discussing . . . which, if you don't want to seriously discuss then you shouldn't have asked if people wanted to debate your point.

But, hey, I tried . . . bare ego . . . . . .