How to exploit emotions: in training and combat
Emotions are not automatically enemies of a martial arts practitioner
Differently from many other approaches, in 6 Dragons Kung Fu, we stress at the same time the importance of:
- Abstraction (read Concentration and abstraction in combat)
- Voluntary emotions (the ones we are going to see)
Note – This article has been asked by one of our Core Course practitioners on Patreon (see how to attend our home study classes here Learn Kung Fu online: a beginner-to-expert course).
Substantially the idea is that:
- Abstraction – On one hand, we have detachment, a tool that allows us to not be victims of the most spontaneous and natural human instincts
- Voluntary emotions – On the other hand, we have controlled emotions, a sort of special resource that can allow us to do things otherwise impossible
A note by Master Kongling – In a few words, in our school we train to become able to voluntarily create, channel and break our emotional flows.
How to use the voluntary emotions in workout and combat
Abstraction and voluntary emotions are extremely powerful “weapons” but to guarantee their access in moments of need (training, self-defense scenarios, etc.) is necessary to:
- Clean our mind – Learn (through meditation) to empty our mind or, at least, to divert its attention; this way we indirectly eliminate all the uncontrolled and dangerous natural instinctive emotions (the ones related to what is happening in the present or, worst, the unwanted ones that come from our past)
- Catalog our emotions – Recognize, collect and catalog the most intense emotions from our past (situations of extreme euphoria, fear, relaxation, etc.)
- Become able to recall them – Use anchoring methods (we have seen some of them, read Fighting and mind control: the anchors) to recall the emotion we need (even in a partially unconscious way)
- Become able to influence our mind – Transform the chosen emotions into a sort of tool of immediate and intense “mental conditioning” (able to assign them roles and circumstances connected to the current scenario)
How to gain full control over our emotions
We must simply do like the greatest actors:
- If, for example, we cannot feel deep hatred for an aggressor we just met (or for an inanimate training target, read for example Basic Kung Fu exercises: Poles Training), we just have to assign him / her a role, assign him / her what we feel for a behavior we hate (picking from our past)
- While assigning roles, let’s always avoid focusing on specific people (it is not only ethically incorrect but tends also to lose effectiveness with time)
- Basically, anything positive or negative in our brain can be effectively employed both in training, in daily life or in combat; the only crucial condition is that what we draw from our past must never have a causal connection with what is happening (so that it can be dissociated instantly, if necessary)
A note by Master Kongling – Naturally in the first point, when we refer to hate, we talk about training with more vigor agaist an inanimated target or about an extreme self-defense scenario where all the steps of our S.A.F.E. method failed (read Personal defense: the S.A.F.E. method) and we are losing a potentially lethal phsysical confrontation.
Final notes
A few conclusive thoughts:
- The key to gain access to the type of mastery described in this explanation is to voluntarily recall the emotional states we need to occupy the “mental space” that otherwise would be in the hands of the ones arising from the present
- Excluding traumas, what happened in the past is always less difficult to manage than what is born vividly and suddenly in the present
- In conclusion, it is important to stress that (obviously) traumas contain an immensely greater power; employing old emotions on which we have not elaborated is at the same time very risky but also very powerful and in a desperate life-or-death situation (where all the rest did not work) it could not be automatically wrong to take that risk
- …
In the next article of this series, we will see some examples of practical applications.
In-depth video courses
- Mind self-control hacks – A detailed, step-by-step explanation of how to improve control and performance of the mind
- Basic 6 Dragons Kung Fu Exercises – Our fundamental training path for martial arts
- Breathing methods and exercises – How to use breathing to reach specific goals / mental states
- Meditation: how to start – A gradual path for beginners, including those who cannot stay inactive
- Self-defense: not violent self-preservation – Everything you should do to protect your life without recurring to violence
- How to build strong self-discipline – How to acquire the skill that opens the way to all the others
In-depth articles
- Combat: overcome perceptual limits of body and mind – How to overcome the limits of our senses
- Mind skills: what we will learn – All the mental capabilities that 6 Dragons Kung Fu teaches
Questions
Reply in the comments and share your experience:
- What is the most intense emotion that you could exploit from your past?
Author: Master Kongling
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