Regarding the Clinic

Of course this involves more than learning at a karate clinic, regardless of the art, the clinic may be from several hours on one day up to a multi day learning experience.

 

 

My first clinic was actually in kung fu. Ernest Rothrock once a year would teach his students a form (kuen) from another system. The first time for me in 1980 , it was a Northern Mantis form, Slip In and Hit. I recall the clinic was about 3 hours long. At that time I was studying Yang Tai Chi with him, and was beginning to study other forms from various Chinese systems in order to be a more informed judge when I judged at Open tournaments

 

As I was trying to learn the form, I noticed several nearby students having a harder time than I was, so after I had the idea of the movements, I worked to help them get it. Unintentionally I learned a great principle of learning, by assisting others it reinforced my own ability to retain the form.

 

But the clinic was only the beginning. That form was not in my studies.At that time I would additionally spend Saturday afternoons at his school in Wilkes-Barre, where it was time given to free practice. There I worked on the form (and my other studies) along with other students who were doing so. We would correct each other’s performance, improving our own performance at the same time.

 

I kept up the practice, long after I moved away from that area. And about 17 years later even competed with that form for fun.

 

So the key was practice, and more practice, Never at the expense of my Isshinryu. But in those days I was working out 7 days a week, and found time in my workouts.

 

When you learn something at a clinic, especially if you are not an instructor, the burden to really retain it and get value is your responsibility. Without continual practice what you don’t use, you lose. You will retain information about that art, and that does have value, but  I always wanted more.

 

 

The next sort of clinic, is a press the flesh, type of clinic. In 1984 I attended a clinic with Shumabukuro Zempo. Who would later succeed his father Shimabukuro Zenryo to head the Seibukan Shorin Ryu. As I don’t practice Seibukan, it was interesting to have some experience seeing the difference to my Isshinryu karate. But there was no reinforcement of those techniques and while years later I came in contact with this system, much that I learned was lost. But the value was in pressing the flesh. After the clinic there was a welcoming party for Shimabukuro Sensei, and I had a chance to hear of his experiences when he had lived in the States, as well as his feelings about karate on Okinawa and the different systems there. More so his impressions about the best experience with American food stuffs. It made the day unforgettable.

 

 

At the first Bushi No Te Summer Camp Tristan Sutrisno shared for the instructors there the kata Nijushiho. One shot. I worked very hard to get it. It was a short, very interesting and advanced form. The only reinforcement I got was from me. My commitment that I would retain it. Several years later, for fun, I competed with this form. Many years late, when I wanted to add one of his forms to my student’s studies, to honor what he shared with me. I asked him what I should share with them. He surprised me when he responded Nijushiho. The next day he shared the form with them at a clinic. Move by move, including his unique bunkai for each move. Of course the person being instructed was me.

That I had worked on the form for 6 years, made it much easier to include it in Brown Belt studies. And over the years teaching it make me appreciate the form even more.

 

 

In 1983 I had one chance to learn the entire Bando Short Stick form, at the Bando Summer Camp. One instructor gave me two of their brown belts and they worked with me for several hours on the form and the application of those movements. I spent some time in the middle of their instruction working with Anna Lockwood, on a different form she wanted to learn, then when I returned to the stick it helped me better understand what I knew and did not know. The break helping me clear my mind. Later that day I drove home, totally immersed in retaining that form Then practice, and more practice. It would be 6 years before I began sharing ½ of the form as a separate form for my brown belts. The full form becoming a dan practice with us.

 

Although I had no other reinforcement for my practice, I think I have done a reasonable job retaining what I learned.    What helped was I saw the value to the study, worked hard to retain it and spent years in self practice so I knew what I was sharing. Not the recommended course of  study, but possible with intense work.

 

I had been training with Tristan for 5 years when I moved to NH. I had spent maybe 6 ½ years also studying with Ernest Rothrock on Tai Chi and a range of Kung fu forms. I had come to realize while they had shared very much with me, except for the Tai Chi, there was a great difference between sharing knowledge and being their student. The one was not the same as the other.

 

Tristan kept me abreast of what his students were studying, but the best description of the difference was working with his senior students, their knowledge was deeper, they know from the pain they felt what you were doing incorrect. That experience was not shared in his instruction.

 

This is an important distinction about clinic learning. 1) there is no shortcut to practice, practice, practice 2)you can only practice what was shared, it is not the equivalent of daily instruction with the instructor. For sure the clinic knowledge is valuable, but it is not what is shared with deep instruction over time. This is a constant with any clinic. Ernest was as deep with his sharing as Tristan, but the day to day experience was always more in depth.

 

 

 About 1988 Tristan who frequently visited my dojo in Derry, shared a clinic on what 3^rd and 4^th level Bunkai were in his art. Using several of the Pinan kata for his examples. He would do a very quick example of each technique then have those present practice. Then he would go around and correct what they were doing to make it more effective to them. (This was reinforced on a video I made of this session.) What I noticed was that many times the participants were not doing the same movements, and he was correcting what they were actually doing. Unconcerned about the difference in what they were doing.

 

He explained what he was doing he had learned from his father. The attendees were not students after all, he called this instruction Principle the “Technique of No Technique”. They would be happy with whatever they had, his father when asked to teach did the same thing. The person that was actually being taught was me.

 

In later years he changed the manner In which he taught and included much more reinforcement of the lessons.

 

 

In the early 90s I had a chance to attend a clinic with Dan Insanto at a friend’s nearby school He was actually doing a whole serried of clinics for two days on a very wide range of topics. Having read much about him for years I thought it would be interesting to see him in action. I selected to attend a clinic on knife disarming techniques. His clinic was focused on just that. Almost every 2 minutes for 2 hours he did a different technique. He would show it, and then you practiced with a partner, Then two of three minutes later he would show another technique.

They were in such profusion that what would go into your head would go right out with the next technique.

 

There was a school present from Princeton University. For those training with him it was technique review time. For everyone else intentional “Technique of No Technique”  .You had your chance to meet and train with Insanto, but you would almost retain nothing. Of course that was what was going to happen, as you weren’t his student. I wasn’t concerned as I recognized what most of what he did was from a book he had published on Stick Fighting. I really only wanted to see his skills, and that I did.

 

 

While this in no way describes every clinic I attended, it does explain many of the differences.

 

 

Then in 1995 one evening Garry Gerossie entered my dojo. He asked to train with me, and I just went through a normal adult workout. Afterwards Garry explained he wanted me to meet his instructor, Sherman Harrill. He felt that what I was doing in class was similar to what Sherman taught and he understood Sherman was a friend of my original instructor Tom Lewis when they were in Okinawa.

 

The next month in June I went up to Garry’s clinic. I met Sherman, and he informed me that he knew Tom, and that he wasn’t looking for any new students. I told him that’s ok for I wasn’t looking for an instructor. We got along fine.

 

Well meeting Sherman and seeing him teach was a real experience. He was a teaching machine, with inexhaustible technique. As he moved along and I felt bombarded seeing how he used Isshinryu. Suddenly I had an epiphany. I wondered what would happen if a strike he had us practice was used to strike into the neck.

I questioned Sherman and he confirmed my opinion, then discussed other methods for using this.

Later after lunch we were starting to get dopy with so many ideas. Suddenly Sherman worked some Nifanchi footwork that was neat. Everyone suddenly woke up, and in a while started questioning him on what he did and how. The afternoon drew to a conclusion too soon.But Sherman was unstoppable, In the changing room afterwards while changing he continued to expound other uses of Isshinryu kata.

 

Time was too short. The next day I had to travel for work and I wrote up my notes and I recalled maybe 20 techniques. The next year Garry let me view his copy of the clinic, and I counted Sherman covered about 160 techniques that day.

 

The next year I attended another clinic in Concord, with some students. And Garry and I made plans to bring Sherman in for a clinic and host it at the Boys and Girls Club. We did so and Sherman asked what I wanted him to cover. I suggested Chinto, Kusanku and SunSu. I remember Sherman laughing and telling me that he could spend a whole day on one and not have enough time for everthing.

 

Then he began with the opening movement of Chinto kata. For three hours he continued to explore  the uses of that opening movement section. Finally he uttered “Well I guess that’s enough, perhaps we should move onto the next movement.” Which he did. He did cover applications for the three kata that day. I began to realize how much depth he put into his own study.

 

I could say a great deal about what I learned from him He really was an encyclopedia of what Isshinryu could do. It was already there, anyone could have done it, he did.

 

Garry and I hosted other clinics. I went to those Chester Houlbecki Sensei hosted in Springfield. To those hosted by a friend of Garry’s in Rhode Island.

For one of them I was able to have Tom Lewis attend from Wyoming. Then I had Charles Murray attend a clinic in Rhode Island, as he was teaching at the Naval War College, and then again in Derry.

 

Over that time I learned a great deal about Sherman’s experiences in Isshinryu. There was much shared in the quiet times before and after the clinics. Sherman explained this was not how he ran his classes. There were many aspects of his training he could not share because there was not enough time, and because he didn’t really know the people and they weren’t his students. Not that he didn’t share enough, but it was beyond what could be done.

 

My student’s learned a great deal from the physical experience. Many times the next day they would come over and share the bruises earned, the locations struck and marks left from the strikes. Much was gained from those discussions, beyond what was shared on the clinic floor. It gave a glimpse at what he explained about what his students learned.

 

The time was too brief. Maybe 50 or 60 hours. Sherman had serious medical problems, one of my student’s a surgeon would worry a great deal about Sherman’s health. But no matter how weak he was at the beginning of a clinic, he found great strength as the day progressed, and he finished the day stronger and stronger.

 

I guess the last time I saw him was the same. He had suffered an  arm injury in Seattle, so he focused on one are defenses within Isshinryu and you never noticed his injury. At that same clinic he shared on Okinawa, in Kusanku Sai the techniques originally included throwing the sai into the opponent’s body but because the dojo floor had too many bodies, the sai was thrown to the floor for safety.

 

Too soon Sherman left us. He shared so openly and deeply it is hard to express what he represented. His passing deeply affected me. I spent the next three months gathering my notes from his clinics and watching every video tape I possessed from them. I put together a listing of what he shared the applications, the principal’s, a Sherm-pedia, to try and grasp the ungraspable.

 

I was often unable to watch those videos long. When I finished I sent a copy to John Kerker and put it’s future into his hands. The transfer of so much knowledge by his efforts was astonishing. I discovered from that too brief time he had covered maybe 800 applications from Isshinryu, and I knew that was but a part of his art.

 

The greater impact to me from having made his acquaintance was that I didn’t focus on repeating his lessons, but instead would work to undertake my own studies. I don’t believe I was original, that I covered anything that he had not already explored, but I had gained the idea that I could take personal responsibility for what I practiced to a greater degree that I had before. This took the meaning of a ‘clinic’ to a new level.

 

The years passed. Finally in 2005 I was invited to a clinic with John Kerker Sensei in Chicopee, Mass. Even though Sherman told us he was holding back when I met John I realized what he actually meant. I had never met John before. He was obviously sharing as Sherman had. But there was a big difference. I had never seen anyone, no one I had trained with, strike another person as he was doing.  Clarence Whitley and the attendees actually were able to go and train with John. He was sharing with those he was training. He was not holding anything back.

 

At the same time he shared many details about directly training with Sherman. I slowly began to gain a fuller picture about what Sherman at times described.

 

Training but a few hours, over subsequent years I gained a fuller understanding of what the training program consisted, and why Sherman focused on many of the drills.

 

I also observed the way John’s teaching grew. It was obvious that he was intensely interested in the students. His methodology moved away from encyclopedic potentials of Isshinryu to a deeper understanding for the student about how they could train. An extremely solid way to share Isshinryu.

 

At the same time those encyclopedic possibilities were still there. He would share them, but the underlying details were more important. You never forgot that even a strike into your arm would put you on the floor. And the understanding how that power was developed was shared.

 

 

In the end clinics serve different ends depending how you approach them. They are a method to impart knowledge. Be the technique of no technique or a sincere attempt to impart knowledge. You are the one in charge of what you get. Many times there is more than you can totally grasp. But if you end up with one thing from the experience, your knowledge increased 100% from that experience.

 

How you integrate what you learned with your current studies is up to you. As a student it most likely is not part of your training in class. Then you alone become responsible how to train it in your private training. Remember what you don’t practice, you will lose is a universal truth.

 

As an instructor, even if the training is inspired, you need personal practice to know what is there, As a rule of thumb, I suggest 5 years of practice, to understand what you have a bit. Then you have the biggest burden. I expect you already have much to share with your students. Years of knowledge. When you consider any new knowledge you must consider where to insert it, what gets dropped in the process.

 

One’s program was not developed casually, but through your own sweat equity. No clinic, no matter how outstanding, can share enough to make you throw everything you know away and begin again. Well, certainly you might discard everything, and go and beg to become an actual student to learn what was being showed from the ground up. I have known several individuals who did just that in many arts. But if you are convinced in your own teachings you have to strike a balance, between what you are doing, and what you have gained. It becomes a personal challenge.

 

For one thing, no matter how diligent your efforts are, no clinic or even series of clinics will ever really get you the knowledge the instructor possesses. With effort you might succeed to make that which you got work for you. That becomes the test. You won’t be the same, but if it works for you, you have an answer.

 

I literally have years of material I have never been able to share, because there was not enough time, and I believe in what I already teach.

 

I hope this makes you reflect on what you have experienced, what the different types of clinics have meant to you. A serious form of training, one that makes you work for a lifetime.

 

For myself when I have been asked to give clinics or teach in other schools. I have never shared Isshinryu (they were not Isshinryu programs). The system is too personal to me. I won’t teach it but the way I have experienced it, piece by piece. Instead I share training from my many other experiences. Good techniques and kata, on occasion. I try to make it interesting for those attending and to give them new ways to drop someone. Personally I do not use ‘Technique of No Technique” leaving it to those attending to chose to use it.

 

 

A Bushi No Te Gathering in NH 1988