Indigenous Ability

[Consider this Part 2 of the offering Move Like a Scout or Indigenous Warrior . You can consume this piece in isolation but to really follow the arc I’d recommend reading the mentioned piece [or even re-reading it] to gather fully where we’re going.] Many of us tout our bona fides as high-speed, low-drag, can-the-noize-boys cuz’ I’m lock ‘n’load from bang to go! It’s a fun little play-acting symptom we see in grown-ass adults who wear the gear, talk the talk, but…do they walk the walk? Before you answer, I’m going to drill down so we get mighty specific with that question of walking the walk. I have zero doubt that there is a squared away cadre that walks a walk some of the time. I wager there is a smaller contingent [not anyone you likely see on the street in the day-to-day] who walk the walk more often than not. I refer to those folks in war-zones, battle-zones, boots-on-the-ground, no time for drill cuz’ this shit’s real. Environment shapes behavio...

Rough ‘n’ Tumble, scufflin’, illegal boxing, boombattle, and all the various and sundry names that go to describe the all-in melee that is truly no-holds-barred, no-strikes-off-the-table uses the entire body as a weapon. Let’s take a brief sojourn with just one of those weapons—The Shoulder. Due to obvious range restrictions, the shoulder is part of the closed-quarters arsenal.  [ Notice, in deference to the origin of the word, I call it “closed quarters” in the piratical naval melee sense and not the modern and incorrect perversion to “close quarters.” Yeah, I’m that guy, a stickler for the details. Consider this, if the name ain’t right, what else might be wrong? If a guy calls a jab “a fisty puncher” and is oblivious to the word “jab” we’d suspect something was a bit awry in the boxing research, would we not?] To the Shoulder! We’ve got three broad ways to use it [Slams, Butts, & Grinds] and essentially only two attack paths [Inward & Upward.]...

Today’s sermon will weave a tale of housecats, early American colonists’ observations regarding battle-prowess in Native Americans, gang-bangers, good ol’ boy hunters, fox-hunters in the Old West, gamers and screen-users, Afghan Combat studies and, if we’ve done our job right, make a case for making risk part and parcel of cogent combat training. Let’s start with the adorable housecat, Felis catus . Study after study has recorded that outdoor housecats are responsible for an astonishing amount of depredation. Any of us who own one of these “awesome prowling machines” [tip of the hat to Les Claypool] is aware that they can go through chipmunks, field mice, and birds like nobody’s business but…the story is deeper than that. For every kill you see, there are likely a double handful that you were not privy to witness.  If you want the skinny on just how serial-killer-esque the common cat can be, Pete Marra, head of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center authored a book on ...

“ What do I do if I guy had me in this hold?” “What do I do if the guy knows jujitsu?” “What do if a guy is a good wrestler?” Combat Arts Instructors get these kinds of questions all the time. The question usually has a simple formulation with the interrogator not quite aware yet [due to inexperience] that they have posited quite a vast open-ended query. The inexperienced questioner is never at fault for questions along these lines. Here’s where the quibble begins [in Mark’s mind.] Any answer along the lines of: “ Well, all you have to do is just…” The implication that there is a simplistic answer to a large physical endeavor shows a good deal of short-sightedness or a staggering amount of hubris. We never succumb to such simplistic answers to encompassing questions in other physical domains. For example, if our naïve interlocuter asks “ What if I’m playing football and he has the ball?” See?  You immediately would want ...