Gary
Author Comments aka Comic News
The reasoning
Today's comic was inspired by last night's class at the dojo. I got annoyed that someone was moving in a, less than ideal, fashion. They would attack, stop, and then wait for a technique to magically be performed upon them, or, if they knew the technique we were doing, they would alter their attack expecting the technique. Normally stuff like this isn't an issue for me, but today it was, and I had a slight rage flash, like my teacher used to. Even as a student, I was frustrated that they weren't getting it, then they said they were standing there, in an inferior position because I had three weapons on target (two legs and one hand), and they had none on target, waiting for me to do a technique to them. At that point I just kind of lost it, in my head. This kind of stuff does happen, and normally I'm fine with it, but today, at the dojo I used to train at, where I just don't expect it, my mind exploded. I then took ukemi for them, and showed, or I thought I did, that you move to a better position when you're the attacker (or for that matter, the defender). To show that, I attacked, they moved to a spot where I wasn't safe, I took my next step where I was safe, and I placed a fist on them, they moved, I moved again and placed a leg on their gut, they moved, I moved again and placed my hand on their kidney, and so on. The roles then changed, and they still did their attack, and waited with their back to me. I placed a fist on their back, they kept waiting for something to happen with their arm. After a little bit, I stepped away and let them attack again. This happened for a couple back and forths, there were only three of us in class, so everyone trained with everyone else, back and forth. Then at some point, my mind just said, "they're not getting it, they're not going to get it, they're never going to get it, my training with them at this point is worthless." That's the wrong thing to think, though, I'm pretty certain my teacher would think that every now and then (later when the annoyance and anger subsided, he'd reset that, but for that class they were basically dead to them, unless they found a way to get it). Normally I just change my approach, or I brush it off, because it's not hurting me, but this time, I couldn't do that (I don't know why). So, for the rest of the class, when we trained, I knew how they were going to move, so I adapted and threw them, sometimes hard, sometimes not, sometimes I just placed my hand in dangerous places and walked away. All of the times, I did it without concern for them, or even seeing them as a threat. Throw them, keep them in the corner of your eye, but otherwise, ignore them. This is not a good response. Every so often, while training with them, I would realize the bad response I'm having, and try to change it, but then they do something like changing their attack to stop a specific technique (example, we have a straight downward attack, but they knew a technique where their arm gets rotated a little is about to occur, so their straight downward attack was down and to the side with their elbow locked so said technique was not sensible since they made a line of force opposite to the line you're supposed to take). Since I know how to counter things like that, because it's just a change of line, so I'd still pull off the throw, but I'd keep doing it like they were a worthless rag, which, in my mind, at that point, they were. It wasn't good. I should not have allowed that reaction in me. I should have just accepted that they were being stupid and let it go. Long story short, a comic came out of all that, and I need to learn how not to let that happen.
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