Warrior Movement, “Susu’ana Ekasahpan’a” & Training Scars by Mark Hatmaker

 

Two Question Pop Quiz

Question #1: When are you most likely to sustain a use or training injury?

“Duh, Mark, whenever I put the body under repeated or unusual stress that results in said injury.”

Question #2: Preferred trained responses are more likely to emerge after long inculcation—True or False?

“Um, true. Mark, these are too easy, you got anything better to offer than this?”

Maybe. Indulge me for a few more paragraphs.

So, trained patterns, be they patterns of movement, patterns of behavior, or even cognitive grooves are more likely to emerge than non-trained patterns.

In essence, what we do more of is likely the best predictor for future manifestation.

If we have never bothered to break an egg, we will be most unlikely to suddenly manifest deft single-handed egg-breaking into a wisely warmed omelet skillet with finesse.

What we do not exercise/practice does not appear spontaneously.

If we regularly practice annoyance at trivialities in the mundane world, we can hardly expect that this “training for umbrage” will dissipate under true and more robust stressors.

“How you train is how you will fight.”

“How you move is how you move.”

“How you behave is…”

We are all reading from the same hymn, I wager.

What we train with alacrity and regularity is the likely Pavlovian response to future similar or more robust triggers.

Train/practice a movement/behavior/cognitive groove seldom or with weak emotional content well, it’s a crap shoot as to whether or not the seldom used becomes the vital use.

“Past performance is the best predictor of future behavior.”

The preceding sentence is also known as “Return to Base Rate” in cognitive behavioral circles.

It simply is yet another iteration of, “What you see today is likely what you’ll get tomorrow + or – small deviations off of an individual’s base behavior.”

With this knowledge that I wager we all know and feel in our guts we are wise to train today what we desire in the tomorrows.

Robust triggers, true stressors, or never hoped for chaos will result in behavioral and physical entropy.

That is, we will never perform at our absolute best when times are at their absolute worst. There will be physical and behavioral degradation.

We strive for the “perfect” in the best of times to retain a bit of “Not too shabby” in the worst of times.

Train/exercise/groove poor performance in the best of times, when it goes bad, well, there’s no place to go but down.

Major-General J.F.C. Fuller offered the following in his work Training Soldiers for War, 1914.

“An army is still a crowd, though a highly organized one. It is governed by the same laws…and under the stress of war is ever tending to revert to its crowd form. Our object in peace is so to train it that the reversion will become extremely slow.”

If we substitute our own crowd of behaviors, movements, predominant thoughts for Major-General Fuller’s army/crowd we have the same message of training to combat the inevitability of entropy.

Training Scars

In military combative parlance, a “training scar” is any behavior in the training environment that may accompany our desired response to our detriment.

Two examples, one benign, one less so.

The Benign—UFC 112, Matt Hughes vs. Renzo Gracie.

Mr. Hughes is doing mighty fine in this bout. [He does win it soundly.]

At one point, the affable Mr. Gracie finds himself leg-kicked to the mat [again] and reaches for Matt Hughes’s hand to assist his rise.

Mr. Hughes does so, then once Renzo is on his feet, Hughes’ seems to have a look on his face of, “What did I just do?”

I wager both gregarious gents train with the protocol of being gentleman with their training partners and give one another a hand up after takedown drills.

Mr. Hughes aiding Mr. Gracie to his feet in the midst of a high-stakes bout for pay is a training scar. An adjunct behavior [aiding partners of off the mat] that attached itself to the desired behavior of getting the takedown.

The Fatal Example From a law enforcement security camera.

An officer is confronted by a weapon-wielding thug, he ably knocks the weapon from the attacker’s grasp, then…

Bends over, picks up the weapon and hands it back to the thug, who then promptly shoots him.

The officer suffered the unlucky burden of a polite training scar. Likely he has performed many a disarm with affable partners and they kindly and with civilized cultivation pick up and hand the mock-weapon back to the assisting friend.

“How we train is how we will fight.”

Susu’ana Ekasahpan’a

In many indigenous warrior traditions this separation of training from all else in life is anathema.

There is to be no separation from desired behavior in “training time” and all other times.

In fact, there is no “training session.”

Those who thought in terms of, “This is warrior training,” “Now, this is physical conditioning,” “Now, I’m doing meditation,” “Now, I make time for worship,” et cetera were, in the Comanche tradition, called Susu’ana Ekasahpan’a, or “Sometime Warriors.”

Along with this concept of “No Separation” was “Always Preparation.”

Back to our first Pop Quiz Question

When are you most likely to sustain a use or training injury?

To “separated minds” use or training injuries are thought of in terms of “I tweaked my shoulder rolling the other day,” or “I gotta go easy on squats till I get past this twinge in the hip.”

The “separated mind” sees use as being confined to these limited designated training times.

The “Always Prepared” mind realizes that we use the body not just during scheduled use but, well, all the damn time.

Sitting is use. Standing is use. Walking is use. Lying down is use. Bending over to pick up a dropped sock is use.

All are movement patterns of habitual grooves that reflect our acquired lifetime of physical and cognitive habits. Our lifetime of trained responses.

The “separated mind” will boast of seeking the “best” way of throwing that turnover hook, or getting under a heavy bar, but give little to no thought to how one sits in a chair while we raconteur with loved ones, or how one walks to the mailbox.

This mind of the “Always Warrior” embodies much of what we see within the science of how the human body moves. [Physical Intelligence: The Science of How the Body and the Mind Guide Each Other Through Life by Scott Grafton is a fine introduction to this mode of thought.]

The “Always Warrior” and the current science seems to point out that many of our aches and pains are less the gym-tweaks than the return-to-base-rate modes of use/movement/thinking that occupy most of our existence.

Perhaps our persistent hip-pain is less about finding the perfect running stride than it is from the just-out-of-kilter posture we adopt when standing, sitting, or lying down.

Perhaps the gym won’t fix the training scar of our “Gamer’s Neck” but the “use-therapy” of discontinuing this persistent posture is just what the Always Warrior doctor ordered.

The Always Warrior sees movement, all movement as an opportunity for training.

The Always Warrior has an eye in mind of controlling General Fuller’s “crowd” no matter the activity.

In indigenous warrior culture we can find ready rules for use in the everyday training of “Suakhet’u,” “Nemito,” Kaht’i,” Kanabai’t’u,” “Habit’u,” & “Kwanu’itu.” [Breathing, Walking, Sitting, Standing, Lying Down, Ascending or Descending Movement.]

To clarify, we are talking about an Always Warrior’s attention to movement in mundane everyday use. There is nothing in this tradition reflective of Movnat or other such modes of physical expression. These are all worthy schools of thought, but they exceed the bounds of the subtle distinction of “This is life, not that” of the “Always” tradition. Likely, a point beyond the expressive powers of this author—best seen and experienced as in our Suakhet’u Program.]

All movement can be an opportunity for training.

All movement can also be an opportunity for a training scar.

We manifest what we train persistently.

May we choose wisely.

[The aspects of “Always Warrior” movement are covered in an adjunct to The Suakhet’u Program.]

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