Hello, in Taekwondo sparring i am always told that the key to winning is to be calm. I know this and i do spar with calmness but one of my fellow students is not aggressive enough to spar when he is calm and attack with any effect. I say he should just get angry when he spars. Does anyone out there have any thoughts on the subject of emotion in sparring?

If I try to relax, I get overwhelmed.

If I try to be aggressive, I make mistakes and lose.

If I don't give a **** and just think about hitting the other guy (without concern for being hit), I tend to do well.

That is very true. I do well when i mix the relaxation and just going in guns a blazin. It is just should everyone find where they are happy and a good sparer emotion or should instructors just say to be calm? In the end will calmness and anger really play a big part compared to skill?

I think a lot of people have difficulty in differentiating between being aggressive vs. being assertive in sparring, and between being calm vs. being passive.

You (and by this I am not referring to anyone in particular, just to people in general) should remain calm when sparring or fighting - stay rational, and monitor/moderate your intensity to the level that's needed at the time, and try to do things with good form, rhythm and timing. That doesn't mean you should try to avoid actually getting a work out and pressure testing your skills.

Also, you should approach sparring with a goal in mind. If you are not so good in a particular range, or at using/setting up a particular technique, focus on that for a session.

Sparring for the sake of sparring is ultimately very fun, but you should be approaching it with a sense of purpose.

If your training partner is being too placid, perhaps you could encourage them to use their countering techniques, or to initiate things, but in the end, that's your instructor's job, not yours.

~my $0.02

According to the Yerkes-Dodson law, variations of which are widely cited in Sports Psychology literature, everyone has a peak level of physiological arousal under which they perform the best. This peak level of arousal varies from person to person. Some individuals benefit from learning to be more relaxed when fighting, some benefit from learning to be more tense.

One thing that an athlete can do to help "get in the zone" is to pay careful attention to how you feel physically during comeptitions. Remember how you felt, as accurately and as detailed as you can, during a time when you were performing at your best and "in the zone." By using this type of sense memory kind of like a method actor, you can help yourself to achieve a similar level of arousal that is appropriate for your performance.

Removed from the KMA forum for almost a complete lack of applicability.

i stopped psarring for the win a while back and now I do much better. Now I spar to refine techniques I already know and to try techniques that I want to know better.

There's a state of calmness that helps fighting. I was attacked by a speed freak some years ago and was nervous until I dropped into stance and waited (very short wait!) for him to get into range. It was like what Jeff Hornacek, the great NBA three point shooter said about when he's in the "zone," it gets real quiet and everyone else is moving in slow motion.

There's a state of calmness that helps fighting. I was attacked by a speed freak some years ago and was nervous until I dropped into stance and waited (very short wait!) for him to get into range. It was like what Jeff Hornacek, the great NBA three point shooter said about when he's in the "zone," it gets real quiet and everyone else is moving in slow motion.

fug, is that what karateka generally refer to as mushin? Like a mindless state where you're completely relaxed, and everything seems automatic? Almost like you're a spectator in your own body? I've only ever experienced something like that maybe twice in my life, and I've never been able to reclaim it.

tl;dr

Watch Fedor.

tl;dr

Watch Fedor.
Damn it.

I knew there was a more efficient way to get my point across.

Well played, sir. Well played.

Yeah, mushin, mind of no mind, which I am sure will be trampled by people who know the language better than I.
Ever zoned out while driving, came to and you were near your destination? Do you think about changing gears at all after a while driving a manual car? It is pretty much the same thing. Your body is so accustomed to doing something you do not need to consciously think about it. Application to combat is obvious, you shave vital milliseconds off your reaction time.
I often found myself in the "zone", it is not some mythical skill that can be acquired, but it is a psychological/ physiological skill that can be developed. Meditation, or simply clearing your mind of conscious thought for as long as you can for an hour daily will help on the way. So will hours of training a technique.
When I am in the "zone" the perfect way to snap me out of it is when I suddenly recognise I am there.

You can use your opponents attitute against you. And your attitude can get used against you. State of neutrality is the best.

Yeah, mushin, mind of no mind, which I am sure will be trampled by people who know the language better than I.
Ever zoned out while driving, came to and you were near your destination? Do you think about changing gears at all after a while driving a manual car? It is pretty much the same thing. Your body is so accustomed to doing something you do not need to consciously think about it. Application to combat is obvious, you shave vital milliseconds off your reaction time.
I often found myself in the "zone", it is not some mythical skill that can be acquired, but it is a psychological/ physiological skill that can be developed. Meditation, or simply clearing your mind of conscious thought for as long as you can for an hour daily will help on the way. So will hours of training a technique.
When I am in the "zone" the perfect way to snap me out of it is when I suddenly recognise I am there.

Interesting point.

Generally when I am sparring, I am consciously engaging in an experiment - i.e. will this work? hmm.. I'm going to try and stand in the pocket instead of setting things up from the outside, etc. which means I don't really allow myself to go to autopilot.

The only times I really zone out are if I'm doing a repetitive drill.

But simply zoning out and running on auto is not exactly the same as mushin I think. When you're in the zone it almost seems like you can predict what's happening next, and everything just seems to flow really easily. I get like when i'm rolling sometimes, almost like I could just close my eyes and roll on autopilot.

Great analogy about driving a car, and I've heard similar things said in other contexts (about the complexity of accurately describing everything involved in riding a bicycle or driving a car as opposed to simply doing it, for example), but I don't know if I would say I'm driving a car at my absolute peak level of performance if I'm on autopilot. In fact, quite the contrary. I have several clients (I work in Acquired Brain Injury rehab) who were involved in serious vehicular accidents because they were "just cruising along and not really focusing on anything". I think when your in the zone you are completely aware of everything that's going on, and very receptive/responsive, despite not dwelling on anything.

I think establishing the optimal level of arousal and attention is a very interesting subject, actually.

The only times I really zone out are if I'm doing a repetitive drill . . .
. . . I get like when i'm rolling sometimes, almost like I could just close my eyes . . . very receptive . . . arousal and attention . . . very interesting .

Sums up BJJ.

Your clients seem not to have been in the zone as much as they were daydreaming, with no offence intended in that remark.
What I am talking about is when your focus is completely on driving, your awareness is heightened, but you have no conscious thought, as in you are a part of the car and surrounding environment. You have no thoughts telling you you must slow down because there is a car entering traffic in front of you, you just automatically and smoothly gear down, brake, etc in order to accomodate an obstacle that you unconsciously predict as being a possible problem. I would say this state is very much mushin, as I understand it. However, I have a motor racing background and if you are not very much in the zone while racing then you might be very much in the wall.
Sparring during training requires you to consciously think about what you are doing in order for it to be committed to memory, which your body remembers in a state of mushin in response to a stimuli that you have practised against (punch= bob/ weave, kick= check). This then means your consciousness is taken out of the equation, as I said before this speeds your reaction time that, even though it is only milliseconds, in response to a punch that might take 0.7 seconds to complete, being able to react even in just 0.6 seconds is beneficial compared to a conscious reaction of say, 1.1 seconds.
This is what happens to you while rolling, you no longer need to think about your next technique because you have trained your body to know what will come next and how you will deal with it, or its multiple variations. Drilling helps in storing the memory in the muscles/ brain and when you can drill without thinking, am I right in saying that technique is easier while rolling henceforth?