Stretching Challenge

If you haven’t been fol­low­ing Taido/Blog lately (and shame on you if that’s the case), you should read the first two posts in this series before con­tin­u­ing. Here they are:

• You’re Probably Stretching Wrong
• Why Flexibility is Important in Taido

Those posts really lay the ground­work for what’s to fol­low, so please read them to make sure that we’re all on the same page. Go ahead, I’ll wait.

Inflexibility Insanity

A lot of Taido stu­dents and teach­ers are insane. At least by Einstein’s def­i­n­i­tion. I’ve often quoted his remark that

doing the same thing twice and expect­ing dif­fer­ent results is def­i­n­i­tion of insanity.

I think that applies very well to our situation.

The stretch­ing rou­tine most Taido dojo use has been in ser­vice for a very long time. It has been taught in Japanese ele­men­tary schools for at least fifty years. The thing I notice is that very few Japanese school­child­ren have the kinds of phys­i­cal abil­i­ties I aspire to. Neither do most Taido students.

If I want dif­fer­ent results than what most peo­ple are get­ting, I can’t use the same meth­ods they use. To do so would be insane. Many of us have been stretch­ing this way for many years, and we haven’t got­ten any more flex­i­ble lately.

You see, I recently came to the real­iza­tion that I am less flex­i­ble right now than have been in my entire life. After 25 years of Taido prac­tice, my phys­i­cal free­dom of move­ment is at its worst, and I’m not happy about it. In fact, it’s embar­rass­ing and makes me feel like a hyp­ocrite in front of my students.

For about a month, I tried to stretch more and stretch harder, but it just didn’t really make much of a dif­fer­ence. I took Einstein to heart and decided to look for a bet­ter method.

The Better Method

Actually, I didn’t have to look far. In fact, I’ve been rec­om­mend­ing such a method on Taido/Blog for some time. It’s called Elastic Steel, which is a really cheesy name, but it worked really well for me in the past.

I men­tioned before two prob­lems with the stan­dard stretch­ing rou­tine. Let me also throw out a third idea. Our usual stretch­ing works on the prin­ci­ple of stretch­ing the hell out of the body’s larger mus­cles. But what is the large mus­cles aren’t the problem?

The Central Nervous System allows stronger mus­cles to release more effi­ciently than smaller, weaker mus­cles. What if the thing keep­ing us stiff is weak­ness and imbal­ance in these smaller mus­cles? If that were the case, we’d get the best results from strength­en­ing these mus­cles as well as stretching.

Elastic Steel is the best sys­tem I have seen for com­bin­ing strength exer­cises with stretch­ing in a log­i­cal man­ner that addresses the flex­i­bil­ity needs of mar­tial artists. It was cre­ated by a dude named Paul Zaichik, who has some fan­tas­tic kick­ing skills him­self. His videos on YouTube clearly demon­strate that he’s the real deal.

I found out about Elastic Steel when I was train­ing in Yokohama a few years ago, and my flex­i­bil­ity and mobil­ity began to improve rapidly. But then I got injured, and then I moved, and then…

Oh, yeah. You don’t want excuses any more than I do. Suffice it to say, I lost that flex­i­bil­ity, and now I plan to get it back.

My Plan

I’m going to do the Elastic Steel course again. This will prob­a­bly come as no sur­prise. Still, after read­ing this far, you may be ask­ing what all this has to do with you.

I’ll tell you.

What All This Has To Do With You

I want you to do this with me. Of course, I don’t expect every­one to go out and buy Elastic Steel (you should buy it, but that’s not really the point here). Instead, I made this video of how I’m apply­ing some of the prin­ci­ples and tech­niques in the course.

Of course, it wouldn’t be right for me to give away the entire course for free. I left out the “extended length con­di­tion­ing” and a few advanced pro­to­cols. However, this is a good rou­tine that any Taido stu­dent can inte­grate into their weekly rou­tine and begin to see results.

The Challenge

I chal­lenge you to warm up and do this rou­tine (or some­thing sim­i­lar) three times a week for 20 min­utes. Do this for a month and see how you feel.

I’ll be the excuses are already start­ing to form in your mind: “I’m already flex­i­ble enough.” “I don’t need to stretch all that much.” “I can just do a lit­tle more of what I’m already doing.” “I don’t need speed or power.”

Let go of that kind of think­ing. It’s not mak­ing you more flex­i­ble, and it’s not mak­ing your Taido any bet­ter. Remember Einstein, and try chang­ing your meth­ods up for a month. If you don’t like the results, you can always switch back.

Fitting It In

Of course, it won’t be easy. You’ll have to find some way to fit all that extra stretch­ing in.

You can try to work it into your prac­tices. Show up early and do the light stretches before train­ing. Then do the deep stretches later. Better yet, talk to your instruc­tor about doing a one-month trial of some dif­fer­ent stretch­ing methods.

Or you can stretch at home on your off nights.

I’m try­ing to do the light stretches every morn­ing (most morn­ings, any­way) and the full rou­tine on my free after­noons. You can do what­ever works for you. We’ll have to make a real com­mit­ment to see real improve­ment in our abilities.

The Guarantee

I per­son­ally promise that you will see results from this pro­gram. I’m so cer­tain that I’m offer­ing a dou­ble money-back guar­an­tee. Just return the unused por­tion of prod­uct, and… Seriously, just try it.

What have you got to lose? Excuses.

Let’s Get Going

There is no rea­son not to try this. There are excuses, but no reasons.

Honestly, what you’re doing now prob­a­bly isn’t work­ing for you. It prob­a­bly stopped work­ing years ago. When was the last time you noticed an increase in your flex­i­bil­ity or mobil­ity? If it wasn’t recent, you need to take a hard look at your routine.

In the end, it just comes down to your choice. I can’t make you do this is you don’t want to. Just remem­ber that, if you decide to keep doing the same things you’ve always done, you’re mak­ing Einstein cry. Whether or not you can live with that is up to you.