What did he think was going to happen?
Published: Mon, 01/12/15
I said on Friday that I would tell you about the only occasion (as far as I recall) that I ever hurt anyone using a Jarl principle drill. Looking back it seems a bit weird but this is how I remember it happening. It was when I was living in Oxford and I was approached for a private lesson. I think I had been in email correspondence or some other form of communication (email was still pretty new in those days) with this person and he seemed to be interested in lots of different martial arts and wanted to add a private Stav lesson to his portfolio. I now realise that when someone is unwilling to participate in a course as their first experience of Stav then there is something slightly odd going on.
Anyway, we met up and went to one of the Oxford parks for the session. As I recall I showed him the standard basics, staff exercises, stances and then began teaching the principles using the two person staff drills. All was fine until we got to the Jarl drill which involves evading and then countering without directly engaging with the attacker. On this occasion my student for this private session did not believe me that a genuinely intuitive response was possible and said he wanted to test it a couple more times. If I had known what was going to happen I should probably have refused and moved the lesson on.
What did happen is that he attacked and I made the initial evasion move. Then, instead of coming in again on more or less the same line which is how the drill is done safely I became aware that he was circling around behind me obviously with the intention of coming in from directly behind me. I remember realising this and still keeping my mind effectively switched off. Then I felt the staff move almost on its own accord until I felt it make a light but distinct contact behind me. There was also a yelp of pain and surprise and when I looked to see what had happened he had a tiny, but bleeding cut above his right eye. I apologised for the minor injury but also reminded him how the principle worked so what did he think was going to happen if he sneaked up from behind me? To his credit he didn’t make any complaint about it and I was just glad I hadn’t done more damage.
I think we completed the training session (I can’t remember for certain) and he paid for the tuition but I don’t think I ever heard from him again. It was a very useful lesson for me though and I make sure that when people are training with the Jarl principle they don’t push it to the point where the conscious mind cannot pull the response if necessary. Strange that the most ‘priestly’, disengaged and ‘spiritual’ principle is actually potentially the most deadly. This is because on Jarl level really don’t care what happens to your opponent. If they choose not to attack you then you just forget they ever existed. If they do attack then they simply get back the energy they created in attacking you.
We had a good training session on Stav for Self-defence on Saturday morning although we didn’t get as far as doing a Jarl application. Thanks to everyone who attended and the next Self-defence seminar will be on the 7th of February in Crewkerne. I am also putting together the programme for Stav training in 2015 as far as the summer. This is proving quite complicated but I will have it up on websites by this week. In the meantime on the 31st of January there will be a foundation day course in Crewkerne. I will keep it to 6 places only and I will have an assistant instructor. Focus will be on stances, staff exercises and two person drills. I will emphasise the importance of personal training and this course will set you up for personal practice in your own time. More details tomorrow but let me know if you might be interested.
regards
Graham