Emmanuel Manolakakis Seminar - Saturday, December 3rd, 2005

I've forgotten some of what Emmanuel told us, which is more important than just describing the exercises. But even so, I can't help wanting to say something about the excellent training Emmanuel shared with us. Emmanuel started Saturday's seminar by taking a few minutes to go around the room and introduce himself to all of the students. I appreciated this personal touch, because most of us had never met him before. After introductions, he asked us to walk around the room and extend our breath for incremental steps. Inhale for one step, exhale one, inhale two, exhale two. I think we went up to 8 or 10. Around 6 or so I start to have trouble co-ordinating breath with movement. We did the same with our eyes closed. Emmanuel also had us do this while running. And back down again to 1. He reminded us to relax our shoulders and neck and keep the head up so as not to constrict the air flow.

Next we spent some time stretching, first, laying on the floor and stretching "like waking up in the morning," stretching your arms and legs outwards, rolling back and forth, coordinating breathing. We got into groups of five for more passive stretching: one person lies on their back and the other four grab each grab a limb and gently stretch. It sounds like it would be uncomfortable but it's really relaxing and everyone enjoyed it. We also did the more challenging version where all four people twist the limbs and the person on the floor has to relax and rotate the limbs to ease the pressure. Emmanuel observed that my movement was restricted on my right side. I told him I thought it was the other side, because I felt some discomfort from sleeping in an odd position. But actually, he was right, the discomfort was on my left side, but it was somehow constricting my right side. He stretched me passively on my back, bringing each leg over the other like a number 4, and holding it there for a few minutes.

A few pushups with pyramid breathing as with the walking: inhale for one pushup, exhale for one, inhale for two, etc. And another limb- twisting exercise in groups of three, this time standing, with one person twisting or locking each arm at the elbow or wrist. Emmanuel showed us how relaxed shoulder can help to free from an elbow lock, so you can rotate out of it and unlock your elbow. He did this with a small movement, not by stepping or moving around, but just rotating his shoulder. When my partner first locked my elbow, my initial thought was how tightly I was locked. It's funny how the mind focusses on the discomfort of the one little part that is locked and disregards the rest of the body which is free. I have done this exercise before, but usually by moving around a lot and rotating the whole body, rather than with such a small isolated movement of the shoulder. Of course, rotating the shoulder unlocks the hold, but I found the first step is just looking beyond the initial lock to open the mind to a solution.

Then back to the ground, on our stomachs, holding our ankles behind us, and rotating back and forth from stomach to back with ankles clasped, and also rolling side to side keeping the arms and legs off the ground, as if you are flying. We also did the Superman exercise where you just lay on your stomach and hold the arms and legs off the ground. I wonder if this is easier for women than for men, because it takes very little effort for me to hold this position, whereas it seemed to be a lot more difficult for most of the guys.

After we had gotten used to moving around on the ground, Emmanuel lay on his stomach and had two good-sized volunteers lay across him to show us how to move on the ground with a lot of weight across the body. He demonstrated first with his hips free, showing how moving the hips can propel the body, and also with his hips weighted, and asked the volunteers to move to various parts to show the shoulders or feet or whatever parts were free can still move the body along the floor. Finally the two guys lay across him in such as a way as to keep his whole body weighted at the shoulders and hips and it looked like nothing was free. To my amazement, he used his chin to inch himself along the floor! It was pretty remarkable. Then he had us try the same thing in groups of three. I found I could move a little, even while the two guys had me pinned almost everywhere, though not as easily as Emmanuel, of course. But I've learned through Systema practice that even when trapped, moving just an inch or two can be all the difference.

I also have in my notes that we sat on the floor opposite our partners and "wrestled" with one arm, keeping the other in our pocket. (I don't mean "wrestling" like the televised sport, but just that we practiced on the ground). I remember that this was a lot of fun. I found that with one arm, the movements have to be more precise, because the other arm isn't there to correct any sloppiness. I struck my partner lightly a few times and it seemed easier to find the right spots to affect his movement using just one arm instead of two. We switched arms to try on both sides. Then, using both arms, we worked freely against our partners, wrestling and striking lightly, just a little light groundwork to get us moving. I found that I used my two arms more efficiently after being restricted to just one. Then we stood up and moved into the knife work, which, along with ground work, was one of the features of Saturday's seminar.

Emmanuel had us each take a knife and walk around the room, doing the same walking/breathing exercise as in the beginning. He said that people walk differently when they are carrying a weapon, and that some professionals can spot a criminal carrying a weapon just by the way he walks. I observed my classmates, and myself in the mirrors, as we walked around, trying to note any differences. It seems the knife creates some subtle tension, as if a part of the mind that would otherwise be focused on walking is focussed on holding the knife, so the walk is a little different. I recalled what Vlad says on the Knife Disarming DVD about the affect of steel weapons on human consciousness over thousands of years. (It was during the part where Vlad is moving away from the knife as he is attacked from behind).

We stopped walking and began an interesting exercise I've never tried before: tracing the body with the knife. Emmanuel showed us how to follow the outline of the body with the practice knives, around each limb, the back, the head, tracing a sort of outline around the body, staying fluid and with breathing of course. We did this also at a half-squat, with eyes closed, and while walking around the room. It sounds simple, but it's not easy to trace precisely, especially while walking. It may seem like the easiest thing in the world, "to know where your body parts are," and you would think I'd know this instinctively, but I find it's something that comes with practice. I can see how important this in regards to knives, because any carelessness or misjudgement as to where your limbs are could result in injury or even death.

We also got into pairs and spent a few minutes pushing each other lightly with the point of the knife, one person pushing various parts, the other yielding. And we slapped each other with the flat of the blade, one at a time, across the arms and legs and various body parts. I slapped my partner first and as is sometimes the case, it wasn't until it was my turn to be slapped that I realized how painful this can be! Slapping lightly stings just a little and it's actually kind of refreshing, but slapping just a bit more vigorously is rather painful. After what seemed to be about an hour, I finally blurted out, "I feel like we've been doing this forever!" Emmanuel said, "I know!" sympathetically and after another minute or so, we moved onto disarms.

Emmanuel introduced the topic of knife disarms by showing us how to use the body to lock the arm with the blade and then disarm. He demonstrated getting parallel to the blade as it enters, capturing the knife hand and applying pressure to the wrist by turning the body. This holds the knife immobile so the attacker can't aim again for another part. I thought this was a pretty important concept, not only to faciliate the disarm and prevent the knife from cutting you, but also to prevent the attacking person from "re-setting" and targeting some other area. From the lock, Emmanuel showed different ways to disarm, which I don't recall, but I remember he showed various ways to manipulate the elbow and cause the person to drop the knife. When we tried with our partners, I found that I had to hold my partner's hand and wrist completely immobile against my body. If it wasn't completely immobile, it was easy enough for him to slash at me again. But with the hand and wrist caputred, I was sometimes surprised by how little it takes it doesn't take much effort to apply the lock and disarm.

Emmanuel also showed us how to use the knife against an attack by rotating it around fluidly and targeting against different parts of the body. I guess you could say the previous exercise, where we locked the knife hand against the body, would prevent such action. But in this case, our partners attacked empty-handed and we used the knives to defend, using a relaxed wrist to turn the knife and target different parts of the body as they were exposed by the attack, and by their initial avoidance. It's not very different from striking where the visible intent to strike moves the person directly into another strike, a feint, I guess you'd call it. With the knife, I found that my partner easily avoided the initial thrust or stab, but I could simply rotate the knife to meet him in some other place. I've never considered myself handy with a knife, but I had some success with this exercise by keeping my arm and wrist relaxed. I think it would be impossible to do this with a tense arm. It seems to me that tension is a big stumbling block to training. I've noticed that beginners who are more naturally relaxed appear more proficient than intermediates who have more technical skill but less relaxation.

I think Emmanuel also showed how to use the handle of the knife against the sensitive areas like the collarbone or the arm itself— that is what I jotted down, but I can't be certain, because I wrote these notes while standing on an uptown 1 train that was stalled in the station. As it turned out, we waited for a half an hour, very tightly packed, with more people trying to crowd on every minute, shoving me, and causing me to shove against the people behind me, who were pretty annoyed with me about that, and not too happy about me trying to write in such conditions. So it's a bit hard to make out what I wrote a month ago, but I think there was more practice with the knives in pairs.

I do remember that we spent the last few minutes of the seminar working with knives in groups of three. First, two people slashed and thrust at a third person, who simply avoided. This is kind of like the "zombie" walking exercise, but with knives. One of my partners was tracking me so that whenever I stepped or rotated out of the way, he simply changed direction to follow me and continue to slash. Moving slowly, I found myself unable to avoid his tracking, so I foolishly began running to avoid him and stay behind the other, who was slashind and thrusting by following through in the same direction rather than zig-zagging to follow me wherever I went. This wasn't the best approach, to be running madly while my two partners were just walking briskly. It sort of worked, until I crashed into another group, which made me realize it was silly. So I asked him if he could stop tracking just for this exercise, which is what I should have done initially. I didn't want to ask him to make the exercise "unrealistic" or "easier" for me, but I realized afterwards that I should have just asked him right away, why should I be too proud to ask someone to make the exercise easier for me if I'm struggling, especially when it's just an avoidance drill?

I think the tracking is less appropriate for an avoidance exercise than for an application, anyway. And that's what we did next, still in our groups of three, at which point I didn't find the tracking to be any hindrance. Emmanuel asked us to have two people attack one person with the knife, the two with empty hands. I tried to remember to use the knife as a tool rather than let it be a hindrance. Sometimes, I end up just holding it and using my legs and the other arm to do everything, in effect handicapping myself with the knife. So I had to consciously remind myself to let the knife be a tool rather than something I'm just hanging onto.We also did the same but the two attackers had the knives and the third person was empty- handed. I found it a lot easier to use the two knives against each other, so I guess I need to spend more time getting comfortable using the knife. I also struck my partners a few times to halt their approach, which I found helped me to put one into the other.

The practice in the groups of three was the last part of the seminar. As mentioned, even though this is long, it's not very concise, being mainly a description of the physical exercises. It's always better when I write within a few days of the training, but my schoolwork and final exam prevented me from doing so. Thankfully that's all over and I have a month to relax before the spring semester begins. But I just want to add that Emmanuel is a great teacher, very soft-spoken and calm, he teaches mainly by example, and he conveys a great deal with just a few words. I can't really describe it, but somehow I began to see new dimensions in even the smallest movements. I'll try to capture this further in my forthcoming description of Sunday's seminar, during which we learned about strikes, mass attacks, and so much more.