There is no
Difference between Attack and Defense
“What is Yu?”
“Following the opponent’s motion without resistance; this
principle is called Yu.”
Through
the preceding discussion we can grasp that attack and defense are no different
from each other. Therefore, one should establish your opponent opposed to the
world but with one’s own harmony in it.
Therein will one realize the sameness of attack and defense that is the
nature of correct Taekwondo.
When
you strike your opponent you should break his will with your will, oppress his
tide down with your tide, scatter his vigor with your Kihap[1],
and shatter his trunk with your weapon. When you block the opponent’s attack
you should empty yourself to frustrate his intention, carry your tide on his one
and scatter his sharpness and absorb yourself in it to create your own attack.
Seen in this way, how could attack and defense not be the same?
If
your hands and feet (your weapons) are firm and quick you can injure an
opponent at will. If your vigor is sharp and you are skilled in controlling
your battered spirit you will suppress an opponent with ease and even without
injuring him. And if your tide is firm and deliberate you will easily surpass
him even without a fight. You can endure the opponent’s attack if you are
strong in body. You can turn his attack to your own if you fill yourself
firmly. He will be unable to find a target to attack if you empty yourself
fully. How can one differentiate between attack and defense?
If
you merge yourself with your opponent’s attack and so have him opposed to the
world in an efficient manner, this defense will prove no less effective than
the best offense. As a result, an opponent will collapse by himself, owing to
his own attack, driving himself against the earth to the loss of his power.
Thus, as concerns attack or defense we can say that neither is such but that
thinking makes it so; it is only what the world thinks that distinguishes an
attack from a defense. However, it is Taekwondo that harmonizes an attack and
defense into oneness, which is manifested through action.
How
can you follow these teachings?
Seek
out an empty point in the opponent’s movements, and then enter into it. As
every motion is a continuous flux of emptiness and fullness resulting in HeoSil,
you will surely find an empty point in his motion. You should strike his Heo in
it. At this moment, you should harmonize two kinds of distance between you and
him: one is your attack distance to penetrate his center, the other is your
defensive distance such that you do not draw back from his attack but rather
move suddenly aside to an unanticipated spot.
Correct
distance for penetrating the opponent dictates that you strike at his center,
as soon as you spot a favorable chance, breaking through his defenses with the
tide of a charging beast. What is critical is that you possess the nature of a
tidal swell submerging and overwhelming a rocky shore.
Correct
distance in moving aside dictates that you do not attempt to directly counter
the opponent’s fierce attack with powerful tide, but rather suddenly move aside
to stab his mind with vacuity. It is important here that you do not distance
yourself far from him but maintain a proper distance from him as you seek out
your opportunity. What is critical is that you do not consider drawing back.
The
secret tip to attaining these skills is to keep your breathing even and under
perfect control. Breath is the main stem of change, extending from the bottom
to the tip of all vital phenomena, and the axis that binds mind and body as
one. Controlling breathing you can control mind and the motion, and promoting
your body which mediates between the two, you can make a movement that accords
with the mind and body that supports such a motion.
In
this manner, you can calm your mind to control breathing, with which you will
generate balance and harmony in your body’s vigor and reconcile them to the
movements of your bones and muscles, so that you can subdue your opponent and
defend against his attack. This is possible because biological breathing flows
consistently from each cell to the entire mass. Therefore, breathing can
ultimately prove the resource of power to attack your opponent and protect
yourself.
The
key point of breath control, be it in attack or in defense, is simple and the
same whether or not you have mastered the other skills of Taekwondo. It is to
inhale when blocking the opponent’s attack and exhale when attacking an
opponent, with no unnecessary breathing. To inhale does not mean to merely take
in air but to empty your entirety to receive his fierceness, while to exhale
does not mean to merely release air but to fill your entirety so as to explode
with your inner energy. Both should be done at once.
[1] “Kihap” is composed of the Korean
terms Ki’ (기[氣]), denoting
man’s inner energy and its flow, and 'Hap'(합[合]), meaning to collect or concentrate.
Kihap originally referred to a concentration of one’s Ki, inner energy or
spirit, but has also come to refer to the vocal shout that results from the
concentration of such energy.
No comments:
Post a Comment