[Procyona]

Валя писал(а):

For me - concentration on my breath is the concentration on my body, on me. when the beginner (and not only beginners, of course) starts to work on fast speed in wing chun, he usually hold his breath, the tension grows, he (or better - we) forgets about the opponents elbows, becomes nervous, irritated and he already see nothing around (a front of) him. and do not observe his own reactions. there is no silence inside without the continuous respiration, I think

Well put, that is how it was and is for me, too. But sometimes just breathing does not work for me, if it attaches me from the environment. So, while breathing I also need to pay attenstion to where I am, what I am doing and why to calm down again.   

[Gra-ach]

For me if I concentrate on one thing (be it breathing, or following my hand movements with me eyes to check if they are what I think they are), I get distracted from anything else. Meaning that I can't concentrate on breathing and elbows at the same time. On the other hand if I don't concentrate at all and don't stop my brain from doing what it's supposed to do I get a more or less desired result. I remember on the last seminar, SiFu and I were doing a simple move. And I couldn't even spot the moment when his elbow disappeared from my sight and his fist connected with my head. But when I relaxed and decided not to concentrate on anything (there was no point, I was never going to consciously catch his movement) I was much better at trying to block his hand.   

[Procyona]

Wow, that sounds great Irene! I guess when you let go of control, you can see things more freely. But it sounds very scary to just be concentrate on nothing when you are hit   

[Gra-ach]

When you let go of control, you switch from your conscious mind doing things to your unconscious mind. And the latter is so much faster (and bigger chunk of the brain). Of course, to work effectively your mind needs to have a base on which to work - if your muscles don't remember movements, it won't work. It's like an intuition - your brain "sees" patterns and make "predictions" on what's going to happen.

For example, when I descend the stairs I don't pay attention to my every movement (how I take my foot of one step, turn my thighs, put my foot down the other step, find the balance again and so on), I just do it. But when in the middle of the perfectly good move I turn my attention to what exactly I'm doing I can easily lose my balance, misjudge length and so on. In some way it's the same. You really concentrate on what you're going to do, you prepare to do the actual move and while you're doing it, your look at your opponents elbow but don't really see it. And maybe your brain wants to start doing something, but your conscious mind prevents it from happening, because, of course, you're in control of your movements.

It's just my take on the situation, which may or may not be correct. And it does go against the idea of being conscious and in control But it does include the "just react to your opponents actions" part. Though one does need the base from which to draw these reactions.   

[Procyona]

[Gra-ach]

[Haveunique]

Today's event with many people training confirmed the idea of silence We adults cannot do anything but talk when we talk....