Testimonial by Kris Melis
When we train a set or form, we don’t train it to change ourselves. The benefit of the training is not creating a ‘new improved me’. It’s not to become someone. It’s to discover everything we are.
We don’t train to create new patterns, we train to tap into the potential that created them.
We define what we are by what we’ve made of ourselves. When we are born we are all potential, no experiences, no education, no opinions. We also can’t experience any separation between us and the rest of the world.
And then, as infants, we start separating the world from ourselves. We start learning. We learn about all things we can sense and we also start to appreciate them. Some we like, some we don’t. We also start to develop strategies for acquiring things and strategies to defend ourselves. In short, we are realizing our potential by developing patterns. And once we can reflect on who we are, we call those patterns and all the knowledge, behavior, and opinions that go with them ‘Me’.
With every pattern we create, there are patterns we don’t create. So even though we are realizing part of our potential we are also blocking parts.
What I do now by training Prana Dynamics is not with the intent of deleting old patterns or creating new ones. It’s rather to learn not to identify with the pattern and to experience the freedom of rediscovering the potential of ‘me’. A good way of doing that is by training with a partner. With some experience they will be able to tell you when you are engaging in contention, separation, domination, and so on. They will also be able to tell you when there is no separation.
Training this in a ‘martial setting’ has benefits and drawbacks. The benefit is that you can’t fool yourself as easily as when you’re practicing solo. The drawback is that it’s easy to fall back to narrowing the world to fighting and thus separation. The martial setting is useful to evolve and to test yourself not to fall back in fighting, but just to spontaneously experience the world and shape it.
Yes, my training in Prana Dynamics helps me when I’m grappling but it also helps me when I’m singing or when I’m in a meeting, or just walking.
Enjoy your practice!
