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Openings are an important concept in the martial arts. Understanding them will help you overcome your opponent. However, it goes much deeper than this. There are important applications in our daily life. In this post, I want to discuss how to use openings to improve both your martial arts practice and your daily life.
In a martial arts sense, put simply, an opening refers to a moment and or part of your opponent's body that is vulnerable to attack. It can include time (e.g. a moment where they are not prepared to defend) or space (a part of their body that is unguarded). Openings are not just of the body, but also the mind and energy field. Their mind might be distracted or unready. Part of their energy around their body (aura) might be weak. In daily life, an opening is probably best described as an opportunity, when or where you have the chance to do something. In the martial arts, you may wish to attack your opponent. If you just attack straight away without finding an opening, it is at best likely to be unsuccessful (they will defend) and at worst dangerous (you leave yourself vulnerable to their counterattack). The same goes for daily life - if you act where there are no openings, you will waste energy and possibly put yourself in a harmful situation. To have the best chance of success, you need to wait for an opening. You must stay very focused and have complete awareness of your opponent. That way, when an opening appears, you can attack at the right time and place. You need both patience and readiness to act quickly. The same goes for daily life. Keep your eye out for opportunities and be ready to act when they appear. Don't be discouraged if you have to wait. Think of the samurai of ancient Japan. When they had duals, they would often stand facing each other for a long time with their swords ready. Any wrong move could lead to sudden death. But a skillful move taking advantage of an opening could mean swift victory. In the martial arts, keep a full awareness of your opponent. Watch for which part of their body is not strongly guarded. Be ready for the moment they are unready, then strike at the precise time and place. Sometimes there are no openings, or the target you want to attack does not have an opening. In this case, you may need to CREATE an opening. In the martial arts, you can produce a fake strike that they will block, leaving them open somewhere else. For example, the classic combination of high - low punch. Punch high, your opponent raises their hands leaving an opening for you to strike down lower. Another way to create an opening would be to enter and break their defence, e.g. move their hands out of the way. In daily life, maybe there's something you want to achieve, but no opportunities are coming up. Sometimes you need to be proactive and make your own opportunities. Think about how this can apply to your daily life, for that is where its real value lies. To help you, let's study an example from my life - my career path. After graduating with my teaching qualification, obviously I wanted a job. There were no offers being given to me, and I knew this was highly unlikely to happen automatically. It was like facing a very well guarded opponent who was unlikely to present any openings. So I knew I had to go out and create me own openings. So I contacted many schools to let them know I was available. Openings were created - schools called me for casual work. I took those openings. But still, I wasn't getting full time work, which is what I really wanted. However, there were no openings for full time work. So I focused on taking the openings that were there - casual work. However, there were still not enough openings. So I began looking for where the openings were. By researching and just generally being aware and thoughtful, I decided to try for schools further from my home. Schools near my home already had plenty of casual teachers, but I realised that schools in other areas had a greater need. In other words, they had openings. I soon started getting much more work, because the openings were not in my local area, but further away. You might be trying unsuccessfully to attack one part of your opponent's body, but then realise that another part is actually open to attack. By working hard as a casual teacher, I proved my worth. This created an opening for full time work - at one school where I was working, a teacher took leave (an opening) and they asked me to take her class for the rest of the year. Naturally, I took the opening while it was there and accepted. This is like in the martial arts if, for example, you wanted to attack the opponent's head, but their hands were guarding their head. You could attack the body. Their hands come down low leaving their head open. Or the work you've done on their body causes them to bend over and now their head is open to attack. The work I did in casual teaching created the opening for full time work. Please continue to reflect on how these understandings of openings can help you, both in your martial arts practice, and, more importantly, in your daily life.
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