hello everyone, i was just wondering, how many people here has had previous experience with other martial arts, what type, and how does the adjustment process go when you started ninjutsu. did anyone find it hard to adjust? or any habits that are hard to get away from?
I feel that I am lucky that I didn't have any martial arts training before starting Ninjutsu. I didn't bring any preconceptions (sp?). I don't know whether this helped or not but from my experience it can be difficult for some people to drop habits (I am not going to say bad habits!!) developed from previous training.
Me 2-3 years aprox Karate from aged 8 also 2 years MT/Kickboxing. Boxing as a kid, trained by dad! For me I could not lock for toffee and my style was more a static one - and still is to a point. I often used my strength as opposed to the technique of the lock in the early days! Loved it all though it was a big change for me and I was often left with the WOW factor by my instructors!
No previous martial arts experience for me, so no habits to unlearn. I'm simultaneously studying Tai Chi, but this works really well with ninjutsu.
Previous training - TKD, TSD, judo, kung fu, shotokan, kempo (Ed Parker style), arnis, hapkido, pa kua, Isshinryu karate, boxing. Having been exposed to so many different styles actually made it easier to discard what I knew in order to learn what I didn't really know. How to control my own body. I have found that people with no prior expeience do have a better time at learning the basics of taijutsu, no bad habits to unlearn. While those with previous training seem to always fall back on what they learned before. Like Kinjuro, I have found that Tai Chi compliments my taijutsu as does aikido.
yeah i've been thinking about that too.. other more "flowy" and less static styles like tai chi and aikido where we utilise the flow of the opponent a lot more.
In all honesty, the hardest thing I've had to try to adjust to is when doing the main leg stretch where you go right down, instead of being propped up on your toes, you're supposed to keep your foot flat on the ground I suppose going into ninjutsu with not *that* much martial arts experience was good in the sense that I didn't have too many preconceptions or bad habits to destroy. It's great to be able to just talk to / ask my instructor questions - in my Hapkido place you can't exactly do that
