Practical Witchery! - John Stormm (best novels to read for beginners TXT) 📗

do well to crowd them early, and not letting them recover enough to use their best moves against you.

 

The same adage about “being the unexpected” can be a valid strategy here. It is possible to use a “Make And Break” rhythm strategy, to get past an opponent with a quick guard. You come in with a flurry of punches: A high back knuckle, and turning it into a low hammer fist, in a “high, low, high, low, high, HIGH” striking pattern. This sets them up with a high, low rhythm of blocking, so that they automatically expect the next blow to be low, after the last high, but you break the rhythm and hit them high again, and score a strike past their dropped guard.

 

In utilizing such things in a number of competitions as I was coming up as a young man, I have often heard of my tactics working like magic! Or it was suggested that I was reading my opponent’s mind, so that I knew what they were thinking about, before they did it, and this made me undefeatable. It was true to an extent, that I knew what they had on their minds, before they did it. But it was because I had done my homework. A good technique, needs to be set up like a billiards shot. And if you already have seen them work, then body language and balance, is going to tell you what’s next, and you’ve already thought of what to do about it. You need not waste a single split second, in taking your opponent down for the count. It’s what everybody in the audience doesn’t know, doesn’t see, or precepts that they never took the time to understand, that makes them believe that the magician on the stage is doing real magic. Be the witch! Study to be the wizard! Be the magician, who has them all dazzled!

 

 

The Difference Between a Master and a Black Belt

 

 

 

In the minds of many, a Black Belt is an award given to someone who has mastered their particular discipline of martial arts. Which is true, only to a very small extent. You have to understand the myriad degrees of learning in any craft to grasp the differences between, one who is proficient in techniques to an advanced degree, and one who is a master of a craft. What I’m trying to convey to you, in the many pages of this book, is how one kind of witch, may know WHAT works for them, but an adept or master witch will understand WHY things work. The first may only know one or two methods of spells or rituals, by which a minor miracle may be accomplished. But the latter one understands enough about how it works, to adapt a method on the spot, for getting it to happen again. Since this chapter is mainly in the warcraft aspects of spellcraft, we’ll put this in the commonly understood martial arts contexts, and I’ll hope that you grasp enough of this truth, to be your own kind of wizards in this craft.

 

There are a plethora of ranking systems in an equally large variety of martial arts disciplines. When we speak of “black belts”, we are commonly referring to, what is known as the “obi system”, or belt ranking. For our purposes here, all of that would be petty or extraneous information to fill your heads up with, so I’ll break it up into a more basic, general understanding of HOW these work for teachers and students, of what-ever disciplines that we may be discussing:

 

 

The Beginner

 

 

The Beginners are as White Belts, or lower level ranks. They have no knowledge or experience, and are coming in, to learn the techniques of their teachers. They learn this in a step-by-step, rote method. It is not their own technique, but still that of their teacher. For instance: A choke hold is initiated by our pretending attacker, from behind. The beginner is patiently taught:

 

ONE) Turn your head into the crook of their arm. This allows your windpipe just enough space, to keep allowing air into your lungs, and buys you a moment of time.

 

TWO) With your right hand, reach up and grasp your attacker’s clothing of their right shoulder, or even behind their neck, if possible.

 

THREE) Pulling on their shoulder/clothing: Drop down onto your right knee, while pulling, and twisting your torso to the left, pulling your attacker over your shoulders.

 

FOUR) As they come down upon their back, in front of you: Deliver the “coup de grace” by chopping hard down on the front of their throat with the knife edge of your right hand. AKA a “karate chop” or “shuto”.

 

It is understood, that NOBODY gets to have this kind of a reaction time in an actual attack situation. But the continued practicing of this technique, makes it more and more of a “second nature” and easier and quicker to do.

 

 

The Intermediate Level Student

 

 

Somewhere after the first couple belt ranks or so, usually around the Blue and Green Belt classes, the student is considered to be in the Intermediate range. At this point, our student is a bit more experienced in the classroom/dojo/dojang/kwoon/gym, to have a working knowledge of the technique. They are more proficient. They still have to think about it. But it takes them fewer mechanical steps to accomplish it. The pretending attacker will wrap their arm in a choke, and the technique will come off as something like this:

 

ONE) They recognize the attack, turn their head into the crook of the attacker’s arm, and reach up with their right hands, and grab a purchase on their attacker.

 

TWO) They drop onto their right knee and twist to the left, pulling their attacker over them and onto the floor, in front of them.

 

THREE) They deliver a quick chop to the throat.

 

This took notably less thinking and time to execute. They are becoming more proficient in their teacher’s technique. But it is still not fully their own technique.

 

 

The Advanced Student

 

 

 

These are usually in the Brown and Black Belt range of students. There can be several degrees of Brown, and as many as ten degrees of Black Belt. The techniques are now as “second nature”, and require no thought to perform. They have done them enough times, to the point that they could do them in their sleep. It is important to note: That by International Law: A practitioner of Brown Belt or higher accomplishment is considered as an “Expert”. Legally, whether they are handling a weapon or not: They ARE the weapon, and should be considered by law enforcement anywhere, as “armed and dangerous”, even if found buck naked in the shower. You do not, by law have to “register your hands”. That’s malarkey. However, you SHOULD be aware, that certain federal, felony offenses pertain directly to you, if you and another “expert” ranking martial artist decide, that you don’t like each other enough to meet and battle it out in an unsanctioned knuckle jousting without a referee. It’s still considered “Dueling” and just as punishable as whether you chose swords or pistols at ten paces. No kidding!

 

For the Advanced Student, the scenario with the choke hold is going to work out like this:

 

ONE) In the same instant that they are aware of the hold: They will turn their head, reaching back and grasping their attacker, while pulling twisting and dropping down on their right knee, and chop to the throat in one smooth and complete move.

 

They took ownership of the technique. It is no longer “Teacher’s move”, but their own, and it is as second nature to them. They have mastered the technique. But does this alone, make them master of their martial art? In a word: NOPE!

 

That same hold can come through a whole variety of circumstances, and some of those can be friendly, as pals goofing around, or varying degrees of deadly, as with whom, how armed and how many are presently attacking you. For these, you’ll need a great deal more knowledge of how many other levels there are for defeating an attacker, or even a group of attackers. In some earlier paragraphs, I mentioned about using psychological intimidation to manipulate the other members of an attacking force set against you. Even for prize fighters, like Mohammed Ali, there wasn’t just the basic “ass whuppin” part of the battle, as much as the psychological, and spiritual aspects of the battle. He knew that he was better off, if he defeated his opponents, BEFORE he entered the ring with them. From that point on, the fighting itself, was merely a “formality”. THIS is the indicator of a MASTER!

 

 

The Fierce And Fantastic Wubba-wubba Technique

 

 

I *know* what you are thinking right now. I know it because it is what I *want* you to think right now. I have a use for that, and I’ll illustrate this in the following story for you. I understand enough about the fighting arts, to know that when I’m dealing with “artists”, that I’m dealing with “big egos” as well. I had learned a long, long time ago, that when a man becomes angry or enraged, that he foregoes the use of his best weapon: His mind!

 

This happened a long time ago, when I and a favorite sparring partner and long time martial arts junkie, were among the few awarded Red Belts, or Master’s Rankings in Chinese Style Martial Arts. Our particular style was Chinese Kenpo, a hybrid form of short fist, Hun Gar kung fu, and hard style Gojo Ryu karate. It utilized roughly 25% foot techniques and 75% Chinese boxing, fist techniques. The papers and the news casts back then, had made us out, like we were going to be the area’s next versions of the legendary Bruce Lee! We were doing exhibitions at a lot of shows, and we missed the competition of the tournament kumites, so we eventually entered into a good local open style competition.

 

They didn’t have a “master’s” ranking class of competitors, but the promoters had that figured that Black Belt division should be plenty for us to handle. After all, some of those Black Belts were third and fourth degrees. What’s the difference? Right? But *we* understood the difference, and we took full advantage of it. Well... *I* certainly did! First of all, it was our common practice to check out, all of our competitors as they warmed up. We warmed up before we even entered the building, so that no one would see what techniques that we favored. We also capitalized upon all the rumors, that we were every bit as dynamic as the legendary Bruce Lee. And we were just so damned good, that we didn’t even have to warm up for a few light weight Black Belts. We psyched them. It had different effects upon different fighters, but the idea was to manipulate them into an easy win for ourselves. This was going to be fun!

 

This competition was being held in a local YMCA gymnasium, and had all of the rules, and the safety equipment, to keep anybody from getting hurt. We weren’t going to physically hurt anyone badly. But we’d just as effectively destroy our opponents. Some of us newly minted masters, had elected to get certain “brands” burnt into our chests and arms, through various means of hot iron filings and such. I had a large Taoist Yin-Yang burned into my chest, and when I took off my gi top, it stood out in a blaze of red upon my pale white chest. “DAMNs”, “Oooohs” and “Aaahhs” broke out from competitors and spectators alike. My first opponent was already thinking: If he can shake off the pain of such a big burn as that, how will I ever take him out of this fight? Lousy reasoning: Especially since in this type of match: It wasn’t a full contact match, where he’d have to knock me out. All he had to do is score more points in quick strikes, than