There are “two major cortical control mechanisms … involved in selecting and processing information…a frontal system associated with restrictive processing and a posterior-temporal system associated with more wide-range processing of information. The brain may be likened to a camera that can use either a wide-angle lens or a zoom lens. Or, in cognitive terms, attention can be directed to the more dominant details in a stimulus field or to the entire field.” – Mind, Brain, and Consciousness: The Neuropsychology of Cognition, Jason W. Brown, 1977, Cited by Bhikkhu Analayo, in his book Satipatthana, The Direct Path.
When I first learned the kata, we were taught that the slow motion moves in kata, including the ones in P3, P4, P5, Wankan, Ananku, Rohai, Passai, and Chinto, did not have any particular meaning – they were just there to break up the sequence of moves in the kata.
Research has progressed. We now use these slow-motion moves to train three specific, practical fighting skills. We have presented interpretations of these moves on our YouTube channel @mountainkarate.
In class we introduce these moves first as recovery breathing techniques – as a way to restore deep breathing under conditions of high stress in training, or metabolic hyperarousal in combatives.
Next, we show how they can be used as chi kung – increasing the flow of energy in the channels and reservoirs of the body, according to Chinese medicine theory, for accumulating energy, restoring energy following a kiai, and for enhanced energy flow for high performance.
There is a third way to use these slow-motion moves, for additional combative advantage and training benefit. This is the development of multiple modes of attention.
Analogous to intentionally developing fast twitch muscle fibers for speed and slow twitch fibers for power, we can train different faculties of attention for different combative purposes.
As a martial artist seeking to develop skill in practical combatives, training our faculties of attention is as essential as training our body is. To optimize our fighting skill we need to develop two modes of attention:
1. Precise focus on an object: in this mode we make our attention stable and clear, and develop the flexibility to shift it spontaneously and instantly, from place to place, as needed. And,
2. Global awareness: in this mode we allow our attention to be open to the whole environment, to be able to sense unexpected movements of an opponent, or to detect and respond to an unknown threat object, obstacle or person.
If we are confronted, we need to act. There may be situations where we will seek out danger. If we respond to a burglary we may need to search a building. If you found an open door or a broken window and need to check your home or backyard for an intruder, it will be best if your attention is your first mode of contact – we do not want to be surprised by an ambush or an assault.
So, we lead with global awareness: Listening. Scanning. Your sense of smell might alert you to the presence of a person hiding; you might feel the vibrations of footsteps in the floor.
Face to face with the threat, in the heat of the moment, you can shift modes of attention. You will need to exclude all irrelevant inputs: noise, traffic, objects, and crowds – to focus on the threat. You will need to exclude inner distractions – irrelevant thoughts, emotions, sensations, memories, fear. At the same time, you need to detect and respond to relevant sense data – obstacles, weapons, accomplices – that may appear. Instantly sensing what matters and what doesn’t, and responding skillfully, will be consequential.
We need to apply sharp attention – laser-focused or global – without distraction, doubt or delay, and shift between those modes as conditions demand. To do that under high stress takes training.
Our kata provides it. Our kata show us how to train both modes of attention, shift between them, and deepen and stabilize each one. This is a tactical advantage. We should make the most of the opportunity the kata give us to master it.
Training our attention happens in every move of every kata, not just the slow-motion ones. If we just go though the kata from posture to posture, we will not get much benefit. But if we have full, laser-focused kime, commitment in every move, we will be training our attention, as well as our body.
The slow-motion moves in the kata listed above give us a chance to train our global attention – scanning one hemisphere of our environment and then the other, as we turn to find and face a new opponent.
That even happens at the end of the kata. Consider the command 気をつけ – ki o tsuke. We get used to hearing it, and it may be that we don’t make much of it. We treat it just as a formality, marking the completion of the movement sequence of a kata.
Or we might hear it as a military command, referring to a physical posture we need to adopt: to stand at attention, back straight, eyes front, shoulders down.
“Ki o tsuke” is a command to have presence of mind. For training purposes, we are not “at ease”, in condition white, caught up in our environment, preoccupied by whatever thoughts are floating though our minds at that moment. The command is a reminder to continue our presence of mind, to continue our fighting spirit, our zanshin, our attention to where we are, who we are, and what we are doing, even after the movement sequence of the kata is done.
As a martial artist, “getting attention” in the conventional usage of the phrase, in the sense of seeking the attention of others, online or in person, is conventional, it is what we are supposed to do – to help us grow our group, get fame, gain, admiration and validation. However, attention in that sense may be unnecessary, a distraction, a burden, an obstacle to deep, sincere practical training.
Just a thought.
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If you are interested in the neuroscience of attention, here are some references:
…many features of attention can be explained, including the preferential engagement of some cortical areas at the cost of disengagement from others, to improve appropriate behavioral responses. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627321004621
Attention is generally regarded as a cognitive process that underlies one’s ability to direct processing resources to behaviorally relevant environmental events. This process improves stimulus detection and discrimination and speeds up reaction times for appropriate behavioral responses. Attention is often viewed as a spotlight, which implies it involves limited parts of the neuraxis; it is thus a limited resource that must be apportioned flexibly and under cognitive control… Functional levels of attention and impulse control allow advanced organisms to behave in a goal-directed manner by decreasing distraction from irrelevant stimuli and by avoiding responses that are premature in a given situation. …
… The attentional control of behavior, which allows the execution of plans and the attainment of goals, represents a distinguishing feature of the most advanced and complex organisms. Attentional control relies on both attentional and inhibitory processes: while the attentional processes subtend the ability to direct or shift the focus of attention to sources of information deemed important for the task at hand (1), the inhibitory processes serve to avoid interference from irrelevant stimuli by inhibiting prepotent behaviors such as orienting toward distractors or impulsively responding to them (2). These highly interacting and mutually constraining cognitive functions are crucial for maintaining goal-directed behavior by allowing the organism to flexibly adapt to continually changing environmental demands (3)….
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2015635117, Cortical control of behavior and attention from an evolutionary perspective, S. Murray Sherman Department of Neurobiology, University of Chicago, W. Martin Usrey, Center for Neuroscience, University of California, Davis
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Post copyright © 2025 Jeffrey Brooks, MountainKarateNC.com, Yamabayashi Ryu, Mountain Karate Dojo, in the mountains of western NC.
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