This website is dedicated to the Students of Seifu A.S. Umar Sharif, MA. It is also dedicated to the promotion and propagation of the Traditional Afro-Asian Martial and Healing Arts. Our goal is to inform, educate, inspire, encourage, and motivate others to improve their lives by applying The Wisdom of the Ancients.
As your teacher and host, Seifu Sharif [aka: Xia` Xue' Gong] [aka: Tobi Alakoso] is dedicated to helping each of you to remember and nurture the Spirit of Wu-Te and the powers dormant within you.
Namaste’ Students and Fellow Martial Arts Enthusiasts!
What is the point of training if it is not to achieve perfection? Perfection is an illusive goal but without the magic of its call we would be lost in the world of mediocrity. Perfection is seductive in its appeal even with regard to small things. Your biochemistry and emotions experience a pleasurable shift when you feel that you have done something to perfection. Although perfection is not always achieved, striving for it is the most important aspect of your training. It is the part over which you have the greatest control.
Perfection is the condition, state, or quality of being free, or as free as possible from all flaws or defects. Striving for perfection is the action or process of improving something until it is faultless or as faultless as possible. If you love the martial arts as I do, your lifelong joy will be striving to perfect each of the techniques that you learn while studying the 7 Circles System. The same applies for my readers who are studying some other martial arts system.
Striving for perfection requires time and dedication. It requires that Humility, Kindness, Patience, and Diligence all be applied to yourself, to how you think about and treat yourself as you struggle to overcome your flaws and master each aspect of your art. In our system we use a simple but effective training formula to achieve perfection. We understand that it is not practice that makes perfect. Only perfect-practice can give birth to perfection!
Training Level 1: Slow, No Power
In level one your goal is to experience each anatomical aspect of the technique you are practicing. By moving slow you give yourself time to see and experience things that will slip into the void when the technique is applied full speed and with qi. You can feel the earth pushing back against your feet as your move. You can experience the movement of your joints, the alignment of your body, your balance, and your form at the final point of execution. When you train at Level 1 you are programming the fine details of the technique into your nervous system, each detail being progressively executed to flawless perfection. You can also use Level 1 training as an opportunity to infuse soft qi into your techniques by using proper breathing techniques and conjuring you qi as you move through the technique.
Training Level 2: Slow, With Power
In level two your goal is to train your muscular, skeletal, and respiratory systems to work together in perfecting the particular technique. Level two breathing method is the Agni (Fire) Breath that we use in our various Qigong systems. You are training, programming, teaching your nervous system exactly how you want the various parts of the technique to be coordinated. You are still moving slow, so again you have time to experience the tension in your muscles and how differently your joints move when your muscles are tense versus when they are relaxed as in level one. You have the opportunity to train your muscles to explode with the power of the breath at the precise points in the technique that you want it to occur. Your nervous system will remember this basic training.
Training Level 3: Fast, No Power
In level three your goal is to train your nervous system to execute the particular technique(s) with repetitive perfection and increasing speed. The technique(s) should flow through your body like the blood flowing through your veins, with an inwardly perceptible perfection. At this level you are giving the techniques over to your unconscious mind more fully. If you have truly practiced the technique(s) at levels one and two then you have done what you need to do under the direction of your conscious mind and you are ready to take a step into the realm of No Mind. With the techniques you have learned in the first few Chambers you are ready to begin our tradition of Fighting Dancing. Fighting Dancing is an excellent method of level three training that allows you to integrate all of your techniques while in the state of No Mind. You have one foot in the door now enter the mysterious room where perfection resides.
Training Level 4: Fast, With Power
In level four your goal is to add the power of your intention and your breath to the technique(s) you are executing. Your intention and your breath awaken your qi. The qi flows through you guided and directed by the silent message speaking to it from the realm of No Mind. Your breath sounds your intention. Your body movement declares the presence of strength and power. Your nervous system responds to imaginary opponents as your imagination confronts it from the realm of infinite possibility. You experience the harnessing and releasing of the tremendous power that you have the capacity to create. And most importantly, you get to taste one of the sweetest of life’s nectars, the taste of perfection.
As with most of what we practice in the Traditional Martial & Healing Arts, this method of Training for Perfection applies equally well to other areas of your life and your other endeavors.
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It is not simply practice that makes perfect. It is perfect practice and consistent practice that makes perfect.
