Thought Provoking Process vs Word Association

This parable was relayed to me first by the Grandtuhon Leo Gaje, Tuhon Rommel Tortal, and Tuhon Nonoy Garrucho, on three separate occasions to describe PTK teaching/learning methodology.

A boy asks his father: "What is this?" If the father answers, "a cup," this is Word Association. Where a word defines a "thing," and now this thing "is" what the word says it is. When I see this thing, this thing IS this.

The thought provoking process is where a boy asks his father: "What is this?" and the father responds: "What do YOU see, feel, smell, taste, hear, think, experience?" And the father guides the son by answering his question with more questions, until the son arrives at his own understanding of the "thing." The thing is not what someone told him, but what he learned from his own exchange and experience with the "thing."

When we instruct, put students through the thought provoking process. Put yourself through it. Pekiti "is", but it "isn't". The PTK concepts are fluid, they take different forms in different contexts. A circular strike is a strike but could also be a deflection, depending on the context. An angle 1 is an angle 1, however the elevation can change depending on context. Techniques are fixed-- this is what "it is". But Pekiti concepts are fluid-- "it is, but it isn't." This is one reason why new students and new instructors struggle. It's not just the physical movement. It's the mental development. Students want the answers like the son in the story-- tell me what it is! But once an instructor just gives an answer, they rob the student of the experience, so they can understand for themselves, and not just know what someone told them. When instructors challenge students to develop their own relationship to PTK concepts, they are developing a malleable mind. A mind that can shift and adapt in the moment. A mind that is not easily tricked, duped, or defeated because it can adjust to split second changes that occur in a violent encounters.

In the current era of “martial arts industry,” many instructors want to define what “is” to maintain control over student growth, retention, and attention. The allure and mystic of “all-knowing sage” takes over authentic learning and instructing. Authentic learning and instructing is a mutual experience, dynamic, and evolving. Never one sided, with only one perspective, and one way to “be.” Questions are an inseparable and required action that both students and instructors should engage in to arrive closer to an agreed upon, proven, verifiable truth. If instructors don’t engage students in the thought provoking process, they are producing students who can only be lesser versions of instructor... instead of pushing the student to become the greatest version of themselves.

The Thought Provoking Process

Angola Tafari

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