Of course like the process of limiting possibility through belief, I have oversimplified during the statements above.

Firstly when I said you choose to notice what you notice, that you choose to act the way you act I may have exaggerated slightly. Unless you question your beliefs, unless you can say that you know them, then they will have a constraining effect without your even noticing. In which case how can you really choose anything?
Of course you can think in this way about any area of your life. However I consider the this article to focus on training, and if you want to think about it more broadly that's your choice.

Let's look a little at the linguistic structure of beliefs. We can reduce it to two simple constructs. The first cause and effect, can be written 'because x then y.'
The second, can be written 'x equals y'.
We use these all the time. They simplify our lives immensely' and also sometimes oversimplify, or over limit them.
One definition of a common quality of genius that I like goes something like this.

Most people seek to prove what they already believe, they notice what conforms with their model of reality, and ignore or seek to explain away what does not.

For example many doctors who do not accept a non standard medical models will describe patients recovering from diseases, or showing other positive effects from non standard treatments as chance, or placebo effect, or ascribe it to something else altogether. You won't find any mainstream medical statistics of spontaneous remission from 'fatal' diseases, even if some people do recover. You will find it much easier researching statistics of deaths from fatal diseases. The statistics, what the doctors observe reinforce the model 'this disease is fatal' x equals y.

The genius looks for exceptions to the belief. Can I find instances where x does not equal y? When you find that you have news. Before you can notice that x does not equal y then you must have some belief in it's possibility.
So the Wright brothers said something like 'people believe heavier than air flight is not possible for humans. We believe it is, lets find a way to prove ourselves right.'
They took the standard belief, questioned it, then believed in the exception long enough to build a aeroplane that could fly.

So how can you apply this in the field of martial arts. You can simply begin to question your beliefs. For instance you may have a belief like 'movements are hard to remember.'
You could then begin to look for and notice exceptions to that belief. You might start to become more conscious of all the movements that you can repeat easily, almost certainly without thinking. They could include martial movements, and could also include other realms of body use. Walking for example, or writing whether with a pen or a keyboard, playing a musical instrument. If you have a 'bad habits' in your movement they were probably very easy to learn, unless you decided to invest time and effort in their acquisition. Perhaps you can learn good habits as easily. You could create a long list, or just stop as soon as you have enough exceptions to create the new more helpful belief 'I learn movements easily.'

Now if you find yourself arguing with this idea, ask yourself if you are really searching for exceptions to the old belief (how long did you stay open to notice the exceptions for? Just the time it takes to read a couple of sentences? I suggest you cultivate the ability to be unsure of what is true or believable for longer periods than that). Or perhaps you have fallen back into the habit of seeking to prove and justify the old belief.

Belief systems refer back to themselves, which explains the importance of suspending them for a moment to look for exceptions. Like the red queen in Alice in Wonderland who said 'when I was your age I used to make a habit of believing five impossible things everyday before breakfast.'

You can makes this kind of belief shift much easier to develop if you get into the habit of giving positive feedback, to both yourself and others. So if you want to develop the ability to side slip attacks while sparring, then mentally underline and acknowledge the one time you slipped the punch, rather than focusing your memory on the times you got hit or went backwards.

When you develop a counter belief to an old limiting belief there comes a point where it needs testing. Without testing the belief stays conjecture, or can become dogma. As I mentioned belief systems tend to reinforce and justify themselves. You can see this phenomenon in a whole range of martial arts and religions.
Many martial artists have a faith that they practise a superior style. They justify this in several ways, by not exposing themselves to other styles of martial art, by choosing to explain other arts in terms of their experience of their own, and by telling 'cool' stories of masters of their style.

Here's a little example of this that amuses me. In one 'superior' school, lets call it oblong style, the students would dismiss Thai boxing because of the techniques that they practised to counter round kicks. Students would say to each other 'give me a roundhouse kick like from a Thai boxer.' so the student would kick like he imagined a Thai boxer can kick, be promptly countered, fall down and get up with renewed faith in his style. At no point did the students of the oblong school consider the hours Thai boxers spend kicking pads and free sparring to develop the power, speed, and timing of their kicks. They never invited Thai boxers to kick them, their beliefs went untested and unchallenged, their arrogance unchecked, and at the same time possibly a little piqued by a niggling feeling of uncertainty.
I mention this not because I want to dis the oblong style (though that does sometimes bring a smile to my face, I'll admit). Just to point out a possible pitfall. Of course this could never happen in our school which is truly superior.

I mention that because I want to show that the same pattern can and does happen to anyone/everyone.

In the last sentence I stated a limiting belief about the nature of belief and attention. I can equally say that everyone also experiences the opposite, times when they remembered themselves, had an awareness of what they believed, and were able to suspend that belief and remain open to learn and develop.

You too will have been in that state, do you remember what it was like? Can you imagine what it could be like to be that way more often? If that's possible, naturally.

Ed Hines 2/10/02