I had the privilege of attending a special symposium held by my sensei at his dojo over the past weekend. It was about 10 hours over the course of two days, and it was intense, in the sense that there was a lot to digest. Through it all though, there were some valuable nuggets that I think any martial artist should spend some time reflecting on. Here is one of the most important.

The Spectrum of Colours Within Martial Arts

What happens when you pass a beam of white light through a prism? It splits into its component colours: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. So what if we thought about the facets of our training on that spectrum?

Red

When you think of the colour red, what comes to mind? Easy, I know. When we think of red, the first thing that usually comes to mind is anger. If you carry that through to martial arts, red would represent the physical side of our training. It’s the blocking, the punching, grappling, kicking and sparring.

Green

Let’s move down the colour spectrum a bit. What about green, what would that be? How about the refinement of our movements? Here, the focus is no longer on performing the technique; it’s on refining it. It’s here that we focus on things like getting the moves of our kata to look and feel crisp and clean. It’s here that we begin to look less at the individual movements, and more at the rhythm of those movements; the hard and the soft; the fast and the slow.

Violet

Now, what about the other end of the colour spectrum? How about indigo and violet? Well, you could look at it like this: at that end of the spectrum, it’s no longer about the physical at all. It’s about working to uphold a certain set of values; values like honour, integrity, courage, respect, loyalty and, most importantly, compassion. The focus becomes displaying those qualities even when it isn’t easy; especially when it isn’t easy.

So where does this put us?

If you stick with the analogy a little longer and look at someone coming in with their white belt as that beam of white light, you can see them a certain way – full of possibility, multi-faceted. The training would be the prism. Through it, we begin to bend, and it’s there that we see the individual colours: the different areas of our training that reach beyond the physical, and the different areas of ourselves that we didn’t even know were in there.

See what I mean when I said there was a lot to digest? Feeling like you ate a 10-course meal? Maybe, but it’s worth trying. If you can begin to see your training this way, you’ll get so much more out of it than if you just focus on the physical side.

So wait, the physical side isn’t important?

Hang on, slow your roll. The physical side of our training is absolutely important. It’s the side of our training that most of us understand and relate to first, and it’s a critical starting point. And I’m not saying that you stop focusing on the physical as you move down the colour spectrum either; not for a second. That’s why the image I chose for this post is an umbrella – it shows the colours in a circle, part of a continuous feedback loop. The other elements of your training just make the physical side stronger, better. You begin to understand it more deeply and, hopefully, to understand that it’s there to be used not as a sword, but as a shield.

Look at compassion. Compassion trickles into every aspect of our training. Compassion is what helps us realize that the guy mouthing off to us maybe has had a really bad day, and just needs to blow off some steam – it doesn’t have to be a fight. Compassion is what allows us to avoid losing our mind when someone cuts us off on the road (still working on that one myself). And compassion is also what allows us to block and take someone down (relatively) gently when they insist on getting physical, instead of breaking their nose or arm.

Wrapping it Up

There comes a point in every martial artist’s training when they feel comfortable defending themselves. That’s awesome; in order to want to stick around at that point though, you need to be in it for something more. I’m trying to give you an idea here of what that something could be.

I’ll be honest, the violet part of the spectrum isn’t part of my palette yet; but, I know it’s what I’m trying to work toward. And by looking at my training that way, I both get more out of it, and become a better martial artist for those I train with.

After all, an artist should always want to paint a picture with access to every colour in the spectrum, don’t you think?