There was this well known factory that produced over 820,000 cans of food week in week out, however after many years of constant production they noticed that last month they only managed to produce 808,000 cans of the same product and no one could say why this had happened.
So the management decided to get a company in to have a look at the mechanic's of the system.
After two days they reported that the main compressor that runs the production line conveyor belt was losing power but could give no explanation as to why and by this time they have dropped in production again to just under 800,000 cans a week for their first time in the factory’s history.
A crisis meeting was called after the strategic management projected that the factory would go out of business if the problem was not found and fixed soon.
It was at that time that someone suggested to see if the original man who had built the compressor could come in and take a look, he had long since retired, but still lived locally.
The next day the old man turned up with his tool bag and walked over to his compressor, stopped, took his hat off and scratched his head a few times while he fixed his eyes on the pipes that lead to a pressure valve about two feet away from the compressor. After a few moments the manager said to him “Do you have any idea what is wrong?”
The Old man said ‘Oh yes, I know what’s wrong all right”.
“Can you fix it” said the manager, “in about 2 seconds’ said the old man.
And with that the old man turned to his tool bag and pulled out a 10lb hammer.
He ran his hands up and down the first joint of the pipe then stood back and stuck the joint of the pipe twice with the hammer hard. It the precise moment of the second strike a huge funnel of steam came from the pressure valve and you could visibly see the convayer belt speeding up, after several pats of the back and a well deserved cup of tea the strategic management division reported the production line was back to normal and the factory was on line to meet the 820,000 cans of food target.
The manager was delighted and turned and said to the old man that he should let him know how much he owes him, the old man produced a bill that said for repairing the compressor will be $1,000.
The manager looked at the bill and said $1,000 is a bit much for hitting a pipe with a hammer, and asked to old man to itemize to bill for him in more detail before he but it through his accounts.
The old man took the bill back and returned the next day will another bill, and this time he had itemized his work.
The bill stated the following. For hitting pipe with hammer twice = $1.
For knowing exactly were to hit = $999
The manager smiled at the old man and ordered the bill to be paid straight away.
The story has learning for all involved in martial arts, we quickly learn how to strike, but very few develop the precision to strike areas that the technique being taught was designed for because of the drive in martial arts to take up its position as a combat sports rather than self defense.
They are not the same and if your instructor tells you different I don’t want you to walk out of his class, I want you to run out of his class because he or she is just making money from you and leading you down a false line of security that will get you very hurt or even killed if you try and use any of that stuff in a real violent assault situation.
So, just like our old man in the story, it is not about just hitting something, but more about knowing where to hit. Well let’s talk about where to hit.
There are many debates about where martial arts started and I don’t really want to get too involved in that, what I will say though is that the Chinese developed it into a deadly art.
This was at a time when the emperor outlawed all weapons, no spears, no bow and arrows, no darts, even farmers had to change their way of harvesting crop from the field. Now I did say the Chinese were the ones who developed the arts, I of course should be more specific and tell you if was the Chinese monks and in particular the Shaolin monks who developed the art of DIM MAK (Death Touch)
The monks were very peace loving people, however they were also not prepared to sit around and be robbed by bandits from the mountains each night, so they took up learning and developing how to defend themselves from these bandits and other villains
The High Priestess arranged a meeting at the emperor’s palace to discuss developing the art of DIM MAK and they requested the use of long term prisoners who were on death row to develop the art. They were interested in what happens to people if they were struck in curtained areas, and just like you see martial artist working two or three techniques together in a combination the monks quickly learned that combinations into certain areas proved to be fatal and could be used to make sure bandits would not be able to return to steal from them again.
These combinations are known to travel along the destruction cycle of the Chinese acupuncture chart.
Now most people use acupuncture as a way of healing some back to health from sickness by applying pressure in certain areas following a path along the body, following certain points of the body has been know the heal internal organs without the use of surgery, for example lungs, kidneys, heart, liver, spleen are areas often areas where the use of acupuncture pressure used following a line from say A to D has often been a proven way to get everything that should be flowing freely to those vital organs working again, however the monks found that instead of applying pressure following A to B to C to D the reverse known as the destructive cycle from D to A caused the internal organs to weaken, and collapse altogether resulting in Death.
This is what is known today as DIM MAK.
There are no shortage of people wanting to learn the secrets of DIM MAK, however people get lost in the fantasy of being able to just walk up to someone touch them with one finger and they fall down dead, well that’s television for you. If you really wanted to learn to kill someone with only using one finger the only advice I can offer is to go out and buy a gun.
The reality is there are several ways human beings die, the most common is old age and disease, however people also die from the effects of Blunt Force Trauma, Asphyxiation and Blood Loss. Martial Arts are always quick to teach that there are vulnerable parts of the body (neck, throat, areas of the skull and face, spine, joints, genitals to name a few) but they all need to be struck with some degree of force resulting in minor discomfort, unconsciousness and some time even death. But let me add a little more reality into learning DIM MAK because it is really not for just anyone.
There are 3 separate categories of Dim Mak striking and they are:
A) Tien Ching- Attacking the Nerves
B) Tien Hsueh- Striking the Blood Vessels
C) Tien Hsing Chi- Attacking the Chi Meridians.
Tien Ching. Is an effective method for attacking the nerves of the body in order to cause paralysis? Muscular people usually have their nerves very close to the top of the skin since they have more muscle than fat.
Tien Hsueh. This is the blood vessel striking method, designed to seal the veins and arteries and cause blood clots. When you strike an opponent in order to seal his blood vessels, death can be delayed through variations of pressure points and time sequences, which affect the blood flow.
The majority of the time this particular method is used with internal chi striking. By sealing the blood,
death will result because you do the following:
1. Block the circulation of blood to the opponent's major organs resulting in organ deterioration.
2. Caused blood clots which will travel through the body's circulatory system causing either cardiac arrest
if they enter the heart and a major stroke if they enter the brain.
3. Attack the main organ or gland when it is full of blood in order to immediately destroy it. This is achieved by knowing the precise time of day in which to strike."
Tien Hsing Chi - Attacking the Chi Meridians is not something I wish to share freely that just anyone could pick up and read, I think the quote is with great power comes great responsibility, I may have got that one from watching Spiderman or something, however joking aside striking into the bodies Meridians is not something you should be trying out, remember the monks were using people who were not going anywhere in a hurry, and the monks were not in a hurry to go anywhere themselves so they had plenty of time to learn this stuff.
Most people today are lucky if they can find a couple of hours a week to train in anything, and although there are thousands of these pressure points all over the body, for me there is really is about eight that I really like and think that the average person in the street would need to know in a self defense situation.
Many people in combat sports get lucky every now and again and connect with one off the great eight points without ever realizing or being ever able to do it again.
As I am writing this I had just watched Mauricio "Shogun" Rua knock out James Te Huna with one punch in their UFC light heavyweight fight. Of course there will be many Dim Mak enthusiasts all over the world smiling in the knowledge that a direct strike into a area known as stomach 6 which is also the seventh of the 13 ghost points will always result in a knock out and lucky has very little to do with it.
In the Self Defense Training System we explain the areas of the body that can cause knock out, injury, discomfort and even death. But it is not a "secret". Well, I guess everything is a secret until you learn it. These areas are simple to find and can be exploited with minimal training. You really don't need the secret scrolls to master the skill. You just need to hit the correct place with the right amount of force at the right time.
Think of it as not needing to know everything about electricity to turn the light on. You just need to learn to flick the switch.
