To truly understand your karate, look beyond the technique.
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Often, we get fixated on what we’re going to do in order get the result we want. Most people tend to ask the question; “How do I do that?”
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I view all techniques and drills to be a means to impart a principle. It’s the principle we truly need to learn. We are given the “what” so we can learn the “why”.
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A principle is different from a technique, in that the principle can typically be used to do ‘many’ things, whereas a technique has a SPECIFIC purpose.
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If you take something solely as a technique, it is flawed, and it WILL fail. A technique does not take into account who is attacking you, where you are, or even who you are, it is just a movement with a name attached to it.
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Any good martial artist will vary his fighting strategy based on his opponent, and his environment. The opponent could be large or small, tall or short, male or female, fast or slow…… a technique will NOT work in ALL circumstances.
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Too many people try to flood their memory with every possible technique to cover all possible situations. This leads to a very technique based style of learning, which will cause problems if the practitioner finds themselves in a situation they haven’t trained for, or they can’t remember the right technique based solution.
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It is far better and more time effective, to train the principles that will protect you where-ever you are, for multiple environments and situations.
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It’s important you understand the difference between technique and principle. Techniques are a series of moves you do. When you actually apply the principles, then they become effective.
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Many practitioners jump from one art to the next trying to ‘complete’ their martial arts training. They train in Judo, BJJ, Boxing, and more. Why?…… Because very few martial arts teachers are teaching complete martial arts methods based on principles, which can be applied to any situation. And students are not pursuing these arts in any great depth.
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Too many people do not fully understand the art they practice, or they get bored with it before they reach any depth of understanding. Studying choreographed forms, dojo sparring, and mimicking these memorized routines to get belt ranks, falls far short of studying a complete method, and understanding how its principles are applied under varying circumstances.
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Practitioners of the martial arts should always be asking themselves and their teacher, “WHY” they are doing something. You should know why you are learning it, why it’s to be understood in the manner in which you are being taught.
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When you know “WHY”….. ‘your what’ has more impact. “What” alone means you’re learning just the technique.
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And that’s why some people go “oh, these techniques don’t work”…… If you apply the principles to those techniques, they will work. 
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