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001 - Greg Souders

Grappling with the World

649 Plays11 days ago

This is a conversation with Greg Souders. We discuss, grappling, ecological psychology, the so called "ecological approach" in coaching, embodied cognition, Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological philosophy and much more!

Transcript

The Joy of Grappling: Physical and Psychological Thrills

00:00:00

Andy Grappling

Okay. So, um Greg, first of all, i think this is like the question I want to ask everybody I will talk with. Why do you love grappling or what do you like about grappling?

00:00:13

Andy Grappling

If you don't love it.

00:00:14

Greg

Yeah, no, I love it more than anything else in the world. It's my first love. um Really, it's the sensations. I'm very linked to the sensations of grappling. ah The idea of the physical engagement, the pressure, the fatigue, ah the struggle. I really enjoy that as a physical sensation.

00:00:29

Greg

I also enjoy that the, I guess, psychological sensation of solving an active problem. like each day, even if you have a partner that you know about, ah there are new problems to solve, you know, Monday to Wednesday, Wednesday to Saturday, every new day that new, your your partner is a different problem.

00:00:45

Greg

And then amongst people, there are different problems. So it just feels very engaging and, yeah and like a a game you can't win, you know, I just love that about it. It always gives me something to pursue something to focus on. So yeah, that's why that's why I love grappling.

00:01:00

Andy Grappling

Nice.

Greg's Grappling Journey Begins at 19

00:01:03

Andy Grappling

And how, maybe if you want to say, when did you start grappling? Was it as a child? Was late late in your life?

00:01:10

Greg

Oh, no. So I've been grappling for 20 years. I started at like 19 years old. it was two months before I turned 20. So I actually remember my first day. It was February 10th, 2004. That was the first time I ever grappled or was exposed to jujitsu.

00:01:24

Greg

um And I've been on the mats every day since. My first class was so fun. Like I knew right away, this is it. ah I don't want to do anything else. ah And I just had...

00:01:34

Andy Grappling

So you so you're started with Jujutsu then.

00:01:37

Greg

Yep, that's when I started. I stretched turned i trained the geon i trained on the ge with the from

00:01:38

Andy Grappling

Okay.

00:01:41

Greg

um two thousand and four until two thousand and sixteen um so twelve years but

00:01:49

Andy Grappling

All right. um

Understanding the Ecological Approach in Grappling

00:01:51

Andy Grappling

So the thing I mostly wanted to talk about with you is the ecological approach, let's say.

00:01:58

Greg

yeah

00:01:58

Andy Grappling

um And maybe a disclaimer from my side. um I have talked about similar stuff like affordances, using constraints and for, for let's say five to six years.

00:02:12

Andy Grappling

So I'm not in the position where I'm like arguing against using constraints, arguing against many of these ideas. um I'm more critical about, think,

00:02:25

Andy Grappling

what I believe has happened to the community of the ecological approach. And I believe that there are some things i have I'm a bit critical at about, but maybe before we get to those, something I believe is lacking.

00:02:44

Andy Grappling

um Can you try to concisely define what the ecological approach is

00:02:53

Greg

Yeah. ah in my In my view, as I see it, It's based on JJ Gibson's idea that the information we need to move is in the environment and it's not impoverished, that it's everything we need to act out onto the world, for example.

00:03:09

Greg

Now, that may seem like a limited picture, so I have taken it to mean more than maybe he's expressed. But I think it's more of a view of the stuff in here, whatever that means as me as a human, is embedded directly with the stuff out there.

00:03:23

Greg

And the only way that I can organize motion is to intentionally act out there. um And so for me, the ecological approach is is just that view that I gain the information I need to move directly from my environment and and is not and that information is not impoverished.

00:03:42

Greg

um And that's

Ecological Dynamics in Coaching: Opportunities and Challenges

00:03:43

Greg

it. i did To me, it's that simple. You know, that the perception and action are inextricably linked. And again, it's through engagement that we come to move

00:03:55

Andy Grappling

Okay, I will assume that people ah listening. They know... a little bit about you or about the CLA and or ecological approach and probably something about the stuff I wrote. so we don't have to maybe explain everything from zero, but the way you described it, it sounded from just like it's ecological psychology, right?

00:04:19

Greg

OK.

00:04:19

Andy Grappling

So, or not. So where's the difference, let's say, between ecological psychology, which I believe to be a rigorously defined, um um field in psychology.

00:04:34

Greg

okay

00:04:34

Andy Grappling

So it's just just said that we are clear about what are these theories and what are they talking about and where are they located.

00:04:40

Andy Grappling

So on the one hand, I believe there's ecological psychology, um which obviously is a field in psychology. um what you have talked about kind of, I think, just sounds like ecological psychology.

00:04:56

Andy Grappling

um But I believe what people claim to be the ecological approach, there's also... the idea of nonlinear dynamics or ah complex system theory.

00:05:07

Greg

Yeah, for sure. Correct.

00:05:09

Andy Grappling

And then together they form this complex of ecological dynamics.

00:05:15

Greg

correct

00:05:15

Andy Grappling

um And then at some point from ecological dynamics, I believe people say you take ecological dynamics, you put them into coaching and then you call it the ecological approach.

00:05:28

Andy Grappling

Is that roughly correct?

00:05:28

Greg

and I mean, that that I think that's what's happening, but that's even something that I'm kind of pulling away from a little bit um because I think it's limited in its scope.

00:05:40

Greg

So instead, I like to just say that the ideas and ecological dynamics inform coaching. It's just a way that we look at the world to maybe ask ourselves if we're assuming this,

00:05:52

Greg

what might we we want to do about creating opportunities for our athletes to learn? And then the method I use is CLA, where we focus on the manipulation of constraints, assuming some of the concepts and ideas that are given to us by ecological dynamics.

00:06:09

Andy Grappling

Okay. So, um

00:06:17

Andy Grappling

my my issue is a little bit... um that I have tried to find sign. I believe people make the claim in the grappling community or in the coaching space that there is an overarching theory of ecological dynamics.

00:06:34

Andy Grappling

um And I had a hard time to really finding it, to be honest.

00:06:39

Greg

and

00:06:40

Andy Grappling

I found it a bit, um it made me skeptical that there is no Wikipedia page on something like ecological dynamics.

00:06:47

Greg

For sure.

00:06:48

Andy Grappling

And to be honest, if something doesn't have a Wikipedia page in my mind, it cannot be this unified theory of anything.

00:06:52

Greg

For sure.

00:06:57

Greg

for sure

00:06:57

Andy Grappling

um Then I dig dig deeper and flow and and just try to find papers in in um on Google. And to be honest, most papers who even use these terms like ecological dynamics or something like this is always the same kind of four or five people.

00:07:14

Greg

Yeah.

00:07:15

Andy Grappling

um So as a scientist, myself i would be very cautious about making claims that the thing people do when they say oh i'm doing the ecological approach and specter by science i would say there's not really this grand unifying scientific theory about behavior out there you claim to use so could you clarify that a little bit

00:07:36

Greg

Right. I i agree. Yeah, I mean, I think it's just a mistake of how myself and other people are using this idea. So in my mind, yeah where we really have like a hypothesis about how we think that perception action affect behavior or informed behavior.

00:07:52

Greg

And then a theory is being developed around it. um And it has some explanatory power, but of course, I mean, we're we're only, I mean, i mean, the the idea wasn't even proposed until 1979.

00:08:04

Greg

And then, you know, the the the two ideas preceding it were like 20, 30 years apart. And so, you know, and Carl Newell didn't even come up with the, you know, the constraints led triangle until 1986. So in my my view, iss this it's being developed.

00:08:18

Greg

I don't think we have a hard and fast answer for anything, but I think we could say that we have a field of thought that's starting to pull these deeper ideas together in a meaningful way.

00:08:29

Greg

And even in its incomplete form, we could adhere to some of the ideas in a pragmatic way. ah And we get results that are predictable based on what what the theory suggests is happening.

00:08:43

Greg

So I think there's some explanatory power. And I think there's some rules we can follow to adhere to the framework. But again, I think there's room on all sides to be both wrong and right or to change things.

00:08:56

Andy Grappling

Okay, to to not be too nitpicky on all the or where what what kind of a theory is it or is not, um we will come back later maybe to what actually says and what it means and how it informs training.

00:09:01

Greg

Thank you.

00:09:10

Andy Grappling

But ah just to keep pressing ah the ecological community, let's say, a bit more. um So the way I see it, it's like... um people claim that ecological dynamics is a developed theory in cognitive science if we say cognitive science is the the field of study of um yeah cognition in the sense of action perception learning attention behavior this whole kind of things what is agency and how do agents behave in the world and i would argue that any kind of sports coaching whatever is is is just a way to understand agency um in a given context and so if we would say if this

00:09:54

Greg

Okay.

00:10:00

Andy Grappling

um idea of ecological dynamics where we already agreed that it's not a well-defined theory but if we say it is located in a cognitive science space to put it somewhere then I would argue it's just a misrepresentation because there is already ah well well well well developed and informed

00:10:09

Greg

Okay. Okay.

00:10:22

Andy Grappling

unifying theory of cognition, who uses many, if not all the ideas of so-called ecological dynamics.

00:10:29

Greg

Which is okay.

00:10:29

Andy Grappling

And we talk, which is an activism, which is ah what we already talked about, because an activism takes all these things like um action and perception coupling, even Gibson's affordances,

00:10:34

Greg

Okay.

00:10:37

Greg

It puts in your government.

00:10:44

Andy Grappling

um connectionism meaning the idea of complex systems and non-linear dynamics and they combine it um with oftentimes the idea of of an organism of biology biology of life of metabolism and so on they incorporate things like phenomenology of heidegger and moponti it's really um let's say ah well and alive community often

00:11:06

Greg

yeah.

00:11:14

Andy Grappling

times grouped in the idea of embodied cognition or for e embodied cognition which stands for embodied embedded extended and i think enacted is the fourth then you could egg add like as many e's if you want you could add

00:11:19

Greg

so yeah Yep.

00:11:27

Greg

I agree.

Phenomenology and Its Influence on Coaching Philosophy

00:11:28

Andy Grappling

ecological to it it would be a fifth e what i what i believe is to be very important would be emotional which would be the sixth e so the whole idea of e cognition right it's already a truly well peer-reviewed

00:11:29

Greg

sir

00:11:34

Greg

i agree

00:11:38

Greg

Okay.

00:11:41

Greg

Yeah.

00:11:43

Andy Grappling

and active um cognitive science theory.

00:11:49

Greg

Yeah.

00:11:50

Andy Grappling

And I feel like people don't give it any thought. They don't really research these papers as much. And they kind of sit on the idea of affordances of Gibsons and have some some knowledge of complex ah systems.

00:12:07

Andy Grappling

And then they say, oh, that's the end all be all ecological dynamic theory. And that's just how I pointed out.

00:12:11

Greg

Oh.

00:12:12

Andy Grappling

was this This theory is not does not exist, but there is something like it already.

00:12:17

Greg

I think this is just a bunch of different mistakes made at a bunch of different levels by people who use language inappropriately. I mean, I actually would agree with you. I read the inactivist literature and I love it. I love how deep they go into like um the different aspects of even engaging with the world. like ah Things are not are solicited to you, afforded to you. They have all these different concepts about how a human might select or search a space for information that's not present in Gibson's view.

00:12:42

Greg

um And so I think that ah rather than be in opposition to, I think it's a continuation of I think that what we can think about is you know, inactivism needs direct perception or some idea like it.

00:12:53

Greg

You know what I mean? It even needs this sort of idea of of processing, too, because let's say there are synergies present, for example, but we would have to process these synergies to create new affordances. um And so it seems to be, a you know— trying to take all of what we think we know and try to unify it a little bit in a more strong way, which i I think is great, but I don't think it's at odds.

00:13:13

Greg

I think that when we're talking about the coaching space and we're talking about agency alone, i think that the human organism, The tasks they're performing in the environment in which they perform them, assuming perception action is linked and they affect each other and they affect the emergence of behavior, and all this is constrained by the component parts and the relationships present in a system, we can stop there as far as the pragmatics of what it means.

00:13:36

Greg

And we can go right into coaching without any other deep explanatory power. But if we're going to say that this explanation is an excuse for all levels of cognition, I think we're missing the point.

00:13:47

Greg

So I'm not saying that. I'm a coach. I'm applying these ideas of how agents, as you said, act in environments forming tasks to create behaviors, or in this case, sporting behaviors. And I just, the ideas that Gibson gives us and Keith Davids gives us and Michael Turvey gives us seem to be enough to get people started.

00:14:04

Greg

So I don't know.

00:14:07

Andy Grappling

Yeah, sure. I mean, if if that's how people receive it, then I'm fine. like Again, I think like...

00:14:14

Greg

I can only speak for other people, speak for me.

00:14:16

Andy Grappling

ah Yeah, I mean, I'm not sure. I mean, like you have kind of nudged out the space, which where you are like the face of the so-called ecological approach.

00:14:28

Andy Grappling

Maybe you don't like that, but it's just, yeah, but it's the way it turned out.

00:14:30

Greg

ah hate it.

00:14:33

Andy Grappling

So ah many people ah use you to... give their ideas, i don't know, some explanatory power or whatever. and And I know, um but the whole point for me is that whenever I see people say the ecological approach, I'm always thinking, first of all, there is no ecological approach.

00:14:43

Greg

And that's a mistake.

00:14:55

Andy Grappling

There is, let's say, an ecological perspective one can take.

00:14:59

Greg

Well,

00:14:59

Andy Grappling

But there is not a framework. There is not this grand theory where you can make a good coaching practice solely on the idea of performance I believe that is just not the case.

00:15:08

Greg

I don't know.

00:15:11

Greg

Well, I mean, i don't I don't think you could if we were to like parse everything out that's present. But as far as just an initial framework to create a practice, I think you absolutely can. I mean, you know just in in general, like CLA has shown just in general experimentation as an idea expressed onto practice outperforms other forms of of learning theory. um Just in small studies like you know kicking a soccer ball, pressing a button, throwing a dart, swimming – um it shows that there is some explanatory power there.

00:15:40

Greg

There's some effect that thinking like that has on the nature of practice. So again, I don't think we need to start with, oh, this theory must be complete now, ah but we're heading in a direction of completeness.

00:15:52

Greg

um And I think there's it's not a mistake to say, hey, maybe this framework is a nice point to start from, but there's much more that we need explained.

00:16:04

Andy Grappling

To be honest, I'm not sure. at some points, you mentioned CLA, and I'm not even sure if constraints-legged approach is the same as ecological approach. Because, to to be honest, the idea that you can use constraints to guide a system is way older than

00:16:18

Greg

Correct. Rick.

00:16:22

Andy Grappling

then then Then even Gibson, it's my I mean, this goes back to cybernetics in the 40th, I think, and so on.

00:16:27

Greg

correct

00:16:29

Andy Grappling

So that's, again, my issue. It's like people use these words like, oh, we do ecological approach, Gibson. It's like the the the idea to constrain a system and have feedback back loops in order to self-organize around, it has literally nothing to do with Gibson.

00:16:45

Greg

correct

00:16:45

Andy Grappling

It's not even what he said. It's, it's, if Gibson's, how I see it is, is first of all, just a theory of perception mostly.

00:16:52

Greg

Agreed.

00:16:53

Andy Grappling

um So that's what I meant is I'm, I'm not arguing. You cannot, you should not use CLA. um I'm saying the whole notion of ecological approach, I believe is just a misnomer. People should,

00:17:07

Andy Grappling

Get on with their lives. Don't sit on it like their life depends on it. And they have found the holy grail of coaching. um So that's why I'm always a bit skeptical, to be honest.

00:17:18

Greg

Well, I think i think what even to hold that position is to sort of miss the point.

00:17:18

Andy Grappling

um

00:17:21

Greg

And I mean, the thing is, is like if somebody decides to sit on something and make it an excuse for everything they do, they're already fucking up. like And so, I mean, that's just that's with anything. Like you could pick any idea, any framework, and if you just sit on it as the excuse for everything, again, you lose it.

00:17:36

Greg

You miss the forest because the trees are in the way type thing. um And if if I take a stance like – i I agree with Gibson's view of direct perception, and I think that is a great idea to start informing practice, that we need to interact with our environment to gain information about it.

00:17:50

Greg

I don't think it's wrong to start with that idea and to call it an ecological approach. um Now, of course, it doesn't explain everything, but I think it gives us a starting point. And I think that's what people should be excited about, informed coaching, using ideas that might be beyond what we can perceive just with general thought.

00:18:06

Greg

And I think that's the value. Again, the value isn't in, oh my God, I've got the secrets. This is it. That's silly. Like, this doesn't exist anywhere.

00:18:17

Andy Grappling

Yeah, sure. I mean, again, if if people use the the constraints-led approach and are open to other ideas that are not covered by ecological dynamics or psychology, then, i mean, I'm all for it, but that's my issue is like so many hashtag ecological this, ecological that. And I'm like, people, you can use constraints,

00:18:45

Andy Grappling

that approach, and you can also use other things. it's I mean, it's it's not the end of all be all solution.

00:18:48

Greg

Agreed. Well.

00:18:52

Andy Grappling

and and And you said if people start with it, okay, fine. But I really, really want to have people to accept that they can also go elsewhere and it always doesn't always have to be constraints-led task-based game whatever um just to give a clear example

00:19:13

Greg

well ah Yeah, go ahead, please. was going to say it sounds like it sounds like a slight contradiction, but but keep going.

00:19:19

Andy Grappling

um yeah for for example is i know for a fact in my experience I learned so much from just watching tape of matches.

00:19:34

Greg

Mm.

00:19:34

Andy Grappling

And i i i I watched the move, I don't know, bunch of times and I was kind of the person who had good enough of a body schema to do it and rolling and sparring with good people right away.

00:19:48

Greg

ae

00:19:50

Andy Grappling

It's like i didn't have to find some face-based solution because I already had a schema. ah and I already had

00:19:58

Greg

assuming that you have a schema. That's an assumption.

00:20:01

Andy Grappling

um Yes, exactly. That's assumption, for example, I have because I'm more like in the embodied cognition field and not ecological dynamics field because I think I have a body schema.

00:20:13

Andy Grappling

But again, we can talk about these things for sure.

00:20:15

Greg

But even if you do even if you do, you actually fall into the same thing that makes you irritated. Because you were saying that if we start with an idea and we excuse as it as an end-all, be-all, as explanatory power, then we might miss things. So if you start with the idea that there is a body schema, you're committing to an idea that isn't well fleshed out.

00:20:30

Greg

I mean, we do know that there are ah there's a robustness, a structural robustness in the system as it relates to the relationship of of ah neural networks, for example. But is that, in fact, a schema? And if it does, where does it sit?

00:20:41

Greg

Is it a cognitive thing or is it a structural thing? So by claiming schema, even to explain what you're about to explain, you fall into the same trap that you're accusing the other side of.

00:20:50

Andy Grappling

No, not really, because, I mean, this is something, again, ah i have to be clear about. When I talk about... stuff like embodied cognition body schema it's for me always from a phenomenological perspective this is where i believe my my my biggest influence is from which is in the end philosophy it's a philosophical philosophical ah tradition it's it's not trying to reduce stuff to to scientific analysis it's really a way um to understand

00:21:14

Greg

Thank you.

00:21:26

Andy Grappling

the world, how we experience it. And I think the idea of the body schema is is is is not some kind of neural representation or representation of anything. it's It's the idea that in order to learn anything, you have to have a structure which is able to have some constancy, but also who has the ability to to evolve, to form, and to be Yeah, it's it's something you are born with.

00:22:01

Andy Grappling

You make experiences in the world. they They shape how you will experience the world in the future.

00:22:10

Greg

Right.

00:22:10

Andy Grappling

And for for that, I believe you have to have some constancy, something that is always with you. And I believe this is, for example, the body.

00:22:16

Greg

What you do.

00:22:19

Andy Grappling

The body just is the body schema.

00:22:20

Greg

Correct.

00:22:22

Andy Grappling

And that's why I believe it's not a miss mis... and it's it's not that i I don't see the issue with with the idea of a body schema.

00:22:25

Greg

well

00:22:27

Greg

Well, it depends on what you mean schema. So if you're talking about a representational schema stored somewhere in the...

00:22:32

Andy Grappling

No, it's not a representation. No.

00:22:33

Greg

Well, then we have to be careful. We have to make sure we don't say that. If you if you take the body as the scheme itself, fine.

00:22:35

Andy Grappling

Yes.

00:22:38

Greg

I'm actually in 100% agreement with you because ah humans only have bodies. So, of course, we can assume that. um So to even say that, like schema leads to this, well, that's the ecological dynamics explains the same thing. We talk about the link between capacity, which would be the same way to say schema as relates to skill, which is the expression of.

00:22:57

Greg

So <unk> were we're all trying to describe that thing that acts for that reason. So again, again we're just using different words, we're just saying the same thing.

00:23:08

Andy Grappling

Yeah, maybe to make this clear, because what I mean by it's not a representation, is when when when I watch tape, for example, it's not like like I'm having a pen, I'm trying to breaking it down, what is he doing?

00:23:21

Greg

Of course.

00:23:22

Andy Grappling

It's like I literally can feel how my body... is having a reaction, right?

00:23:27

Greg

For sure.

00:23:27

Greg

Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

00:23:27

Andy Grappling

It's not it's nothing like intellectual.

00:23:30

Andy Grappling

And I always felt that whenever I, I don't know, let's say, just to give a really concrete example, I watched a bunch of highlights of David Taylor.

00:23:40

Greg

Yeah, yeah.

00:23:40

Andy Grappling

And then I had a certain feeling in the body, like a prime being primed. And I was able to hit like ankle picks left and right the way i usually wouldn't be able to, or maybe just aren't primed to see.

00:23:46

Greg

Correct.

00:23:51

Greg

Okay.

00:23:54

Andy Grappling

and And these are, for example, for me, like important stuff people can do. They can add it to their practice. It's obviously, obviously not one or the other.

00:24:05

Andy Grappling

It's stuff you do on the mats. And there's, for example, like this, you can watch, you can be inspired. ah um and at home, alone, and it can have tremendous impact, tremendous.

00:24:14

Greg

Yeah.

00:24:18

Greg

I agree. I don't disagree with anything you're saying.

00:24:19

Andy Grappling

and and and And that's what I meant with people shouldn't be too hung up with, I don't know, um oh, we have to always use constraints, this or that.

00:24:29

Greg

Well, that is a constraint.

00:24:30

Andy Grappling

Another example, maybe,

00:24:31

Greg

I'm sorry, I don't i don't i don't mean to interrupt you. I just want to stick on that point before we move on, because I think there were some things said that are aid a misrepresentation of what is meaning. Forget what people say, because people fuck up all the time.

00:24:43

Greg

But the idea that watching someone act is somehow separated from... separated from an ecological approach or direct perception is is untrue. Like there's not there's nothing wrong with looking out at behavior. So there's even some evidence and experiments to suggest that when we watch expert performers, we watch other people produce a behavior, we have a similar response internally to the behavior that we're looking at because we pick up their affordances.

00:25:10

Greg

So by imagining acting like another, whether it's intentional or not, we in some way connect to that action. um whatever that means. But that to me, that is a human quality, a human experience, a a human possibility.

00:25:23

Greg

So in my mind, this is not separate from an ecological approach to skill acquisition. It isn't

Critiques and Philosophical Debates Within Ecological Dynamics

00:25:28

Greg

because you're engaging with the external world. That's having an effect on you. I mean, think about it.

00:25:33

Andy Grappling

Yeah, but but but but but but are you really engaging?

00:25:33

Greg

At, at, Yes.

00:25:36

Andy Grappling

I mean, if you're sitting, you're mentally engaging.

00:25:36

Greg

Yes. I'll tell you why. Action. Wait, wait. No, no, no.

00:25:39

Andy Grappling

That's

00:25:40

Greg

that we can't We can't use that reductionism to describe it. if we If we say acting out on the world, we assume every action a human could take. Humans analyze and can look out and predict what they might be seeing, experience what they might be seeing cognitively wherever it sits.

00:25:55

Greg

So you are in fact acting out on the world when you watch tape. it is um Our system does not know the difference. So we're acting is not just reaching for things. Acting is not just taking a step forward.

00:26:08

Greg

Acting is also intentionally cognating or viewing or engaging with psychologically. These are human capacities. They're not separate.

00:26:18

Andy Grappling

but again that this is where i believe it's like sure i agree with all that but The way I read Gibson, he was always talking about an organism in an environment.

00:26:31

Andy Grappling

And I think it was really clear that this it was meant to be a really that the the objective, that there is something like an objective environment the organism is embedded in.

00:26:43

Greg

then you then we don't we don't read him clearly because he says that. So two things that are very interesting about Gibson is, one, that at the beginning of all his lectures, he gave out a copy of Morel Ponty's book. So clearly he has some link to phenomenology and he he he believes in the human experience.

00:26:59

Greg

um The second thing is his definition of affordances is not it's non-deterministic. He says they are subjective and objective, but they're also neither. So I think what he was trying to get at is that there is an exchange happening, but we're just not sure at what level.

00:27:13

Greg

So we since it is a non-deterministic system, since it's non-linear, again, acting out in the world is not as clear as stepping, reaching, grabbing. But sometimes I think we have to use those lines of demarcation to try to define what we mean.

00:27:28

Greg

Because it's hard. Like, how would we talk about viewing? How would we talk about the environment of a human watching a video of other humans doing things in the context of a culture? How do we get there?

00:27:39

Greg

And so I think we must start with something like, for example, the visual field. You know, he was he just he just picked the starting point. But i don't i don't I don't read him as being solely materialistic.

00:27:53

Andy Grappling

Yeah, i mean, see, that there's maybe well how people conceive of things or how, how let's say,

00:28:07

Andy Grappling

Yeah, how how how people really read all this stuff, because, for example, the way you talk about Gibson and the environment, I think it's like you you already mentioned Melon Ponty.

00:28:14

Greg

I agree.

00:28:17

Andy Grappling

It's more of a phenomenological view how Heidegger or Melon Ponty used the word the world.

00:28:21

Greg

i agree

00:28:23

Andy Grappling

But it's not how most people read really ecological dynamics.

00:28:27

Greg

I know because most people are stuck within a reductionist framework and they're not trying to get out of it. So when I read the you know ecological dynamics literature or whatever, I'm not hard pressed for that to be the definition of the world. What I'm assuming is they're trying to pick little pieces of phenomena out that we can adhere to, maybe to understand something that's going on under the hood.

00:28:48

Greg

some deeper level of engagement that we really can't describe. But I think what we're trying to get at is this idea of embodiment, this idea of of of of coupling, this idea of non-separation. These are difficult ideas to discuss.

00:29:01

Greg

So we start with what people do that's obvious, reaching, stepping, jumping. But at the same time, it's deeply contextual at all levels. But again, how do we take all that apart in one moment?

00:29:15

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I mean, this is where my criticism comes from. Because if you move or more of the ideas to mean all this, then to be a bit of a, I don't know, to be a bit harsh maybe, then why don't you just talk about Melon Pondy?

00:29:30

Greg

No, be harsh, yeah.

00:29:32

Andy Grappling

Because he did all this stuff 40 or 20 or 30 years before Gibson.

00:29:33

Greg

Because I... Yes.

00:29:38

Greg

Yes.

00:29:38

Andy Grappling

And so I feel like people use Gibson, Then say, and he means actually this and this and this and that. And I'm like, okay, but as a scientist, I have to say there was a person well-received way before him who said all this stuff.

00:29:52

Greg

Yes.

00:29:52

Andy Grappling

So why don't we give the the him credit for being actually the originator of these ideas?

00:29:57

Greg

ah well i Because I'm not worried about credit. I only care about the ideas. I don't care about the man. See, my exposure to these ideas was through Gibson, Kelso, Turvey, Keith Davids, Ian Renshaw.

00:30:08

Greg

I mean, you know, Chao. That's who I was exposed to. So I'm just reading their stuff and and coming to the these ideas to understand them for myself. And when I met you and we talked, I talked about William James and you talk about Ponty. I was like, oh, there might be a deeper thing to this.

00:30:25

Greg

And then when I found out that Gibson really liked Ponty and would talk about him often, was like, oh, I probably should read this too. because But again, i'm I'm more worried about the ideas themselves. I don't care who gets the credit. You know what I mean does mean? Doesn't mean shit to me. Like, honestly, because to me, these ideas are in a river moving forward.

00:30:41

Greg

They're not these steady states in time, like who said what at what time, because everyone's ideas are going to be superseded by somebody else's as we get a more clear picture of what's going on. um Again, so I'm just I'm just moving forward.

00:30:53

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I mean, the the thing is, you are a complex person, you have complex ideas, um but my issue is that...

00:31:06

Andy Grappling

again, how I'm not talking criticizing you as a person, because I said you are like in complex individual, you have complex ideas, you think about stuff your own. But as a community, as people represent the idea of ecological dynamics, I think it's all these ideas you talked about, the lived experience, the world, the embodiment, the ideas of Heidegger and Meloponti, it's not in there.

00:31:33

Andy Grappling

I mean, for you, maybe it is implicitly in there.

00:31:33

Greg

Of course.

00:31:36

Andy Grappling

that's I'm not arguing against that at all.

00:31:38

Greg

Yeah.

00:31:38

Andy Grappling

But I think, like for example, if... if if I would have, ah if if if if you would truly be the voted representative of the ecological community, which you are not, I know, but if you would be, then I would had it would say, but then you have to be honest about it and say all these assumptions,

00:32:00

Greg

Well, I want to.

00:32:01

Andy Grappling

are not yet really clearly formulated and if you don't do this then you're missing a lot of really important really crucial things

00:32:12

Greg

Well, Andy, I just let you know, I agree with you, pal. Like ah you have no idea how deeply frustrated I am. I can't get past a basic explanation of what perception and action are.

00:32:24

Greg

Like our community is so numb and so vapid and so far behind, we can't even have a ah meaningful conversation. So I ended up repeating the same tropes over and over and over again.

00:32:37

Greg

I can't even get past the standard of evidence with people. And so what I end up doing, and it's a huge mistake on my part, is I ended just saying things for an effect because I need to get people off it.

00:32:48

Greg

But I can't, i'm yeah I'm failing over and over and over again. Because if I hardline something and I say something like, the evidence suggests, then we have an argument about what evidence means. If I say something like science suggests, then we have to have an argument the limitations of science and research.

00:33:05

Greg

We can't even get into these wonderful ideas that you and I are able to talk about because people are just not willing to engage at that level. So we spin our wheels on social media and on these stupid podcasts saying nothing.

00:33:17

Greg

It's awful. I hate it Like, it's so exhausting for me. Like, so I'm with you, pal. I fucking hate it.

00:33:25

Andy Grappling

Okay. um So there may again, sadly, I cannot talk to the whole community. It's not possible. So um I will caricature you a little bit as a representative.

00:33:39

Greg

Thank you.

00:33:39

Andy Grappling

And maybe i also, again, I'm doing you maybe wrong doing that. But again, I'm just trying to press on some issues, right?

00:33:50

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

00:33:50

Greg

Oh, no, I really enjoy this, honestly, pal. I really enjoy this. I

Integrating Ecological Dynamics and Phenomenology

00:33:54

Greg

enjoy the conversation with you. I've been trying to talk to you for a long time. So, because I know that if you and I have a public conversation, people can hear this, you're going to be able to pull out nuances of my thought, because just like you say about me, I think you are a complex person as well that has good ideas.

00:34:10

Greg

And so, yeah, I mean, I really appreciate you pushing this.

00:34:14

Andy Grappling

Okay, so let me picture how I believe many people um think of ecological dynamics. i try to be really concise.

00:34:27

Greg

Okay.

00:34:28

Andy Grappling

and shot and again, I'm 100% sure that I'm missing a bunch of nuances you have as as an individual, but I'm just trying to so to to make a make a rough sketch of what I believe to be ecological dynamics.

00:34:45

Greg

okay

00:34:45

Andy Grappling

And then I will try to give a rough sketch of what I believe to be what I do, which is more based on phenomenology or lived experience.

00:34:57

Andy Grappling

And ah maybe then you can say something about it or push back or whatever. Okay.

00:35:04

Greg

Okay, sure.

00:35:05

Andy Grappling

So when I read all the stuff, for me, ecological psychology boils down to the idea of affordances.

00:35:15

Greg

okay

00:35:16

Andy Grappling

which is basically the idea that you have an organism, the organism an environment, and there are opportunities for action.

00:35:27

Andy Grappling

And these opportunities for action are presented to said organism um directly. So it's not like the idea of... some let's say computer where there is like a camera and the organism just has these sense data and then there's like cognizing and calculating and computing and then he makes a decision and says oh i act now this way so ah gibson is um highly non-computationalist i believe and he says the environment presents itself to the organism in ways

00:35:44

Greg

Okay.

00:36:04

Andy Grappling

telling him how he can act or should act or whatever.

00:36:07

Greg

okay

00:36:07

Andy Grappling

Then on top of that, We have the idea of um systems theory or nonlinear systems theory or complex systems yeah theory, whatever.

00:36:18

Andy Grappling

And then there come in all these ideas of self-organization that complex systems have have ways to self-organize into certain forms by way of auto-regulation, which is just another way that there is this ongoing feedback loop of of input, output data and where there's like

00:36:26

Greg

OK.

00:36:41

Andy Grappling

yeah, you regulate, you you do to try trial and error, and then there's feedback, and you do something else. And at some point, you you work down a gradient descent, and at some point, you find stable ways to do something or to self-organize in a certain way.

00:36:54

Greg

um

00:36:55

Andy Grappling

And this these two ideas, I believe, are first of all, um yeah, standing as theories on their own. It's like one is a theory of complex systems. So it's mostly about physics, maybe mathematics, or it's highly interdisciplinary theory.

00:37:12

Andy Grappling

And then there's this idea of perception of psychology. And again, as we talked about together, um then they are meshed together and it's called ecological dynamics.

00:37:24

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

00:37:25

Greg

Yep. I'm with you.

00:37:26

Andy Grappling

I will come back maybe to say where I see the issues and maybe try to be even faster to talk about phenomenology. Okay.

00:37:34

Greg

Okay. Yeah, yeah, for sure. yeah

00:37:35

Andy Grappling

ah

00:37:35

Greg

But understand I'm with you. i know I know how you're defining all these things and I know how they're connected. so

00:37:39

Andy Grappling

Okay, so phenomenology for me, um i try to be ah fast, goes back to Husserl. Husserl was a philosopher who was like really concerned with all the things going on about epistemology. What can we know? What can we not know? There were people like rationalists who believed everything is in the mind and there were empiricists who thought everything is in the world and then came people like Kant to try to um balance it all out to make one big picture and so on and so on and so on and then Husserl said okay maybe we just go back a little bit and say for philosophy it's important to

00:38:19

Andy Grappling

take the world as we experience it, first of all. Because he he argued, we can all do this these abstractions later, but how is it the world is experienced by the subject, by the human in this case?

00:38:24

Greg

for sure.

00:38:34

Greg

Thank you.

00:38:36

Andy Grappling

and And Husserl was really more of an analytical philosopher, and then people like Heidegger and Melodon-Ponty took this method, let's say, of focusing on lived experience.

00:38:49

Andy Grappling

And then Heidegger came about and talked about many dimensions of lived experience. So he called this subject who was ah inhabiting this world, Dasein, which just means German for being there, basically.

00:39:06

Andy Grappling

And he tried to be highly non-reductionist, non-dualistic, to to just almost in a descriptive way point out how it is dasein or let's say humans ah live and engage and experience the world as a living breathing subject and for him really important for example was this idea of care that that that in experience it's really important that there's always this effective dimension that we care about certain things and we don't care about other things

00:39:17

Greg

Thank you.

00:39:41

Andy Grappling

And then maybe more important for for our discussion came Melon Ponty. And he was a phenomenologist who was highly ah influenced by Heidegger, even though he wasn't really that clear about it because they were politically very different. different um

00:39:57

Greg

that' For sure.

00:39:59

Andy Grappling

and um And he took these ideas and he he he said, Heidegger, look, all you're saying is is very good and great about lived experience, but What about the body? It's like the body is really absolutely crucial to the way how we perceive the world.

00:40:17

Andy Grappling

and um And then Merlin-Ponty had this big, big, big philosophy, which is all centered about embodiment. So the whole point of Merlin-Ponty is trying to pin down how we perceive embodiment.

00:40:31

Andy Grappling

how perception is really highly dependent on the body. Without a body, we don't have a perspective on the world. And Melopotti literally says the body is our perspective on the world.

00:40:44

Greg

yep. Right.

00:40:45

Andy Grappling

um So it's even more fundamental than perception, let's say.

00:40:48

Greg

Right.

00:40:48

Andy Grappling

um And based on this whole notion that that whatever cognition you talk about, let's say attention, language, action, whatever you want, everything is basically built on top of perception, which again is built on top of the body.

00:41:06

Greg

right

00:41:07

Andy Grappling

and um And then this this this whole tradition, I think, is very rich and there are like ideas like motor intentionality, which I believe is something very, very, very close to affordances, for example.

00:41:18

Greg

Greg? Yep.

00:41:19

Andy Grappling

Motor intentionality is the idea that we directly perceive ways to engage with the world around us without the need to think or to abstract out in words.

00:41:33

Greg

Greg?

00:41:33

Andy Grappling

So for example, if I want to open a door, I just grip the handle and there's just no need for me to have thought, representation, language, whatever. It's just a directly perceived idea.

00:41:44

Andy Grappling

Very similar to affordances, I think. And then also very important for Melo Ponti is this idea of the body schema. Again, that there is somehow all this information because in order to care, in order to have an emotional connection,

00:42:02

Andy Grappling

dimension to experience, we actually need something that can anticipate. And anticipation also lies on the idea of past experiences, of learning, right? Of some form of memory or what all he calls habit or body habit.

00:42:18

Andy Grappling

So for him, the body schema is it basically our self or how we ah collectively gather habits in the body to anticipate how we interact with the world and this schema as schemas do can morph it can shift it can learn it changes and so on and so on

00:42:27

Greg

For sure.

00:42:40

Andy Grappling

OK, so just to be clear that maybe people who aren't, I know you and me, we're familiar with these terms, but maybe not everybody who's listening to this afterwards really knows, oh, what is this phenomenology? Who is Melophon T or whatever?

00:42:53

Andy Grappling

So this was just to maybe give them rough sketch, I think. There, of course, are many more nuances to both ecological so psychology and phenomenology.

00:42:57

Greg

but sure but Right.

00:43:02

Andy Grappling

And here now are my issues with ecological dynamics. If we, for example, think, speak of affordances. I right now sit in a room and with all without the ideas, I believe Heidegger and my local T-Givers, there are like million affordances I can act upon.

00:43:19

Greg

i such

00:43:23

Andy Grappling

I can grab my AirPods, I can grab my my Mac, I can type on my keyboard, I can look at my guitars on the wall.

00:43:28

Greg

right

00:43:32

Andy Grappling

There are like countless ways the environment, um offers me opportunities for action.

00:43:38

Greg

right

00:43:39

Andy Grappling

So I don't see really how and where in in just using the term affordances, it really gets across what actually is relevant for me.

00:43:50

Andy Grappling

What actually do I care about? What actually um so So in a way, for me, just staying there at a affordances without integrating the idea of of of relevance or care or, yeah.

00:44:06

Greg

Well, Freeze, can you mind if we stop? right Because I mean, yeah, so you're you're again, this is this is the problem. I mean, you're you're assuming that that's not in there. So like we say affordances, imagine this, do humans care?

00:44:18

Greg

Do humans have the capacity to care? Are there things that are important to humans that aren't important to dogs? Are there things in rooms that humans need to do based on their current intentions or ah inclinations or habits? Yes.

00:44:30

Greg

So we can take that as an axiom because you can there is no such thing as an opportunity without an intention to move. So it is literally the axiom that we start with.

00:44:40

Greg

And I think that's why Gibson didn't explain it because it's silly to ever try to reduce a human down to anything other than itself. It's silly. We have to assume a person in the world, and we have to so assume all capacities that humans are capable of are already present before we act, and if we act, and therefore affect our action.

00:44:58

Greg

It's just, so affordance is assuming all these things that you say are missing, and that might be the mistake. The mistake might mean he didn't say, these are the assumptions we start with when we say affordance.

00:45:07

Andy Grappling

yeah

00:45:10

Greg

So, I mean, who knows?

00:45:10

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I don't know. So so so let's let's talk let's make a really concrete example.

00:45:11

Greg

That's

00:45:15

Andy Grappling

okay um there's Let's stay with grappling. Let's say there's a certain grappling exchange and somebody picked up an affordance, right? He saw he could grip something and he did it.

00:45:30

Andy Grappling

And then it didn't work out the way he thought it would be and it was a mistake and whatever. And then he is in a similar situation and then he picks up another affordance, which maybe then is more successful.

00:45:46

Andy Grappling

um I believe there is still... um let's say, if we just go about and and try to explain learning by picking up affordances again and again and trying, and then it's trial and error and self-organization and and it's figured trying to figure it out, I think it's missing this whole idea that, no, actually, we can perceive multiple affordances at once.

00:46:11

Greg

Well, they they talk about multiple affordances.

00:46:11

Andy Grappling

And there is, yeah, but there also is

00:46:13

Greg

Yeah.

00:46:16

Andy Grappling

some um dimension of having. so so So how would you explain in ecological dynamics term if you have multiple affordances?

00:46:27

Andy Grappling

um Yeah, how would you go about this?

00:46:30

Greg

So again, i don't know if I'm the person qualified enough to give ah an articulate example of what, but I'm to my best based on my personal, uneducated, just reading books, Greg Souders idea, and you can take it or leave it. But again, nothing I say is beyond anything other than a speculation based on what I think I understand.

00:46:47

Greg

Um, so I think the idea is that affordances aren't fit since they're not things, but they are things. They're also synergies and relationships. Uh, and so, and and so then there would be affordances nested in affordances. So, um, as I take one action, there's lots of other stuff that I'm taking action on at the same time that I'm really unaware of because they're all actually the same thing. They're all pointing towards this thing that I'm trying to figure out.

00:47:13

Greg

um And i'm I guess we could say picking them up at different space and time scales relative to our current capacities, our current level of attunement and our current level of coordination. And these things are constantly online and interacting.

00:47:25

Greg

So affordances are there, not there, synergistic. and constantly appearing and disappearing every time anything happens. And I'm just engaged in this field where I'm constantly bumping into it and making decisions in real time. Like, I don't know if we could define it out as a thing.

00:47:44

Greg

Do you understand what I mean

00:47:45

Andy Grappling

I understand what you mean. And we again, we are both trying to struggle with these ideas ah because they are not easy. So I'm not

The Role of Language and Context in Coaching Communication

00:47:57

Andy Grappling

sure if what I'm going to say is really ah even a proper recapulation of MeloPort T or how how how he would go about it.

00:48:02

Greg

Wow.

00:48:07

Andy Grappling

But this exactly where I see the difference, let's say. Because say it the way I read it, The whole idea is that you have like multiple affordances and like you say, they are nested and they are out there and they're not out there. And in some sense, they are objects and in some sense, not. and And I think like, for example, what Merleau-Frontis says is something like this.

00:48:30

Andy Grappling

you don't perceive just atomic objects of Fordance, call it a Fordance, doesn't matter. is There is a Gestalt, a wholeness of a given so context and situation.

00:48:43

Greg

I right

00:48:46

Andy Grappling

And this wholeness is not located in an external environment. It is not located inside the body. This perceived wholeness of the situation is the relationship of the body with the environment.

00:49:02

Greg

agree.

00:49:03

Andy Grappling

So where I see that that I believe what Gibson is, well, maybe that's wrong, what ecological psychology is doing, and maybe, again, maybe that's wrong.

00:49:13

Andy Grappling

What I believe is they still have this idea, there are affordances, and the organism picks it up, and where Molopotti goes is no.

00:49:13

Greg

Thank you.

00:49:22

Andy Grappling

Their perception from the get-go, from the beginning, is already a whole, wholly defined Gestalt, which is, again, already conditioned on your body schema, on your body habits, on your past experiences.

00:49:38

Greg

right Right. Well, how, so how do you get out of that? How do you pull the wetness out of water? Like you, you can't like the condition of a human capacity in a human world can't be pulled apart.

00:49:53

Greg

So when we say affordances, we're making reasonable assumptions. um And and ah to sit and argue about where it really sits, I think is is sort of, of course, the the job of philosophy, but it it really has no pragmatic value because a person must act in an environment. So if we just take that idea and we apply it directly and we say what we want to do in a practice environment, well, if I want to help somebody understand the affordances of, let's say, graspability, well, they better start grabbing things.

00:50:19

Greg

They better start moving things with their grips. They better start looking for opportunities to grab as it relates to the intention we're grabbing in the system in which we're we're intending to grab. So ah all the affordance does is it gets us back in the environment as far as ah tool for determining what interventions we might want to use and in in the grappling space or in the sporting space.

00:50:37

Greg

So outside of its pragmatic utility of just getting us back into action, it it it's just a fun philosophical conversation. But I don't think overly defining it or underdefining it really matters to a person designing a program, just knowing that they exist.

00:50:54

Greg

Do you know what i mean?

00:50:55

Andy Grappling

I know what you mean. and And again, I have no issue with the thing affordances. I mean, I've written about affordances. I constantly use the term to explain stuff. So it's not it's not like um I'm saying, oh, no, it's stupid or whatever.

00:51:09

Andy Grappling

It's more like I'm saying, again, trying critic to criticize a little bit the idea that you can bootstrap a bunch of things about cognition by just using ideas of affordances and things.

00:51:21

Greg

Well, I think that's kind of what we have to do. We have to sort of, i mean, because how other how else are we going to get at it? We're trying to basically so to link something that we call senses with something that we call acting on them.

00:51:35

Greg

And I think that we don't have a good descriptor for what that is. And I think affordance is a great is a great way to get at that. um while also making a bunch of assumptions about what humans do.

00:51:47

Greg

And I think that we're safe to use that um because it gets us acting and it it keeps things holistic just by its very assumption. And that's what we're all trying to get at. and that's what Ponzi's getting at. That's what I'm getting at. That's what you're getting at.

00:52:01

Greg

You know, I mean, how do we how do we create language that gets us out of this reductionist system that we've been in since the 1700s as far as using scientific descriptors to describe reality?

00:52:13

Andy Grappling

yeah okay so so so what really is important for me is what i believe merleau ponty and of the phenomenological tradition has done for me as a coach as a person maybe even as just living in this world and doing stuff and behaving in a certain way is

00:52:30

Greg

Thank you.

00:52:38

Andy Grappling

It's not meant as a critique about ecological dynamics, just why I love, for example, this this way to look at the world. is It it it's brings together the most detailed ways of interaction with grabbing, watching, looking at something.

00:52:57

Andy Grappling

And like the whole idea of what is meaningful in my life, what what speaks to me, what talks to me, how how i have a self um or am a self or whatever.

00:53:09

Andy Grappling

It's like it it tries to bring all these things together in a way I think only a philosophy can do and no theory of perception can ever do that.

00:53:14

Greg

For sure.

00:53:17

Greg

and

00:53:20

Greg

sure

00:53:20

Andy Grappling

But it must be a whole philosophy. And this is what my whole point of my project is. And I believe as athletes, students, as coaches, as people, we cannot just focus on the next game, the next task, the next affordance.

00:53:38

Andy Grappling

But in every moment, whatever we do, this whole... thing has to be connected it has to to be always be part of the whole picture and and what i mean practically by doing that is for example when a coach too often and even if they do constraints led approach which is already far improved over just showing the move of the day and repeating it 100 times

00:54:01

Greg

you

00:54:06

Andy Grappling

is always sometimes people forget how are people experiencing that right now? how How maybe even, is it fun for them? Is it engaging?

00:54:17

Andy Grappling

what What are other people doing? How is, for example, the whole mood in my group? Are people having a good time? How's the culture? And again, it's not no criticism of the culture dynamics.

00:54:29

Andy Grappling

I'm just saying people should not be overly focused on things What can I do? Which move? Which task? Which game? But really try to understand the whole thing.

00:54:37

Greg

I agree.

00:54:40

Andy Grappling

And that's why I believe ideas of existential phenomenology, Merle-Ponty Heidegger, can really benefit students, athletes, coaches alike to give this this this continuum a certain...

00:54:41

Greg

Well.

00:54:57

Andy Grappling

yeah, consistency across all spectrum. And maybe my last sentence is, I noticed that whenever you do, you watch athlete musicians,

00:55:09

Andy Grappling

craftsmen. ah so Those people who actually believe what they are doing is the most meaningful in their life are the ones who have the highest focus of detail.

00:55:21

Andy Grappling

like They are like going about stuff and you're like, oh my god, how is he so immersed in this little tiny thing?

00:55:21

Greg

I can...

00:55:29

Andy Grappling

And that's why I always think in order to go deeper into the details, to be more proficient in the task ah at hand. More important than how we approach training with what what method or whatsoever is how meaningful is it for me as a person, as a coach or whatever.

00:55:47

Greg

Right, I mean, i i i could I couldn't agree with you more. or You don't see experts, you don't see masters that don't have that that emotional quality. and i And see, I think the issue here is just that, of course, having a philosophical tradition tradition to understand humanity, to understand action, to understand truth, perception, all these things could help us better get at the holistic nature of things.

00:56:09

Greg

Because I think a big sweeping soft view is sometimes more effective than a hard specific objective view. ah Because we don't experience the world as in these hard lines, right? We experience the world in these feelings and these assumptions. So yeah, I would agree with you. But I mean, you try this. You try taking some of Husserl's ideas, Heidegger's ideas and put them to the public.

00:56:30

Greg

They won't read that shit. Like just saying the word affordance makes people want to melt. Imagine you've read Heidegger. It's it's the most jargonous stuff you've ever read in your life.

00:56:37

Andy Grappling

Thank you.

00:56:40

Greg

You know what I mean? It's fine. It's beautiful. But who's going to engage? So how do we get modern coaches engaged in these deep and complex ideas? I think that we get them attached to actionable items.

00:56:53

Greg

Because if we think about the base nature of practice, we're asking people to take actions. And we're asking people to take actions for specific reasons. And so we need a ah framework that helps us get at what actions should be taken for what reasons.

00:57:06

Greg

And these actions for what reasons should be linked to something true about the human experience. And I think ecological dynamics or ecological psychology or CLA is a very usable tool that gets us close to these things that are important to you and I without having to go into the depths of Morel-Ponty's mind, Heidegger's mind, Husserl's mind.

00:57:24

Greg

You know what I mean? And even in ecological psychological literature, you as you were talking, it reminded me of the – this is a German word, I think. i don't know if I'll say it right, but it's Umwelt.

00:57:33

Andy Grappling

Yes, Umwelt.

00:57:33

Greg

Yeah. So in the psychological literature, they talk in in eca ecological psychology, they talk about having three environments, the objective environment of the structure of the stuff out there.

00:57:34

Andy Grappling

Great.

00:57:44

Greg

We have the human environment. That's the human as it relates to the structure out there. And then we have the, you know, Andy specific environment. and that's the Umwelt, right? And so um they they bring they try to bring that phenomenology in with them when they talk about environment, because I think it's critical to the success and interactions of the organism.

00:57:52

Andy Grappling

Mm hmm.

00:58:01

Greg

And so for us to miss that, I think we miss a lot too. Anyway, but again, I think it's just ah an idea of pragmatics, man. What do we do tomorrow? What do we do right now? And why do we do it?

00:58:13

Andy Grappling

Yeah. um

00:58:15

Greg

like

00:58:16

Andy Grappling

So maybe to go a little bit in another direction, because again i criticize that people are too hung up a little bit about methods like they think a good coach a good athlete is somebody who uses x method x like method y right and i obviously believe that there are better methods and worse methods i think ah we all do probably um and i wrote on this and whatever i talked about this

00:58:31

Greg

Thank you.

00:58:48

Andy Grappling

But in the end, again, I think like the biggest lever you have is the stuff we talked about just now. like Do you actually care about what you do? And are you meaningfully engaged and whatever?

00:59:00

Greg

all right

00:59:00

Andy Grappling

um And what I think is something I noticed is one of your favorite topics, like demonstrating a technique, is ah If you have a person who has a certain um

00:59:20

Andy Grappling

competency already and who has a bunch of experience they can yeah fall back on,

00:59:28

Greg

might be

00:59:31

Andy Grappling

And oftentimes they come maybe after rolling to me and they have a certain problem and whatever.

00:59:31

Greg

Yep.

00:59:36

Andy Grappling

And then I might, for example, show them a very specific move, a very specific technique.

00:59:40

Greg

ye

00:59:42

Andy Grappling

And I don't try to come up with a task where can they can find it themselves, where whatever. And I can really see that because they... cared right now because they had a problem they emotionally attached to and they had experiences they can embed everything in that these techniques for example can be picked up and be used and very very very very helpful right away and it is just i'm not saying you are like against this it's just for me for for people listening example you are allowed to show techniques if people

01:00:09

Greg

Right. Yep.

01:00:18

Greg

ye

01:00:21

Andy Grappling

have actually emotional ah relevance and they can see why this technique might benefit them, then it can be very beneficial and maybe don't be afraid about showing something explicitly once in a while.

01:00:37

Greg

Right. I talk about this often. I know you don't listen to my stuff, but I talk about how I did.

01:00:40

Andy Grappling

I cannot listen to anything, to be honest.

01:00:42

Greg

Well, because I...

01:00:43

Andy Grappling

Sorry, not anything, everything.

01:00:45

Greg

No, it's okay. It's okay. Because i actually I actually talk about this because when I say I don't use explicit instruction, I don't show technique, I mean something very specific when I say that. So I don't explain how, unless the how is relevant to what's happening currently, which rarely it ever is.

01:00:59

Greg

And the second is I don't believe in a technique. So even when I'm showing somebody something, I'm showing them from my perspective. And what I'm showing from my perspective would be the tasks that I'm trying to perform for the reasons I'm trying to perform them.

01:01:15

Greg

And so that's what I want somebody to understand. So if I model a behavior, first, I always model a result. I'm here and I'm looking for this result. To go from here to this result, this is the tasks I'm focusing on accomplishing These are the problems that I'm facing while trying to accomplish this task and get this result.

01:01:35

Greg

That's how I show things. But I have to get students into that space before my showing means anything. So we first start with demonstrations of result. So if I'm talking about a brand new person and we're talking about this idea of getting under somebody's elbow, as I'm describing the tasks that I want them to try to perform to get there, I model the result of that as I'm speaking so they can see me moving And see the result that I'm asking about as I'm directing them through the task.

01:02:03

Greg

And this seems to be a nice robust way to show something. um And so that's how i I do it. And then I let them try to solve their own problems. So again, I don't show techniques. I show results. I show intentions. I show interactions.

01:02:17

Greg

You know, we talk about these things. But again, only after movement has occurred.

01:02:24

Andy Grappling

Yeah, but but again, I would say the way you you you talked about it, if somebody was watching you and someone would ask that person what Greg did, that he would probably say he showed a technique.

01:02:35

Greg

Yeah, because they you said...

01:02:35

Andy Grappling

I mean, it's like, it's a certain way you think about those things and you use your language, but in the end of the day, we should also be be be ah

01:02:39

Greg

Correct.

01:02:44

Andy Grappling

bit clear about how people perceive it and not be too hung up about our own, let's say, beliefs and whatever. It's like, in the end, you show the technique, even if you have, I still think so.

01:02:56

Greg

No. ah But I didn't show a technique because you have to to, it's the same problem we talked about earlier. Where does the technique start and begin? What is a technique? Is it the way I showed it or is the way I did it?

01:03:08

Greg

Is it the result or is it the process or is it a marriage of the two things? Is it a movement that I did or is it an effect that I had? So when you say technique, you actually say so much more than just that one word. Now, I'm not trying to be overly pedantic and like trying to move it around, but the nature of reality isn't as clean as the language tries to excuse it to be.

01:03:26

Greg

So I have to be more specific. Because if we are just like, just like you argued, if we're just stuck in this is a technique, then that's all we'll intend to do. That that is a strong constraint on attention.

01:03:38

Greg

And it it produces effects. And just like you said, like people see, say and see silly things.

01:03:42

Andy Grappling

so Yeah,

01:03:45

Greg

Same thing. I had the same experience, you know.

01:03:48

Andy Grappling

yeah but I think this is where maybe um people criticize you, is you are very careful about your language. And I told you this in person already. I think you're too careful about language because in the end, let's be honest,

01:04:03

Andy Grappling

The words we use, you always talk about context. There are no sharp categories and concepts in language. It's it's like it's not um the idea many analytic philosophers maybe had in the past that there is like this just these these words and they are always in a certain category.

01:04:18

Greg

I

01:04:21

Andy Grappling

It's not how language works at all. Language is is conceptual.

01:04:23

Greg

i know

01:04:26

Andy Grappling

And I strongly have um trust in the people I coach that they will know what I mean by this and that. And I don't have to be overly explicit in the exact word and be super careful because ah the way they know me as a person, the way I coach, them all the way I know the person I coach, I know which language to use, I know they will just get what I want to talk to them just fine if I use the term technique and will not get hung up with all these specifics.

01:04:59

Greg

Okay, perfect. Stop. Pause there for a second. So the' exactly right. If you've listened to any of my stuff, I say this all the time. The importance isn't in the language, it's in the shared experience.

01:05:11

Greg

So once we have a shared experience, I can anchor my language to something that we agree upon. And then we can use that anchor to shift intention and attention in a meaningful way.

01:05:22

Greg

So I tell everybody this. The language I use in my room is the this different than the language I'm using now. Because when I'm talking on a podcast, when I'm talking on the phone, when I'm talking to someone who doesn't know me and I don't know them, i have to be more clear than I mean to be because I don't know what you're hearing.

01:05:39

Greg

We do not have a shared experience. So in an attempt to be clear and consistent, I'm picky about my language. But when I'm just hanging out with my students, I'm far less picky because we can work out the nuances right there sitting in front of each other.

01:05:49

Andy Grappling

Thank you.

01:05:53

Greg

But the shared experience holds so much value in giving language context and utility. You know what I mean? This is why i don't speak Chinese. So when i hear someone do it, it sounds like noise.

01:06:06

Andy Grappling

yeah see but there that's where i would push back a little bit because i think we all the grapplers have a shared experience it's not like uh it's it's you're talking to golf player or something so so what i want to to i know what what you mean but what but what i i mean is when you watch adcc and you have seen five armbars from close cut everybody knows when I say, oh, I saw the technique armbar 10 times.

01:06:36

Andy Grappling

Everybody knows what you what I mean.

01:06:38

Greg

no, no. no

01:06:38

Andy Grappling

and i and And I don't know necessarily if it's really beneficial to say, no, there was no armbar, there was no technique. It's like people have this shared experience and they all agree on that there was and obviously an armbar.

01:06:52

Greg

Okay, so you're talking of the difference between defining a thing that has agreed upon features versus what it actually is. So if we're talking about how to get to a state or get to an endpoint or get to a conclusion, we're gonna have to define things a little bit differently.

01:07:08

Greg

If we're talking about the agreed upon conclusion, then we can define it as its set of features we can give it a name. so So I'm in agreement with that. But again, people are conflating these things and that's what frustrates me.

01:07:21

Greg

Um, because if you if I, I I've seen this so many times, do you know how many times I've been around high level people that can say arm lock that can show an arm lock, but they have no idea how to discuss it outside of its steady States.

01:07:21

Andy Grappling

yep But

01:07:33

Greg

They don't know why it emerges. They can't articulate anything about it, but they can do it. But none of their language gets us to how it emerged or why it exists. That's mysterious to me.

01:07:45

Greg

and And the thing is, i well, not really, because I i know it's a a different function of our ability to engage with the world. And so, again, it because what ends up happening is you get an expert performer who uses their ability as an excuse to define things one way, and they think that their definition should lead the listener to where they are now.

01:08:03

Greg

And that's a shit path. You know what I mean? It's not real. That's not actually what's happening.

01:08:10

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I don't know. It's like we talked about this also a lot. It's the phrase we both use. It's like don't confuse the map with the territory and I mean, you said, for example, people use words to describe stuff, but not they are not clear about what it actually is.

01:08:31

Andy Grappling

And this is my point. It's like words, by definition, are never what it actually is. so the So language is always, in some sense, you have this issue.

01:08:38

Greg

I agree.

01:08:43

Andy Grappling

And you can try to be more precise and use more and words and be more informed, whatever.

01:08:45

Greg

Right?

01:08:48

Andy Grappling

but it will never be ah what it actually is. And I i think, um again, it's like there's...

01:08:52

Greg

I agree. but But getting closer to that helps us communicate more clearly. And then linking that to a shared experience gets us there better. So that's what I'm arguing for.

01:09:02

Andy Grappling

Yeah, but I... But oftentimes the way you speak, I don't perceive it as more clearly, to be honest, because I feel like if I say to persons, okay, this was a Kimura trap, there is no need to say, oh, there's no Kimura trap.

01:09:08

Greg

Because...

01:09:16

Andy Grappling

There's only steady state this and that. it's It's everybody knows what I mean. Everybody. It's like there's no need to be more precise.

01:09:25

Greg

Well, you would think that, but if if things are in fact functional and things are in fact context dependent by saying Kimura, I just give an idea of a shape. Now that shape has a multitude of functions it's achieved many different ways.

01:09:37

Greg

And we don't get at it just by calling it a Kimura or calling it anything really. And so again, it's just a philosophical discussion that it doesn't exist. So, and what I mean is it, because it as a steady state is contextually dependent.

01:09:50

Greg

And if we don't understand the context in which it emerges and why it emerges, then we don't understand anything about the thing we're calling a Kimura. And that's what I'm trying to show to people. because Because this is why we get instructionals. This is why we get these perfect techniques. This is why the system bloats.

01:10:06

Greg

Because we only have names of things, but we don't understand the thing itself. Because once we understood the thing, we wouldn't need as many names for it.

01:10:15

Andy Grappling

See, but but again, this is where i kind of disagree because when when when I, for example, use the term Kimura, which I highly dislike um again because it's named after some person, but it's short and concise, so I use it.

01:10:30

Greg

But it isn't. It's a nickname of a Japanese guy from 200 years ago.

01:10:34

Andy Grappling

Yes, I know, but again,

01:10:36

Greg

But without the shared experience, it's a meaningless word.

01:10:38

Andy Grappling

Yeah, but but but again, this is this is my whole point. is But there is the shared experience because by invoking the name Kimura, I believe that invoke the whole experience people already have and already know in an embodied way.

01:10:43

Greg

Right.

01:10:55

Andy Grappling

And and it's it's much more more than just these five letters. and And this is where i what what I say is if you say a Kimura doesn't exist, yes, okay. But then I believe also,

01:11:08

Andy Grappling

a dog does not exist. I mean, it's like, of it's not in the name. It's like when when we talk about dog, you invoke a bunch of experiences people have.

01:11:15

Greg

you

01:11:20

Andy Grappling

Some people might have been bitten and then they perceive the word dog a little bit differently. Other people might have a dog at home and and whatever. And so so I'm like, i'm I'm not sure if you're maybe a bit too concerned about the lack of experience um by by by using certain certain words, because I feel like maybe for some people, and this is always the issue with language, it will not come across the way you want it to, because there is no shared lived experience.

01:11:49

Andy Grappling

But with many, there is.

01:11:52

Greg

But again again, it's just like you said, where is the line? What is the shared experience? When we say Kimura, what are we referring to? Are we referring to training it? Are we referring it to being on the bottom? Are we you referring it to as a control point? Are you are we referring to as a threat?

01:12:04

Greg

What are we doing with it? Why is the arm bent? Is the arm always bent? is it What if the arm's a little bit straight? Is it still a Kimura? So again, its just all I'm saying is that with the one word, we can only agree upon what we think we see when we look at it.

01:12:18

Greg

That's it. And that's fine. There's a fine starting point. But if if we don't wrap, if we can't get to the context in which we use the word, then we don't get to anything. That's all. That's the only point that I'm making.

01:12:30

Greg

So like, for example, if i if I'm coaching a position, we would say something like this. grip We use this word figure four. So this is a figure four grip. Doesn't matter. It's just what the language I like. um And the the figure four grip looks like this, and its central function is to stay attached and to keep the arm bent.

01:12:45

Greg

And so in this situation, we're going to try to perform those functions with this specific grip. We call this figure four. And so they have a name for a thing that they can refer to, but it's also directly connected to an experience they're about to have based on the function we use it for.

01:12:58

Greg

And then to me, that's a more robust way to put somebody in the environment and to get them acting. And so then later on in the community, we can both say Kimura in figure four, but ah the strength of that word will only be relative to the strength in which we have the shared experience.

01:13:13

Andy Grappling

I mean, with the last part, I agree um with the first part, but but but let's also can not get hung up with the whole discussion about names.

01:13:25

Andy Grappling

Again, i just believe context is everything and oftentimes, um

01:13:29

Greg

So do I.

01:13:33

Andy Grappling

the words get clear by the context we use them. And and and and and I have trust in a lot of people I talk with.

01:13:36

Greg

Thanks.

01:13:40

Andy Grappling

um And I never had the feeling, for example, in my room, that people really don't get what I meant. It's it's more mostly it's like in the whole context of everything we do from a weekly day-to-day basis.

01:13:57

Andy Grappling

And they know me, I know them. It's it's usually perfectly clear use the term Kimura or double egg.

01:14:03

Greg

For sure. But again, again, yeah again, you're du that's your experience. That's who you're with. And I'm in agreement with everything. I'm not in disagreement. I'm only talking about this on podcast to start a philosophical discussion to try to get people at the idea that context is everything.

01:14:17

Greg

Context is everything. And so a single leg doesn't exist out of the context in which we're using it and engaging with it. So if we say single leg, we have to be very clear of what we mean when we say it. That's it.

01:14:29

Greg

that's that That's all I've ever meant to do. It's just that for some reason, context is too hard for most people.

01:14:36

Andy Grappling

Yeah, that's why I made a post about fantasies and I call it contextual blindness, right? Because people are just blind to the whole idea of of things being embedded in a context and that one thing who looks a certain thing might only work in a certain context and be absolutely catastrophic in another context.

01:14:44

Greg

Yes.

01:14:54

Greg

That's, Andy, that's exactly why I'm bringing that up. and that's exactly what I mean. Because usually that that context issue comes from the naming fallacy. The naming tells us nothing about the thing itself, nor the context in which it's embedded.

01:15:08

Greg

So we have to get away from names. We have to start talking about things differently. Our language needs to be more reflective of the context in which these things are operating. Again, I'm just arguing for a new language that gets the learner back into the environment, you know based on a functional relationship.

01:15:27

Andy Grappling

All right.

Exploring Grappling Techniques and Naming Conventions

01:15:28

Andy Grappling

um OK, maybe let's go somewhere else, maybe the last big topic, because I think we might discuss it more at length, but maybe not. Let's see. And whatever comes up.

01:15:38

Andy Grappling

um So I have this idea. method it's it's It's maybe a bit complicated. And I hope I can sketch it in the mind for for you and the people listening.

01:15:44

Greg

Okay.

01:15:51

Andy Grappling

um So the way I think, let's focus more on the complex systems on non-linear dynamics side of things, okay?

01:16:00

Greg

okay

01:16:01

Andy Grappling

So we move away from the sole helpers perception, direct perception, meoponti gibson we focus on the idea of complex systems or non-linear systems And because actually as a physicist, this is something I'm maybe most competent with, in the at least from the pure ah mathematics analytics side of things.

01:16:24

Andy Grappling

So I picture grappling like this. And this is very abstract. OK.

01:16:30

Greg

Okay, now I'm with it.

01:16:31

Andy Grappling

So again, this this is a picture, obviously, right? So don't confuse the map or the territory.

01:16:34

Greg

Okay.

01:16:35

Andy Grappling

But let's say like this. um So we have a certain phase space, like this word gets used a lot, right, in in complex system theory.

01:16:47

Andy Grappling

And we could imagine that for each joint, let's say, in the human body, we could um have an axis.

01:16:59

Andy Grappling

like, I don't know, x-axis for one joint and another. And and then on this axis, we can we could really exactly say the position of this joint by either one angle, if it's just open and closed, like at the elbow, or maybe two angles, if it's like rotated, like the shoulder more, it has a solid angle in space.

01:17:05

Greg

Thank you.

01:17:20

Andy Grappling

And then in theory, we could have a coordinate frame where we could...

01:17:28

Andy Grappling

picture every angle in the body of person A, then we could do the same thing of person B. um And then both have a certain relation, both bodies have a certain relationship to each other.

01:17:45

Andy Grappling

So they could be close, they could be behind, left, right, pop up, down. And there's also the relation or the coordinates compared to the floor, which is, I believe grappling is ah it's it's a sport where we we we basically use the floor and then another person in our body. So this is for me like the three big components.

01:18:07

Andy Grappling

um And in theory, we could have this very high dimensional space, right? Like this would be a very high dimensional phase space. Maybe at some point, if I'm very bored, I might actually write down how many dimensions this really has, because I think this can be done quite easily.

01:18:22

Greg

Matsakis, yep. Okay. Okay.

01:18:25

Andy Grappling

um But I assume it's ah maybe 50 dimensional space, whatever. um So this is obviously something we cannot depict in a picture, 50 dimensions, it's impossible.

01:18:37

Andy Grappling

So let's just assume that we do an abstraction, we try to have all the positions of body A on the x-axis kind of abstractly and all the positions of the another body on the y-axis, okay?

01:18:54

Andy Grappling

And then we have this phase space of all grappling positions possible. And then I would picture a grappling match could, in theory, um be any trajectory going on and about in the space.

01:19:09

Andy Grappling

So one can move and there are many different positions and at some point it stops. Let's say when we have a submission.

01:19:18

Greg

Right.

01:19:18

Andy Grappling

And what I believe, which is quite interesting, is if we if we picture these trajectories in the space, then we have always the same starting point, right?

01:19:30

Andy Grappling

All matches start the same way. um And we have very similar endpoints. it is Again, they might be a little bit different. Each arm lock might be a little bit different. But in in many dimensions, for example, extension of the elbow, it's the same.

01:19:47

Greg

but

01:19:48

Andy Grappling

And ah this is maybe what you would call invariance, I'm not sure. um And what I'm thinking about is in this very complex space where we all move about in grappling, only a very, very, very tiny fraction of this configuration stage is actually reached.

01:20:11

Greg

Yes, correct.

01:20:11

Andy Grappling

and And we have very many, um that's that's that's wrong, we have many, but not too much points, we repeatedly um reach again and again and again.

01:20:29

Greg

Correct.

01:20:30

Andy Grappling

um

01:20:33

Andy Grappling

And my question is, because this is like like like like, I think we agree, right now we have just, this is the language of non-linear dynamics, it's a phase space, we move, and then we can do a bunch of stuff and picture.

01:20:47

Andy Grappling

But I would say, for example, isn't there for you also um ah big value in defining really, the the let's say, the...

01:20:56

Greg

Thank

01:21:01

Andy Grappling

the that The things where all the trajectories always cross certain points and then maybe they spread apart again and to make very clear which are reoccurring themes and give them very specific names and even short impregnant names.

01:21:16

Andy Grappling

Or would you say as long as it's not exactly specifically context isn't that, it's not good. Because what I believe is like how I approach things. There are like certain choke points in this phase space.

01:21:29

Greg

Right.

01:21:30

Andy Grappling

where ahead where I want to be clear, i have a name for this, a short name I can talk about. And then from going from point to point, from these choke points to choke points, then all these trajectories go go far apart and about, and they have certainly X thousand ways to go from a to B. And this is where i use more like probably your language or know of saying there's no move.

01:21:57

Andy Grappling

um So maybe do you have some thoughts on on on this picture?

01:22:03

Greg

I do. So I rather than, so that's what i my entire framework is based on what you just described. So taking all the ideas that I've come to, I think, understand and, and, uh,

01:22:15

Greg

ecological dynamics, I came with the idea of ah different lenses to look at what you just described. So the first one was immobilization as it leads to strangulation and breaking. The reason I picked this up is because as I engage with the other body, as the other that body engage with me, as we both engage towards the floor, there are certain degrees of immobility in the system that causes strangulation and breakability.

01:22:37

Andy Grappling

Thank you.

01:22:37

Greg

And so these are all present at all times because it's the big effect that causes things to happen. And so I think defining that is important because it links intention, attention, and out outcome all together into meaningful action.

01:22:55

Greg

and Because that's what we're trying to get at. So if we don't have techniques, for example, or we don't have these highly specific definable things, but instead we have these conditions that have effects, I think we can get at it better if we just describe it big picture.

01:23:08

Greg

Like i said, immobilization, strangulation, and breaking. And then we change the scope. Like, what does that even mean? Well, we attack the periphery. This is the stuff that sticks out from us. And so when we engage to try to get closer to one another, that's where the fight initially is phased.

01:23:24

Greg

um Because closeness is the first surface that we use um as a proxy for control, just getting closer and closing the gap. and then what And then that's getting attacking the periphery, getting past the head, arms, legs, the little bits that stick out to get to the center.

01:23:40

Greg

ah Once we get to the center, there's another phase transition where we go from standing to the floor. And we basically sandwich the person in between us and the floor as the next phase transition. And that's where we have, um so once we gain access to center mass, we immobilize it so we can isolate and re-attack the periphery.

01:23:56

Greg

And these are the things that are always happening. So as the person defends itself from being held on the floor, it tries to create some space by pushing, pulling, twisting, basing, all that stuff. um We fight over that space to try to achieve the ultimate end of immobilization as it leads to strangulation and breaking.

01:24:10

Greg

So these aren't not so specific. They're actually all happening at the same time at different degrees at different levels. And then if we zoom out again, and we so how do we even start this process of attacking the periphery to get access in our mask, blah, blah, blah.

01:24:23

Greg

We make and maintain connection. So there there's another choke point. So I have to start getting close to you to make contact with you. And I have to use that contact in specific ways to manage that distance, i.e.

01:24:35

Greg

the control points between you and I and the control points between you and I and the floor. So anyway, I've taken all that into account when designing the conceptual framework that I created as a usable and pragmatic way to get past these hard definitions or these highly specific technical lines of engagement.

01:24:56

Andy Grappling

OK, so so um

01:25:01

Andy Grappling

how how I picked that up is you used a lot of verbs and a lot of processes. You talked again about intention, attention, effects, and and so on. And and again, it's all all great. We discussed this already.

01:25:17

Andy Grappling

so But there seems then that you still see no value if a certain position, really by just the looks of it, not kind of ignoring really but they've wrote what's next, what came before.

01:25:27

Greg

We have no...

01:25:31

Andy Grappling

But but there if there are like certain positions in phase space who come like almost guaranteed every match, you still wouldn't want to give it a very specific <unk> name.

01:25:40

Greg

we have no

01:25:46

Greg

We do. So, but we want to give it a process oriented name rather than a steady state name.

01:25:47

Andy Grappling

OK.

01:25:51

Greg

So we have the invariant features of the periphery, for example. So we have the head arms, excuse me, head, hands, elbows, shoulders for the legs. We have feet, knees, hips, and then we have chest and back. So these are like the the big picture items that we engage with to try to impose our will as it leads to immobilization, strangulation, and breaking.

01:26:11

Greg

um And we focus our intention attention toward these features, because if we can engage with those features, we can produce invariant effects like um ah pressure and opposition that creates breaking or strangulation or ah pressure and opposition to me and the floor that creates pinnability.

01:26:28

Greg

um And there are certain lines of demarcation that are constantly and continuously reached that produce stronger effects than otherwise would be had. So for example, if I can cover your chest with my chest or cover your ah back with my chest while simultaneously covering your hips and shoulders, then i produce more of pinnable space. So the engagement there is you become more pinnable to me.

01:26:51

Greg

So those alignments matter as it relates to the function in which we're producing while reaching them. So if we want to give it a name like mount or back mount, great. But if we don't understand functionally why those exist, then we don't understand why those lines of demarcation are necessary and why we call them anything.

01:27:13

Andy Grappling

um Yeah, I mean, on the whole functional side, I kind of agree. And i feel like almost reluctantly you mentioned mount and back mount. So to be very clear, do you use mount and back mount as words in your practice?

01:27:28

Greg

Yes. I only, i don't reluctantly name them. i because again, choose, we could call them rabbit position and tiger position. It doesn't matter what we call them as long as the shared experience has had and is based on some functional idea.

01:27:42

Greg

Like, yeah. and And that's what i'm I'm always trying to get at. So I try to use words that describe features that we all experience. So I like to use back mount um or mount to try to help facilitate what exactly we mean by that or chest to chest pinning or chest to back pinning.

01:28:02

Greg

Because any human in the world that speaks English, at least. um And I say those words, they they carry more meaning just because they're descriptors of something we all experience. So that's, I only reluctantly say back mount or mount just because I, again, you and I haven't been in the same room together.

01:28:21

Andy Grappling

and okay yeah i was just curious because um you talked about um highly specific positions and how we how you believe it's not good to use specific language for or terms for a highly specific thing.

01:28:40

Andy Grappling

and and And I kind of agree and I agree with kind of what you said about the shared experience and the functional role and everything. But all I'm trying to get at is there are actually some highly specific positions

01:28:56

Greg

Agreed.

01:28:57

Andy Grappling

who are highly frequently.

01:28:59

Greg

Agreed.

01:29:00

Andy Grappling

and And I think we have to be clear that this is not the same as highly specific positions who who are highly contextual and highly ah infrequent, right?

01:29:12

Greg

okay

01:29:12

Andy Grappling

so So, and I think we have to be clear that we cannot put them both on the same footing.

01:29:18

Andy Grappling

We cannot say it is the same if I want to ah see a certain thing somebody did at the latest Polaris tournament and then there's an Instagram clip and then somebody does a YouTube video of this technique and calls it, the I don't know, Bobby Locke or whatever.

01:29:30

Greg

Agree.

01:29:37

Andy Grappling

um See, then I'm in complete agreement with you. It's just stupid. It's using language in a very deflationary sense and it makes everything more confusing. But the whole thing I wanted to get across is like, if somebody has mouth or something, which is like almost in every match, it's highly specific, but it's also highly frequent.

01:29:59

Andy Grappling

And so I think it's very important to have very concise, very clear language and not say something.

01:29:59

Greg

agree

01:30:02

Greg

I.

01:30:05

Andy Grappling

I know you didn't say that. I know just to to bring a point across i think it's not then very good if to say it's a position where our torso lies on the torso of and of another person and i hook one um with this with the function to do that i think like you know what i want but to say right

01:30:23

Greg

No, I don't. That's not how I operate. Let me give you an example. So if I'm teaching pinning, we teach the function of holding somebody down on their back.

01:30:28

Andy Grappling

boy

01:30:30

Greg

And we start with either a chest-to-chest alignment or a chest-to-back alignment. This is the idea that my chest is over your chest or my chest is over your back. And the idea is that we start students within these situations at any degree, at any angle around the body,

01:30:43

Greg

for the purpose of maintaining this relative alignment, to produce a relative function of holding someone still. And then if we do something like have our students perform the task of covering the bottom player's hips with their legs, we would refer to this transition into from one state space to another as the mount.

01:30:53

Andy Grappling

Thank you.

01:30:59

Greg

So they have a reference point for something that they will try to go towards and repeat on a regular basis because it is it is almost... invariant like it's where invariant feature like human body alignment or human body parts line up with invariant function i.e the pin ability of a body these two things comes very close to being absolute and so i think that when we get to those points where feature and function marry we have we have a we we can talk more consistently about what we're seeing and we can call it something very consistent

01:31:33

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I mean, this is where it's something we talked about before the recording.

01:31:38

Greg

Mm-hmm.

01:31:40

Andy Grappling

It's yeah, I think it's there's great value if the community of grappling really tries to ah figure out what these let's say choke points in face space which might be highly specific but also highly frequent are and give them very descriptive concise names ah so people like you who are very careful about the language and people who really want words and

01:32:11

Andy Grappling

want to have short words and don't be afraid to say, oh, OK, we don't have shared, that we are clear on what we are talking about. And I think, um yeah, it's obviously but some people think that's already the case.

01:32:28

Andy Grappling

i and I think you and me, we would disagree. And some things are well described, like not.

01:32:32

Greg

For sure.

01:32:35

Andy Grappling

Other things are not well described, like i don't know um reverse that either guards i don't know what that means i don't know i mean i know what it is but i don't know what the words should mean or describe in any way um so i think um it will be hard and it will probably not happen to be honest that we will go over all the stuff in grappling and rename it i don't think there will be a great convention of renaming but at least as coaches i think we can all um

01:32:48

Greg

but sure

01:33:06

Andy Grappling

Try to introduce concise language, um but also not be afraid to um yeah give certain things, certain positions, good names.

01:33:14

Greg

for Well, that that's my project. That's literally what I've been working on over the last 10 years. So I'm trying to, again, take a nonlinear idea and put it into a system that currently see things as linear.

01:33:28

Greg

and And that's a very difficult thing to do. And i'm again, I'm trying to create more meaningful language based on like what you said, ah spec but high specificity that meets high frequency. Because if we get high specificity that meets high frequency, that means that something about that exchange is invariant and we're getting close to what must happen.

01:33:48

Greg

And we can start there as our main focus for what we might want our students to do.

01:33:56

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I give you maybe an example which is quite similar, I guess, to the ones you gave. For example, I came from Judo, right? So this was my first martial arts and I did it for many, many, many years at a fairly high level, I guess.

01:34:13

Andy Grappling

um And yeah Judo is highly specific in the language they use, which at times is very helpful.

01:34:17

Greg

Yes.

01:34:22

Greg

Yeah.

01:34:22

Andy Grappling

um And at some points it's very unhelpful because there are very distinct differences and then people get hang up.

01:34:26

Greg

For sure.

01:34:30

Andy Grappling

Actually, that's very common in the Judo community that people discuss if it was Ashiguruma or Haragoshi or whatever.

01:34:36

Greg

but Right.

01:34:37

Andy Grappling

And then there's like great discussions on how and why and where the action and whatever.

Constraints and Playfulness in Skill Development

01:34:44

Andy Grappling

um And so I always try to find the best middle ground where things are descriptive.

01:34:51

Andy Grappling

concise but also not too much. So for example, for me, when it comes to pins, I say there's mount and there's crossbody.

01:34:55

Greg

you

01:35:00

Andy Grappling

It's like these are for me two distinctions who are valuable, I believe, because like you said, in one case, we are really engaging with the legs and the hips. And in another case, usually the hips are fairly far apart.

01:35:15

Andy Grappling

ah far far away But also, I'm not saying that every pin can be a mount or crossbody. i i I say if if it's a real curing thing, probably it's crossbody or mount, but also you can pin in 100 different ways, which are not crossbody and not mount, um just to give example, for example.

01:35:39

Greg

Yeah, we...

01:35:39

Andy Grappling

Because I don't use, I don't know, the this and that pin and whatever. It's like either you're on top of the guy with your legs or not. I mean,

01:35:48

Greg

Right. Well, that's actually how we define it in our system. So we talk about pins being either more or less complete. So chest-to-chest pins, as long as they function as a pin, are are considered pins. And same thing with chest-to-back.

01:36:00

Greg

The ones that we consider less complete are when the legs are not involved in the pinning process. And then the pins where the legs are involved in the pinning process are more complete. um And so this is where we look at mount and back mount as being steady states that are highly ah ah sought after because they're very defined they're very defined as having both arms and legs involved in the pinning process.

01:36:22

Greg

but there are also functions in between them, like half guard, for example, as the top player, like what wrestlers would typically call the Turk, which is our half guard, ah serves to help pin the hips to the mat by getting the legs involved from the top player.

01:36:35

Greg

um So either way, leg involvement versus not leg involvement is ah sort of our descriptor for pins.

01:36:43

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I think in general wrestling does better but does a better job in naming than Jiu-Jitsu. Also so Judo does a better job. Again, both not perfect, but I think Jiu-Jitsu has a major problem with naming conventions because most names are just x extremely...

01:37:03

Andy Grappling

not descriptive and sometimes even stupid, I believe. um And yeah, I mean, for example, really find that the concept of half guard is very, so it's it's half a guard and half not a guard or it's it's like just whatever.

01:37:21

Greg

So for us, even when we say, for example, in my school, I want to teach quote half guard, I always define as half guard is any position where their bottom player has two legs wrapped around a single player's one.

01:37:22

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:37:31

Greg

So if I, two of my legs interact with your one, we could consider it half guard. Whether they're standing, whether theyre one knee up, one knee down, whether to double knees down, whether they're chest to chest, doesn't matter. Two legs interacting with one is considered half guard.

01:37:44

Andy Grappling

but yeah For example, what I do is I know not that everybody would agree, but if there is no clear frame or way of separating or exerting force, I don't consider it a guard.

01:38:00

Andy Grappling

So for example, if somebody would just have my leg wrapped around with their legs, and I have them flatten out, I would not consider that any guard whatsoever.

01:38:12

Andy Grappling

um Because for me, always guard means you have created some separation or you have some means to move the the other person.

01:38:20

Greg

Yeah, we say that all guards have the same central function, which is to manage distance. If we can't manage distance with our leg as engaged, we don't have a guard.

01:38:29

Andy Grappling

OK. Yeah, because I think some half guards actually don't manage distance at all.

01:38:34

Greg

Yeah, well, depending on the...

01:38:35

Andy Grappling

but But whatever, and we don't have to discuss like intricates of some gods.

01:38:37

Greg

Well, I mean, no, for sure. Well, and the idea is this this is why we sort of define the position as just having a generalized alignment um because it produces the function of distance management at varying degrees of effectiveness.

01:38:49

Greg

So like we could say that something like reverse De La Riva or knee shield are much more effective half guards than something like your traditional chest-to-chest where you have both your legs wrapped around one, but top player has cross-face and underhook.

01:39:01

Greg

Like you're basically stuck there.

01:39:04

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:39:04

Greg

So...

01:39:06

Andy Grappling

Yeah, that's why we discussed earlier before recording, we both actually roll with pins in our gyms. So if people listening, and pins are great.

01:39:16

Greg

Yeah.

01:39:16

Andy Grappling

and Because I strongly believe that even if you were are guard player, almost every guard with maybe some tiny tiny tiny exceptions you shouldn't be flat on your back anyways you should be either on your side or maybe seated or maybe curled up or whatever but if you are like flat on your back and another person is on top of you you are probably doing something wrong so it's best to just avoid it and i really really think that people try to give it a try.

01:39:47

Andy Grappling

You don't have to be overly specific with all the constraints.

01:39:50

Greg

Thank you.

01:39:50

Andy Grappling

Just make sure you do some rounds where you would do pins and submissions because people will develop, I think, a lot of great habits if they are really conscious about pinning.

01:40:01

Greg

I agree. We actually don't even consider guard recovery when the legs are back in front. We consider guard recovery when the back is off the mat. So whether you're seated, on your side, or standing, this is what we constitute as a recovery.

01:40:10

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:40:14

Greg

And we do this for, of course, training purposes to really build a culture of movers who keep off their backs as much as possible.

01:40:22

Andy Grappling

yeah that's exactly what we do for example um um what i do a lot or what we do a lot is what i call and reps ah good norma huh it stands for a reversal escape pin or submission so uh

01:40:37

Greg

Oh, yeah, that's interesting.

01:40:40

Andy Grappling

So we do a bunch of positional rounds where we start in any position. Oftentimes it's one of these positions where we say it's highly specific, but they're highly frequent, let's say like turtle or whatever.

01:40:51

Andy Grappling

um And sometimes it's a very weird position I come up with to get people engaged in scrambles and stuff. But I always say the end goal is the same. It's like if you're on bottom in the defensive position, if there is a defensive position, sometimes it's neutral.

01:41:06

Andy Grappling

If you're in the defensive position, you either reverse the guy, which means you you are on top for an extended period of three to five seconds. Or you escape. And by escape, we literally mean the way an escape is defining college or American folks are wrestling, which means you're like back on your feet and you are in a neutral position.

01:41:23

Greg

neutral

01:41:26

Greg

you

01:41:28

Andy Grappling

um And obviously, if you're on top, ah your main goal is to pin the other guy or to submit the other guy.

Coaching Methodologies: From Beginners to Advanced

01:41:35

Andy Grappling

um And I believe this is also like a concrete practical tip for many, many people listening is I tried a lot of constraints led things and the experience I had that um oftentimes it is better to have less constraints and be less specific and to have this reoccurring theme for me, where just said we do reps.

01:41:57

Greg

you

01:42:00

Andy Grappling

And I give a position, it allows me to explain the task very quickly because it's reoccurring. And also I think it's it's specific enough for people to really um learn and to self-organize, but it's still broadly enough to have the room for play and for creativity and for freedom, which I believe is very important and often lacking if we introduce too many constraints.

01:42:29

Greg

I completely agree. we this is so we've pulled like Our constraints are um very, what we call necessary, like levels of engagement that guide action and in a meaningful way, but not so much so that you can only solve the problem in one way.

01:42:30

Andy Grappling

so

01:42:44

Greg

um So yeah, we try to make the CLA games as big as possible.

01:42:49

Andy Grappling

yeah Yeah, so um maybe if we just talk about constraints-led, because even though i kind of played devil's advocate in the beginning, I'm obviously also so using constraints-led approaches in my trading.

01:43:03

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:43:04

Greg

Well, we can only constrain. That's the only tool we really have because you know no matter what level we believe that action is happening on, we have people performing tasks in environments. And so at some level, we're constraining it for some reason, whether it's time, whether it's emotion, whether it's ah fatigue, you know whether it's task.

01:43:14

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:43:21

Andy Grappling

Yeah, I mean, of course, but in the end, you if you want your terms to mean anything, you cannot say everything a sad term. I mean, because I heard people say, or you cannot not coach ecological, everything is ecological. Yeah, okay, then why do you call it ecological approach?

01:43:39

Greg

Right, well, but the that...

01:43:40

Andy Grappling

Then everybody is doing the ecological approach, and it's always what everybody is always doing.

01:43:43

Greg

what Well, true. Well, that's, I actually think that's what's happening. And so just, I think what helps us is we define, so it's a constraints led approach. So what this means is that if we know that we only manipulate constraints and then that's what we should do. We should focus on ones that are contextually relevant and ones that are both shared between the practice environment and the game that we play.

01:44:07

Greg

So it's less so that, you know, we either manipulate them. We don't, it's that that is all we do. So then we should focus our attention on doing that.

01:44:17

Andy Grappling

Okay, so that's exactly what I want to talk about is just to give people some ah look into what I do and maybe you can comment if you do it similarly or maybe differently.

01:44:29

Andy Grappling

For example, um the way I see it is

01:44:34

Andy Grappling

I usually start with beginners if I can and I usually I can because I don't train in a big commercial gym it's usually small small groups um if people come I usually immediately roll with them full without constraints without anything because I basically tell them okay try to take me down hold me down, kill me, I don't care what you do.

01:45:01

Andy Grappling

And because i'm I'm like, obviously more advanced, usually I don't get killed.

01:45:01

Greg

from

01:45:06

Andy Grappling

Otherwise, I wouldn't have this conversation, I guess. and Because I want people to start with the whole thing right away. Because that they have a certain experience that they understand, oh, basically, I don't know, I don't have to know shit.

01:45:20

Andy Grappling

And I can still kind of intuitively and instinctively move about and try my best. Obviously, they a lot of mistakes and it's not great. That's not the point. The point is I usually start actually without any constraints other than the natural constraints of the sport or the context of the class and stuff.

01:45:38

Andy Grappling

And then, um, Again, we do these kind of reps, repetition escape, pin submission from any given position, basically every class.

01:45:49

Greg

Thank you.

01:45:49

Andy Grappling

We do with some takedown variation games, like I post a lot about the Sub-Sagai or the so Sumo style games. We do this also every class. And where I believe like specific constraints led really where we have like specific, you set a specific goal, you guide the intention, attention and and you add additional constraints is I use them either um in addition to the more broad games.

01:46:20

Andy Grappling

For example, we might do just starting from something like rear position and then maybe before afterwards we do more specific things but again i always try to make sure that we extend the the scope of the task then before or after that people can use what they have worked on specifically in a broader context then after or before um or where i use highly constrained things is to fix specific issues of specific people

01:46:28

Greg

Thank you.

01:46:55

Andy Grappling

because I see it like this is any system, complex system has of course many parts, many subsystems and everything is nested and whatever.

01:47:00

Greg

Hmm.

01:47:06

Andy Grappling

And usually you only have to break things apart if something is broken. um So I'm very careful, especially with the advanced guys With the advanced guys, I almost never do much constraints.

01:47:23

Andy Grappling

I let them use very broad things, very playful, lots of free sparring. But when I see that certain people make certain mistakes again and again, then I might pick them and give them a very specific task with very specific constraint. Because ah as a coach from the outside and being knowledgeable about the mechanics, I know where the system collapses at which point.

01:47:47

Andy Grappling

And then I can, without maybe giving it a specific technique or anything, I can create very specific task or game for set person to fix that problem.

01:47:50

Greg

Thank you.

01:47:59

Andy Grappling

And once it is fixed, I don't do it ever again anymore. Maybe then another problem will arise and so on. But I'm also, um I'm also, um

01:48:11

Andy Grappling

aware that this does not work if you coach, for example, 50 people a class. So it's also, again, every coach is constrained by what he's working with. So um this were just my two cents.

01:48:24

Greg

Yeah, I mean, you know, I have a much more organized way to approach it because I largely teach a general class anywhere between 30 and 50 people. You know, I would say about 21 classes a week. So we have to, there's a lot of stuff we're constraining for. We're constraining for our initial experience. We're constraining for...

01:48:41

Greg

ah Level of fatigue, current capacity, we're constraining for um ah removing rate limiters, so we know things like fear of falling. So there's there's also lots there's lots of things that we're trying to bake into a practice to try to deal with whatever problems we have in the room that day.

01:48:56

Greg

And again, for basic people, it's different than for, I guess, like an intermediate group versus what we consider advanced group that has, let's say, competitive desires. um But generally, and the class is structured a meaningful way to to help teach people that intentions lead to outcomes through engagement.

01:49:11

Greg

And that's our main constraint. And then we do that a bunch of different ways, keeping the games as big as possible from standing to guarded to pinned. Um, and then we open them up as the student becomes more advanced and we do more like what you would suggest, like the rep thing.

01:49:24

Greg

We do this often from a lot of given positions with a lot of variation, both stereotypical alignments and random alignments. Um, you know, different types of games, like continuous, terminal. Yeah. So, I mean, it's, it's much more in depth than, um,

01:49:39

Greg

Just kind of let them play. i mean, we we get basically to eventually just play by the, you know, as we're dealing with more advanced players, because like you said, we can't solve problems that haven't yet ah arisen. So we have to let those things arise to really constrain individual athletes well at the higher levels.

01:49:56

Andy Grappling

Yeah, the last point you mentioned, and maybe that's a good topic to slowly finish the podcast, is ah the concept of play, because I think it's probably something we both believe to be important.

01:50:11

Andy Grappling

um is that play and the whole idea of the play circuit which is very well understood in the in the neuroscience and learning and cognitive science community play actually and needs freedom so it's very important that we may we we are very um clear that if we want to people to really get into flow states and in playful minds we cannot over constrain anything

01:50:25

Greg

Thank you.

01:50:39

Andy Grappling

And I see a lot of things, especially online, as people show a certain new constraints like game task payment or whatever, oftentimes they actually are too constrained. They don't offer enough freedom to actually engage in in the play circuit in ithu to achieve like true creativity, joy, and everything, the all the nice stuff that comes with it.

01:51:02

Greg

Mm-hmm.

01:51:02

Greg

Okay.

01:51:02

Andy Grappling

And so I also believe that um especially especially for advanced people,

01:51:08

Andy Grappling

playing as much as possible, having this play mindset, going, um trying to figure it out, moving, being very, very free um is very important. And maybe because I know the way you think about it, you said, like you said, constraints are everything with you, but the name constraints suggests that we limit the people. And it's very important that we know constraints,

01:51:33

Andy Grappling

We have to remove the limits, let people figure them out. And for me, what I want, and I think I'm almost there with my people, um not yet, is for the advanced class that it at some point becomes almost like always open mat, where I know people have enough freedom and enough competency to know what they want to do, how they want to play,

01:51:42

Greg

Yeah.

01:51:49

Greg

yeah

01:51:57

Andy Grappling

and me as a coach to actually step back as much as I can. um So yeah,

Reflection and Closing Thoughts on the Discussion

01:52:05

Greg

yeah Well, see, here's the thing is like, e what's what the, the, the real fucked up beauty here is that even when you say something like you want prolet constraints, we know remove options. So for example, how do you remove the option of competitiveness to where things open up to more play like scenarios? Now I figured this out.

01:52:05

Andy Grappling

don't overdo it with constraints.

01:52:26

Greg

I actually know how to do it, but Of course, I would never tell this in public because it's a huge trade secret that I've figured out um because I've been constraining myself to try to find what causes competitiveness versus what takes it away.

01:52:30

Andy Grappling

Hehehehe.

01:52:39

Greg

um yeah And you actually have to constrain competitiveness, but you can't do it by saying things like 50%, 25%, go easy, go light. And you can't do it with rehearsal or um with what you would call predictive engagement.

01:52:59

Greg

Anyway, yes. so Again, it constraining constraints is just not put limits on it until we engage in performance battles. It's also constraining things we don't want to affect the amount of touches that are happening in a given session.

01:53:14

Greg

yeah

01:53:15

Andy Grappling

Yeah.

01:53:17

Andy Grappling

All right. I guess it's a good point. We stopped almost two hours. It was definitely fun to talk about stuff and um maybe I don't know if I asked the same question every person asks you in the gazillion podcasts you do or not.

01:53:35

Andy Grappling

um So hopefully i didn't. And hopefully this was kind of something new or enjoyable for you and also for the people listening. And I guess we will talk again sooner or later and some things.

01:53:51

Andy Grappling

And yeah, I enjoyed it.

01:53:53

Greg

yeah Yeah, me too, man.

01:53:54

Andy Grappling

And

01:53:55

Greg

I really appreciate it I mean, i never get to talk beyond basic definitions and basic arguments, even though you and I went back and forth and had a little disagreement. I still felt like our disagreements were productive um and that we were able to kind of illuminate some of our ideas more deeply.

01:54:07

Greg

So thank you for for that. And thank you for trying to bring that out in this conversation.

01:54:14

Andy Grappling

All right. Bye-bye.

01:54:17

Greg

See