Sales of comic books and movie spin-offs are at an all time high, we all enjoy Spidermanm, the X-Men and co. Magicians and mentalists such as Derren Brown are doing very well too. Running parallel to that is the NLP / psychology industry which has made huge inroads into the corporate market.
The martial arts world has always been fertile ground for superhuman feats. Every culture has its myths and legends, from Achilles to Cuchulain to Mu Lan to King Arthur. Many martial art styles have roots in mystic practices - Shaolin temple, ninjitsu, Zen monks. They often talk about developing "superhuman" powers. Traditionally these might inlcude things such as - light body skills (the ability to jump high distances from a standing start), poison hand/ dim mak (the ability to kill with a touch), telekenesis (the ability to move people or objects with the power of the mind), telepathy (the ability to read others' thoughts) and so on. In popular culture martial arts masters are able to display any or all of the above thanks to years of rigorous training in their respective disciplines.
So do these things exist? Are there really people who can read your thoughts and kill you with a mere touch? In recent history both major superpowers obviously thought it was an area worth investigating. The USA set up groups like the Stargate Project, the Soviets had similar programs running (in fact the book Experiments in Mental Suggestion discusses research as far back as the 1920s). As you might expect from the Cold War era it is difficult to draw definite conclusion from amongst the fog of secrecy, competition, desire for funding and mis-information. However I can't help feeling that if anything truly substantial had been achieved we would have had some kind of trickle-down effect by now
On a more personal level over the past 30 years I've experienced a wide range of teachers, some of whom claimed "special powers". In fact some of whom built their whole persona around those powers. So I've seen most of the no-contact people, a few ninjas and various type of chi-power exponents. In 100% of cases where their powers were heavily promoted, I thought their work was totally explainable through mundane psychology. They were very good at leading, establishing rapport, cold reading and so on. In even less savoury cases they were very skilled at manipulating the psyche of their students through what could probably best be described as "grooming". Of course there are a few Youtube clips of what happens when these teachers try and work with someone who hasn't been through the process - with predictable results!
On the other hand I've met a few people who demonstrated interesting skills not so easily explainable. The big difference was these skills manifested in normal situations rather than as a show-piece. No attention was drawn to them, they weren't presented as anything special. No money changed hands either!
Let's take a simple example, the hunter who lives and works in the forest, the commuter who works in the city. Switch environments and both will struggle. The commuter in the forest will not be able to predict the coming change in weather, see animal tracks, pick up the distant scent of woodsmoke. To the city dweller these may appear to be "superhuman" abilities (Crocodile Dundee) when in fact they are the result of training, experience and finely honed natural senses.
You can apply the same thing to human interaction. Those of you who trained at our Body Language Workshop recently will now be able to pick out some good indicators of stressful behaviour. When you get good at this you can amaze people by telling them what they are thinking in some circumstances. It isn't telepathy - you aren't literally getting a word flash up in your mind - but you can "read" them through the physical indicators. Refine that skill to a higher level and you can understand how some people disappear from view, confuse you into forgetting your name and all the other things that a skilled operator or "mentalist" can achieve. That's not to say there isn't trickery involved in stage mentalism though, as anyone who has seen my "mind reading" routines will know!
So "superhuman" abilities are a fantasy. Either the wishful thinking of someone wanting to be a lot more than they are, or the bait on a hook to reel in the vulnerable and gullible. Developed human potential is something esle altogether - but even then this development takes part alongside regualr training, it grows alongside the "bread and butter" skills. To sell it as some sort of instant "add-on" is also misleading in my view. There is also an issue of potential harm for anyone undergoing some types of training without adequate qualified supervision, that applies equally for physical and psychological work
I guess the old adage applies at the end of the day "if it sounds too good to be true, it is"
I'll leave you with a story I heard about an instructor up in Manchester. There was a local Ninja who was offering to teach the "secrets of invisibility". Out of interest the instructor visited the class and the results were less than spectacular. A few weeks later the instructor was in a local pub and saw the nija talking to a girl. He went over to the table, ignored the ninja and started chatting up the girl. The ninja gave an indignant "oi mate!". The instructor turned and said "sorry mate, I didn't see you there!" Classic....
PS if anyone out there feels they can demonstrate powers of telepathy, non-contact work or the like please do get in touch - as long as I can film whatever goes on I'm happy to give it a try.
that made me laugh Rob, well written too, good pace and mix, you are quite the scribe- very funny at the end,had me giggling in my car half an hour later, the power of humour, available to us all but ignored by many!terry g
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