Problematization
Problematization deconstructs common or conventional understandings of a subject matter in order to gain new insights. It is a method of defamiliarization or demythicization of common inherited knowledge (myth). Rather than accepting oversimplified viewpoints or stereotypes as givens, problematization frames that knowledge as a problem, allowing new viewpoints, consciousness, reflection, connection, possibility, hope, and action to emerge. In LMA, it creates the conditions for learning to flourish.
Introduction
Although our approach is called Liberation Martial Arts, we usually refer to it simply as LMA. This is intentional—we rarely address "martial arts" or any specific discipline directly in our movement modules. Instead, we focus on exploring activities and conditions. This isn't merely stylistic—it's philosophical, pedagogical, and political.
"Martial arts" is not a neutral term
The term "martial arts" is not historically accurate, universally agreed upon, or neutral. It's a Western invention that homogenizes diverse, predominantly non-Western folk traditions under a single label, reimagining them as military systems. Even in the West, the term only gained widespread adoption starting in the 1970s—mostly as a marketing tool. "Self-defense" is even more ill-defined and worsens the problems raised in this module.
Avoiding these terms—and direct martial arts training—helps us sidestep colonial, Western, capitalist baggage. "Martial arts" summons a rigid, fixed, predetermined image and set of assumptions that limit movement scope, learning, and freedom. Just as our bodies are occupied, movement must be liberated. Liberation Martial Arts also means liberating martial arts.
The problems with martial arts convention
Several problems arise in teaching martial arts today, especially in the West.
First, the broad category we know as "martial arts" mostly consists of informal, regional, non-standardized folk traditions that emerged from the land. Today, many of these traditions are no longer emergent but standardized, caricatured, orientalized, commercialized, industrialized, colonized, crystallized, and separated from the land—not just in the case of the teacher or the formalized art, but also for the practitioner who walks in the door. It's hard to escape.
Second, using martial arts to teach martial arts is like measuring a telescope with itself. It generates no new perspective or insight because it's trapped within itself. It's self-reinforcing and circular, where its assumptions or premises are also its conclusions. (e.g., these techniques are the best because they're in this martial art, and this is the best martial art because it has these techniques; since I want to learn martial arts, it must be the best way to do so; this is the best way to get what I want because that's what this best way says.) It's a closed loop where all that's left is to memorize its assumptions rather than learn new conclusions. The method and the goal—where the assumption is treated as the conclusion—oversimplify and reduce the greater historical practice of living, experiencing, and learning, ultimately defeating their own purpose. In this way, goal-setting coupled with predefined practice—a shortcut to bypass the slower, open-ended process of discovery and learning—is self-defeating. They claim to support learning, but actually undermine it by collapsing the process into itself. The goal sabotages the goal; the goal prevents the Way.
Third, there's the clash between the "martial artist" as a predefined, closed object and the openness required for learning. Both the "art" and the "artist" are known properties—the conclusions are written. But learning lives in the unknown, where conclusions have yet to be written. It requires stepping into uncertainty, the unexplored environment, not following a script.
The individual is not engaging with the situation and learning what it affords; they're engaging with a closed, dead, prewritten system. They're talking to themselves while someone stands in front of them, rather than having a conversation with the person. They're sleepwalking.
The psychological trap of "doing martial arts"
When someone believes they're "doing martial arts," they unknowingly constrain themselves. Instead of engaging dynamically with their environment or partners, they imitate their mental model of martial arts. The environment whispers, but they're not listening. They're trapped in the theater of the mind rather than navigating the present moment.
Such scripted movements are lifeless—either hyper-constrained, overly complicated, oversimplified, or violent. Detached from context, movements fragment and become energy-inefficient, excessive, rigid, robotic, unreliable, and unsafe, failing to adapt to living, dynamic situations.
This mindset assumes there's a single ideal technique for everyone in every situation, ignoring individual perception, bodies, and experiences. It flattens the richness of diversity into memorized stereotypes, suffocating exploration. Practitioners no longer discover what situations offer; they merely replicate stored movements, bypassing real-time decision-making.
A non-playable character
The moment a teacher or guide mentions "self-defense" or "martial arts," people stop being present and go on autopilot based on their preconceptions. Once someone with martial arts experience thinks they're doing martial arts, they stop doing the new thing and start doing the old thing. Once it is labeled, it becomes crystallized and stereotyped. You lose the learner. Individuals may not be fully aware that they're taking on these default fixed preconceived roles. However, it will show up in their attitudes, behaviors, and expectations. These mental traps don't arise in isolation—they are shaped by the deeper structural problems in "martial arts."
Philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre explains this as a form of self-deception where individuals deny their inherent freedom and responsibility as decision-makers by conforming to predetermined roles or perceived expectations, effectively treating themselves as objects rather than free, choosing beings. It's a form of inauthenticity where one avoids the difficult task of creating their own meaning and values. From the LMA perspective, it avoids the difficult task of lived experience—isolating oneself from the world and disengaging from its realities. Meaning is not found within the self but in the environment and communities one lives in.
You are not the master—the environment is
Approaching activities explicitly as "martial arts" centers you—your prior knowledge, expectations, prejudices, and biases—making you the master. Yet skill doesn't arise from the self alone. Movement emerges from relationships with the land, conditions, and partners. You don't jump from internal energy; the ground pushes you into the air (ground reaction force). The environment affords your movements.
You are not the master. You are a Wayfinder. Movement isn't something you impose; it's something you navigate. You cannot listen to the environment if you are the one speaking. Being a master of the environment is a colonial construct. It is unnatural, self-centered, and unsustainable. The environment is the knower, and you are the listener. Yield to the environment and let it be your teacher.
Environment first, always
Centering yourself limits you; centering the environment sustains us all. The environment can exist without you, but you cannot exist without the environment. This means environment, including conditions and inhabitants, first—always.
LMA isn't ultimately about "play," although play aids exploration. It's about immersing yourself in the environment that shapes possibilities. Without the environment, there is no mind, no "you," no "us." We are inseparable from mountains, rivers, oceans, and air. Everything exists within the environment.
Centering "martial arts" or the martial performer inevitably centers myths, prior information, orientalism, and misinformation, flattening the unknown into something already known. Making you the knower—the keeper of knowledge.
Why we don't teach "martial arts"
LMA employs creative design rather than direct martial arts instruction. We create environments and conditions that allow movement to emerge from interaction. Directly "doing martial arts" shuts down exploration and confirms what you already believe rather than letting the environment guide you toward new possibilities.
Creative design reconnects you to your ancestral ability to live in direct relationship with your surroundings, moving as a human—not as a programmed machine executing stored responses from a hard drive. Knowledge isn't in you—it lives in the world. You learn by exploring.
Learning is alive
In creative design, knowledge isn't drawn from an archive but from interaction, exploration, and trial-error. Relying on stored responses instead of the present moment isn't learning; it's forcing a fixed peg into every hole.
Learning means unlearning predetermined shapes—where learning is dead—and instead drawing from real-time interaction, where the environment gives form and knowledge is alive. Direct martial arts often predetermine answers, stripping away opportunities to learn. What's left to learn if the answer is predetermined—if the thing itself is predetermined?
Individuals are doing a martial art, not learning a martial art. It decenters the environment and centers the self—the knower and their stereotypes. Learning cannot grow. Directly attending to the environment centers learning and lets it flourish.
Unplayed vs. replay
An unplayed activity requires and develops thinking and responsiveness. A preplayed, predetermined activity requires no thinking, which makes it easy—you don't need to be present, and it can be done mindlessly. A replay is simple, that's why it's attractive. But the cost is play and learning.
Unlearning as a core value
LMA prioritizes unlearning—not because prior knowledge is always harmful or that it can even be erased, but because the shadow it casts shouldn't limit you. How can a tree grow if it comes precut?
Most people unconsciously carry a map of "martial arts"—ready-made by media, colonialism, commodified culture, and commercialized martial arts. This map overrides the present moment, replacing exploration and growth with stereotypes imposed on every new activity.
Projection, not movement. Replay, not exploration.
LMA fosters Wayfinding—the ability to create new maps through real-time engagement. It's not about memorizing fixed paths but reading landscapes and adapting dynamically. Becoming a Wayfinder means breaking free from old loops, stereotypes, and patterns that prevent you from growing and engaging with the present.
The LMA approach is not a fixed thing you do or a specific discipline, but an ecology of movement, a relationship, a creative engagement with conditions, and an immersion back into the living world. It's a process for growth.
Final note
You are not a finished product—nor are you a product at all. You are not the center. The environment is the center. We can only center ourselves insofar as centering ourselves within the environment. We only exist because the environment affords us that ability. There is no "art" without the environment it emerged from or the people and culture that emerged from that land. The environment has much to teach, but it only teaches in whispers. So listen.
– Sam