Drawing the bow, but not releasing the arrow....

I came across the above phrase whilst re-reading "The Demon's sermon On The Martial Arts" by Issai Chozanshi. (Do not fret Dear Reader, the Demon of the title is a Tengu rather than a Satanic variant. Think more like a mischievous and only occasionally malevolent mountain spirit). Anyway, it struck me as an excellent metaphor for the coaches dilemma; i.e. how much is the right amount to teach someone? A sports coach of any variety has to find the right level of instruction for the student he is dealing with and there are a lot of different blends of student. Some students want to be very competitive, some don't. Some students simply enjoy the challenge of learning, some don't and prefer to carry on at their own level. Some students just like the encouragement a Coach should give them, some just like to challenge themselves and have a quiet smile to themselves when things go right. Some students respond well to feedback, some crumble at the first hint of advice. Some students just don't want anything to do with a coach at all (apparently Musashi never had a teacher and it didn't seem to do him much harm..!)
On top of the considerations of the student themselves, the instructor has to consider the technique being taught. How far can the coach take the student? Can the bow be drawn and the arrow released or are there things in the technique that mean the student has to release the arrow himself? Most fencing techniques can be taught to a simple mechanical level but there are always subtleties that the student can only learn for themselves by doing. The Coach has to decide how far to take the student on that journey. Not far enough and the technique will not be comprehended at all; too far and the technique will be obscured by technical details and opaque subtleties.
The final piece of the puzzle is the Coach themselves. They will have a view on what they like doing. Some prefer to teach the simple stuff, some prefer the more complicated techniques, some prefer groups, some prefer individuals, some prefer that their students outgrow them, some prefer they don't. I enjoy teaching the basics to people and spreading the word but I guess my take on the coaching that I really enjoy can be summed up with two examples. One from Confucius who, if he turned over one corner, would not teach a student who didn't attempt to turn the other three (harsh but fair!) and from Walt Whitman's 'Leaves of Grass'.... "I am the teacher of athletes, he that by me spreads a wider breast than my own, proves the width of my own, he most honours my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher."