Aug 29 2008
‘Philosophy of Martial Arts’
I am inspired to write about my personal philosophy of martial arts. I am actually surprised that I didn’t think to write about it before.
First some background: I’ve been doing various Martial Arts for the past 8 years, and my experience sits in Hapkido, Jeet Kune Do, Kyokushin Karate, and Muay Thai. Currently I train in Muay Thai as its the most enjoyable martial art I’ve experienced so far.
As well, as you most likely know, I’m a practicing buddhist. Many see contradictions in practicing martial arts such as Muay Thai and being a buddhist that believes hurting others isn’t a good thing.
So why do I train if I don’t value hurting others? Well, as I’m sure many would disagree with, I learn martial arts in order to defend myself and others and I believe this is justifiable.
When I first started Martial Arts I remember signing a contract at my Hapkido martial arts dojo. It said in a lot of words “If you are ever caught street fighting with this skill you will be banned from the studio, and may even be prosecuted for defamation of character.”
“Through compassion comes wisdom, through wisdom comes strength.” is an expression I believe in and has helped guide my martial arts practice.
For example; most look at sparring and competitive fighting like a kind of violence. What I think is important to realize, as I believe most don’t, is many martial artists hold the opinion that this process is done out of self improvement. As such you don’t fight someone with the objective to beat them up, rather you fight them in the hopes to improve yourself and them.
So what’s my philosophy? Motivated by my saying “Through compassion find wisdom, through wisdom find strength.” I always train with the intention to help others in mind.
Hmmmm, yet this leads me elsewhere. I hope to avoid a zealous rant about defending the weak, as it seems like this is quickly becoming, yet I don’t know how to pursue this article otherwise.
Hmmm, give me a day or two to think about this.
One Response to “‘Philosophy of Martial Arts’”
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You often hear mind and body are one. If one is out of balance, so is the other. If this is true, if you train your mind, it’s pretty damn hard to do so without training your body. You could argue martial arts is the physical component to you training your mind to follow Buddhism.
People who don’t practice martial arts don’t seem to understand that you learn to strike so that you don’t strike. In the event that you have to strike someone, you know exactly where to hit, and how hard to hit to get the job done and not cause further injury. So really, what’s more violent? Unless you choose to ignore it, if you have to raise your fists after learning martial arts, you feel pretty terrible about having to do so. So one could argue martial arts makes you less violent.
People also focus better after physical activity. Practicing Buddhism takes quite a bit of focus. I’m sure it’s second nature for you now but at the beginning I’m sure the primal urges are strong, I’m talking about eating meat. In my case, there was a time when I went to the gym almost twice a day. I could eat veggies all day and not miss meat. Now I give into meat cravings. Happened shortly after I stopped going to the gym as much.