Thursday, April 21, 2016

Values in the martial arts.

Watching the news this week inspired me to write again about values and what I want to promote in Swordfighters.  There is an awful lot of duplicity in the world today.  This isn't new I suppose but the way people are universally sick of it regardless of their beliefs is stunning.   This begs a question about what your values are.

As a martial arts instructor, I am not interested in ideological thinking, dogma, or hierarchy though I value and respect my own teachers and students.  Ideologies often seem like a good idea at the time but somehow the original good idea ends up robbing people of awareness and independence. Anyways...without belabouring this post with justifications for writing it here are some thoughts about values in martial arts.

  1. You are free.  You can do what you want.  What you decide to do and how you do it is up to you.  Free will exists despite pressures against it.  I am not your mom or someone that you have to pledge allegiance to. My relationship to you as a teacher is finite.  We are colleagues. Brothers and Sisters in a shared endeavour.
  2. You are responsible for your own spiritual, physical, mental development.  You need to commit to being responsible for your own growth.
  3. You are responsible for the consequences of your actions.  Martial arts in its essence is about being willing to take action.  It is active and not passive.  Its not crazy though.  You are responsible for what you do.
  4. Know what matters to you.  Aspire to a code of values.  You don't have to believe what I believe but you need to have a decent code and you need to try to stick to it.  Here is a list of values that I tend to gravitate towards and think about a lot.  This is personal.  I decided what matters to me.  It is a code that I aspire to and its not etched in concrete.  It has changed as I learned and grew.  I simplified it over time.  The act of working our your personal code is really valuable and a lifelong pursuit.
    • Honor:  My word has to mean something
    • Honesty: Tell the truth
    • Integrity:  What I think, say, feel, and do must all match
    • Courage: Sometimes doing the right thing is hard.  Do it anyway.  
    • Humility: I will fail to hold to my values sometimes. I want to use this realization to bring about kindness and tenacity in myself.
    • Kindness:  Because I fail in my endeavours at times I know what it feels like to struggle. I do not know the dark battles that others face.  Be kind always.
    • Tenacity:    I want to discipline myself to endeavour. The old saying "Fall down seven times get up eight" sticks in my mind. 
  5. Face yourself. Face your fears. That is where your real growth lies.
  6. Question everything. Do not hold to dogma.  Adjust your world view when confronted with evidence of the truth.




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