Opportunity

The last day of August. Summer is almost over and everyone is gearing up for the return to the routine that most will adapt to over the coming months. For me, September is always an opportunity to begin anew.

One, two, three, here we go…

“It should be one's sole endeavor to see everything afresh and create it anew.” - Gustav Mahler - (1860 - 1911)

Form

Form training is where the art in kung fu resides. It is what defines our art and makes it unique. Done properly, a student’s style and lineage are apparent in the way they perform their forms.

I have always admired Master Macdonald’s form practice. His vocabulary of motion is beyond anything I have seen before. I have witnessed him learning a new form in a new style and I am dumfounded at how his body instantly adapts to the structural fundamentals of the new style. He does a hung gar form like a hung gar stylist. He does a kempo form like a kempo stylist. He does a choy lay fut form like a choy lay fut stylist. No matter what he is doing, he just is, nothing more. This is the quality of wu wei - non striving, effortless effort.

I have had the privilege of studying under Master Brian Macdonald for the past twenty years. He is the standard to which I measure myself. There is a reason why only a Master is qualified to promote someone to black belt and there is a reason why, despite holding that rank myself, all my black belts have been promoted by Master Macdonald. I am the first to point out - not all Masters are created equal. Master Macdonald is a step above.

When Master Macdonald performs a form, the intensity of his technique is intimidating. The intensity is not in how fast he moves or how hard his technique snaps. The intensity resides within his soul. There is some otherworldliness to his kung fu. You can see his mind focusing on an imaginary opponent. As he moves, his eyes follow his body, and his feet drive his centre forward as he delivers his technique. The energy he delivers is exactly right for the situation, every time.

It is easy to confuse teaching technique with applying technique. When Brian Macdonald teaches you a technique, he is the most approachable, empathetic, compassionate person you could imagine. However when you are on the receiving end of a Master Macdonald application, it is a very different experience. The intimidation factor can be overwhelming before he even delivers the blow. Such is the power of his intensity.

What is exciting for me as a martial artist is the infinite layers found in form training and how each of those layers colour technique and application. Whenever I am searching for focus in my training, I pull out one of my many videos of Master Macdonald performing a form. What I learn from watching him gives me years of material to apply to my current knowledge. So much to learn, so little time.

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.” ~ Bruce Lee (1940 - 1973)

Despair

There has been a lot of activity on the internet this week concerning mental health due to Robin William’s death. I am dismayed at the level of ignorance displayed by so many smart people when it comes to suicide and mental illness.

Suicide is not simple matter of choosing to live or choosing to die. There is no way to quantify the mental anguish a person is enduring behind their public facade, yet so many are quick to judge something they know little about. Expecting the mentally ill to reason their way out of their despair is the equivalent of expecting quadriplegics to walk themselves out of a forest fire. Empathizing with the physically disabled is easier than finding empathy for the mentally anguished yet the latter often only requires a moment of logical reflection.

Mental illness indirectly affects all Canadians at some time in their lives. One in five will personally experience a mental illness. If a physical disease had these types of statistics, money would flow like water to find a cure and smart people would spend less time judging and more time supporting.

“The so-called 'psychotically depressed' person who tries to kill herself doesn't do so out of quote 'hopelessness' or any abstract conviction that life's assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire's flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It's not desiring the fall; it's terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling 'Don't!' and 'Hang on!', can understand the jump. Not really. You'd have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.” - David Foster Wallace (1962 - 2008)

The Power of Abstraction

The advanced concepts I have been presenting to my black belt students over the past few months have resulted in exponential growth for some of them, and a quantum leap forward in my own training. It is one thing to have a working, physical grasp of a concept but your understanding achieves a whole new level when you are challenged to pass on that knowledge — especially abstract knowledge.

I like abstractions. They are defined by ideals, not specifics. Abstract knowledge is acquired through experience, not lecture. A mentor can show you where to look but cannot tell you what to see. The personal, organic nature of abstract knowledge is why it is unique to each individual and it is what separates science from art and a master from a student. Scientific knowledge is limited by paradigms that are often only broken through the application of artistic, abstract creativity.

I challenge my students to ground their training upon a foundation of values. Without that foundation there is no focus for your training or your lessons. Do you want to be a fighter or do you want to be a martial artist? Do you want a black belt or do you want to be a black belt? Do you want to feed your ego or do you want to feed your soul? Answering these questions can completely change the application of a lesson, opening doors of understanding, or slamming a door of opportunity. The meat of a lesson is not found in the specifics but in the abstract ideal.

“The more abstract the truth you wish to teach, the more you must allure the senses to it.” - Friedrich Niezsche (1844 - 1900)

Black Belt

The black belt is one of the most misunderstood achievements a person can attain. The only people who have the ability to fully appreciate and understand the rank are those who have achieved it. Unfortunately even those who achieve the rank are not guaranteed to fully comprehend the soul of the black belt.

As an instructor I feel a great responsibility when it comes to upholding the ideals of the rank of black belt. I take every possible precaution to ensure people who earn a Silent River Kung Fu black belt are solid martial artists and, more importantly, are strong moral characters who understand the spirit of the rank and the responsibility that goes with it.

No instructor is perfect. You can do your best to weed out the candidates who are in it for their own ego but despite all the safeguards you put into place, people can, and do, mislead you. I don’t know of any instructor who has not had the embarrassment of having one of their unqualified first degree black belts decide that they have arrived and branch off on their own. Having thirty years of blood and sweat trivialized by someone who thinks the rank of black belt is the end rather than the beginning is only worsened by having that embarrassment instigated by one of your own.

The black belt has changed and it continues to change. Schools have stopped teaching styles and only teach techniques. Students are judged and ranked solely on what they do in the training hall. Honour, kindness, loyalty, humility - these attributes that form the foundation on which the martial arts are based, have little value in today’s schools. It is all about the next student and the latest craze. Want to learn tae kwon do? We have an instructor of that. BJJ? No problem, we have an instructor for that too. The great grandmasters like Morihei Ueshiba and Wong Fei Hung are being replaced by Greg Jackson and Billy Blanks. Our industry has lost its way.

I think the genesis of a solution lies in each of us who wish to attain the rank of black belt. This may be as simple as making your black belt mean something by keeping the following truths in front of us:

• Training is not a sacrifice, it is an investment. If your training is a sacrifice, you are only doing it to satisfy your or someone else’s ego. Remember, nothing is for free. If you want the benefits of training, you need to put in the time and make your training applicable to your life outside the training hall.

• The black belt is a journey, not a destination. Make your journey something to remember and you will never regret it.

• The black belt is earned, not given. Your journey is unique so what you do to earn the rank will be just as unique.

• Your black belt is defined by who you earn it from. Every black belt has a lineage attached to it. Some have meaning, others do not. Earn your rank from someone who understands what the rank means and whose lineage has not been severed by ego and ambition.

• Never forget that the black belt represents skill in a complete, all encompassing system. Getting a black belt for knowing a bunch of individual techniques that allows you to fight well is the equivalent of getting a degree in literature for memorizing the dictionary. 

With the popularity of the UFC and our society’s tendency to seek instant gratification, true martial arts are difficult for the public to identify and are becoming endangered. It is only the schools that stay loyal to the integrity of the art over the public’s demand for easier standards and the latest crazes that can ensure the future of the two thousand year old discipline.

“To all those whose progress remains hampered by ego-related distractions, let humility – the spiritual cornerstone upon which Karate rests – serve to remind one to place virtue before vice, values before vanity and principles before personalities.” – Sokon ‘Bushi’ Matsumura (l809 - 1901)