"Sport fighting"

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Forum
61

Shaking off fantasies for reality:

In reality, if you study Hung Gar or Wing Chun or Issin-Ryu or Hsing-I or Southern Mantis you are studying a school of combat. That’s what they were created for.
Each school will have its own way to develop, protect themselves and heal. Whether its pad work or bag work or the makawara or wrapping your hands or using jow or an ice bath… the point is to develop a human weapon.

In reality, Chinese medicine and five element theory is its own school of study.

In reality, Chan Buddhism and Taoist are their own school of studies.

In reality, I know a Hsing-I player who is a western doctor. He learned his Hsing-I from my master and medicine at University. I don’t know his spiritual beliefs.

In reality, a martial artists could be many things, like I am a surfer, writer and musician. I also happen to be a Taoist. Not everyone can be a real martial artists. And unfortunately we have to use the distinction “real” these days.

Martial arts are for combat. I’ll maintain that until I die. To say that is fantasy is to say that swimming is for health or meditation or self improvement, when it can provide those things but it is to keep you from drowning. You want to survive in deep water you need swimming. To survive in combat you need specific training. We call THAT training martial arts.

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963587]Shaking off fantasies for reality:

I also happen to be a Taoist. [/QUOTE]

cool. What type of Taoist are you? How did you become one?

63

I’m the kind that is mindful of what I think and say, trying to live with intention and focus. I try to live naturally (food, clothes, sleeping), and according to my intuition.

I like to smoke weed and surf, train and fight.

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963587]Shaking off fantasies for reality:…To survive in combat you need specific training. We call THAT training martial arts.[/QUOTE]

YOU call it “martial arts” Ray, it is your definition, and some others too! That you do not agree with the definition others use for the term and apparently believe “your” definition is the only valid one, i IS your fantasy, at least one of them.

I personally call training to fight, “combat training”, but I don’t insist that others adhere to my personal definition. I don’t care what others call it, I don’t care whether others think they are tough or not, I don’t care whether someone trains to dance, stay fit, or fight and still call their practice “martial arts”. I let others have their own definitions that work for them…THAT is following Tao, not imposing your own fantasies/definitions of life on to others or insisting that your own definition is the only true one.

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963587]Shaking off fantasies for reality:

I like to smoke weed…[/QUOTE]

fascinating… :wink:

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963592]I’m the kind that is mindful of what I think and say, [SIZE=“3”]trying[/SIZE] to live with intention and focus. I [SIZE=“3”]try[/SIZE] to live naturally (food, clothes, sleeping), and according to my intuition. [/quote]now you could do better at being mindful on what you are trying and not doing…

I like to smoke weed and surf, train and fight.
so these are the qualities that make one a taoist??

if you are a taoist that can be called a taoist, you are then not a taoist. :stuck_out_tongue:

[QUOTE=dirtyrat;963617]fascinating…[/QUOTE]yes it is… nature provides some of the coolest stuff!! :smiley:

67

Martial arts or fighting arts[1] are systems of codified practices and traditions of training for combat. While they may be studied for various reasons, martial arts share a single objective: to physically defeat other persons and to defend oneself or others from physical threat.

That is literally the definition of martial arts.

The folks you refer to can twist it to mean anything they want if it makes them feel better. That’s fine. But they’re living in the fantasy.

I didn’t need the dictionary to know this. I know this by the way they talk. The things they say reveals that they know very little of the realities of combat and how to prepare for them.

This is the problem I have. The guy who fixes the golf cart or holds the clubs or keeps the greens well kept is not the golfer. The guy hitting the ball is.

Martial artists fight. <-------- (period).

68

Hi Ray,

When one clings to a fixed definition one is bound by chains created by that clinging, chains created by their own mind.

Remember, Lao says, “Tao that can be fixed/defined is not Tao!”, and all things participate in Tao!

While everyone has the freedom to cling or not cling as they choose, there are consequences to be enjoyed by each choice!

I recommend, as do masters of Ch’an and Tao, to avoid clinging to fixed definitions.

69

Now you’re trying to use your intelligence to shift words and meanings to fit your world view.

Things are defined so we have understanding. I go to a “doctor” in good faith that he has received the training to help me. Any bozo who has popped a few aspirin or applied a few band aids should not claim that title… though interestingly enough there’s no shortage of “martial artists” who claim to be “doctors” and apparently know $hit about either subject.

I use to be an intellectual, literary type myself but became bored with it. Too much talk. Too much back and forth with nothing being accomplished.

How I train martial arts, the methods I employ are not fixed. The styles and even the people I train with are not fixed… the goal remains the same as when I started at 4 years old. To beat the people I face and not be beat by them. To continually face better people.

To cling or not to cling and fixed definitions and consequences are just words dancing around the reality that we’re discussing. But I will say this, the Kung Fu people clinging to their alternative reality definition of martial arts, are in fact ruining the thing that they claim.

What is western boxing without head punching and knock outs? Once you make a thing that requires roughness and toughness delicate so softer men will participate you have changed that thing. The people you refer to are not martial artists though they claim to be. It is as plain to me as two people standing 10 feet apart throwing punches into the air are not boxing.

It is so basic and elemental it baffles me that this conversation even needs to take place.

Ultimately, they’re not hurting martial arts. The world has seen enough now to know. They’re hurting Kung Fu. It’s a laughing stock. It’s pathetic and weak. Its pajama ninjas in a system where ninjas did not exist before. It’s fake weaponry in the hands of children and immature men.

I don’t say these things to be mean. I say them as a slap in the face to wake up the sleeping.

70

Unfortunately Ray, you do not understand that it is you that is sleeping.

If you cannot understand that what I have written is simplicity, perhaps you should cease considering yourself a Taoist, or perhaps study/contemplate/experience Tao more. What I wrote is not complicated. It is your own mind, your own insistence on fixation, that is complicating things!

Neither am I trying to be mean. I take you as a sincere person, but you are young and have many misconceptions. I would not be taking the time to share with you if I did not consider you sincere in your purpose!

You have locked yourself into a prison of your own making. You cannot see it, but if your sincerity of purpose continues, you will eventually perceive it on your own someday!

Until then I will take the time to point the way from time to time!:slight_smile:

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963652]
But I will say this, the Kung Fu people clinging to their alternative reality definition of martial arts, are in fact ruining the thing that they claim.

Ultimately, they’re not hurting martial arts. The world has seen enough now to know. They’re hurting Kung Fu. It’s a laughing stock. It’s pathetic and weak. Its pajama ninjas in a system where ninjas did not exist before. It’s fake weaponry in the hands of children and immature men.
[/QUOTE]

1)Not just Kung-Fu. also Isshinryu, goju ryu, shotokan,TKD, etc, etc.
You have a sore spot for Kung-Fu, because of your past failed relationships with your former Sifus, (which you yourself have blogged on this very forum)-thus you still feel you need to prove something to them. You are still carrying that negativity, while they have long forgotten you and moved on.
(realize that you only spent a couple of years at their schools, while they have been teaching for decades. Thousands of people have walked through their doors, come and gone. You are just one more. Nothing else.)

“Holding a grudge is like taking poison, and waiting for the other person to die.”

“…I left her at the stream. Whay are you still carrying her?”-if you know the Buddhist parable.

  1. do not mistake a small group of ignorant children on Martial Arts internet forums as representative of “the Whole World.” This is a very, very small group. Most of the posters are not knowledgeable, experienced, or over 25. There are hundreds of thousands of people practicing MA, who do not share your World View. Most aren’t even aware of it.
    There are however, many people who have much, much more experience and knowledge than you or I, and don’t think for a second, you are “waking” any of them up to your reality.

Ray-stay with it. But realize that Martial Arts (like enlightenment) is a very personal journey. Sometimes we meet kindered spirits and walk the same path with them, if even for a short while. But the path we walk, we walk alone. You cannot pull others onto your path.

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[QUOTE=uki;963630]
yes it is… nature provides some of the coolest stuff!! :D[/QUOTE]

:Dtoo true:cool:

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[QUOTE=Scott R. Brown;963657]Unfortunately Ray, you do not understand that it is you that is sleeping.

If you cannot understand that what I have written is simplicity, perhaps you should cease considering yourself a Taoist, or perhaps study/contemplate/experience Tao more. What I wrote is not complicated. It is your own mind, your own insistence on fixation, that is complicating things!
[/QUOTE]

Maybe you’re right. Because I admit I don’t see it.

As for my trouble’s with kung fu. I still have a relationship with my master. I spoke to him last week. It was time for me to go. He had so much more to teach me and hopefully one day I’ll learn it but I had to go out and be with fighters. I got maybe 3 or 4 more years physically. I hope longer. But I’m giving myself that. I’ll be ready to fight again in three months. I’m close to wining.

Karate. The karate I seen. Maybe it was that I was lucky enough to catch it in the late 70s’, when guys still had ponytails and were punching each other in the mouth in the black belt division. Those were my heroes. There were a lot of them. We kids mostly didn’t wear anything, but it was full go to the body with legs and kicks. Bloody noses happened. It was great.

The problems I’ve had with Kung Fu, are exactly as they have been stated here: There’s some good $hit to learn but ultimately you run into the dead-end, as someone really interested in THEIR martial art, with a lot of moderately-skilled loudmouths that won’t fight you. So you drill to death and get an understanding of the thing but you’ll never OWN it, until you do it to someone who’s really trying to hurt you. Not help you. Ironically, those people help you the best.

I’ve seen some good kung fu. I think the trapping and counters are awesome. I love my master’s leg kicks and I use his jamming/striking all the time. The problem is it only puts down weak fighters. After a few times good fighters get hip to it and have to change. But my side kick is coming back… in reality, I’m mad at what Kung Fu took away from me all those years.

Bunch of $hit talkers. Good technique… but do something.

^ That’s how I feel as a weed smoking, wave surfing, a$$ kicking Taoist. Word.

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963640]Martial arts or fighting arts[1] are systems of codified practices and traditions of training for combat. While they may be studied for various reasons, martial arts share a single objective: to physically defeat other persons and to defend oneself or others from physical threat. That is literally the definition of martial arts. [/quote]okay… so are you implying that we on the boards do not grasp the art of war?? i’d give a hardy chuckle to think a little surfer dude from the bahamas vicinity thinks somehow has aquired a greater understanding of the “martial arts”.

The folks you refer to can twist it to mean anything they want if it makes them feel better. That’s fine. But they’re living in the fantasy.
no fantasy here ray… mess with my family or myself and you’re a dead man - not just you, but anyone. i don’t see how you can classify that belief as a fantasy…

I didn’t need the dictionary to know this. I know this by the way they talk. The things they say reveals that they know very little of the realities of combat and how to prepare for them.
please… i am dying for you psychological evaluation of me. whenever you are ready doctor… :stuck_out_tongue:

This is the problem I have. The guy who fixes the golf cart or holds the clubs or keeps the greens well kept is not the golfer. The guy hitting the ball is.
i must say, you are pretty observant. :rolleyes:

Martial artists fight. <-------- (period).
only if they have to. :slight_smile:

[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963652]Now you’re trying to use your intelligence to shift words and meanings to fit your world view. [/quote]he’s not trying - he’s doing.

Things are defined so we have understanding. I go to a “doctor” in good faith that he has received the training to help me. Any bozo who has popped a few aspirin or applied a few band aids should not claim that title… though interestingly enough there’s no shortage of “martial artists” who claim to be “doctors” and apparently know $hit about either subject.
and what do you know about?? lowering your eyes?? walking with a tucked tail from wounded pride? you think because you fight in a ring that somehow you are superiour to those who do not?? LOL… as far as i can remember you lose in the ring, on the street, and on the internet forum boards.

I use to be an intellectual, literary type myself but became bored with it. Too much talk. Too much back and forth with nothing being accomplished. How I train martial arts, the methods I employ are not fixed. The styles and even the people I train with are not fixed… the goal remains the same as when I started at 4 years old. To beat the people I face and not be beat by them. To continually face better people.
you know they say that a violent man will die a violent death… looking for fights is a violent action ray.

To cling or not to cling and fixed definitions and consequences are just words dancing around the reality that we’re discussing. But I will say this, the Kung Fu people clinging to their alternative reality definition of martial arts, are in fact ruining the thing that they claim.
is this an attempt to sound all taoisty??

What is western boxing without head punching and knock outs? Once you make a thing that requires roughness and toughness delicate so softer men will participate you have changed that thing. The people you refer to are not martial artists though they claim to be. It is as plain to me as two people standing 10 feet apart throwing punches into the air are not boxing.
sigh

It is so basic and elemental it baffles me that this conversation even needs to take place.
and yet here you are attempting to perpetuate it even further…

Ultimately, they’re not hurting martial arts. The world has seen enough now to know. They’re hurting Kung Fu. It’s a laughing stock. It’s pathetic and weak. Its pajama ninjas in a system where ninjas did not exist before. It’s fake weaponry in the hands of children and immature men.
you lack even the ability to define kung fu… LOL… you are the immature kiddo.

I don’t say these things to be mean. I say them as a slap in the face to wake up the sleeping.
so did you have a back up plan for the return b!tchslap?? com’on ray… you are living in the fantasy world. :stuck_out_tongue:

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"I’ve seen some good kung fu. I think the trapping and counters are awesome. I love my master’s leg kicks and I use his jamming/striking all the time. The problem is it only puts down weak fighters. After a few times good fighters get hip to it and have to change"

That’s a sport mentality, which isn’t bad, if that’s what you want. If you were fighting for self-defense, there should never be “after a few times,” you should have stayed in and finshed. End of story.

]^ That’s how I feel as a weed smoking, wave surfing, a$$ kicking Taoist. Word.

Now, THIS I like!:cool:

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[QUOTE=Ray Pina;963671]
Bunch of $hit talkers. Good technique… but do something.[/QUOTE]sometimes the techinque is sooo good there is nothing to be done. :smiley:

got taoism?

77

Here is a suggestion Ray,

The thing is, all you do is engage in controlled duels and “call” it combat! What you need to do in order to get some real experience with really “bad guys” is a few of the following:

  1. Go to a big city and work in a shady bar/dance club as a bouncer. You will learn social skills in order to avoid being clubbed with bottles and slashed by knives when you are not looking. You will have plenty of opportunity to use your skills. The down side is that most of them will be with drunk guys, but at least they will challenge you by being sneaky, and sometimes really big.

  2. Go to Europe and participate in a few soccer thug melees. This will give you a taste of fighting in large groups with the attending “idiot group behavior” like being group stomped.

  3. Get a job in a big city police department, in a big city county jail or in a bad state prison. The advantage here is you will be dealing with REAL criminals. The ones who will be happy to hand you your head on a platter and don’t care they will have to spend years in prison as a consequence. I knew an inmate that threw another inmate off the second tier KNOWING he would be shot for doing so. When I took care of him in the hospital he said the 9mm glaser round to the leg was not as bad as the .45 cal he took on the street. The advantage, again, is people who don’t care what the consequences are of getting to each other or to you. I recommend a level 3 prison, not a level 4 because these prisons generally rock-and-roll everyday. You will get a lot of experience wrestling bigger guys and nuts, You will also risk getting clubbed or slashed without warning. And I know personally correctional officers that this has happened too! One had his throat slit, and missed dying by a quarter of an inch, another has had his arm broken and on a second occasion years later his leg broken by inmates, a third was clubbed from behind…I could go on, but I think you get the point.

  4. Join the marines and go to Afghanistan. THAT is some REAL fighting, REAL combat. Until your life is on the line in battle all you are is a wannabe, martial artist Ray. The REAL martial artists are the ones whose lives are in the balance when they lose!

  5. The best one is for last, join a mercenary force in a tumultuous African nation. Preferably one with gangs/tribes that attack each other with axes and machetes. The risks and advantages should be self-evident here!

You talk big and like to criticize others thinking you know better and are the real deal, but in reality Ray you are just a wannabe like everyone else you criticize. If you really want to do, stop playing around with pu$$y controlled duels and really put your life and limb on the line in REAL dangerous situations! Do that for five or more years, Then come back here and lets see what you have learned.

I am willing to bet you will be a bit more humble by then!

But in reality, I am willing to bet you won’t do any of that. You will find a reason not too, just like you criticize others who do not train the way you THINK they should.

Well put your money where your mouth is and do something REALLY dangerous and stop playing around with controlled duels!

I am being direct here Ray, but remember I respect your intentions, but you are too young and too mouthy to know what you are talking about. It is time to grow up and REALLY challenge yourself with some REAL life experience!

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real life experience…

LOL… once i was wasted drunk and i walked into a passing van when i was in galway, ireland…

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[QUOTE=TenTigers;963674]
That’s a sport mentality, which isn’t bad, if that’s what you want. If you were fighting for self-defense, there should never be “after a few times,” you should have stayed in and finshed. End of story.:[/QUOTE]

That’s the problem I had: Sifu’s, high-level guys, implying things like that. Go fight somebody who’s well trained and prepared and see if you finish the thing so clean and neat in one move.

As for my living in Puerto Rico, I deserve it. I grew up working for everything I got in not so great places. I’ve never lost a fight on the street. I’ve never lost a Vale Tudo match, a Throwdown or challenge match. Of those criticizing me, I’ve probably have had more of those than all of yours combined.

I haven’t won a sanctioned MMA fight yet. It’s true. But I will. I’m getting better, and better, and better and better. So enjoy it now, because that’s what a couple of you have thrown at me the past few conversations but that will be gone with 2009.

Now it’s went from pugilistic mastery, to fencing expertise, to peace and love to attacking my credibility… a guy who’s competing and winning in BJJ, willing to go kick box, willing to go MMA, willing to go Vale Tudo or straight up challenge match. I’ll step up… but I don’t know about fighting? Real fighting? Sport fighting? That’s why I come here. So I can soak in all the combat wisdom gained from the sidelines.

Unbelievable.

80

I once got into a fistfight in a bar with a bunch of big, tough, man-hating womynz of an alternative lifestyle. Does that count?

(actually, Ray might remember that club-Escapes. Friday nights it was fifteen dollar cover-open bar. Lots of wiminz, lots of fights, and in some cases, fights with wiminz!)