IMAGINE I PUT A SCALPEL IN YOUR HAND & ASKED YOU TO PERFORM A SIMPLE OPERATION
I would assume that in most cases, a scalpel in your hands or mine, is best used for precisely cutting out magazine clippings for our vision boards. Most of my students ain't no surgeons.
Training, practice, and what I would call "some other stuff," is what transforms that scalpel into a tool to assist in healing. I invite you to read and take into consideration these principles of Yin & Yang on your journey through wellness.
We often don't consider:
HEALING & KILLING - MEDICINE & POISON
This is an important part of ourselves to honor when getting into a wellness, healing, or martial arts practice.
I've journaled about this for decades, and I invite you to also look inside yourself at these principles.
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Countless people ask me to teach them self defense, but they don't want to hurt anyone. They want to somehow peacefully fight off an attacker. When really we need to make friends and train these volatile energies inside all of us. A huge source of trauma in people is when a part of us that we judged as "wrong" comes out and we can't control it. "I didn't know I was capable of that" or "I thought I knew them, then..." Cue the inspiration for Incredible Hulk, or the moment your cute cat eats a lizard in front of your kid that was just trying to dress it up like a vegan princess. Here's my schpiel.
We all wish that we were so good at communication or martial arts that when stress or conflict arises. We can mediate and bring peace with a simple movement or word. You can if you practice. I mean PRACTICE!
Low level martial arts is: Brutality, fighting, trying too hard, and honestly a bunch of hurting yourself while you thought you were gonna "F&?@k Sh!t Up" but you really just end up with a hurt wrist and groin muscle wondering why the movies lied to you.
High level martial arts is: Awareness, communication, and conscious decision making in volatile and stressful environments. It's a presence, it's inner peace. You can peacefully fight off an attacker if you walk with purpose presence and awareness of your environment. (aka SITUATIONAL MINDFULNESS) That takes time. Don't fool yourself. Especially if you're reading this email in public or worse, in your car.
Medicine and martial arts are potential poisons that the practitioner administers with conscious Intention and dosage. Doctors don't judge your illness, they make a decision. Same thing with a great martial artist. A well placed strike can heal you, ask your chiropractor.
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A DOJO IS WHERE IT'S SAFE TO FAIL
All this work is art. Artists have a productive and positive relationship with failure. We transform it into feedback. Train to seek feedback. Train to feel it, hear it, and grow from it. Judging failure is a recipe for escapism, delusion, fear, and worst of all, becoming addicted to posting quotes on Instagram. Find your voice. Speak your words and stand behind them. But first find a dojo.
Dojos aren't just for martial arts. It can be people who you trust, your journal, or anywhere that supports ideas. We are training to live in an emotionally reactive, judgmental, pro lynching, self important world. Train your voice. Speak, move, and just try stuff. In dojos they remind you to keep your hands up, in life they often just punch you in the face.
Remember intention and dosage. We need healers, we need artists.
You're always invited to try out our courses 2 weeks free, and if you have any questions, book a 15 minute call with me.
Thank you, YAMASTE
Matt
PS: Premium members... try the New STETCHING LUNGE JAM in the video on demand library.
PSS: THIS IS THE LAST WEEK TO GET THE YEAR OF THE TIGER ASTROLOGY TALK. After that, only premium members have access.
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