elbows_and_knees

what's wrong with power through anger? I would imagine jesus was upset when he chased the money changers from the temple. I would imagine soldiers were upset when they were in battle but had Him on their side. There is no commandment that states not to get angry, and if I'm not mistaken, nowhere in the bible does it tell you to not get angry. Anger is a natural emotion. What's important is what you do with that emotion. anger and hate are drastically different. I would say there's nothing inherently wrong with anger at evil, but it's so hard to stay angry and simultaneously objective. Anger rapidly disolves into uncontrolled rage. Wasn't there something about, "Do not let the sun go down on your anger..."? there is: "Be angry and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger." read the first part - you can be angry, but it stresses not to sin if you do. Also, here's another scripture: "Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry..." as long as the result of your anger is not sin, then there is no issue. If you walk into your house to find someone assaulting your mother, won't you be mad? but the end result was saving her, which is not sin. your anger was justified.

start here on this forum. Then, train martial arts. find a school in your area and begin training. This will help you feel more energized, get in shape - over all feel better about yourself - which will in turn enhance your confidence. rank testing may help with your feeling of completion, or possibly competing and winning. competition is an excellent way to achieve clarity of mind. If you don't mind me asking, what is this conflict of interest?

You sure? I never heard of that before... Translated it literally means "Death Touch"... All it is about is focusing your Qi into some sort of form (like a Ball of Energy etc) and then "transfer" that ball/energy over to a pressure point (and depending on how sensitive the points are, determines the end result...) == That is what Dim Mak is.... *goes away and looks it up on the interent* pressure points can be used to heal - but no, that's not dim mak. consider them yin and yang - there is the ability to heal and there is dim mak. if you know one, you should learn the other. But IMO, dim mak is garbage when it comes to fighting. you won't be able to apply it. now, for demonstration purposes, it would be great, but not much more. You're not going to kill anybody using dim mak. They're one and the same. Just like Yin and Yang cannot be separated, so is this. I'm just guessing, but I would assume that the same techniques from dim mak could be used to heal. It depends on the intent, the amount, the force, the direction, the type...if one is sick some techniques from dim mak may be used cautiously and in little amounts to heal, however if used on a healthy person it would cause sickness and/or death. Think of it this way. If you water a plant when the soil is dry, the plant will soak up nutrients and be healthy. If you water a plant who was out in the storm the night previous, the soil and nutrients will wash away, and the plant will die. It's all a matter of which, when. the thing here though is that the intent behind what you are doing changes the whole thing. you are familiar with the cycles of destruction and life, right? they are a different order. according to the cycle, fire produces earth, but according to the destruction, fire destroys metal, not earth. Wood destroys earth. This indicates two different stratregies. So, just because a person learns dim mak and the cycle of destruction, that wouldn't automatically qualify them to be able to heal.

you can also prove the existence of air... you can't positively prove the existence of ki - heck there's not even concensus on what it actually is.

that's the other thing - there are so many different concepts of what ki is that nobody actually knows what it is.

what's wrong with power through anger? I would imagine jesus was upset when he chased the money changers from the temple. I would imagine soldiers were upset when they were in battle but had Him on their side. There is no commandment that states not to get angry, and if I'm not mistaken, nowhere in the bible does it tell you to not get angry. Anger is a natural emotion. What's important is what you do with that emotion. anger and hate are drastically different.

Who said the east was the only to discover it? It's merely called different things by different groups and religions. an example of meditation from a christian aspect - prayer. look at the references in the bible to strength received through God - He is the rock, the sword the shield and through him all things are possible. Battles where few people beat thousands, david and golliath, etc. pagan religions who draw their power from the earth... is it not all the same? the east seems to put more focus on belief and development of self, or lessening of self. either way, focus is on the person and not on something greater than the person, as in western religions. You don't attain nirvana through belief in a god. But in christianity, belief in God is how you get to heaven...

not to dishearten you, but it sounds like you have a somewhat over romanticized view of qi... for everyone to feel your presence, you don't need qi - you need confidence. Walk tall, look people in the eye as you approach. your walk is something simple that can project a lot about you. as for your age - you're a baby. At 28, I'm a toddler, but was fortunate to start when I was younger. you definitely haven't started too early.

yeah, I thought so. Here it is: http://www.angelfire.com/dbz/majinvegeta50/findpl.html he says that the avg human ranks between 5 and 8, so my 12.56 makes me super saiya-jin.

I got 12.56 FWIW though, this is dumb. it's like someone is taking numbers and trying to find a formula for determining somone's level of strength, a la the dragon ball z scouters.

Any combinataion is "real", and none are guaranteed. break this, stomp that, punch em in the throat... In reality it doesn't happen that easily.

In this case it does. tkd was created because tsd was too reflective of japanese ma. the hatred of the japanese gave birth to a new martial art.

The statistics still don't go up that much. When you think of how many people there are in the world, the number of people that are victims of these things is actually quite low. The simple fact is that most people will not be involved in an altercation in their adult lives. In my city of about 700,00 people, this year, we've had about 115 murders. that is a lot, but small in comparison to 700,000. And even at 115, we are worse than the national average in that and every other category when it comes to crime. In 2004, we had the following: 3771 robberies 444 rapes 105 murders 7339 car thefts 233 arsons and thousands of other violent crimes, totaling 10,133. so, out of 700,000 people, only 10,133 were victimized. More than we'd like, but it shows what we are saying - most people are not victimized. that's why I use the following when comparing sport fighters to self defense guys: SD guys train for a possibility; sport guys train for an inevitability.

shamrock is past his prime. he shouldn't be fighting high caliber mma guys anymore.

Not only that, but the right time of day. during certain times of the day, qi flow is stronger in some meridians than others. So you have to be aware enough to know where to strike in conjunction with the time of day in order to achieve the desired result. Like I said, I wouldn't worry about dim mak in combat.

You sure? I never heard of that before... Translated it literally means "Death Touch"... All it is about is focusing your Qi into some sort of form (like a Ball of Energy etc) and then "transfer" that ball/energy over to a pressure point (and depending on how sensitive the points are, determines the end result...) == That is what Dim Mak is.... *goes away and looks it up on the interent* pressure points can be used to heal - but no, that's not dim mak. consider them yin and yang - there is the ability to heal and there is dim mak. if you know one, you should learn the other. But IMO, dim mak is garbage when it comes to fighting. you won't be able to apply it. now, for demonstration purposes, it would be great, but not much more. You're not going to kill anybody using dim mak.

once again, basics are drilled every class. And we spar (roda) every single class. kicking wise, your basics in shotokan don't differ much from capoeira.

like I said above - people get use to what they see on tv and games and think that's all there is. some regional groups get into all the flash, but our group - nacao - does not. You will learn the acrobatic stuff eventually, but EVERY class is spent working basics repeatedly. capoeira has a lot of headbutts, evasion and elbows_and_knees. basic kicks are the crescent, roundhouse, front thrust and hook kick. However, FWIW, I've used a jumping roundhouse in a fight, and it landed. I saw a buddy of mine - a tkd black belt - knock someone down with a spinning side kick in a fight. As for the ability to perform acrobatic moves in the heat of the moment, when under stress and adrenaline dump, the body forgets that which is not ingrained into it. If the acrobatic moves are what's ingrained, that's what you will use. At the time I used the jump roundhouse, that was one of my favorite techniques and I drilled it all the time.

yeah, that's my point exactly. you don't have to teach stance per se to achieve that effect, hence the lack of formal stance training in judo. I think you'll find I said right at the beginning that stances are transitional and the work is done getting into a stance. Also just because there is more than one way to skin a cat does not make another way wrong. Shotokan at least trains stances for a multiple number of reasons, including strengthening and conditioning of the leg muscles; being low lessens the target area; drops the COG and also to achieve a projection of body mass in a given direction. I never said I disagree. I stated that stances weren't necessary, that's all, as some of you make it sound like they are necessary. basically, my point was that there is more than one way to skin a cat. Stance training doesn't really improve leg strength - here goes another tangent - unless your legs are weak. Stance training - a prolonged exercise - trains muscular endurance, not muscular strength. I would say being low lowers the target area, but it doesn't lessen it - you aren't making yourself smaller.

I should clarify. I was speaking from a martial athlete's point of view. he is a martial artist. a martial artist may or may not be a martial athlete.

I have a korean friend whose dad said to me once: "God created the japanese. Then, he realized he could do better, so he made koreans." which was hilarious hearing him say, but it points out the animousity they have as well. However, what I find odd is that the japanese people I know have know ill feeling toward koreans at all.

I would like to see the statistics that most altercations do not involve weapons, it is more of an opinon than a statement. Who would walk over to a billiards table and pick up a stick, Unless your playing. I was trying to point out, use the weapons in your enviorment- chairs, ash trays,pocket change,improvise and be aware. Based on my own experience as a bouncer, I would agree with Triangle man, however, yeah seeing some stats would be cool. I have only been involved in six altercations incolving weapons in my line of work - two involving a knife and three involving beer bottles, one with a moet bottle. on the street, my experience has been the same - no weapons in most cases. I think that most people tend to have an over romanticized view of what streetfighting is and is not. Granted, it is dangerous, but you always here MA guys say "don't go to the ground cuz you can get cut on glass and dude's buddies will stomp you!" I have never been stomped by anyone's buddies, nor have I been cut by glass.

that can't be verified, actually. there are a lot of stories on the origin of jjj, but there is no one verifiable, concise story, AFAIK. one story is that it came from china via chen gempin who taught three different locks to three different people, and they expanded on it, creating the first three styles of jjj. Other stories say that development of jjjj was completely japanese. Now, one thing we can say is that china influenced sumo wrestling. If you watch it, you can see similar principles in execution to those found in shuai chiao. see my reply to PAL. but to elaborate on part of what you said, there are three parts to a throw - kazushi, tskuri and kake. when you perform the kazushi, you are NOT in a stance yet, you are transitioning to it, in most cases, seionage (since we keep using that one) is one of them. The next part - tskuri - is where you drop into a "stance". since there is no stance training, it may not be a technically correct stance, nor does it have to be - and that's part of my point. my footwork is putting me into something that resembles a horse stance, but technically speaking, it is not a horse stance. in the kake phase, you leave the "stance" and complete the throw.

yeah, that's my point exactly. you don't have to teach stance per se to achieve that effect, hence the lack of formal stance training in judo.

in chinese MA, this is also used to throw.