In Dreams; I Fight

He backed his car up on my lawn – a boat of a thing.  Hit my retaining wall.  All this as I watched from across the street.  It was dusk if I recall.

I’d had enough.  I called out to him and said that I was going to make him pay.  He crossed the street and I laid into him.  He seemed to recover for a second and he hit me in the face hard but it did nothing more than jostle me.  I kicked his legs out from under him and he collapsed to the ground.  I pounced.

He turned away on his side to cover up as I rained punches and elbows over his head.  Then I proceeded to throw knee after knee into his kidneys.  He would be sure to piss blood now.

After the finishing blows, he hobbled away muttering to me that he would never encroach on my property again.

———-

I’ve had a lot of fights in my dreams, but I usually have a habit of losing.  I move awkwardly and can’t seem to control the pace.  I haven’t had a fight dream in some time so it was nice to know that I’ve gained ground within my subconscious – where it really counts.

One thing that still bothers me though, is how that skin on my forehead got torn out…that’s some Freddy Kruger type shit…

CTK

GSP Speaks; Best Foot Forward

My foot positioning, if I compare my first fight to my time as champion, is probably the biggest change in my style. In the beginning, I never paid attention to my foot positioning and seldom made sure my front foot pointed at my opponent. I didn’t realize the importance of it.

- Excerpt from The Way of the Fight by Georges St.Pierre

Luk Dim Poon Kwan

A Student of Movement

John Danaher Speaks; Routine

Whether or not I had ever met Georges St-Pierre, my life would be unchanged: I wake up, I teach Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu all day, and I come home at night. Certain aspects of my knowledge base would be deficient, but the living of my daily life would be the same. I have a belief that all human greatness is founded upon routine, that truly great human behavior is impossible without this central part of your life being set up and governed by routine. All greatness comes out of an investment in time and the perfection of skills that render you great. And so, show me almost any truly great person in the world who exhibits some kind of extraordinary skills, and I’ll show you a person whose life is governed largely by routine.

- Excerpt from The Way of the Fight by Georges St.Pierre

Too Late, No Friends

My wife often jokes that if it wasn’t for the internet, I’d have no friends at all.

But seriously – how the hell is a martial arts nut who wakes up at 5:30am to kill a heavy bag supposed to relate to normal people?

How am I supposed to get on with folks who aren’t privy to their own internal programming?

Plus, I’m self-employed, working the opposite hours that the norm does to provide for my fam.  I’ve built my life against the current.

At least I have myself (and HDS).

Train vs Teach

It is bad when one thing becomes two.
One should not look for anything else in the Way
of the Samurai. It is the same for anything that is
called a Way. If one understands things in this manner,
he should be able to hear about all ways and be more
and more in accord with his own.

—YAMAMOTO TSUNETOMO

I’ve decided I will no longer teach, per se.  It’s not like a lot of people come ’round these parts of the country to seek out some Gung-Fu guy.  Gung-Fu is dead as far as the masses are concerned.  So be it.  We have been delving back into the underground for some time now and there’s no turning back.  However, it is of no concern because concealment is power.

It’s not like things that I’ve learned won’t be taught, it’s more of a mental shift.  Words mean things – and they mean different things to different people.  I will take the back seat in making sure that everyone has the knowledge of the system and instead be more concerned with how they are serving everyone at that given time.

Another thing, modeled off of my mentor and friend, is that I will not charge for any time spent with me any longer.  This takes the burden of having to teach (read: sell a product) to someone.

Come.  Train.  Bring gear.

Opportunistic

Car in the shop.  Oil and tires.  Order a new wheel bearing.

Two-hour lunch gap.

Running home ≠ inconvenience.

Work clothes ≠ inconvenience.

I.  Am.  Opportunistic.

Monday, Monday, You Break My Heart

Gents came over on Sunday for photos and training.

Twice a week, before my family wakes, I do the same thing: forms, heavy bag, solo-Chi Sau with elastic band, sprints with burpees

Once a week, between gaps in my day, I do the same thing: hindu pushups, tabletops, crunches, burpees; all to a deck of cards

From time to time, I do the same thing: dynamic sparring warmup, punching drills, Chi Gerk, Chi Sau/Goh Sau, sparring

There is a reason there are only three techniques written in the curriculum after the punch: Tan Sau, Pak Sau, Lop Sau

I am a savage

HDS Speaks; Savagery

My attitude as a trained fighter is simple. I presume the opponent can match my skill. However I remain confident that he is unable to match my savagery.

Some Life Lessons Learnt from Chinese Boxing

What you put in you get out.

Stay the course.

You don’t know what you don’t know.

If you can get hit and keep rolling with it, life doesn’t pack such a punch.

Learn the lesson and then let it go.

You can find moments of personal glory somewhere between seeing stars and black eyes.

Return of the Body Snatchers

I’ll Be Too Busy Lookin Good

Thoughts

I believe in magic.  I believe in a Great Spirit to guide me.  I believe in ghosts, buddhas and gods and tao.  I believe in myself.

I work to have an immense trust there are reasons for everything – a chaotic, synchronistic beauty to life.

For some time, I have been working out where hate and violence comes from – as if from an external source to myself.  This has been the same when it comes to martial knowledge.

In a society built around rules, and many a quote written about surrendering to some  Tao, I understand; however, if it is against my true nature of wanting and pushing, then it is wrong.

Who are you to tell me I can’t do something?  That I can’t achieve and grow?  That I can’t change my lifestyle to represent my dreams?  You don’t know me for shit.

This talk of knowing one’s limits irks me to no end.  Limits?  How would anyone know their own limits?  Bruce Lee was right: there are no limits.

And the reason I think this has all happened to me over the last two years is to help me cultivate a capacity of violence – my missing link – my ‘on’ button.

Fuck Wing Chun.  Fuck systems.  Create your own mini-system out of what you have.  Perfect it and train it until your hands bleed and your joints ache from the repetitive movements.

All the greats have done it.  And I still want that.

It’ll never go away.  Maybe that’s the secret.

It’s Not About Me

It’s not about me, it’s about the patient in the clinic.

It’s not about me, it’s about the student at the school.

It’s not about me, it’s about my wife and children at home.

It’s not about you, it’s about me at the gym.

How Low

How low are you willing to go before you reach all your selfish goals?

Farther than you.

CTK

Karate Kid

I didn’t grow up watching Bruce Lee like so many others.

Being a child of the 80′s meant that I grew up with Karate Kid and American Ninja.

However, like many of the latecomers, I schooled myself on the importance of Bruce Lee and what he brought to not only cinema, but Gung-Fu.  I then immersed myself in Shaw Brothers classics and Wu Xia style movies.

No different than someone who didn’t grow up on KRS-One.

Or Wu-Tang Clan.

Shame on you when you stepped through to
The Ol’ Dirty Bastard straight from the Brooklyn Zoo
And I’ll be damned if I let any man
Come to my center, you enter the winter

Memories; Temple Kung-Fu

At 14 years of age, sleeping in the basement of my home, and watching late night television, I saw a white-haired man beat up ninjas on a bridge.

The next morning I woke with such promise.  I had quit everything to date; soccer and piano made no impact on my life anymore.

Learning Chinese Gung-Fu was the beginning of my studies as I delved deeply into Taoist and Buddhist works, spending my free weekends in Calgary Chinatown drinking bubble tea and browsing the shops, returning home with trinkets such as the three wise men.

Roots

Sometimes you have to return to where it all began.

To find the reason again.

The Grande Finale

On September 29, 2009, I joined forces with His Dark Side to write for this blog.  It’s now time to say goodbye and move on to something else.

I still have memories of when http://www.darkwingchun.com used to point to a comic-style website with an invitation to email the owner – responses on an ad-hoc basis.  If my memory serves me correctly, it was a forum post with a link that probably brought me there.  I really liked what the guy had to say.  His opinions were sound and yet, unlike most, he wasn’t selling anything.

What grew out of that chance website-encounter will be greater than anyone could ever imagine.  I’ve grown by leaps and bounds over the years and have developed a friendship closer than I ever thought possible.

I’ve always been terribly upset when visiting a blog and finding it defunct, but now I understand why it has to be done.  Blogs are their own little entities in the stratosphere of the internet.  Very much like a band that tours year after year, eventually looking across the studio, they say: I think we’re done here – some “We came.  We saw.  We conquered.” -type sh*t.

Perhaps this isn’t goodbye.  Perhaps it will remain an open-ended project in some regards.

I will start a new project that will continue on the lines of ‘Dark’ Wing Chun – just more personal than what I’ve been building here.  Perhaps I’ll come back to this post and leave a cookie crumb when it has started for those interested.

So.  Without further ado:

May you find your own path.