Rory Speaks; Ulcers

You can take yourself seriously or your work seriously, but not both…ulcers and such.

-Rory Miller

Stolen

Sticks and stones may break my bones

My bones will fully heal

Names will hurt forever more

And my soul will steal

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

GSP Speaks; The Norm

There is no such thing as a normal friendship in my life. There is no such thing as a normal relationship either. I’m not certain I have real friends in the definitive sense of the word. If I am going to reach my goal, I simply cannot afford “normal” relations.

…

As I look back, every single person who tried to change me is no longer in my life. All of the people who tried to shape me into something that better represents their idea of a normal existence are gone.

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

Confucius Says

Silence is a true friend who never betrays.

—Confucius

GSP Speaks; Prey

The key is always being lined up with your opponent’s eyes, like you’re trying to stay on a level with a wave in the ocean.  Up and down, side to side, stay level with his eyes.  Like he’s your prey.

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

GSP Speaks; Dark Side

I discovered a darker side, a darker place in my existence. I’m not sure exactly how to explain it. I just think it was part of my evolution. I’ve been a good and nice person at times, and it has helped me win opportunities, and other times I’ve been pitiless because that’s what the situation demanded of me.

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

Gung-Fu Truth

Go to your garage.  Get some friends.  Have fun.

Everyone Has A Dark Side

Opportunity

Not knowing when the dawn will come
I open every door.
― Emily Dickinson, The Complete Poems

The Way

Yuan once asked: Do you make efforts in your practice of the Way, Master?
Hui Hai: Yes, I do.
Yuan: How?
Hui Hai: When hungry, I eat; when tired, I sleep.
Yuan: And does everybody make the same efforts as you do, Master?
Hui Hai: Not in the same way.
Yuan: Why not?
Hui Hai: When they are eating, they think of a hundred kinds of necessities, and when they are going to sleep, they ponder over affairs of a thousand different kinds. That is how they differ from me.

I Look At You

Do not tell everyone your story. You will only end up feeling more rejected. People cannot give you what you long for in your heart. The more you expect from people’s response to your experience of abandonment, the more you will feel exposed to ridicule.

— Henri J.M. Nouwen

I’ll Be Too Busy Lookin Good

Super Microphonious; Chinese Medicine Taught Me How To Learn

Chinese medicine is a zoom-out theory and it has taught me how to learn.

Because Chinese medicine doesn’t subscribe to just one line of thinking (keeping all theories and ideas for their appropriate place), over time this permeated into all parts of my being.

I am therefore able to slip seamlessly between spiritual faiths and traditions, and see the common threads.

I am able to visit a martial arts club and not get hung up on style or system.

Zoom out:

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

The Progress of Pain

It’s so hard to forget pain, but it’s even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace. ―Chuck Palahniuk

Bad Guys

My son loves to play Darth Vader.  He loves The Joker.  He asks questions about the enemies of the superheroes.

Because, of course, the bad guys are portrayed as having more fun.

Look at the typical ‘cocky Mayweather’ vs ‘humble Guerrero’ picture Showtime is editing.

And being really honest with ourselves, I think we’d rather have the life Mayweather has over some ‘humble’ bullshit.  We love to watch the ones on top fall…

As if there’s something wrong with living life large, if so be your nature.

And therein lies the crux of it all:

KNOW THYSELF.

Seth Godin Speaks

Running

You call yourself a free spirit, a “wild thing,” and you’re terrified somebody’s gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you’re already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it’s not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It’s wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.
― Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Alter Ego

“The most racking pangs succeeded: a grinding in the bones, deadly nausea, and a horror of the spirit that cannot be exceeded at the hour of birth or death. Then these agonies began swiftly to subside, and I came to myself as if out of a great sickness. There was something strange in my sensations, something indescribably sweet. I felt younger, lighter, happier in body; within I was conscious of a heady recklessness, a current of disordered sensual images running like a millrace in my fancy, a solution of the bonds of obligation, an unknown but innocent freedom of the soul. I knew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be more wicked, tenfold more wicked, sold a slave to my original evil and the thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like wine.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

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