What’s your style?

What’s your style?

What’s your style? As Parsons (bully on the boat in Enter the dragon said)

Bruce Lee’s reply ‘‘It is the art of fighting without fighting.’’

It is a strange thing that as martial artists we spend all our time working out, training, practicing, sweating, taking the pain, the bruises, the knocks, obsessing over the best techniques that will work on the street, thinking of the best ways to defend ourselves and our families yet all we want to do is to avoid confrontation.

When I used to do some security work many moons ago, we always used to get the Jack the Lads who could not hold drink wanting to cause trouble, one large F*****, Sorry fellow wanted to fight me, thinking of the increasing danger to the public at the venue by his behaviour it had to be dealt with. I really did not fancy it as he was a bit of a monster but I was used to dealing with the wife so I thought I would cope (sorry wife). He motioned me to go outside to fight and of course in that moment everyone is staring and looking at the altercation unfolding and the impending spectacle so something had to be done.  As we were walking towards the door to go outside I just used the old following him out the door ploy and when I reached the door I just shut it leaving him outside and me on the inside. He went crazy kicking the door, swearing, shouting and all the normal stupid behaviour associated with alcohol etc.

Basking in the round of applause given and feeling good about avoiding the unnecessary cuts and bruises to myself I thought that was the end of the matter only to see out of the corner of my eye him trying to climb back in through the window, how did I not spot that one? Oh well it did not matter anyway as the window was a little high and as he climbed in and  him being the worse for drink he face planted straight on his head and gave himself concussion.  I asked the other security guys to drag him outside and this invited another rousing round of applause from the public!

Looking back on everything I have done in the martial arts and in life, I always think to myself could I have done it better or chosen a different way and the overwhelming thing is it is always correct for that moment in that time. When I have made a mistake I always try to learn from it and not to repeat it again if the same scenario occurs.

There is no substitute for experience and as you learn more about people, life and yourself, you tend not to make the same mistakes over and over again.

In relation to our martial arts it is not important about the style you choose to do but it is important to understand about yourself and people.

‘‘The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.’’

Train safe and keep well

GM Angelo