Keeping in touch with your inner kitten
Published: Thu, 03/15/18
Sometimes soon I will be having a conversation with a journalist from Beverley Life, a local monthly newspaper. The plan is to run a feature on Stav in the April edition. Pictures were taken at the course earlier in the month but a journalist will need to put together the text based on what I tell her. So, I have been thinking about what I can say about teaching Stav, particularly the martial side of it. I also need to develop the http://beverleystav.uk/ website too.
Of course I can talk about how we train, the weapons and techniques we use. I could make an attempt to explain the principles behind Stav training. I know that getting the message over to a journalist in a short conversation is going to be a challenge. Same with the website. Then I found myself thinking about my attitude to martial training and how would I sum up my attitudes? Well, here goes.
‘If you get to the point where you have to sort a problem by hitting someone then something has gone seriously wrong.’
I don’t mean that force is never necessary but violence is created by a whole web of circumstances and actions. If you really understand martial arts then you should be able to see the web forming and avoid the need for force.
‘No one gets out of this world alive anyway so what is there to really be afraid of?’
As I have mentioned before I like to have a walk around a cemetery from time to time. They are usually calm and peaceful places. Usually pretty quite too since most people seem to avoid them unless they have a particular grave to visit and pay their respects. I will read the names on some of the stones and wonder who is buried there. It does not matter that I do not know any more about them, it is a memorial stone so having the name read is sort of the point. Walking quietly in the cemetery is also a reminder that we are all mortal and will all go the same way eventually. So, enjoy the peace of being among the dead and then get back to your life and don’t waste your opportunities. No amount of martial training will make you immortal, but it might help you live without fear of death.
‘Martial Arts is fun.’
When I lived with cats that had kittens I found the little creatures quite educational. Kittens do four things. They sleep a lot, they eat as much as they can, they explore the world with great curiosity and the rest of the time they fight each other. Not viciously and you could call it play but they are perfecting their fighting skills with each other. Considering how much they do it I suspect that they must be having fun since no one makes them do it. Young children are pretty similar as they love to romp around. Then we grow up and we are not supposed to have that kind of fun any more. Even martial arts has to be ‘reality based self-defence’, for fitness, winning competitions or passing grades. It has to be taken seriously.
Really? How about enjoyable physical activity, making friends, gaining confidence and becoming conscious of your internal processes as well as understanding the universe we live in? This is also why martial arts should last a lifetime. I am 59 tomorrow, not sure how that happened but it has, but I still keep in touch with my inner kitten, I don’t intend to lose a childlike sense of wonder at the universe.
Those are my attitudes anyway:
1. Take responsibility for conflict if you have to, otherwise just avoid it.
2. Accept your mortality and stop worrying about it.
3. Have fun.
My next programme will cover martial training. Not the advanced weapon training, that has to be taught face to face. But I think I can share an approach to developing self-defence skills and cultivating an understanding of the five principles of Stav. Most importantly, I will be encouraging participants to develop similar attitudes to the ones described above.
I would like to start trialling the martial programme at the beginning of April, I will post details soon but do let me know if you are interested. Just send me a reply to this email.
regards
Graham
PS The HDC will reflect these attitudes, especially the having fun bit. Which is why I asked Allen, Fox and Milo to participate. All three have skill, knowledge and experience of the highest order but none of them take themselves too seriously. Different people will take different things away from such an event, but one thing I am sure of, there will be fun. If you want to join us see http://hdc.stavcamp.org/