Friday, June 27, 2008

Lazy Paper on Martial Arts and My Life

Living to Fight

I have known no other passion other than martial arts. It is the one thing I think I cannot live without. From my five years of Karate to my four years of Capoeira, martial arts has been quite an influence in my life. Martial arts not just offers a person ways to fight or defend himself, it also gives him, what I like to call, a way of life. It is wrapped in many philosophies and theories that tell people a lot about life. Trying to understand what lessons I have learned from martial arts, I came up with three simple essentials of life: Discipline, Respect, and Trust.


Martial arts requires concentration and discipline. Without Discipline, order is lost. No order means that chaos will run amok. There will be no progress. Discipline gives us the power to overcome the laziness that comes with taking on different tasks.


A hierarchy of members exists in martial arts, respect those who out rank you. Without Respect, relationships will fail. It is one of the most, if not the most important, things in a relationship. Broken relations mean conflict between each and every person. Respect teaches us to value everything around us and promotes a harmonious life.


You need trust when training, especially with a partner. Without Trust, you only leave room for yourself. To be alone is to not have the unwavering support that friends and family give. We were not meant to be alone in this world. We cannot make it on our own; we need one another.


All these I learned from martial arts. Some see martial arts as learning how to fight. I see it as learning how to live. These three things are essentials in my life, and I share them with you. This is how I choose to live my life.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well said.