Now
this is a wonderful demonstration of
what I love about martial arts
and martial artists. I was at the mixed martial arts Expo in Toronto and I was
scheduled to do a demonstration
on a Sunday morning and my students, who were going to
help me out with a demonstration, were unable to make it.
So, the martial arts school in front of me,
"Lanna MMA and Kickboxing,"
they were doing a demonstration ahead of me and were
planning to quit when my turn came along and I just said, "Well, I don't have any
students to demonstrate on. So,
you folks may as well just continue
and do the demonstration."; and the chief instructor there
said, "Well, would you like to moral one of my students?"
I said, "Well that would be very kind of you!
"Are you sure that's okay?" He said, "Sure" and he just
pointed to one of his senior students and said, "You're learning Tai chi.
Get out on the mat." Now, I have never trained with this particular club. I've
seen them do their demonstrations but I've never visited their school
I'm and not a kickboxer myself.
I didn't know much about their lineage and they didn't know much about
me.
But they though enough of me to
respect why I was there and what I was doing.
and if you watch, this is the second demonstration we did that day.
This is one of the
assistant instructors from Lanna MMA
and look at how
good-natured he is and so very nice
and relaxed.
He gives a really good honest application
and its at no point
does he let his ego get in the way.
At no point does he worry about whether or not he could kick my butt.
Instead he just make sure that he
gives me the opportunity to demonstrate my skill.
and without trying
too hard to make me look bad. In fact, he
makes me look pretty good in a couple places.
There is something about martial arts. You find that
the more skill that people have the better they get
and the better quality of skill that you find
at a martial arts studio or martial arts school....
the nicer the people are. In fact, you can judge
the quality a school's martial arts
by the character of their students and by the personalities of
the instructors. Because nobody who has anything worth teaching
is going to waste their time teaching somebody
who is it worth it. Nobody is going to waste their time teaching a jerk.
Not only that, but in order to master martial arts
you need to master yourself. This is not just
and idealistic principle this is a very practical thing.
Every time there's a thought there's an emotion. every time there's an emotion there is
a physical response.
So, people who master martial arts
have to work through their own "stuff." So, there's no room for
fear, hatred, or anger, ego, or anything
on the floor. Everyone has to be paying very close attention to very fine
details
and constantly respecting their training partner, because if you break your
partner, you don't get another one.
So, here's a fine example a really
obviously a wonderful martial arts school. Now I didn't know
much about them until I did these demos. I just seen them do their demonstration
in the past.
So, when I finally got around to checking out
who these people were who very kindly volunteered
to help me out with my demonstration,
I found out that the chief instructor, Kru Mel Bellissimo,
trained in Thailand with a very famous Muay Thai
master named, and I'll see if I can say this
properly, Ajahn Burklerk Pinsinchai.
Now, he is referred to as the Mohammed Ali
of Muay Thai. So, my point is that
these very nice people
could have shown me up very easily
and I certainly wouldn't want to get into the ring with any of them
and yet here you would think that I was
some great martial arts master just because all the way to they're
helping me out with this demonstration so it
bears my point. The better a martial arts school - the nicer the people,
and the higher the level of skill -
the nicer the personalities of the instructors.