Friday, April 4, 2008

Martial Wisdom (part 1)


I have include in here the many martial wisdom (quotes and saying) that I have collected throughout the years in my martial art training. I wish to impart these very same wisdom to those who are willling to open one's mind. Read to your hearts content.

- Only when we understand nature, instead of going against it, will we become the masters as well as the servants of nature.
- If you can practice with a quiet mind and a calm spirit your movement will be active and nimble. (Sun Lu-Tang)
- Use yi(mind) no li (force). Use you yi and your li will follow. If you use only li the movement will be too slow. (Sun Lu-Tang)
- In the absence of light darkness will prevail.
- Everything free from falsehood is strength.
- If the training method is wrong even years of training will fail to produce desirable results in any respectable martial arts. (Morihiro Saito)
- A correct training method starts with learning basic mavoements, which are always practiced at each training session, and obtaining a knowledge of what these movements mean. (Morihiro Saito)
- Basic movements should be practiced at each training session and should under no circumstances be omitted. (Morihiro Saito)

- The only time you find out how smart you are is when you meet a worthy adversary.

- When love and skill work together, expect a masterpiece.

- Opening an argument is like closing a door, making it impossible to see both sides.

- The more you know, the more you know you ought to know.

- Learning without thought is labor lost.

- A failure is not yet death. It is discouragement after failure that brings death.

- Ignorance doesn't kill you but it makes you sweat a lot.

- It is the man, not the style, that wins.

- No greater enemy exist than one's own illusion of safety.

- To know the hunter know the game.

- It is the height of arrogance to fling your chances of survival into the lap of the Goddess of Fate, demanding
that she perform what you will not . This arrogance is always punished.

- Know why you need to teach, know why your student wants to learn, and half of the training problem is gone. (Sun-Tzu)

- Make the first move to gain control. Attack according to timing. Even when you do not advance, I do not relent. Face the opponent directly as you move in. Execute three moves together. Stay with what comes, follow through as it retreats, thrust forward as the hand is freed. (Wing Chun Theories)

- Courage is not the absence of fear.

- Simple truths are the most profound truths. (Jim Davies)

- Neither womb, nor wealth, he has not earned is the measure of a man, but what he has been trained to do. Only his skills are his worth.

- To reason with the unenlightened is like trying to make buildings by watering stones.

- The mighty oak always win before the raging storm begins.

- Corruption causes justice to appear as insanity.

- There is nothin of worth that does not try the soul.

- Next to arrogance, fear is the major enemy.

- To Threaten damage was to give a man a shield, to spew insults was to give him energy, except in a case where the enemy could be provoked to foolish anger.

- Pain is an excellent teacher. What your mind cannot grasp, your body will never forget. Remember this in your pain. Never rush. Time is your ally or your enemy.

- Our weapons are only as useful as the arms that wield them.

- In the hand of a true master, every object becomes a deadly weapon.

- A mountain is a thing you climbed or fell from. But not a place where you rested.

- There is one sure thing that will be punished in this world and that is doing something wrong - making a wrong decision or making a wrong move.

- The bear went over the mountain and what do you think he saw? He saw another mountain.

- What you do not look for, you do not see.

- You can bang your head against a wall all day and it will not come down. But pull out the right brick and it will collapse in ruin.

- As long as the mind questions, seeks answers, investigate new areas of endeavor, we are never truly alone.

- A child can learn what is not taught. He can learn from the skies, the earth, the sea, a piece of metal cannot... A child can unlearn lies. He can grow within himself to discover truth. A piece of metal cannot.

- He who leaves vengeance to others will never slake his thirst.

- He who lives is strong.

- He who attacks with himself first, gives away his patterns of attack and becomes the more vulnerable.

- Man is so unlimited that he meets his limit when he tries to duplicate himself.

- Diamonds are not more valuable because everyone has them.

- Pride is a good thing for a house to have, but it is dangerous for its individual members. They stop thinking and live on pride instead, and he who lives on pride does not live long.

- The ideal man has a calm that is linked to the forces of the world. The ideal man seeks no unnecessary danger but accepts whatever danger there is, knowing that it is how he dies, not when, that matters. I see the ideal man capable of sitting quietly for hours, his long, thin hands resting at peace upon his robes. I see the ideal man in command of his craft and doing what he must do as well as man can do it. I see the ideal man as a teacher of someone he loves.

- I am one with everything, therefore I am nothing.

- Fear is tragedy, Courage is patience, Honor is faith!

- Evil cannot be destroyed or avoided, you can only confront it or embraced it.

- The powerful man is the one who subdues his enemies without unleashing a single blow.

- Killing is sometimes a necessary evil but it damages the soul.

- Know your enemy and know yourself; one hundred challenges without danger; know not your enemy and yet know yourself; one triumph for one defeat; know not your enemy and know not yourself ; every challenge is certain defeat. ( Sun Tzu The Art of War)

- To learn conceptualization one must practice it. To be able to apply it swiftly and correctly one must be familiar with its processes within the parameters of our own intellectual frameworks. You see, thought is too slow in comparison to the lightning flash of concept type thought. It can see you through some tough places that no amount of preparation ever could. Instinct and conceptualization are life savers when the odds are stacked against you. (James Keating)

- Know the wisdom of being patient during time time of inactivity. Choose the course of justice as the path of your life. Do not allow your heart to be controlled by the demands of desire, pleasure or dependence. Sorrow, pain and resentment are natural qualities to found in life; therefore, work to cultivate an immovable spirit. Hold in your heart the importance of respect for your seniors, and pursue the literary and martial arts with balanced determination. (Koga Ninjutsu, philosophy)

- Budo is not a means of felling an opponent by force or by lethal instruments. Neither is it intended to lead the world to destruction by arms and other illegitimate means. True Budo calls for bringing the inner energy of the universe to order, protecting the peace of the world and molding, as well as preserving, everything in nature in its right forms. In other words, I have realized that training in Budo is tantamount to strengthening, within my body and soul, the love of God who begets, preserves and nurtures everything in nature... (Morihei Uyeshiba)

- Remember to avoid the temptation of seeing yourself as a teacher. (Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi)

- Be wary whenever you reach the point where you feel that you have finally gotten down to the bottom line as to the essence of the warrior arts. To reach the bottom line is the same thing as being dead. (Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi)

- Ultimately, you must not allow yourself to be consumed by striving for strength as opposed to weakness, hardness as opposed to softness, or speed as opposed to slowness in the warrior arts. The only way to attain total invincibility is to let go of all concern with the limitations of the body, and allow yourself to become one with the "ku no sekai" (void) that will permit you complete freedom of adapting. (Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi)

- Truth in the guise of falsehood, falsehood disguised as truth. (Stephen K. Hayes)

- The sculpting artist endeavors to remove only jusat enough rock to free the desired image trapped within. The martial artist, likewise, works to let go of all limitations that bar him from the freedom and power he seeks. (Stephen K. Hayes)

- Total capability is the goal of the warrior arts. (Stephen K. Hayes)

- Even bitter enemies have their lessons to teach us, if only we can be sensitive enough to interpret those lessons from their actions. (Stephen K. Hayes)

- Before I studied the art, a punch to me is just like a punch, a kick just like a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick no longer a kick. Now that I understood the art, a punch is just like a punch, a kick just like a kick. (Bruce Lee)

- Take the fang of the snake and you control the body.

- Be strong, a faint heart never wins.

- To conquer fear, one must embrace fear.

- That which doesn't destroy me only makes me stonger. (Nietzche)

- Summer grass;
of stalwart warriors splendid dreams
the aftermath.
(Matsuo Basho)

- The deepest desires often comes the deepest of hate. (Socrates)

- You are who you pretend to be so be careful who you pretend to be. (Gilmore Trout)

- Dark clouds may withhold the blue sky from our eyes but the heavens will shine on those brave enough to pierce those clouds.

- Defeat is but a moment.

- You can take mud from the river ; but you cannot make of it a diamond. Be satisfied with a brick.

- The enemy of enemy is my friend.

- Admitting error is not a confession of weakness, but a sign of strength.

- Broad statements come from narrow minds.

- A woman can overcome a big, strong man by using her wits.

- A man's pride is not easily reasoned away.

- Let everyone be his own master; yes, but let him first and above all, be his own charge. (Ferdinand E. Marcos)

- Kindness in words creates confidence, kindness in thinking creates profoundness, kindness in giving creates love. (Lao-Tzu)

- Anger is wind which blows out the lamp of the mind.

- When love and skill work together, expect a masterpiece.

- Talk to your heart when the world can't listen.

- All armor has flaws. All mountains have fissures. All arms have elbows.

- The Iris, a beautiful flower, stands out more on a cloudy day thatn on the brightest of sunshines.

- The doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance.

- The emotional distance between the darkest of hate and the deepest of love is nothing more than the width of rice paper. Just as hate can cause a man to act with extreme violence so thus love can cause a woman to cherish the worst of killers, as if he was a new born baby. It is the weakness of the heart, our most formidable enemy.

- In everything you do, you must always put your head above your shoulders.

- Stop being better than your contemporary or predecessor. Start being better than yourself.

- The ultimate object of the study and training...... should be the perfection of self by training physically and mentally. (Risei Kano, President of Kudokan Judo Institute)

- Our life is made by the death of others. (Leonardo Da Vinci)

- The clouded mind sees nothing.

- Live as if you would die tomorrow, learn as if you would live forever. (Mahatma Gandhi)

- The hero can prove what he is only by dying. The power of good is shown not by triumphantly conquering evil, but by continuing to resist evil while facing certain death. (Edith Hamilton)

- By submission, you conquer.
- Whoever robs from his own efforts robs himself.
- Passion are the first level of survival. The mind is the higher level. Discipline, properly pursued, brings together all rebellion into perfection. It is long, it is hard and when doing it properly, learning it properly, man feels small and inadequate. That is how we grow. There has never been a shortcut to anything worthwhile.
- To confront the unkown, one must first stand aside and watch it and wait until it was known.
- Avoid violence whenever it is necessary.
- The main principle behind continuity without interruption is to perform from start to finish in a continuous, circular and unending manner.
- Even if the external body is in motion, the internal mind is as still as the water in the lake. This is what we mean by seeking stillness in movement.
- The key to any art is determining its exact purpose. One could try exploring the founder's background. Maybe the founder had some physical handicaps to deal with or perhaps physical gifts to capitalize on. Each system has a specific design. We just have to determinewhat the system was designed for. Once the purpose, if revealed, the art's design is understood. Learning the art, then, becomes much easier, and the student has a better appreciation for the art.


- A master is not just someone who is an expert in his field but a master of his lower emotions, being an expert judge of time and circumstances. He delights not in his personal but the glory of his students. Often times a superficial cruiser in life will not recognize a master, since a master would never proclaim to others he is one. For the more sincere seekers, they look at the fruits of the master. Like a full stalk of ripened rice, he is humble, patient and tolerant. (Marilitz Dizon)


- To evade is better than to block an attack.
- The ideal warriorship is that the warrior should be sad and tender, and because of that, the warrior can be brave as well. Without that heart felt sadness, bravery is brittle, like a china cup. If you drop it, it will break or chip. But the bravery of a warrior is like a lacquer cup, which has a wooden base covered with layer upon layer of lacquer. If this cup drops, it will bounce rather than break. It is soft and hard at the same time. (Changyam Trongpa)
- Toughness has nothing to do with a killer instinct or ruthless play. (Jim Loehr)
- Combat training is not really about learning styles or techniques. It is more about developing the human person. (Mon Rivera)
- Acquiring toughness and knowing how to fight back using just a few simple but effective techniques can save more lives than a hundred and one executed without the proper 'emotional content.' (Mon Rivera)

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