Dark Sentiments Season 7 – Day 15: The Traditional and the Tribal
Posted By Randy on October 15, 2016
“The way Nature sees it, stress is the motivator for an organism to do something to relieve it. If you’re hungry, find something to eat and eat it. Thirsty? Find water. Too cold? Seek warmth. Too hot? Seek shade or some other method of mitigation. Tired? Find a way to get some rest. Sexually aroused? If you need me to clarify the solution to that, you don’t belong here. The point is that these are real problems shared by all Nature’s creatures, and illustrate one of the reasons why your Dog doesn’t care how much money you make. Stress becomes negative when we embrace living with it in self-imposed perpetuity, permitting our action to be limited or even paralyzed completely by a belief that certain plans of attack will fly in the face of the way things are ‘supposed to be’, or the way others expect you to conduct your affairs. In truth, it’s not always as simple to define as that, but in far too many cases, it is. The magic lies in knowing when you’re letting yourself fall into the trap.
“’Conflict’ is another word that’s been handed a bum rap, and government policy makers, corporate CEO’s, and school administrators wring their hands daily over finding the best way to eliminate it from the Earth. Good luck with that.
“In Nature – including the office I’m sitting in at the moment – the world is abuzz with Conflict, but for the most part with nary a raised voice, harsh word, drawn blade, nor bared fang. Conflict is inevitable when organisms in Nature compete for the same resources, but conflict and fighting are not the same thing. While fighting is an expression of conflict, not all conflict involves fighting, nor even negativity for that matter ….
“… The more I’ve studied the application of fighting arts and delivering lethality, the more I came to eschew the posturings of “toughness” and implied violence. I always laugh at the old saying that you should never fight with an old man because if he’s too old to fight, he’ll just kill you. It carries a solid element of truth at its core methinks. Study your methods and tools, train, and don’t fight unless your predetermined limit is reached. Then it’s all in – the way animals do. Fighting is counterproductive and wasteful – NOT at one with the Way of the Wild as a point in and of itself, but as a necessary element of survival that must be learned by everything that walks, swims, slithers, or flies, each in its own way.” ~ Worldly Wisdom Wednesday – The Positive Side of Conflict
“I’ve said many times before that for creatures in Nature, getting through a day is very much an exercise in energy management. Investment measured against return. The Way of the Wild doesn’t hold it up as a good idea to expend valuable energy and expose the self to risk of injury or immediate death by attacking and killing out of such base sentiments as boredom or sheer malice, and defensive measures offered by the presumed “prey” are what hold potential attackers in check. Nothing in Nature meekly submits. It’s flight or fight, all the way!
In Human terms, the offer to a potential attacker of being maimed or killed as the cost of doing harm to one they would have their way with is an enforcement of morality. The moral code of a just and sound society patterned on the immutable laws of Nature. Respect Life, and never take it without sound reason …. ~ In Ferro Veritas – Chapter the Third
Just this week, the Raven Tribe YouTube channel posted an interview with my Esteemed Friend, Master At Arms James Keating. Whether or not you have ever practiced any fighting discipline, I invite you to set aside the time to absorb what Jim had to say. Most particularly, his statements that the ability to express violence in a sane and productive context is but part of what it means to be a complete Human; a concept that will seem counterintuitive to the 21st century ear. Listen though, and you will learn that only those who understand destruction, and yet also have the strength to withhold it, can truly know what it is to be merciful.
Hearken also, Goode reader, to the distinction between “traditional” and the “tribal” martial styles, and how their distinctions factor in to a healthily balanced expression of Life. For as Jim describes our time to be one of “ascension”, in which the clamour is that the fight is the thing, in and of itself. A grave mistake as he so eloquently points out, for what this time truly demands is, as Musashi defined, the all encompassing Spirit of the Thing Itself.
Now listen and learn. Take notes.
First paragraph suggest self-actuated anarchic reasoning and it is pretty much self explanatory.
I mention in my Art of War that conflict is essential for growth and the stress that accompanies it is a necessary aspect for conclusive end results that enhance your societal status. So it is good to have some amounts of stress that can be relegated to advancement while certainly bypassing psychosis ad vindictive aggression.
I agree with the premise of the ‘old man’ and would rather think in terms of killing outright instead of fighting though I underwstand your rationale.I think I have also arrived at a position where I would rather strike out preemptively and kill some motherfucker rather than have to deliberate my intention albeit a momentary lapse of reason.
In “Rings” i discuss the fight or flight mentality, or is it AoW, I forget which,that to corner an opponent it always makes sense in some respect to allow for an avenue of escapeinorder to avoid a ‘to the death’ scenario…When you corner someone yo have to go at it with utter resolve to destroy the ‘target’ as the target will certainly be pschotic and in fear that can c\ause to get killed. We will talk about this, indeed.
Now, on to te video. Be right back … OK, a enormous amount of information in this video and I would imagine that the others contain as much.
Nothing to really argue with Keating about, however, because all different marital forms consist of specific originality that causes them to become specific can never be fully understood from an individual perspective. It is essential, in my view tat ALL forms are immediately accepted as personally mastered and then selectively technique gleaned for the development of one’s own particular loife style. We wills definitely go into much of this in our upcoming work on Sunday. Mr. Keating certainly does prevail as an instructor and practitioner of merit and my compliments to him. It is good to know that the few of us that ‘are’, are not alone.