What It Means to Be a Warrior Part 2
If there was one thing that summed up my experiences this past year, it was the fact that I learned what it really meant to be a warrior. I used to think that warriors were people who possessed incredible fighting skill and courage. However, I realized that I barely scratched the surface when it came to knowing what being a warrior is all about.
When I began the foundations of Bayani Warrior back in 2003, I realized I wanted the group to be far more than just a group of people who could fight with weapons. I wanted the group to stand for something...to represent something bigger than just ourselves. I wanted the members to possess a high level of skill, but I also wanted them to carry themselves a certain way throughout their normal daily life. I wanted there to be a sense of duty and honor in what we were doing. I wanted to use the Filipino fighting arts to develop people into stronger, better individuals.
As the years went by, I kept doing everything I could to live what I thought was the warrior lifestyle. I trained everyday in the gym to keep my skills fresh. I sparred anyone and everyone who wanted to move around with me. I ate right. I exercised relentlessly. I would develop new drills and weapons to use. However, I still felt something was missing. While I was training hard and my skills were improving, I felt that there was something that I just wasn't doing...something that would complete the puzzle, so to speak. I knew that I wanted to possess great fighting skill, but even that goal didn't seem enough for developing myself into the person I sincerely wanted to be.
A few years later, I began training in a system called Atienza Kali under Tuhon Carl Atienza. Atienza Kali is a blade-based system that specializes in long blades as well as small blades in multiple attacker scenarios. Tuhon Carl not only taught me how to apply my techniques in real time, but also taught me valuable lessons as to what it meant to be a warrior...a Filipino warrior in particular, and how to better run Bayani Warrior in the proper way. When I went to my first instructor weekend for Atienza Kali instructorship, I was put through training that I had never gone through before. I realized that while I possessed a pretty good deal of fighting skill, it still wasn't enough to make me into a warrior. Fighting skill was only a very, very small part of the puzzle.
I learned that a warrior is not just a person with great fighting skill. A warrior is a person who looks at any problem, any problem at all, and solves it with a focused and clear mind, without panicking or being sidetracked by emotion. I learned that true warriors embrace challenges. I realized that warriors do not care about the individual. In fact, it's never about the individual. Rather, it's about the group and how well the group functions as a whole. Above all else, I learned that warriors could apply their training not just to combative scenarios, but to every aspect of their life: their relationships with loved ones, their careers, and life's challenges.
When I returned home from the weekend, the experience stayed with me. I learned that while I have been training my whole life to be the best fighter, I was not training to be the best warrior. Warriors and fighters are not the same. Fighters are great at fighting. But, that's about it. Warriors, on the other hand, apply their training to every aspect of their life. They live by a code of conduct. Like fighters, warriors can fight...but they also think their way through tough situations as opposed to responding emotionally about them. They can maintain control of their relationships with their family and friends. They can lead and teach others how to be better people.
Throughout this year, as a result of God's Grace, Tuhon Carl's constant guidance, as well as going through life's challenges and experiencing things first-hand, I have had a better understanding of how to be the warrior in my own life for Bayani Warrior, my family, girlfriend, and friends. Now, I have been able to not only work through problems of my own, but I have also been able to help those I care about get through their problems...which is something I have been unable to do before.
The Samurai, Spartans, Moros, Maori, Knights, Hwarang, Zulu...all of them were warriors. Not fighters, but warriors. It wouldn't make sense to call these groups fighters. Sure, they could all obviously fight, but that's not what defined them as warriors. What made them warriors was how they carried themselves every minute of the day...how they viewed daily life and battlefield combat as the same thing. They were open to challenges and faced any problem life threw at them head on. They not only possessed physical skill and strength, but they were also incredibly focused on the importance of spiritual and mental cultivation. It is for reasons such as these that I wanted to call the group Bayani Warrior. Not Bayani Fighting Systems or Bayani Martial Arts. I wanted to call it Bayani Warrior...a group that melded the ideals of the hero with the focus and courage of the warrior.
In the last entry, I wrote about the Bayani, or hero, and how heroes possess the willingness to act and do something extraordinary for the benefit of those around them. The Warrior is very similar, if not almost identical, to the Bayani. Both the Bayani and the Warrior possess courage and the willingness to act. Both the Bayani and the Warrior place the needs of their community, tribe, or country above themselves.
However, the Bayani and the Warrior differ in the sense that while the Bayani seeks to take action when faced with a problem, the Warrior wants to exactly know how to do deal with the problem efficiently and logically. If the Bayani and the Warrior were standing side-by-side in front of a problem, the Bayani will say, "I want to do something about this!"...but the Warrior will say, "Okay, fine. Now how do we solve it in the most efficient way possible?"
As I said in the last entry, I have a lot of work ahead of me when it comes to being both the Bayani and the Warrior in every aspect of my life. I am still trying to be the best warrior I can be. However, I believe that as with most things in life, being a warrior is a constant process. I am reminded of a quote by the writer Carlos Casteneda:
Next, I will talk about how the Bayani and the Warrior work together. Stick around for Part 3.
When I began the foundations of Bayani Warrior back in 2003, I realized I wanted the group to be far more than just a group of people who could fight with weapons. I wanted the group to stand for something...to represent something bigger than just ourselves. I wanted the members to possess a high level of skill, but I also wanted them to carry themselves a certain way throughout their normal daily life. I wanted there to be a sense of duty and honor in what we were doing. I wanted to use the Filipino fighting arts to develop people into stronger, better individuals.
As the years went by, I kept doing everything I could to live what I thought was the warrior lifestyle. I trained everyday in the gym to keep my skills fresh. I sparred anyone and everyone who wanted to move around with me. I ate right. I exercised relentlessly. I would develop new drills and weapons to use. However, I still felt something was missing. While I was training hard and my skills were improving, I felt that there was something that I just wasn't doing...something that would complete the puzzle, so to speak. I knew that I wanted to possess great fighting skill, but even that goal didn't seem enough for developing myself into the person I sincerely wanted to be.
A few years later, I began training in a system called Atienza Kali under Tuhon Carl Atienza. Atienza Kali is a blade-based system that specializes in long blades as well as small blades in multiple attacker scenarios. Tuhon Carl not only taught me how to apply my techniques in real time, but also taught me valuable lessons as to what it meant to be a warrior...a Filipino warrior in particular, and how to better run Bayani Warrior in the proper way. When I went to my first instructor weekend for Atienza Kali instructorship, I was put through training that I had never gone through before. I realized that while I possessed a pretty good deal of fighting skill, it still wasn't enough to make me into a warrior. Fighting skill was only a very, very small part of the puzzle.
I learned that a warrior is not just a person with great fighting skill. A warrior is a person who looks at any problem, any problem at all, and solves it with a focused and clear mind, without panicking or being sidetracked by emotion. I learned that true warriors embrace challenges. I realized that warriors do not care about the individual. In fact, it's never about the individual. Rather, it's about the group and how well the group functions as a whole. Above all else, I learned that warriors could apply their training not just to combative scenarios, but to every aspect of their life: their relationships with loved ones, their careers, and life's challenges.
When I returned home from the weekend, the experience stayed with me. I learned that while I have been training my whole life to be the best fighter, I was not training to be the best warrior. Warriors and fighters are not the same. Fighters are great at fighting. But, that's about it. Warriors, on the other hand, apply their training to every aspect of their life. They live by a code of conduct. Like fighters, warriors can fight...but they also think their way through tough situations as opposed to responding emotionally about them. They can maintain control of their relationships with their family and friends. They can lead and teach others how to be better people.
Throughout this year, as a result of God's Grace, Tuhon Carl's constant guidance, as well as going through life's challenges and experiencing things first-hand, I have had a better understanding of how to be the warrior in my own life for Bayani Warrior, my family, girlfriend, and friends. Now, I have been able to not only work through problems of my own, but I have also been able to help those I care about get through their problems...which is something I have been unable to do before.
The Samurai, Spartans, Moros, Maori, Knights, Hwarang, Zulu...all of them were warriors. Not fighters, but warriors. It wouldn't make sense to call these groups fighters. Sure, they could all obviously fight, but that's not what defined them as warriors. What made them warriors was how they carried themselves every minute of the day...how they viewed daily life and battlefield combat as the same thing. They were open to challenges and faced any problem life threw at them head on. They not only possessed physical skill and strength, but they were also incredibly focused on the importance of spiritual and mental cultivation. It is for reasons such as these that I wanted to call the group Bayani Warrior. Not Bayani Fighting Systems or Bayani Martial Arts. I wanted to call it Bayani Warrior...a group that melded the ideals of the hero with the focus and courage of the warrior.
In the last entry, I wrote about the Bayani, or hero, and how heroes possess the willingness to act and do something extraordinary for the benefit of those around them. The Warrior is very similar, if not almost identical, to the Bayani. Both the Bayani and the Warrior possess courage and the willingness to act. Both the Bayani and the Warrior place the needs of their community, tribe, or country above themselves.
However, the Bayani and the Warrior differ in the sense that while the Bayani seeks to take action when faced with a problem, the Warrior wants to exactly know how to do deal with the problem efficiently and logically. If the Bayani and the Warrior were standing side-by-side in front of a problem, the Bayani will say, "I want to do something about this!"...but the Warrior will say, "Okay, fine. Now how do we solve it in the most efficient way possible?"
As I said in the last entry, I have a lot of work ahead of me when it comes to being both the Bayani and the Warrior in every aspect of my life. I am still trying to be the best warrior I can be. However, I believe that as with most things in life, being a warrior is a constant process. I am reminded of a quote by the writer Carlos Casteneda:
"To be a warrior is not a simple matter of wishing to be one. It is rather an endless struggle that will go on to the very last moment of our lives. Nobody is born a warrior, in exactly the same way that nobody is born an average man. We make ourselves into one or the other.”
Next, I will talk about how the Bayani and the Warrior work together. Stick around for Part 3.
posted by Mike Pana at
7:53 PM
1 Comments:
Hello Mike,
Want to know more about arnis especially "NARAPHIL" and other personalities that you mentioned & involved with it? Like LSAI, Illustrisimo, Doce Pares, IMAF and etc.
Try browsing www.naraphil.blogspot.com.
Hope you onjoy some of it.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home