Peace

Background

Remember the sixties? The music, the riots, the wars.

Ok, not that great. Maybe the music was ok. And since I was born at the end of the sixties, I can’t really say that I remember them either.

One thing that did come out of the sixties that was cool was the movement towards non-violent social change. Yeah, there was some very violent civil disobedience, but that wasn’t the whole story. There were sit-ins, demonstrations, concerts, and all kinds of groups advocating peaceful change of government policies and private beliefs and attitudes.

Some of it worked, some did not. But the idea of non-violent protest and change has stayed with us.

As a martial art school owner, sometimes I’m embarrassed to be lumped in with the hooligans that seem to represent our industry on television. The MMA world has good people, don’t get me wrong, but the ones who seem (to me at least) to get the most attention are violent, scared people. Most of the martial artists that I know are confident, competent individuals who are peace loving. They want to help people face their fears and overcome them.

Most martial artists are committed to nonviolence as a way of life. They train themselves to become strong and fast and knowledgeable in the art of self-defense. In a healthy mind, these qualities and abilities engender confidence and sense of well being. One of the ways that martial artists train themselves is by practicing hyung, or forms. These hyung train their body, mind and spirit together. Different martial arts call them different things, but as far as I know all traditional martial arts use them in one sense or another.

Commitment

My personal opinion is that rather than focusing on things that we want to put and end to (like bullying or suicide, which I feel strongly about), we should focus on positive ways to bring attention and help to our cause. As both a private and a public display of my intention to nonviolence and peace as a way of life, I am committing to 1,000,000 hyung. While practicing, (and I need more practice) I will meditate on peace and recommit to nonviolence. That link will take you to Dr. Chopra’s site on non-violence. He has a TON of information there.

One million is a big number. I did some quick arithmetic and found out that if a hyung takes one and a half minutes, and you did nothing but hyung, it would take you nearly three years to do one million repetitions. How long will it take me? I have no idea. I am willing to accept help though.

I have created a Facebook Page for this endeavor. If you would like to join me, no matter what your martial art style or affiliation, just join the page and add your numbers. I’ll post weekly updates with accumulated totals.

Use the comment section below to let me know what you think. I’d love your ideas and feedback.