Childish "warriors"

During the early childhood , parents are the whole world for the children .Small kids have totally uncritical view on their parents who are omnipotent , all-knowing . strongest, the most beautiful , in one word , perfect .

As we grow up we starting to understand that our parents are not gods, they have same needs and desires , same flaws as everybody else , in time we do come to understanding that our parents are not perfect. Of course , this is not an obstacle to love our parents as much as we did when we were kids.

Children will take very personal any “attack” on their parents, it is common thing to hear children arguing whose mom is more beautiful or whose dad is stronger. Any statement about parents which does not fit child’s view in them will be considered as an attack , and this is perfectly normal for this level of personality development . It is not normal to hear adults arguing whose parents are better .

Very small children also have noncritical view of reality , therefore they are completely dependent of their parents, they have complete trust in them and everything that parents say it must be true.

Small children up to the age of 5 are not completely able to separate reality from fiction, for example , if they hear a story about 3 little pigs they will believe that really happened . Later , children realize that fairy tale is just a work of fiction.

Later , during the adolescence , we realize that we cannot take anything in absolute categories, there is not absolute good or absolute evil ( or maybe it does in some cases) and how we will perceive some things depends much on our point of view , personality , cultural background, education, religious believes , political convictions ect.  For example , war in ex Yugoslavia can be viewed from two different sides. For Croatian people , “Ustashas”( same name of fascist organization from WWII who was responsible for killing 1 000 000 Serbs and Jews in concentration camp Jasenovac) were good guys , heroes who fought for freedom . From Serbian side these people are war criminals who killed 20 000 Serbs (mostly woman and children) ,30 000 Serbs still missing and 500 000 people were forced to leave their homes and escape to Serbia making Croatia ethnically purest country in Europe. No matter who is right or wrong it is obvious that two sides have totally opposite opinion and feelings toward same group of people and same events .

We also realize there are no absolutely good or bad people and if someone is good in one area ,for example science , that does not mean he is also good in all other areas of life . For example Wernher von Braun was brilliant scientist who sent people to the Moon , on the other hand he was a fascist who made weapons for nazi Germany.

Process of maturation leads us to complete understanding of life and the world we are live in ,and when we come to this understanding we are finally adults .

On the other hand , in the area of martial arts there is a very specific and strange phenomena . Adults , who can be very serious in all other areas of life have completely infantile affection for martial arts.

Just like in the early childhood , martial artists often see founders of some particular style or “old masters” the same way as they saw their parents. These people are omnipotent , they didn’t lose any fight , they are morally and ethically perfect . This goes even beyond worshiping a particular person, even the legends or creations myths of some style are taken as real historical facts although it is obvious those stories have no foundation in reality and they do not fit in cultural, economical, social pattern of the particular time.

These people will react in the same manner as young children when they are confronted with evidence which proves their believes wrong. They will refuse to even think about presented evidence and they will response with an anger ,often attacking the person who presented the evidence on personal level because they lack evidence to support their believes. Everything that does not fit in their view of things is wrong and it is considered as personal attack. They will defend “honor” of some people from the past just like that person is their father. Usually there is no even a smallest amount of critical thinking and logic in their view of the style’s history, founder, some prominent figure form the past.

While no one actually believes in stories about King Arthur or Robin Hudd , everything that comes from the East will be “swallowed’ in one bite and taken as an absolute truth. Funny but true .

It is not normal to hear adults argue whose dad is stronger , isn’t it?

There is an endless arguing all around the world whose style is more efficient , more effective , more ‘real” , more original .and whose founder is/was better fighter.

It is hard to believe that adult people talk about this things.There in an infinitive number of "warriors" ,'ninjas" , "bushido folowers" ect.

Adult person has no problems to see some founders of the style as he or she really was . Good fighter doesn’t mean that person is automatically good in all other areas of life (take Mike Tyson, tremendous fighter but as a person…).   

For adult person there is no reason to hide behind some “grandmaster” all his life, just as we leave our parents when we come to an age the same thing we should do with our martial art, we have to leave the teacher and continue on our own. Hiding behind some big names is childish and shows a great deal of personal insecurity. There is only one right approach to martial practice and that approach is not different form  approach to any other thing in our life , it should be logical , supported with critical thinking and evidence .