Fight

If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

Hi Chris. Could you add a few more details? For example, is the "you" in your question any of the following:

(1) A US Marine in Iraq,

(2) A 70-year old female urban crime victim,

(3) A drunk young man in a bar that just insulted wrong "someone"'s date,

(4) A businessman's wife being kidnapped who already disabled one of three attackers, making the other two very angry.

Context matters, I think. Maybe.

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

at least you still learning from it. if i'm not mistaken O-sensei said that all harmonies comes from disharmonies. it is our task as aikidoka to turn the situation of disharmony (fight) into harmony (peace/fight finished). The choice is yours, but i suggest you control rather than injure, injure rather than maim, maim rather than kill.

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

...stupid?

Hi Chris,

it sounds you already have an idea of your answer.

I'd agree with Frank - probably depends on the situation. Although I've been in a few conflicts, there is only once I think someone would have actually killed me.

What I learnt is that i. training is necessary to respond ii. your training/sub-concious takes over iii. it is the little things that keep you alive (such as body movement and awareness), not techniques.

i.e. it's no point thinking you could think in such a situation - you just have to hope you've trained your body to move.

Ian

IMHO, what your learn is that training is different than sparring, sparing is different than fighting, and fighting is different than combat. Each has its own intent and rules of engagement.

What you might learn is that there are levels of escalation of conflict. But, what your learn most about is yourself.

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

Simple. Having somebody try to knock you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you really sucks.

Regards,

Am I oversimplifying by saying, "try not to get hit." ??

Reza Kauzar (sanosuke) wrote: The choice is yours, but i suggest you control rather than injure, injure rather than maim, maim rather than kill.

I like what you said here. Care if I put it down in my notebook?

Clayton Kale wrote: I like what you said here. Care if I put it down in my notebook?

go ahead, i myself quote it from somewhere, though

I believe you loosely quoted a shaolin edict which goes like

"run before you fight

fight before you injure

injure before you maim

maim before you kill"

If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

What is it ? maybe, the nature of life… that we're not immortal,

Wisdom to be a little humbler also...

I think it is all very well saying 'run before you fight' etc, but in many situations you mentally do not have the choice. My first point was that these situations can be so quick that your reaction occurs before you have chance to think should I run/maim/kill.

In shaolin they train to kill, in Aikido we train to avoid damage and (usually) to cause little damage. My point is: what you intend to do is often irrelevant, what you train to do is closer to what happens.

Ian

Having trained in shaolin wushu, I'd say that many aikido techniques are equally dangerous if not more so.

Many of the chinna techniques of shaolin are the same as ikkyo-gokyo, shihonage, and kotekaeshi.

Actually, the principal of not harming the attacker is the same as well.

But the training methods are different. And the costumes.

The way you put the question sounds like a joke dude. Like...An aikido tenkans round a bar...

Is there a punch line coming up here? An aikidoka taps out...boom, boom.

Serious: I guess you learn what you don't want; or what you want; bad enough to fight/ compete/ aiki for. Motivation.

Merry now btw all,

Mark

x

How about you learn to stay away from dangerous people?

Jeanne

Colin Moynier wrote: I believe you loosely quoted a shaolin edict which goes like "run before you fight fight before you injure injure before you maim maim before you kill"

Well, I don't know if it's truly shaolin, but it was used in the TV series Kung Fu...

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

Don't cheat at cards?

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

You learn who you truly are and what are the principles you stand by when things get tough.

The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do and what a man can't do." ~Jack Sparrow

I guess in conflict we learn what these things are.

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

That the members of this forum suffer from a severe case of premature enlightenment?

Why dont you just get a dojo buddy to play with you, get him to try and totally, utterly pin you, imobilize you or otherwise incapacitate you. Make sure that the dojo buddy is bigger, stronger and more experienced than you.

Put up a lot of resistance, and when you get ground into the mat, honestly look at yourself, you are just doing yourself a disservice if afterwards you go: "but in a real fight I would have kicked you in the groin or pulled your hair..."

In a real fight the other, bigger, more skilled guy can do exactly the same things.

If you manage to "win" by whatever definition you have for winning, you picked the wrong partner or you need to re-evaluate your definition of "winning"

Finally, you will also learn that even if you get consistantly beaten there is a visceral, primal enjoyment to be had in conflict, all your senses are heightened, you stop thinking, your heart is beating in your skull and pure animal bloodlust takes over. Clashing in conflict with someone else, win, lose or draw is the purest most beautiful feeling you will ever have.

Chris Birke wrote: If you fight someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you, you learn something about the nature of conflict. What is it?

Don't know. Never been in that situation before.

How would you avoided fighting someone who is trying to beat you unconscious, kill you, or otherwise utterly defeat you?

A fascinating set of answers, keep em coming. Thanks to all those who assume because I ask the question I think I know the answer; didn't see that one coming ;D.

By the way, sorry for not clarifying, but I wanted to keep it wide open for the purpose of enabling debate (which is why it was worded in the fashion it was, to encourage reaction).

btw, we did some randori whenever there's opportunity in my dojo. (sensei's not teaching)

once, a friend came back from his holiday and told us that he visited a dojo somewhere, where after every practice they did a rather "quaint" randori. One of them will stand in the center of the mat, the rest will circle around and upon a signal, charge to tackle him down. Free Attack.

He decided to test it on our dojo and once during his turn to teach, he did. It was a truly eye-opening experience.

I THOUGHT I was pretty good at free randori. It turns out that we're ill equipped for such attacks. After being tackled down three times, I can't stop thinking about what I should've done during it.

Granted, I didn't have the heart to use atemi or pressure points during sabaki, but as Dyk said up there;

Quote: In a real fight the other, bigger, more skilled guy can do exactly the same things.

...there's no excuse

IMNSHO, everyone should give this sort of test a try. If I hadn't experienced it, there's no way I could ever be ready for such a situation.

I could now.