All about Fighting

***battlefields*** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 12:59am

"After the training session, I went to a friend's party, because, you know, my life can't be all about fighting..."

"Yes it can," replied Corey, deadpan, serious, during a conversation in the lulls of UFC 157.

After a vigorous training session on Saturday morning that went into the afternoon, despite being supremely tired, I traipsed my way across town, well, I drove, but it felt like I traipsed, to my mates house who was having a party. Good word, that, "traipsed". Very descriptive. When I sat down in his backyard, the past couple of days rushed up to remind me that, "hey, you really should be at home right now, horizontal, with your eyes closed and that god awful snore taking effect."

I tried talking, socialising, listening to my friend talk about his final exams, making small talk with people I don't know, drinking water glass after glass, doing my best to think of interesting conversation pieces that were formerly in abundance. It was hard. My life is all about fighting.

I don't have much else to talk about. I train MMA and BJJ most days of the week. Any other days I am preparing for training, washing gis, cooking meals, resting. At the end of this week my position at the company I work for will be redundant, a position that in itself was not only very interesting, but due to its nature was like an aphrodisiac to women. I have zero ambition for a career in anything that I have pursued to this point in my life, I have had my fill of working my arse off for a company and then being let go. I do have a vision for my own company, but I am keeping a tight lid on it. I have a fight coming up in a few months and a BJJ tournament in a little over a week, therein lies my focus.

It was early in the evening, I'd been there about an hour and I was done with these meaningless conversations that in the past I would entertain as it was a means to an end. The "end" being picking up. All conversations have this "end" in mind, not just one with females. I'm not bi-sexual. The power of public perception is a huge thing when on the prowl, chatting up a chick is easier when there are a few people in the background alluding to the fact you're a catch.

Anyway, I wasn't in the mood for chasing tail, putting in all that work only to have a 9 in 10 chance of succeeding. Without my usual weapon of talking about my career where I was paid well to help charities, I reduced that potential to only about a 8 in 10 chance. Well, 8.5. And I just didn't have the energy to **** eight and a half women that night. That means I'd have almost 9 problems occurring in my future, problems I have realised I don't want, presently, at least.

I had a brief chat with my mate about music, a shared passion, one that, although taking a back seat at the moment, is of great assistance in my training. Then he changed the topic, excitedly.

"I've been training Kung Fu!"

My heart sank.

"He's the real deal, he only trains people in his driveway and only has 4 students and..." you know the rest. The guy is deadly. He doesn't do "what you do, for sport". The guy is super fast. The guy draws chi through the earth. The guy can **** around with your chi.

He showed me some footage of his master doing things with his arms very quickly. Useless things. Things that are not fight applicable. He's learning them thinking he is learning to fight. I didn't have the energy. I realised I'd become weary of arguing against bullshido in real life. I think because when I have come up against it in the past, I was overzealous and I may have spent all my zeal. If it is not fighting, I don't want to talk about it.

I said my goodbyes and was in bed by 8:30pm on a Saturday night.

As I prepared myself for sleep, I started thinking why I like fighting. I have come to the conclusion that it's the honesty. I've seen the theory floated previously, it rings true for me. It's not just the honesty of standing toe to toe with someone looking to do to you what you want to do to them before you do it to them, it's everything in preparation for the fight as well. You have to be honest with yourself, with your team mates, with your coaches. And they have to be honest with you. If any of you isn't, you'll find out on fight night in a bad way.

I consider myself an honest person. I've been described by a former employer as "too honest" as part of his reason for firing me. Literally, in his eyes, I was honest to a fault. I can't and, more importantly, won't turn it off. That's why I like fighting, I can be honest with myself and be honest with those around me and I know that, for the most part, they're going to be honest with me.

The next day, while among friends from the gym watching the UFC, the conversation would deviate from fighting here and there, but it was honest conversation. It was real conversation. Afterwards, I went home to rest, so that I could be prepared for this weeks training.

As I went to sleep, as has been happening for the past few weeks, my mind began going over all the things I need to work on in training, the possibilities, the emotions, all related to my upcoming first MMA fight. Fear, happiness, disappointment, joy. Injuries, KOs, submissions. Training, working on weaknesses, building my strengths. Wins and losses. I think about these things as I drift off to sleep. Not about the fact that I'm unemployed. Not about the fact that I haven't made a connection with a woman in several months. Not about the various other matters that used to fill my head with dread, with loathing. Those battles in a world filled with dishonesty fade away.

I agreed with Corey. Life is all about fighting.

**Azatdawn** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 5:26am

Get a girl and a job, you nerd. I bet you still live in your mom's basement.

**Permalost** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 12:13pm

Originally Posted by battlefields

I agreed with Corey. Life is all about fighting.

If life is all about fighting and fighting is all about honesty, maybe it would behoove you to embrace honesty in your non-fighting endeavors as well. It'd probably resolve some of this tension.

Isn't that what your hapkido tattoo has been telling you?

**Vieux Normand** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 1:07pm

Originally Posted by battlefields

...the lulz of UFC 157.

Numerous, weren't they?

**Diesel_tke** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 1:47pm

Fighting is fun. I don't compete any more because my body is all busted up. I probably should quit, but I don't know how. I don't know how to be, without training. Yeah, I could go to the gym and work out, which I do. But fighting is so much funner.

I know what you mean about dealing with bullshido in person. I've had similar experiences socially. It just takes way to long to try to explain everything to someone who has no background to start at. So, I usually just let it go and press on into other topics.

The bond you develop with the people you train with is different too. You relate to each other on a primal and like you said, honest level. I think it makes the bond deeper. I would do almost anything for my training brothers.

**Kovacs** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 1:48pm

Good post, sounds almost exactly where I'm at as well. Good luck in the fight.

***battlefields*** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 7:24pm

Originally Posted by Permalost

If life is all about fighting and fighting is all about honesty, maybe it would behoove you to embrace honesty in your non-fighting endeavors as well. It'd probably resolve some of this tension.

Isn't that what your hapkido tattoo has been telling you?

This is a pretty vague post, bro, even by your standards. What do you mean?

**Permalost** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 7:42pm

Originally Posted by battlefields

This is a pretty vague post, bro, even by your standards. What do you mean?

You started the trend by writing about how fighting is about honesty, which is the name of chapter 2 of my book Events Can Be Emotional.

What I'm saying is that your rant there identifies that fighting is the part of your life that's superceded everything else, losing interest in other activities you used to enjoy so that you can be all about fighting. What is it that draws you to fighting? You said because of the honesty, opening the Floodgates of Vague Interpretation. If fighting is what draws you away from other things to think about fighting, and the reason that fighting appeals to you is the honesty, doesn't it follow that you may be missing honesty in another facet of life? This isn't me calling you out as dishonest- its simple inference.

Seems like the straightforward conclusion to be drawn, unless what draws you to fighting is actually more complex than "fighting is honest". I think the truthiness of fighting is a facet of it that you like, but its a facet that only somebody who has known dishonesty would really appreciate.

The hapkido tattoo part was me making a self-deprecating joke about how some TMA people are full of fancy words about how fighting isn't the True Way or whatever.

**Mr. Machette** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 8:17pm

Don't sweat the no girl thing. They'll come around. Especially if you keep focusing on self improvement.

Cutting back on the drinking an whoring is a positive choice. It means you are rejecting the illusions that seduced you in the past in favor of a true life's pursuit (Test of self).

There will be time to indulge yourself after your big fights. Women will notice the man you have become. They'll come around (as long as there's straight chicks in Austrailia), you can bet on it.

Until that day;

Strike hard, strike first, NO MERCY!

***battlefields*** · Posted On: 2/25/2013 8:55pm

Originally Posted by Permalost

You started the trend by writing about how fighting is about honesty, which is the name of chapter 2 of my book Events Can Be Emotional.

Where can I pick up your book?

What I'm saying is that your rant there identifies that fighting is the part of your life that's superceded everything else, losing interest in other activities you used to enjoy so that you can be all about fighting. What is it that draws you to fighting? You said because of the honesty, opening the Floodgates of Vague Interpretation. If fighting is what draws you away from other things to think about fighting, and the reason that fighting appeals to you is the honesty, doesn't it follow that you may be missing honesty in another facet of life? This isn't me calling you out as dishonest- its simple inference.

What draws me to fighting? Originally? Or now? Originally it could have been out of fear, a desire for protection. Now, it is about betterment. But that is the subject of another dissertation.

It is more a realisation that I crave the honesty of fighting, rather than being drawn to it. This realisation makes it clear that, with very few exceptions (music being one), I probably did not enjoy many of the things I have done in the past. Maybe through conditioning I learnt that I should enjoy those things, that getting the hot chick, the good career, the money, etc, was a key to happiness. In my experience, getting all those things required at some stage dishonesty.

I can see how you made the inference, I just see it as a little reaching, considering I was not vague about explaining I believe myself to be an honest person. I'm actually intrigued as to what you are referring, because you have a long memory, Permalost, and I write a lot about my life on this site, so I'm actually keen on hearing what areas you think I may be being dishonest in, in relation to life.

Seems like the straightforward conclusion to be drawn, unless what draws you to fighting is actually more complex than "fighting is honest". I think the truthiness of fighting is a facet of it that you like, but its a facet that only somebody who has known dishonesty would really appreciate.

True. I've faced dishonesty, in others and, most importantly, in myself. So in that, yes, it is decidedly more complex than "fighting is honest".

The hapkido tattoo part was me making a self-deprecating joke about how some TMA people are full of fancy words about how fighting isn't the True Way or whatever.

Fair enough. The HapKiDo tattoo still symbolises to me the two meanings, a harmony with life and coordinating power. It reminds me of what I see as the catalyst for the true beginning of my martial arts journey, the seeking of the path with a rejection of certain esoteric bullshit.

In my adult life I have taken some massive hits, some of them were self inflicted, some of them were the result of mistakes I had made and some of them were just life's way of letting me know that it could take a swing. Each time I stood back up. There have been times when it literally felt like each week I would receive a new battering. And I walked headlong into the fray.

Consider the few things that have happened to me since I've been on this site. Many people are privy to this information because I am relatively open about it and tend to air it on here when it happens. Then think about the fact I had 26 years prior to that, 10-12 years of which were spent involved in criminal activity, drinking, and drugging. I am forthcoming about my shortcomings in these times, but not about the all the details. I lived a life of dishonesty that most people could not comprehend and that life delivered blows that even now I wonder how the **** I survived.

The opponent in these "fights" was fluid. It could be the owner of a company that promised me that I would be looked after only to **** me royally, or the guy who got in the ear of a friend to turn him paranoid against me, to the chick that lied to the police to have me arrested. These are all opponents I cannot "hit" back. Despite being real people, in a "fight", they are a non entity. In all these cases I didn't even know someone was fighting me until they tried to deliver the KO. And I stood the **** back up.

The honesty of having the person you are fighting right in front of you, knowing that they have a strategy while not knowing what that strategy is, that is what it is all about.

The thing I know about myself is that I will get hit and keep going on whatever battlefield I fight. At least in an organised fight I know where to swing.