Lazarus Austin is a junior majoring in history. He can be contacted at [email protected].Why do you believe what you believe? Have you spent your entire life as a Republican or Democrat? Do you like to listen to a certain kind of music?
For this week’s column, I’m going to step a little bit out of politics and jump into philosophy.
Ever since I was seven years old, I have been a practitioner and teacher of martial arts and have earned a second-degree black belt in one style and a green belt in another. Martial arts have always been a form of expression for philosophical beliefs, but in the wrong way.
Martial arts consist of different arts and styles, and most martial artists stick to that one style. Many instructors, including mine, believe that cross training is bad training. On the other hand, some martial artists think that the best training comes from mixing different martial arts.
Both sides are wrong.
When students join a martial arts class, they tend to soak in whatever the instructor says and accept it as if it is the gospel. They essentially become mindless robots.
In normal life, people are raised by their environment (parents, school, etc.) to form certain habits or beliefs.
As a result, people do not stray away from their “style.” It is almost like a sin to practice something that is not particular to your martial art. Be damned if it doesn’t work, it’s part of the style and that’s how they do it.
Some people also like to combine the best elements from many styles to form another style. This is still wrong, because it is still just a combination of other styles and is still a style itself.
The same situation tends to occur with people’s musical tastes.
People who live in the country tend to like country music, African-Americans tend to like rap, etc. Personally, I grew up listening to rock. Some people like combined genres such as rap-metal, southern (country) rock or symphonic metal.
One of my all-time favorite role models, Bruce Lee, was also sick of this way of thinking. As a result, he formed his own style of martial arts. He called it a “style of no style.” It means exactly that. Most martial artists practice certain techniques because that is part of their style, not because they are the most effective techniques. They stick to certain boundaries.
That does not mean mixing styles, because you are just combining styles into another style. In order to have a “style of no style,” you almost have to think about starting from scratch.
Ask yourself “what works?”
Bruce Lee, however, created a style that did not have the rigidity or limitations of an actual style. Students were taught on a personal basis, because everybody is different. He also believed a teacher is “never a giver of truth-he is a guide, a pointer to the truth that each student must find for himself. A good teacher is merely a catalyst.”
When it comes to music, people will not like something because it is not rock or not country, and they will dislike something because it has too many elements of a different genre. As for me, I listen to good music, not country, rap or rock music. Good music is my only genre, my “style of no style.”
And the same goes for political beliefs.
People tend to believe or do things because they fit a certain framework, such as conservatism or liberalism, not because they are right. Does anybody besides me not see why this is wrong?
Bruce Lee is right about martial arts and life. Don’t just vote Republican or Democrat in the next presidential election because that is how you were raised. Take a stand on issues because you think your beliefs are right. Think about their practicality, morality and justness first, not your ideology. What is right should be your “style of no style.