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For those that know the Dune series or Dune movie the message above will make perfect, poetic sense. The Gom Jabbar is a method designed to test whether you are a human (and not an animal). I'll leave behind my committed belief that humans definitely are animals, and that it is wrong to imagine a separation and not a continuity between them, but essentially it's the order of a prescription that you must be able to resist your greatest impulses. In this case, your impulse brought on by pain, and ultimately fear of pain. In the story the messianic hero Paul is told to place his hand in a box that will submit him to incredible pain, and the fear of pain. If he removes his hand he will be pricked by the mother superior, and killed instantly. It is a test, but a test that stretches out the soul of the hero, from an attenuation of fear all the way to certain Death. This is fighting. Fighting is not about winning. Fighting is not even about surviving. Fighting is about putting your hand in the box. Its about all the training that you do so you can endure with your hand in the box. The purpose of training, ultimately, is not to train your hand so it can do oh-so-many-things when it is in the box. It's about keeping the hand in the box. We are mislead into thinking what training, and even fighting is about. It's easy to imagine that it's about handling yourself, physically, under pressure. Or, being able to impose yourself upon your opponent. These are worthy ends. There is a great deal of self-cultivation in both of these. But, it isn't about that. It ultimately is about just keeping your hand in the box. This is the wonderful thing about fighting a lot. I'm speaking here not as a fighter, but as a very close, compassionate observer of a fighter who happens to have fought more than any western Muay Thai fighter...ever. Fighting a lot you get to glimpse through the veils. You think you understand what fighting is after 50 fights. After 100 you realize that you didn't really understand at 50, but now you know. Then at 150 you suddenly see things differently. Now at 240...well, you see where I am going. What is infinitely cool is that the vision you have at any one particular point, let's say that particular ledge on the mountain where you stand, overlooking a drop off and valley, that was earned by you, and you simply could not have had that view 300 meters down, or at basecamp. It doesn't mean that what you saw at 50 fights was wrong, it was limited. It was limited not only from your perspective - where you are standing - but also because of your narrative. When you are at 100 fights your view will be informed by all the other ground that you covered. You have become enriched. At first when you put your hand in the box, seriously, with focus, all you have at your disposal is Will Power. You feel that Will Power is your only ally, the only thing that can get you to keep your hand in the box, facing the pain (and the fear). You just grimace in one way or another and just keep that mutha' fucker in there. You keep it in there because it matters to you. You do another round on the bag. You bust it harder on pads. You train through and around injuries. You endure. It's a beautiful commitment. And, it would be enough if that is all there was. Just keeping your hand in there out of force of will. But a funny thing happens when you keep your hand in there for a really long time. Or honestly, what has been happening is that you keep choosing to put your hand in there. It comes out, you put it back in. It comes out, you put it back in, fully knowing what that will feel like. You come to realize that Will Power isn't your sole resource. In fact, there is something else far more powerful and complete. It's the peace you can try to make with the pain itself, and more properly with the fear. And this leads to personal excavation. This is the real beginning of fighting. Of course it is wrong for me as a non-fighter to talk of the real beginning of fighting. Fighting has many uses and many values. But what I mean by "real" is perhaps what I would call the superseding value and use of fighting, the one that lies behind all other other values and pleasures we take in fighting. The guiding principle. We would not have really encountered this, in our path, at 100 fights, or even 150. It just wasn't realizable though the seeds of this understanding were certainly growing then. Sylvie had a real breakthrough in this area, back in 2015, four years ago, when she received her Tiger Yant after her 108th Fight. As a close, compassionate observer, this was the first time that it seemed that she became released by the notion that submitting to the fact of the pain - and here, read "pain" as encompassing all the experiences and associative thoughts that repulse - was the only true doorway through it. Sylvie's been soaking in that truth for 4 years now, and over 120 fights more. Keep putting that hand in the box. The hardest thing to digest about all of this is that it's not Will Power. It's not straining and pushing yourself back into it. There is something addictive for people who have strong wills. Will is immensely successful in this world. It pushes through things, through people, through circumstances that have less will. The world will bend to will. But the Jom Gabbar is about something else. Fighting is about something else. It involves Will, but it is the wings that grow out of Will, when you let go of that branch and discover you have wings. This is why people who put their hand in the box, over and over and over again have value. Yes, some of them are just toughened. Great examples of fortitude. They've cut pathways of commitment and focus that others of us, mere mortals, can follow. But occasionally, they break through in their relationship to the box. They find another way, a higher way, that could not otherwise be found in shorter stints. And I'm going to detour here toward what actually is my focus of writing this. Fights are The Box. Stepping into the ring is putting your hand in the box. And anyone...and I mean ANYONE who has stepped in the ring, no matter how dubious or controlled the circumstances, has done something worthy. They have put their hand in the box. But then becomes the path of the fighter. What follows that first fight is putting your hand back on the box. And then putting it in the box again. And again. And again. What is inside the box is different for every fighter. In the beginning it's just pain, and the fear of pain. Then, pretty quickly, it's the shame of possible defeat, or fear of being "unworthy" of even being in the ring. What develops, as you put your hand again and again in the box is a certain relationship to the fears and pains of the ring. A fighter will build emotional armor for what is encountered in there. Habits or mindsets that shield her or him from what's in there. And honestly this armor is largely just a defense against a deeper relationship with what's in there. You aren't fighting an opponent. Your opponent is just a stand-in, a proxy, a figure designed to trigger your own demons. And those demons will come whether you win or lose. I say all of this because I'm witnessing a revolution in Sylvie's self, her soul, and I don't even know where it came from, other than to say that it came from putting her hand in the box repeatedly, and opening herself up to what the box can teach. When fighting so many times you can get looped into 20 fight, 40 fight stretches were you have a pretty firm conception of yourself, but then it breaks down, and another conception arises. These kinds of things simply cannot happen at lower repetitions. You cannot know these things with 20 fights, because they come from putting your hand back in the box. Yes, you can learn a lot from training incredibly hard, patiently honing your weapon, struggling through all the adventures of training. Yes. But it isn't the same as putting your hand in the Box as a fighter does. Take a look at this mental training vlog from yesterday: This might seem like just some good mental training advice, but I'm really astounded by it, simply because of the meta position Sylvie finds herself in, and importantly the comfort she has achieved in taking that meta position. She's been there many, many times. Groundhog Day. So much so that its starting to lose its tension. It's starting to gain relief. The fundamental issue, the struggle, which might be called the Fighter's Quest, isn't what it seemed it was. Having the right attitude toward the struggle, yes, is the focus of training and ultimately of fighting. But the excavation comes in realizing and working on the structures of judgement that surround that struggle. It is as if we are all watching a television show, and then suddenly realize that the cameras in the studio, the audio and the cue card holder are really the point of the show, not what's happening "on screen". This is pulling at the threads of who you supposedly "are". These are all the things that make the tv show happen. You cannot get to these things only at the level of the show, what is on the screen. The fighter's struggle, the Box the fighter repeatedly puts their hand in, is the pain (physical pain, fear, humiliation, shame) that draws attention to attention to the frame around the picture. The fighter will be limited in entrench-able ways if they remain "in frame", and do not look at the frame itself. You can win lots of fights without dealing much with your personal framework. This is why winning doesn't really matter to the value of fighting, and often works as a disservice. The point of fighting is to keep putting your hand in the Box, until you learn. You may never learn. It may feel like it's just a goddamn pain box. The lesson cannot be forced. But, if you keep putting your hand in there, and give it time, you will/can learn something incredible. In this way Sylvie is an absolute astronaut, traveling far beyond the dimensions any of us regularly can reach. She has been blessed in her circumstances. She's very small bodied and she lives and fights in the country of fighting that is like no other. As a small bodied fighter she has an endless number of available, high-skilled opponents that can increase in size. She now is giving up 5 kilos regularly, sometimes 10. A year or two from now, it may be 8 regularly. It's the very rare opportunity to keep putting your hand in the Box, where it really, really, really does hurt. The hurt isn't the pain itself, its all the thoughts that surround the pain of the public display of your soul, as an adversary works incredibly hard to discredit you. And, you do that over and over and over again. Fighters of the past, or present day fighters of larger size who have limited chance, simply did not (do not) have the same opportunities to put their hand in the Box as many times. What they know of the Box is necessarily limited by this. They do not know less than Sylvie, but maybe it's fair to say they do know less of what they could know themselves, at least in terms of this particular Gom Jabbar. The trial of what a fight is. I wish I could describe this not as a negation. What we are looking at is a shooting star. So many people put their hand in the Box, maybe even many, many times, and then hold onto the "Hand in the Box" award. It's understandable. The Gom Jabbar is fucking serious business. If you've done it many times, or even a few, it is worthy of all our celebration. Every time the hand is placed in the Box something is learned, and there is infinite variety and even contradiction in these lessons, fighter by fighter. But I want to call attention to this other thing. What it means and what it is worth when you really just submit and turn yourself over to the Box itself, all the fears, all the pain, in such a way that it will unravel you, so that you can be remade. I'm rambling here because I'm reaching for something. I'm witnessing something in my wife that is unexpected, and could never be predicted or forced. The fighting has opened up into very large and valuable truths that point to the fabric of what we really are. It's a kind of alchemy that maybe can only happen at very high repetitions. I'm not sure. Sylvie could have retired at 150 fights and never come close to this, and all praise would be upon her for what she had done. We would never have a sense of what was lost by her not persevering on. She's passed through several personal veils since then. What is the value for all of us? This is the fighting equivalent of Walking on the Moon. What is so interesting to me is that vanishing from our sight is even the question: Well, how well did she fight? The aim to fight well, to express oneself in the Thai vocabulary, impose oneself, to solve duress, to meet up with Thai aesthetics demands ultimately unraveling. To get there, where one wants to be as a fighter, requires a disassembly of what might be called persona, the thing you think is "you", that you tell yourself is "you", so that you can tap into forces and streams that lie outside of that frame. The artform of Thai boxing, its full aesthetic, is a pathway to a very unanticipated becoming. If you want to fight a certain way, if you are reaching for a beauty or efficacy or a soul of movement, you have to become other than you are. A soul has been defined as "all the affective capabilities of a person", the spectrum of everything that one could possibility, feel. Like all the radio stations a radio could turn into, even if it currently is on one. Muay Thai, and what I'm calling the Gom Jabbar of fighting, pulls the soul deeper into its spectrum of possibilities. You cannot feel that pull, necessarily, to the same degree, in the same fashion, unless you keep putting your hand in that Box. The reason for this is that the Box, fundamentally, exposes you to your limit, what you think you are, who you are. And each time you revisit that limit, which may or not be changing, you have a chance to alter your relationship with not that limit, but to understand what any limit is, the very nature of limits. Where Does the Nature of Limits Lead? A Fighter is nothing if not a metamorphosis. Every fighter adapts, every fighter is changed. The fighter takes on a mask, a persona, a shape...forms. This is a ritualistic donning in which the fighter is imbued with power or responsibilities that are not her or his own, and however ill-fitting, or altering, or heavy that mask is, is what changes the fighter. Sometimes the fighter wears different masks. Tries different masks, but they are all in the ritual of fighting, and they are all calling down that god of that particular mask. As you wear masks into the ring - and masks can be anything from ideal thought patterns, to embodied fighting styles, to alter parts of yourself, personalities, armorings - you come to understand masks and yourself better. When you fail a particular mask, many times, you understand yourself and that mask better. Maybe you need a different mask, a different god. Maybe you need to grow into that mask. Only by wearing that mask, over and over, are you ultimately transformed by it. Only by working through masks, do you come to understand what a mask is. Masks are not "false" selves. (It's true, there are many inefficacious masks, usually masks detached from higher values or traditional transport, from process.) Masks are technologies of change and transformation, they pull with them the unseen, the range of affects beyond what you are "are". And, the fighter comes perhaps to understand that she or he has been wearing masks all along, only masks they have become comfortable in, masks they have been told and that they tell themselves are really them. But you cannot just throw off your mask, any mask you've grown into. You have tissue, blood vessels, skin, organs even that have become symbiotic to it. The act though of putting on a mask, to stretch the soul, uncovers something about yourself. And, what is special about the alchemy of the process of fighting is that this is done, this art, is done under duress, sometimes extreme duress. It's an art-form of mask making that pulls on our deepest evolutionary threads, triggering all the alarm bells of our organism - physical survival, and shame (social survival). The things to be learned from growing in your relationship to mask are unending and profound. There is a theme building in Sylvie Muay, which directs itself away from the ring, beyond the ring, through the ring. The ring stands in as an analog for the soul in life. It presents in extreme, stark relief the Nature of things. Your relationship to all the things that steer you, unconsciously, in living. The Ring exposes your conditions, and your conditioning. Because it is real, because this mirror is real, there are many ways to fail it. There are serious handholds in the rock where you will be tempted to say: "Ah! Here is a good place to stop." and then to head back down the mountain. The Ring in this way feels Impenetrable. It can feel like proverbial and metaphysical "sound and fury, Signifying nothing". Many fighters come out of their ring days and feel like they've simply survived. But within their souls, even those who have been muted, I think they know something others do not know. And in some sense the limits of what they have discovered is conditioned by the circumstances and pressures of fighting. I cannot shake the feeling though, the dramatic feeling of difference that I feel between what Sylvie has discovered, and is discovering as a person, maybe in the last 6 months, from where she was, as a person with 150 fights. All of that veil passing would have been lost. There is a feeling like she is now stepping on a whole new continent after sailing across a long and variously believed endless sea. There is a shore here. On the other side.

And thats also a big issue. I can understand coaches "de-evolving" there style to fit customer demand. From a business perspective this makes some sense. But I also see it as treating the whole gym in a dishonest way. The thing I tell all who train with me is simply whether you want to fight or not (and I really dont care either way, no pressure) you will learn how to fight. Again, not against spinning or fancy techniques, just against them being the focus over the basics that will win fights. The term basic even has a deceptive ring to it. You need a lot of time on those to really understand the nuances of why they work. Skipping them, or placing their importance as less, makes it really hard to actually progress, even to the point where the fancy techniques you want to learn become less for it. Hope that makes sense. In the frand scheme of it, its a minor annoyance and more a slightly frustrated joke. Ive never actually turned away a student because of this. I just always looked at it as an opportunity to educate them. Usually that works well.

What a stud. But haha I’m not the spinning aficionado. I just don’t like all the karate shit talk but of course I understand spectacular showy stuff breeds greedy awkward noobs. I also would like to slap Joe Rogan (cause that’s more humiliating than a spinning kick). Thank you I’m touched!!

This is an offshoot of a previous thread I started, on the "light" versus "hard" sparring and how that kind of divides down the emotional line, rather than the physical power of strikes. I wanted to ask my trainer, Kru Nu, about this. He's been teaching Muay Thai for 25 years or so, grew up in a gym that had the very, very early westerners who lived and trained in Thailand, has raised countless Thai boys to be stadium fighters and champions; and has had his fair share of "what the f*** was that?" experiences of people losing their cool in sparring and things erupting into potentially dangerous situations. My impetus for asking Kru Nu about this subject was two fold: 1) the "Thai sparring is so light," refrain I hear from westerners is often one that I've failed to witness with my own 7 years' experience living in Thailand. Thais don't spar super light, at least not the way that I see it performed by the westerners who are trying to mimic what they deem to be "Thai style sparring." And 2) I've seen some pretty intense sparring under Kru Nu's supervision, where he doesn't tell people to turn it down, whereas I - and probably most coaches in the West, would have done. With very little kids, like 7 and 8 years old, when they're clinching they aren't allowed to throw knees. Kru Nu tells them explicitly, "if anyone throws a knee, it's a foul." That's so they don't hurt each other, because they don't have control of themselves yet. They're tiny, so the impact is relative to their size, but I think it's more of an emotional precaution - they don't have control of their emotions yet and so they'll knee hard and hurt each other. They're emotionally not in control, so if they get mad they don't have a stick in their hand at the same time, so to speak. Most of the time, sparring or clinching with little kids like this ends because someone's crying. They're learning how to control their emotions way more than they're learning how to do proper technique, although they do get a few pointers here and there. Mostly it's just spending time in the water, as I like to say, and learning not to cry about it being too cold or deep or whatever else. Back to adults. The teenaged Thais in my gym have mostly been training for a lot of years, so they've gone through the emotional bootcamp long before they ever get big enough to really do any damage to anybody. We have one young fighter, Maek, who is often my clinching partner, and he's new enough and young enough that he gets a little emotional sometimes. He's ignored most of the time when he gets like this, or he's teased to put him in check. But he's pretty big, 60 kilos at only 13 years old, but a little butterball so he goes with partners who he outweighs but is shorter than. So, with his weight he can do some damage, but with his size and age he's kind of not so dangerous. In contrast to this, the westerners who come to train in Thailand are mostly pretty big, compared to me and Thais. They can do damage before they have any kind of skill, or moderate skill, and they've done usually no kind of emotional formation by a culture that esteems "jai yen yen," cool heartedness. So, you've got giant babies. Yesterday, my regular sparring partner and I were told to go spar but to go "bao bao," which is Thai for gentle. I've never been instructed to go light before. The reason was that both Carabao (my sparring/clinching partner) and I have fights in a couple of days, so a clashed knee or bruised eye or ego is not on the ticket. I fight often, Carabao doesn't. So, the instruction to go light is more to do with his fight than mine, but interestingly, Kru Nu has credited Carabao's wins in the past with being my clinching partner. In clinching, nobody is ever told to "go light." Just maybe to be more careful with hitting with the inside of your thigh instead of with your kneecap. So, this sudden "go spar, but bao bao," thing got me thinking. I wanted to ask Kru Nu about how he does sparring at his gym. I told Kru Nu that westerners seem to think that sparring in Thailand is all really light. He frowned at me when I said this, like "why?" I laughed. I don't know. But then I used the example of this Indian guy, who I referenced in my other thread. He goes too hard (in my eyes) with everybody. He's not out of control, but his power is enough to do damage. In the example I gave in my last thread, he sparred with an Italian who also goes quite hard. Hard vs hard, and Kru Nu said, "they like that, so I give for them." But I reminded him of a match up that was not a syncing of likes, where one guy didn't like to go hard. A few weeks ago he was sparring with a fellow from Spain. The guy from India is cracking these leg kicks and has good boxing, so he's touching up the guy from Spain and then just bashing his leg. The guy from Spain is not super experienced, but not totally green. He does okay for a round, listens sincerely to my advice to teep with the leg that's getting kicked when I talk to him between rounds, but ultimately lays down and sparring is ended with a "TKO" late into round 2. I thought that was shitty, honestly. I asked Kru Nu (yesterday, not when this happened), why he let the sparring go like that. "Because I want the guy from Spain to understand that in a fight, if someone kicks you hard here (he chops the side of his hand into his leg), you cannot ask them to stop. And you cannot stop. He has to understand." And, as I recall, the next sparring session, Kru Nu put the guy from India with Team (Thai, stadium fighter) and he got worked, which Kru Nu had said was, "so he can understand." Keeping everyone in check. I nodded my head in understanding when I was listening to Kru Nu. It's what I was saying about hard sparring, how it teaches you that you have to figure shit out under duress. You have to know what contact feels like and how to hide your fear, your shame, your pain, but you also have to be able to not get upset yourself. If you're going to hit hard, you have to know you'll be hit hard back. Kru Nu actually pointed at me, poking my shoulder as I sat next to him on the ring for this conversation. "Sometimes Carabao kicks you too hard, I know, I see," he said. Honestly, guys, I know Kru Nu sees everything but I totally assumed he was not clocking the times that Carabao is hitting me hard. "But you don't get angry, I know you are okay. And if you want, you can show him that you kick hard too and then he understand." I know there are times I've lost my cool in sparring and clinching when I feel like I'm being hit too hard. I've been punished for that by Kru Nu before, basically by him telling me to get out of the ring and go kick the bag and he ignores me for the rest of the session. But I've also learned how to control that shit myself. With Carabao it's a bit harder, just because of his size and the relationship we have in the gym, but with Maek I've learned how to take a too-hard strike, hit him back hard as a warning shot, and then use the next shot as an immediate comparison (much lighter), to let him choose which kind of strike he wants. You hit me hard, I hit you hard, but we can always go back to this. And know what? He always tones it back down. No words spoken. No looks. No complaints. No calling "dad" over, and the escalation in emotion is super short. But I wouldn't know how to do that if I'd never been hit too hard in sparring; if I'd never been overwhelmed and wanted to cry. When Kru Nu lets these big Western dudes bash on each other, he's giving them the same lessons that led me to where I am now, but on a much shorter timeline. These two go hard, they go hard together. This guy goes hard with someone who doesn't reciprocate and he doesn't read the temperature, make him go with someone who will touch him right back (Team) and then some to keep him in check. It reminds me of the Cesar Milan approach to reconditioning aggressive dogs: put them in with the pack and a natural order will shake out, pretty quickly. I remember taking our dog Zoa to a dog park in New York and she was growling and nipping at some dogs who came to sniff her. I immediately thought to go control her and Kevin told me to wait, let it sort itself out. Sure enough, within 3 minutes the group had figured itself out and Zoa was playing chase with a dog she'd just been ready to fight with. You can't control everything. And if everything is always controlled for you, you never learn to control yourself.

I don't really have words to express how much I love this essay. It's incredibly beautiful and well-thought out. <- saying this when it comes to your writings it's like saying water is wet. I feel you - hahaha. I mean, I think I feel where you're trying to go with this. I'm just a baby in Muay Thai. In French, when you want to say someone is very naive, you say that person was born from the last rain. In English, I think the idiom is: "you were born yesterday". It just so happens that yesterday it rained a lot in my city. That was my Muay Thai birthday actually. I am one day old now. Happy birthday to me lol. I don't understand much and I don't have much to say yet. I'm still going to meow a little here. Though it won't be a profound meow. It's a very high-pitched kitty meow. So far, I've never thought that fighting in the ring is essentially about winning against your opponent. I've just been approaching it as another form of Jihad. Not the Jihad expressed in Dune. That's a one aspect of the Dune series I strongly dislike. It wrongly associated Jihad with colonisation and conquest. You can kinda feel that the book was written by a white man... That's another matter anyway. Jihad isn't about conquest and defeating an external enemy. It is simply a neverending battle against your own ego. That's what fighting is for me. Defeating my own ego. The ego for me is everything that has to do with being comfortable - physically, mentally, emotionally comfortable. Comfort brings you nothing but stagnation - to the point where you end up rotting away. Keeping away from comfort is staying closer to pain. The kind of pains that you don't like and find extremely unpleasant/extremely hard to bear. Comfort always has a way to sneak up on you - so a pain that may be challenging in the beginning can quickly become pretty comforting, and even addictive. When that happens, you need to stir away from it and find another kind of pain that you will hate, so you can grow - or die. If you're not able to keep your hand in that box right. That's why I think maybe I understand a little your Gom Jabbar analogy. It kinda echoed with what I was thinking/feeling even though I never precisely thought about the Gom Jabbar test before. As a matter of fact, the first time I read Dune I didn't understand what the hell was going on in that test haha. I just understood there was a lot of pain involved, a lot of fear (I love the litany about fear Paul recites in his mind during the ordeal), and there was the risk of death. I reread the book several times and each time it brought about more understanding. I don't know if I'll ever get to 100 fights in my life to experience the kind of understanding and metamorphosis you talk about here. I don't even know if I will ever experience any kind of real pain to really test myself during my lifetime. I am pretty certain where I'm at right now, it would so easy to extract informations out of me with physical torture. I'm that scared. Some people not only can withstand extreme torture, but they can make up complex lies while under extreme pain. That fascinates me to no end. I guess the not-knowing whether you will be able to endure what could be coming at you is part of the pain. Maybe it's even worth than the pain itself? Well, I wouldn't know. If Paul knew what was awaiting him in the box. If he knew putting his hand in the box was going to be so painful, maybe his mind would've crumbled way before getting in there. That's why it's so incredible when you know what kind of pain you will get, and go in there anyway. Sylvie has been doing the Gom Jabbar test 241 times so far, fucking hell. It's like the box is her home. I don't even think the Gom Jabbar could kill her now. Her own blood would just fucking transform the poison into protein. Take that, Reverend Mother Gaius Mohiam. Lol. Just a little thank you for this. It irks me so much when people not only think that humans and animals are separate, but that humans are superior than any other species. When people use religion to justify this, it irritates me even more. This prompted me to listen again to the following song. It kinda fits.

Thing is, you can kinda feel sorry for that every new guy with the red hat. Sounds like you guys had good training starting out so were decently schooled, but in loads of countries it's a bit shocking. In the beginning, this one gym (stayed there about 5 minutes, for this reason) had a trainer only wanting us us to do his bizarre convoluted long ass 13, 14 hit combinations. No joke, one would involve superman punch, then flying knee, then spinning back something, then another jumping teep, then his own ninja matrix move he invented... I mean it was cringe. Didn't know where to look. Growing up, there were guys running gyms this way to keep paying members coming back because it felt fancy and exciting. He knew his... well, basically cult members, loved to know they were learning the same thing they saw in a highlight reel the previous day on their instagram.

Great essay, and perfect timing for me (I actually meditated to the Litany against fear last night). I particularly like how you approach use of Will, you do have to force yourself thru Will to fight initially (or even just to spar). Early on though, I found that if it was just will that I was struggling against myself so much that I didn't have much for my opponent or the greater opponent (e.g. fear, anger, desire). I also think you undersell your "right" to talk about this, this is all our struggle (every single one of us) because we all walk around looking at the existential inevitability of the end. I fight for a lot of reasons, but most importantly to live a better fuller life because we always have our hand in that box (even if we aren't always aware of it).

Yes, the way he's always watching. Kevin took those. Kru Nu is very handsome but hard to photograph, haha. This is what he looks like when I take his photo:

I love that idea of a compressed files and I don't disagree that much of karate has taken a turn towards the unreal. Part of it is I don't really like the word "karate". Seems important to be precise. I also don't think being original (Okinawan) necessarily makes things right. I am not always looking for the oldest thing although that is also of interest, just not definitive. I tell you what Kevin, I was in tears when it became clear that for family reasons I was going to have to add in Korean Tang soo do (a precursor to Tae Kwon do, heavier roundhouses, many other differences but still a 20th century hybrid like so many). I just absolutely hated it but I have to do it (my mentally ill daughter is trying to get back to her practice and she needs to see a beginner, me, for courage). I am learning some brutal things (so many approaches to yanking off the testicles lol), and because my teacher knows I prefer Muay Thai, he is at pains to explain the real purpose in different movements. The single blow thing, for example, is obviously ridiculous so Tang soo do also teaches nasty little hand and wrist locks as a sort of backup in case your opening salvo fails on the street. But this is not a defense of karate. Go ahead. Chop at it. I love that video! Two smart guys making solid arguments for the necessity of "kata" or forms. Makes sense. I didn't know Okinawan was so grappling based. Style I hate is Shotokan. So still, so low. Seems just fucking pretentious. That is probably similar to peoples' reactions to flying shit. I have shot thousands of frames of different styles of karate at tournaments so I'm somewhat aware of the variety. But my heart and soul are with Muay Thai, as much as they can be from this country.

Both I guess :). Everybody does it. Substantive analysis like you do is valid. But shit talk generally, knee jerk stuff is something I try to be careful with, just for myself. I try to maintain 100% curiosity all the time, though critique is part of that. Doesn’t apply to anyone else so I’m gonna drop it.

I couldn't access the general forum part. Thank you, Sylvie and Kevin for creating such a space. It's wonderful to be able to converse with people of a like mind and without the presence of trolls. I have been absolutely mesmerised by Sylvie's YouTube channel since discovering it and joining 8limbs has been a great thing. Thank you too, to all the contributors for their intelligent and well thought out questions and answer. This place provides a lot of food for my brain.

Well, he also said that because in his case it's pretty clear that a TKD background led to becoming a high level fighter You know, if your kid wants to become a fighter he should do what I did...to not become a fighter. It blows my mind that he is so far out in space on this. None of this stuff works in fighting, but it's really good to make all this shit that doesn't work your FOUNDATION.

Truth. And hilarious. Similar to commentators saying things like black belt in muay Thai to me.

Love watching it, but hate doing it. Feels like you're giving up too much for the attempt. But ahh, dunno really. Popularity of it in the West might come a bit from MMA and the level of informed fight culture it produces. Even from the commentators, or the journalists if we're gonna call them that. A guy can throw spinning shit all day that never lands, switch stance 5 times every 10 seconds from a mile a way when there's no purpose in doing it, or even just make up random shit. Then it's immediately called "Elusive...high level striking...unorthodox...creative etc etc..." in hush tones, and actually encouraged to guys just starting out. Now what I don't get......how come the people who encourage that kind of thing don't apply the same thinking when it comes to BJJ or Greco? Imagine a Jiu Jitsu teacher with 30 years under his belt training one of his white belts or blue belts for competition. He says, OK dude, so this is what you do...as soon as the ref says go, you run at the guy and throw a jumping flying omoplata, or look for a berimbolo whenever you can. Hell no. No way he would. Like... in no other sport would that thinking be acceptable. If that teacher wants to create the white belt world champion, he'll drill him with 2 simple sweeps, 2 simple guard passes, 2 simple submissions, tonnes of hip work, and tell him to go out there and play the percentages. O

And this is my only detractor to light sparring. Too light is an issue. Its like the punch in a demo that goes no where near the person's head. Ive had to tell more than a few people to actually make contact. Like anything else its balance. What is too hard and what is too light ends up depending on the person. Like I said in another post, Ive seen people get injured in light sparring because someone zigged when they should have zagged and a lightly thrown technique ended up being run into. At the end of the day, its combat. Theres a level of risk always. Find the balance.

I made this for you 3 Oaks. I saw it randomly in the fight and thought "Hey, 3 Oaks would like this!":

So a good friend made this meme a while back and its always resonated with me. The idea being dont pass over the basics and fundamentals for fancy technique. This meme always becomes so relevant when someone in combat sports wins by spinning anything. Not because Im against spinning techniques, but because of how they always seem to jump the line so to speak past tried and true (possibly boring to students?) fundamental techniques with high percentages of landing. For context: (its not muay Thai I know, but it does effect me teaching muay Thai, so...) Raymond Daniels winning his fight in mma this last weekend. If you havent seen it, look up Bellator's social media. Curious to hear people's opinions, reactions, etc.

I love this part too: "You can win lots of fights without dealing much with your personal framework. This is why winning doesn't really matter to the value of fighting, and often works as a disservice. The point of fighting is to keep putting your hand in the Box, until you learn. You may never learn. It may feel like it's just a goddamn pain box. The lesson cannot be forced. But, if you keep putting your hand in there, and give it time, you will can something incredible." It really resonates.

Man Kevin, I always need so much time to read and just absorb what you write. Its not even the quantity of words but the quality thats so rich and needs digestion time. I love the analogy of the box being fighting. Even more I love this: "You think you understand what fighting is after 50 fights. After 100 you realize that you didn't really understand at 50, but now you know. Then at 150 you suddenly see things differently. Now at 240...well, you see where I am going. What is infinitely cool is that the vision you have at any one particular point, let's say that particular ledge on the mountain where you stand, overlooking a drop off and valley, that was earned by you, and you simply could not have had that view 300 meters down, or at basecamp." I see this as a good description of life and perception through the years (ie: your 20's, 30's, 40's and so on). Great write up as always man.

This is a beautiful and amazing feat of acrobatic skill but I can definitely see why you wouldn't want Muay Thai heading in that direction.

Horses in the Age of the Gods were 20 ft high, little known fact (pretty damn spectacular, though)

Well said! For me, if I really care about Muay Thai, and its clash/synthesis in the west I really need to understand the history of what happened to TKD, which seems like a disaster (from my pov). I know that some people involved in the progeneration of Muay Thai in the west are inspired by the perceived success of TKD, and for me this constitutes maybe an existential danger. But, if I don't know what the hell happened with TKD, it's very hard to see if Muay Thai faces anything worrisome in that direction. My hope was that it would clue me in on all that, but instead the really interesting parts were what happened in the 1920s before TKD, when modern ideas about martial arts were just developing.

Yes I have seen you posting about it and bought it. Expensive! But nerdtastic. Thank you for putting up screenshots.

I put up extensive screenshots of one of the best chapters (to me), it will give you a sense whether this author has the right tone and level of detail. Not all the book is this good, but I really liked parts of it:

I think the only interesting thing about (supposed) Okinawan Karate is that it is likely closest to the root of actual combat or realism. On the other hand what we have from that lineage maybe is rarified now. If you don't appreciate Shotokan though, Shotokan is kind of the bottleneck through which almost everything else got passed through, if I got that right. You may find the Taekwando book I recently read interesting. I'm a sucker for these kinds of historical tracings. It goes way too into the history of particular strikes, but the general history about the TKD evolution from Karate (about half the book) is crazy good.

Totally so. I do have a problem with mystification of fighting styles. I mean, I was a huge Kung Fu cinema fan, and so absolute love that kind of mystification, in film, but it's difficult when it comes into the real world. Karate is a difficult subject. Much of what is "Karate" is quite far from it's origins in Okinawa (reportedly then, it had very few kicks, now its stereotypically identified with kicks). Even when it came to Japan in 1922 it took a hard turn away from its roots and continued on a fairly strong path towards un-realism. They tried to correct that with full-contact, but it really seems like it never found its realism root, for a hundred reasons. But, I like to think of Karate as kind of compressed file, that likely contains a ton of wisdom and knowledge from eras that are not our own. And that is super cool to me. If you can unzip the file there is probably a Goldmine in there, and I'm sure many have claimed, or have worked to do so, translating it into fight contexts, but wholesale Karate feels a little fantasy based. In thinking about unzipping files, I really like for instance what these young dudes are doing:

Haha! Ok maybe not that ridiculous, like go out there and crocodile kick him in the first 5 seconds. But, not super far off that. Actually wait, Fabricio Werdum once opened up with a flying karate thing to someone's face in round 1.

Pretty sure many striking coaches dont necessarily tell their fighter to run out and do a spinning attack either lol (well maybe Raymond Daniels' coach does ). I do know they get super frustrated like i do by similar requests to learn low percentage but spectacular moves. I used to teach at 10pl hq and know a bunch of the instructors under Eddie. Drives them nuts if a guy that cant avoid mount wants to learn a flying armbar lol.

Lol we need a laughter emoji added to the like selections. Rogan said that cause thats his fn background lol. Like muay Thai fighters cant spin .

Weird, because starting out back home, loads of those guys came through the 1st gym I was at. Karate guys, TKD guys, dudes who wanted to be ninjas etc. They tended to have the most awkwardness adapting to the new thing and didn't like it, so didn't stick to it. Guys coming from other sports like football, triathlons and stuff did way better. Actually, even the guys who came from video games did better.

hahaha. So true. I just heard Joe Rogan say that if you are a kid learning to fight you really need to start with Taekwando because you can learn all kinds of amazing spinning kicks that you would not otherwise be able to learn (if you were exposed to real, fight limitations, someone disturbing you, interrupting you, etc). And then once you've learned all the spinning kicks (I can't even write this, I'm rolling my eyes so hard), then you can move onto more realistic fighting arts, like Muay Thai and whatnot. Shaking my head. And THIS guy (and I do like him for other things) is the prime educator of what fighting is to America, and really the world. Edit: here it is. Listen for 2 minutes, mind blow:

This also could just be a misrepresentation of Liam lol. Ive seen the man live many times and hes never really been someone Id say goes light. I mean to him, hes probably going light, but he didnt look like that in the video lol. Dude is a savage.

My opinion originally was selfish, I want my fighter to be able to hear me or have the best opportunity to be able to hear me during the fight. But my opinion changed when a friend and peer said how about we train our fighter to have enough fight iq to handle themselves during the fight to where you only need to give them instructions between rounds, that way we keep the music as is. This made more sense to me, especially because lowering the volume wouldnt necessarily make it easier to hear the corner anyway (not to mention it makes a better fighter). Im more like Kevin in that I feel we've already lost so much that is distinct to muay Thai, like the ram muay (because of time and interest of the casual observer) that I dont want to lose much else. Theres so much that is enacted but barely understood but its there meaning we might get understanding later vs if it was gone. Btw, I kind of expected most people wouldnt even think of getting rid of it, but I was curious to see if there were any. Sylvie's answer was the type I was hoping for because it might be unexpected and its layered.

When it said select forum, the first one on the list wasn't in bold and that was the selection I wished to place this conversation in. It's no big deal, I just would have liked to place it in the right spot. It is a pleasure to be part of this forum. I really enjoy it. I love the whole concept of what you and Sylvie are doing. The patrons you have deserve a big congratulations for having the faith to support such an endeavour. And the effort you guys put into it is amazing. We the viewers, commentators and general fans get to benefit greatly. In particular, I have real fan boy moments with each Muay Thai Bones podcast.

So awesome James, happy it struck you! Means a lot.

Well, I would be careful about wanting the "thai experience", for that is exactly what I sought and that disappointed me about training in Thailand. Unless you speak Thai fluently, and you are only and exclusively into fighting, you won't enjoy being surrounded by Thais only in some camp in the outskirts of Bangkok. I went to train at Sitsongpeenong (Bangkok) for a few weeks, thinking that its isolated location, its huge stable of Thai fighters, the lack of any distractions around the facility, would lead to the ultimate Muay Thai experience. It turned out, however, that mine was a foolish way of reasoning: the eastern outskirts of Bangkok became rapidly boring after a few days, the Thai fighters wouldn't really speak to me or any of the other students, while the trainers barely spoke a few words of English; it was impossible to socialize, and that, added to the fact that there was nothing in terms of distractions outside the training hours, quickly made my stay very different from what I expected. I learnt that distraction from training, as long as it is not intended as drinking and partying, is equally as important as training itself. For what concerns Yokkao I can strongly recommend it. Not only is the gym located in the heart of Bangkok, in a beautiful area in which you won't feel isolated, but the training and the vibe around it are great. The vibe, in particular, is what struck me most pleasantly: there is a sense of joy during training; everybody laughs, smiles, has a good time; you see Manachai smashing pads, Singdam coming back from his daily run, and Saenchai arriving at the gym looking for the first victim to prank. The quality of training is high, the level depending on your skill: I have seen lazy tourists doing the minimum required and professional fighters being pushed to their limit; you will have to show interest and motivation, for you will only get what you are willing to give. But no matter what, Yokkao has nothing deserving criticism. I had a private session with a trainer named Sak, and found him a great coach, highly experienced, patient and motivated. Please consider training with him if you are at Yokkao. For what concerns privates with Saenchai, I recommend you to book them in advance and be ready to pay 200$ per hour. Saenchai is not only the legend of this gym, but also the head of it: it was my impression that the type of Muay Thai taught at Yokkao resembled very much Saenchai's style on the ring: clever, elusive, fun. That would be it about Yokkao, but there is another gym I want to recommend to you, though it is located in Ao Nang, in the South of Thailand. It's called Khunsuek, it opened only recently and is a state-of-the-art facility. It certainly caters towards westerners but there is a trainer here, named Peteak Sor Suwanpakdee, who is by far the best coach I have ever had, who will tear your technique apart, and push you hard; one class with him is worth the entire trip to Ao Nang. Hoping it helps, I wish you a good trip.

I 100% agree. Ah shit I did that wrong. I was replying to Oliver about Rogan v Cruz.

To me, this is a great example of balance. Neither going too light but definitely not hard. Good back and forth, good flow, full speed but no where near full power, recognition of landed strikes, etc. victorsaravia_mtag_20190603084728.mp4

My first reaction was actually the same. Especially the first video where shes in a dress. It was just this one, seeing it a few times, seeing the damage from the leg kick, the kids face at the end of it. The more I watched the more it felt off. Not sure what I was responding to so I focused on the safety issues. Agreed that gear doesnt mean much, but its better than nothing.

I like your point about partners being dishonest with each other when they go too light. I've used the comparison many times that it's like tossing a ball at someone so gingerly that their ability to hit it with a bat is impossible. You have to pitch the f***ing ball, man. If you go too light, it distorts the technique so horridly that you're doing your partner a terrible disservice and they can't properly learn how to respond, block, etc. Interesting to me, also, is how different these two video clips look (to my eyes), despite them both being a "light sparring" example. The first video with Liam Harrison looks far too light to me. Like, you can only learn how to do tricks in that kind of sparring. There's nothing sincere about the basic movements and strikes, although the tricks and sweeps are slow enough that nobody is going to get hurt. Whereas with Pakorn and Sangmanee, the basics are all solid and the playfulness is present without it being "performed." But hey, my eyes.

Hello all! This is my first post and I am really excited to throw my voice in with you! My question is this, what are some "go-to" texts, videos, or podcasts that I may be able to get my hands on to better understand the philosophy (if there is one) of Muay Thai. For example, I have been studying the ancient Greek Stoics for about 5 years (what I graduated in) and have noticed that their teachings have influenced modern Cognitive Behavior Therapy and Roman Catholicism/Christianity. I am wondering if there are any writers or thinkers like that for Muay Thai: people who wrote about the meaning behind each movement or the mental state one needs to be Nak Muay etc. and are revered in the community. Thanks for your time! I'll be googling around as well and make sure to share whatever it is I find.

One of the reasons I think that the traditional Muay music isn't necessary for Western promotions is that it's not live. Ever. The live version is great because the musicians not only read the action and respond, but also press the action by speeding up or getting louder, etc. It's like an orchestra pit under the stage of a ballet, versus those gymnastics floor routines set to a Michael Jackson mix (or something). They're not the same thing as each other. The use of the traditional music in the West is a nod to the traditions of Muay Thai, which I like. I wasn't allowed to do my Ram Muay at many of my fights in the US, first because they changed it so that only Pros were allowed, then they just cut the bullshit and said there's no time. There have been a handful of times in Thailand that I've been told not to do the Ram Muay (the Wai Kru bowing to your corner bit is ALWAYS allowed) due to televised shows not having time, or to speed it up and do an abridged version. I bitched about not being able to do my Ram Muay in America, quite a lot. I even said "fuck you" and did it anyway more than once. That said, keeping the music and butchering the art doesn't make up for it. People who do videos shadowboxing with a Mongkol on their head, it's got good intentions but what the hell is going on? If you're going to leave out some elements because they're strange to foreign audiences, that's fine. A Ram Muay is hard to watch if you don't know what you're looking at. The traditional music isn't easy on the ears if you aren't accustomed to it. But changing the movements, rule sets, and integrity of the sport - that feels more nefarious to me than the music. If they stopped playing it in Thailand, however (which, THAI FIGHT and other "international shows" have opted to do), I'd feel totally differently. It's a loss from the Thai tradition, it's a nod or not from the West.

Sylvie has written and spoken a lot about this. Here is a list of articles that will give you insight, it's a very different scoring system that prizes balance, dominance but not necessarily aggression, and what is called Ning, the performed in ability to be affected, check those articles out: 8 Limbs Us - Muay Thai Scoring But yes, you can be hit in the back, and even the back of the head, which is why there is very strong advisement to never turn your back in the ring.

Fighting up a weight class or two vs the Northern Champion Nong Benz Sakchatree, in Chiangrai, Thailand My Post Fight Vlog

I ultimately went with hard sparring, under the assumption that most people who would use this board are probably training in the West - and in my view if you're training in the West and aiming to fight, you're not going to get nearly as much ring time to get used to the intensity of a fight so that hard sparring is a must. That being said... For me the ideal sparring is technical, with a slightly slower pace, but with strong contact to the body and light contact to the head. When I see people in my gym sparring technically, I usually find that they're being too light, not being honest with each other and in doing that they don't learn the danger of a fight. Ideal sparring for me looks like this: Or this: When it comes to hard sparring, I think it's completely appropriate to bash people hard in the body and legs if they signed up for it. But I don't think hard contact to the head is ever really appropriate. A fighter should learn to defend his head through strong drilling and light sparring - never through heavy sparring. I think people read the words hard sparring and they think of something like the Groenhart brothers going to war: When it should be more like this:

I think it valid to critique techniques and fight values that flow out of unreal fighting styles, that is styles that develop along increasingly artificial lines usually involving scoring or packaged promotion styles, in so far as these fighting styles ALSO try to portray themselves as "real fighting". For instance, to take a non-Taekwando example, for a long while historical Karate apparently developed a real lack of combination fighting because it had adopted a philosophy (fantasy) of the death blow. Karate strikes were imagined to be dealing death blows (something inherited from older weapons martial art forms, where sword strikes really would be death blows). This lead to a very abstract and unreal development of fighting techniques, one which shunned full-contact sparring (how can you spar with "death blows"?), that took some serious and devoted branches of Karate quite far from real combat or even fighting prowess. BUT, I also think that these kinds of fantasy detours of fighting styles can be super important too, because they allow imaginative, and even artistic developments that otherwise might not be given the space and time to be explored. I liken it to Science Fiction writing. Science Fiction is NOT Science. But it has had lots of impact on Science. Hey Sci-Fi writer Arthur C. Clarke imagined that one day satellites would circle the planet in a vast communication network, and look what happened. But, just as it's important to distinguish between Science and Science Fiction, you would want to distinguish between fantasy fighting and efficacy fighting (which sometimes is harder to do, because all sport fighting is shaped by rule-sets and aesthetics). Even if it is difficult sometimes, it's healthy to make the distinction. If Karate is claiming death-blows all over the place, and refusing to spar, it just can't sit there as the most deadly martial art because other fighting styles/systems are sparring and fighting frequently (with non-death blows).

I think both Daniels and Gaston (love him) are perfect examples of people that train it to make it integral to their arsenal who also have their fundamentals down solidly. In those cases Im a fan. I have a guy who has a nasty spinning hook kick hes used successfully in competition. He trains it diligently. Raymond is another guy that has made it part of his tried and true from years of training. I cant find any fault with that. What Im not a fan of, and the coach who made this meme is also trying to say, is focusing on techniques that for most are low percentage working techniques over the tried and true fundamentals of fighting. Ive encountered some people that couldnt throw a round kick with out losing balance want to just learn a spinning elbow. If theyre a hobbyist and we're doing a private, Ill just sigh and take em through it, but for my students that compete its a bugger frustration. Nothing wrong with spinning stuff as long as you have everything else coming along nicely.

I want to listen to all your favorites but I thought I’d add one first. I really like Thai country which doesn’t even crack my top 3 over here but I found a Thai rapper named IllSlick. He sings in Thai and English is some of his songs but also does ballads also. He’s my favorite artist at the moment. This one is on my playlist.