Uniting The Arts

As a pupil of the martial arts, I strongly believe that your entire life should be reflected in and out of the dojo. I feel those of us who strive to follow “the way” simply cannot comprehend the wasting of time for useless actions and empty blabber. Like Buddhist who spend a lifetime seeking enlightenment, so do martial artists in their respective fields.

Last week I experienced a situation that tested my self control. In my Judo class, an verbal argument quickly escalated to physical abuse (light but still forcefully applied). Here’s the scenario – wihthin the general class structure of a) warm ups b) Uchikomi c) Newaza then d) Randori, it was still early on in the class beginning Uchikomis. I currently have a bruised rotator cuff so was on the sidelines to exercise and learn watching. As I was scanning the dojo of paired students, I heard some voices start to be raised. I look over at these paired two, one male in his mid twenties, a green belt and one female in her late teens, a brown belt. There was some sort of quick argument and words were exchanged. Within moments, the green belt has a loud outburst and pushes the arms away of the brown belt. Immediately after that he decides that wasn’t enough and pushes her at the shoulders with a very firm shove.

He then yells over at a couple other students and informs them that he can no longer practice with her and forces one of them to take over. Concerned at his behavior I walk over and ask what that was all about. Still enraged over the argument he hollers how he just can’t practice with her and gave no specifics on the issue at hand. My reply to him was “that’s no reason to push anybody.”

At this point, his behavior took a worse turn. He turns to me and actually pushes me and starts squeling about how I shouldn’t tell him what to do, accusing me of trying to be a “hero.”

At that instant my blood boiled! My muscles tensed, my heart rate picked up and I was ready to start throwing some bows. The nerve of this guy to accuse like that, concerned about his disrespecting the entire dojo! I don’t know exactly whether he was going through the worst day of his life or if he was hopped up on something. It was extremely difficult to hold my tongue while he let his flap like a fish out of water. The only thought that went through my head at that moment was not to disrespect the dojo, not to look like this guy.

I personally know this person outside of Judo and not only is he acting like a blabbering idiot, he’s physically threatening me. For the time that I’ve known this person (approximately five months now), I NEVER would have expected that type of behavior. For him to flip like that was a little much to accept. To put his rage in perspective, I’ve personally known victims of abuse and have heard doctors discuss psychology of abusers. I’ve also grown up in an environment of abuse and can testify this guy is that kind of person.

At that point I started to walk away and he actually accused me of trying to look like a badass who now is “walking back and forth.” I would have loved to give him what he was looking for. The thought of having an appearance like that, in front of my sensei and fellow pupils? I think not.

I find several thing wrong with his actions. First and most importantly, he disrespected to dojo 2) the green belt disrespects a much higher ranked student 3) he disrespects fellow pupils by disrespecting the dojo 4) the green belt obviously disrespected the sensei 5) you use physically force against a female. That list came out longer than I initially thought.