PMABM Newsletter #12

I'm sure you'll appreciate this video.

I'm doing Contact Flow with my instructor Matt Kovsky, co-author of the book Attackproof, which is required reading for Level 3. Contact Flow is the staple exercise in Guided Chaos, which helps you train every aspect of five major principles for effective self-defense: Body Unity, Looseness, Sensitivity, Balance, and Economy of Movement.

Study this video closely (or as closely as you can with this low-resolution garbage). Other than enjoying seeing me get pummeled, what can you learn from it? What do you see me doing wrong? What do you see Matt doing right? I made a ton of mistakes and I've learned a whole lot from watching this video. I've also learned a lot from watching Matt and seeing many of the Guided Chaos principles effortlessly expressed in his movement.

(Due to privacy issues, I had to take down the video, so I have posted an official Guided Chaos video instead to show what Contact Flow is like.)

Philippians 4

I was reading about the Stoics, how they would seek an inner calm: "The Stoics did not seek to extinguish emotions, rather they sought to transform them by a resolute 'askēsis' which enables a person to develop clear judgment and inner calm."

This is different from the Bible's peace that passes understanding. Stoics used their own strength and understanding, but clear judgment is not just a highly developed reasoning skill, but reasoning based on what God says in His word. Inner calm is not emotional stability or a placid feeling concerning decisions, but a resting on the knowledge and the assurance that He's there and He's sovereign, and truly has all things in His control. Everything in life, people and circumstances, can make the soul unstable, frazzled, or uneasy, but there is a rest, a peace, when we bring to God all that make us anxious.

The Upstart

Would've been nice if this truly happened. In reality, Einstein didn't philosophize like this until at least in his teens, when he started his thought experiments, and by then he was more into reasoning out math and physics than God. It's still a good story and a good introduction to the discussion about God's existence.



And if I remember correctly, a typical teacher of that day would've given a student like that a verbal if not an actual smacking.

Hippie, diaper, halo Christ

A friend told me about Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church, how he is quite the controversial church leader. I looked him up on Wikipedia and this excellent quote was in the Criticism section:

"There is a strong drift toward the hard theological left. Some emergent types [want] to recast Jesus as a limp-wrist hippie in a dress with a lot of product in His hair, who drank decaf and made pithy Zen statements about life while shopping for the perfect pair of shoes. In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up. I fear some are becoming more cultural than Christian, and without a big Jesus who has authority and hates sin as revealed in the Bible, we will have less and less Christians, and more and more confused, spiritually self-righteous blogger critics of Christianity." — Mark Driscoll, Relevant Magazine

I am now a big fan.