"Self Defense": It so commonly slips off the tongue of the average martial artist, but what really does it mean? Survival is the key flavour here. Survival at a physiological level, with one eye on the march of time which carries the body with it. Survival at the social level, that our lives are not forfeit to the first forceful person we encounter, as Cheng Man -Ch'ing said "The difference between yoga and tai chi is that even if you get it studying yoga , there's nothing you can do if someone tries to knock you off your cushion." (pp 81 "There Are No Secrets")
If we look beyond the self, at the wider picture, what do we see? Ecology, simply put. Interconnectedness. That youth that feels aggressive towards me is carrying that feeling from elsewhere; that drunken man who shoulders me in the pub is that drunk because of circumstances leading up to the drunkenness.
Obviously we cannot control everything; we cannot control much at all if we are honest. So an attempt to stem all violence at the source is impossible. But we should be aware of how our every action, our every small aggression streams into the ether, to reappear who knows where...
By the time violence reaches our bodily person, often it is too late. But a really strategic approach would see that violence comes from general suffering and lack of attention to others, and before the trouble gets near, we might do well to redress the balance in our favour. As the inimitable TT Liang wrote: "Make one thousand friends, but don't make one enemy." (pp.126"Steal My Art")
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