Anger Management

Anger Management.

A comment, a push or shove even a sly look just may be enough. It could take you over in an instant or slowly engulf you, either way, that brain snap, that mind explosion, what ever you want to call it can change your life and the life of many others in an instant. You may be a totally rational and reasonable person and appear to be in total control of your life, but push your buttons and who knows what is just below the surface. Bottom line in martial arts, you have to control your anger, you have to control your temper. If you don’t the damage to other people’s lives, their family and work can be immense. Anger Management is a great start.

Martial arts can be very powerful

Martial arts can be very powerful and the force required to hurt another person is minimal. The development of the mind, creating stillness, space and being neutral is an absolute necessity in your Northstar martial arts practice. By doing this you slowly train to become an observer of the thoughts and emotions that arise during training, especially during the intensity of sparring or wrestling, there fore learning to not attach to the emotion as it arises. As the emotion arises such as anger if not monitored with presence, it will take you over and you will become the anger, even for a brief instant, and in that instant you may damage either physically or emotionally or be damaged yourself. You may say later that it was not you, totally out of character etc, and it will go to sleep until the next time it is awakened and acted upon with out consciousness.

Drop all identifications

Use the dojo as your space to become present. Drop all identifications, judgments and pre-conceived notions, become still and neutral and use this as your backdrop while training. As thoughts arise, keep them in check by focusing on the workout. As emotions such as anger, frustration or fear arise, give your attention to the physical sensation of training, become present, calm and neutral, and respond with clarity and not a zero fuse anger reaction that may be well trained to rise up in an instant. The further you distance yourself from the emotion the less control it has over you. This way you slowly and surely start to uncut the emotional strings that can disempower you and you can start to see them coming well in advance.