I Guess Things Haven’t Changed

Wednesday morning message

October 15, 2014

“Experience teaches that when the will and imagination are in conflict, the imagination usually wins. What we imagine may defeat our reason and make us slaves to what we taste, see, hear, smell, and feel in the mind’s eye. The body is indeed the servant of the mind.” – Joseph B. Wirthlin

“In accounts of men in battle, there is an incredible adrenaline rush from group-versus-group conflict. The fervor and passion of partisans is clearly rewarding; and if it’s rewarding, it involves dopamine; and if it involves dopamine, then it is potentially addictive.” – Jonathan Haidt

Dear Academy friend,

Watched Denzel Washington in the 1999 movie The Hurricane recently. I don’t recall if there was a lot of hubbub about this movie of his, do you?

In case you never saw it or don’t remember it, it tells the (highly ficitionalised) story of Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, a boxer wrongly imprisoned for murder and the people who aided in the fight to prove his innocence.

I won’t talk about the extreme liberties and dramatic licence that the filmmakers took in creating the film, ‘cause that’s not my point.

The thing about the story that struck me was that we still have this problem of white law enforcement officers and young black men clashing with each other.

It’s incredible, isn’t it? We had this event in Ferguson and then the one in St. Louis followed and the thing they seem to have in common is deep-seated distrust or mistrust between the cops and the community.

Why do you think we haven’t yet been able to conquer this situation?

I also watched Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 1987 hit movie Predator. There’s a scene where two of the combat veterans are trading war stories. One says something about being in Afghanistan. The other talks about being in Libya.

I don’t follow too much the news of ongoing conflicts but aren’t we (the USAF) still doing stuff in those two locations? This movie was made 27 years ago!

What’s going on here? Perhaps I just have a naïve approach to international conflict like Ron Paul but it just seems like nothing’s changed.

What do you make of the fact that this world seems to be embroiled in never-ending conflict?

Now go out and do what you can to conquer your inner world,

Sifu DW for TeamUMAA/MVP
www.unifiedmartialart.com
“Using Martial Art As a vehicle for personal growth and development”
305 595-2892

P.S. JKD Sihings Yhave Montalvo and Gil Morales will be teaching a new “JKD Street Defense” class on Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 6.00am starting next week Tuesday, 10/14. Details available from the TeamUMAA/MVP office.

P.P.S. Evaluation results are up and Graduation will be on Friday 11/14 at 6.00pm followed by the first edition of “Friday Night Fights” at 7.00pm. Details available from the TeamUMAA/MVP office.

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