Indigenous Ability

  [Below is an excerpt from the Pliant Physique Program. The package is a 65-minute DVD & 12-page booklet detailing the Old School Principles behind and detailing the Four Program Paths tailored to your Combat Athlete needs.] Pliancy vs. Flexibility, Part One Let’s start with a definition, as this strict use of the adjective gets to the heart of what Old-Schoolers meant when they used the word “pliant” or sometimes “lissome.” Pliant : Yielding, as in a willow that bends against the force of the wind and easily returns to its standard posture. [Keep that willow analogy in mind, we’ll come back to it.] Lissome : (of a person or their body) thin, supple, and graceful. We sometimes see this sort of physique or attribute referred to in the old literature as “willowy.” The Two Attributes of a Pliant Physique Attribute One -The concept was to foster a yielding-resiliency, that is, the ability to easily and ably return to posture/base after an applied force [wind vs. th...

  [See the like titled podcast episode of Mark Hatmaker, Rough & Tumble Raconteur for the Comanche version of the below.] I am Awake I See… I Hear… I Smell… I Taste… I Feel… Everything. I Live Here… I Live Right Now. I Live Freely. [More Completely: I Live Freely Wild.] [BTW-Puewats’i the name of my sailboat.] Do not be a Coward. Free Your Mind… Free Your Body. Live Unconcernedly. [More Completely: I always prepare so I can live without concern.] Live Well. [More Completely: I live and enjoy each Blessing.] Be Good. [More Completely: I Walk the Right Path, I Assist on That Path.] I am Grateful or I am Unwise. Ura Tahp’i [More completely: Thanks to God/Nature/The Great Spirit/The Fates/The Unknown. There is no attempt to “solve” simply to live Gratefully.] The Black Box Warehouse for all your Old School Training Needs

  Buckle up, Crew, as we’ve got some ground to cover. First, “ Face under pressure ” is, obviously, a reiteration of Ernest Hemingway’s original quote on the concept of “ Grace under pressure .” Some refine to simplicity and say it was his definition of courage/guts, but in a letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald, he makes it clear he has something more in mind than sheer guts. As a matter of fact, he’s a bit disdainful of guts or courage on its own. “ It makes no difference your telling G[erald] Murphy about bull fighting…. [I] Was not referring to guts but to something else. Grace under pressure. Guts never made any money or anybody except violin string manufacturers .”-A letter dated April 20, 1926. Hemingway was expressing a courageous ideal as something more than mere bravado, he reaches for something that might be closer to the Italian concept of Sprezzatura, a word that appears in the 1528 volume titled The Book of the Courtier by Baldassare Castiglione. The Book of the...

  Mr. Muldoon Roadwork. That word, to the combat athlete, conjures images of pre-dawn runs, breath fogging the morning air and, to many, a drudgery that must be endured. Boxers, wrestlers, kickboxers the world over use roadwork as a wind builder, a leg conditioner, and a grit tester. The great Joe Frazier observed… “ You can map out a fight plan or a life plan, but when the action starts, it may not go the way you planned, and you're down to the reflexes you developed in training. That's where roadwork shows - the training you did in the dark of the mornin' will show when you're under the bright lights .” Roadwork has been used as a tool since man began pitting himself against others of his species in organized combat. But…today’s question . Has it always been the sweat-soaked old school gray sweat suit pounding out miles on dark roads or, was it something subtler, and, remarkably slower? And if it was, why did we transition to what, and I repeat myself,...

  [The New Year's Resolutions Clock is ticking, if you want to train like a geriatric, well, here's some fodder for thought.] What follows is a summary of how I incorporate the excavations of Old School training into a typical day. A Few Preliminaries ·         The photos range from my 55 th birthday to my 56 th , a scant 5-days ago. ·         No special allowances were made for photos, meaning, no “weight-cutting” or “ Let’s get that bathroom light just right as I bust a gut and choose the non-bum selfie number 17.” ·         The photos are impromptu, on the spot, or playin’ around. ·         They are all walk-around weight. Also… ·         I do not diet. ·         I eat according to Old-Timer’s principles and dropped 16 pounds in the first 2 months of esche...