DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Evolution of Kendo (split from what do you have on zekken?)

**casinobonusa** · 12-05-2005, 08:00 AM

Oh, not so, Achilles! Truly, I think a heartfelt application to any sport could make you a better person. But think about it. What about kumdo advances you as a person?

In the first place, you learn to work hard. Exercise also makes you better emotionally, mentally. In the next, you pursue, though it is in a much more safe environment, the art of life and death through the way of the sword. Struggle. Sure, it's a sport, but some part of you still has to think of it as a life and death struggle. Then there is competing. To try and win or fail, these things build character, both as a "loser" and a "winner." And it's all unconscious, something that just happens to you over time, rewarding you with what you put into it. Substitute "football," "baseball" or "tennis" for kumdo, and you'd come up with the same thing. IMO.

I'm not saying competition isn't important, it is. But it's one pole in the tent, so to speak. As for shimpan and the subjectivity of grading, I don't have a problem with it, both because competition isn't the top priority AND because I think it's the best system there is. No computer or electronic feedback device can do what a shimpan does, see what a shimpan sees. Also, as Scott said, the shimpan's skills evolve.

May I ask you to read Rudyard Kipling's "If,"* and consider these words by Theodore Roosevelt, which serve as the credo of the United States Judo Association?

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

*http://www.swarthmore.edu/~apreset1/docs/if.html

12-05-2005, 08:00 AM	#10
casinobonusa Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 596 Senior Member	Oh, not so, Achilles! Truly, I think a heartfelt application to any sport could make you a better person. But think about it. What about kumdo advances you as a person? In the first place, you learn to work hard. Exercise also makes you better emotionally, mentally. In the next, you pursue, though it is in a much more safe environment, the art of life and death through the way of the sword. Struggle. Sure, it's a sport, but some part of you still has to think of it as a life and death struggle. Then there is competing. To try and win or fail, these things build character, both as a "loser" and a "winner." And it's all unconscious, something that just happens to you over time, rewarding you with what you put into it. Substitute "football," "baseball" or "tennis" for kumdo, and you'd come up with the same thing. IMO. I'm not saying competition isn't important, it is. But it's one pole in the tent, so to speak. As for shimpan and the subjectivity of grading, I don't have a problem with it, both because competition isn't the top priority AND because I think it's the best system there is. No computer or electronic feedback device can do what a shimpan does, see what a shimpan sees. Also, as Scott said, the shimpan's skills evolve. May I ask you to read Rudyard Kipling's "If,"* and consider these words by Theodore Roosevelt, which serve as the credo of the United States Judo Association? "It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat." *http://www.swarthmore.edu/~apreset1/docs/if.html
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