When I write of my Eat Simply, Rest Completely and Train Deeply principles as being derived from ancient wisdom traditions I’m not being poetic. I’m being honest in attribution and practical on execution.
Clients who receive my Self Health guidance enjoy modern day, proven practices refined from the same ancient principles by which elite martial arts warriors trained, profited and survived.
Ancient martial arts schools each had their own unique wisdom tradition, but all focused on the same business model: use great economy and functional rigor to make highly-effective, durable and powerful warriors as fast as possible.
Martial arts instructors of antiquity got paid for their warrior output, not for a cappella chanting, elegant koans or chef’s-special-sauce-in-warrior-making process. Either the instructors made the best fighters, or they didn’t.
My sharp focus is less on harvesting their talents for killing and more on their disciplines for rapid Self Health healing by which they transformed their elite warriors for thousands of years.
There are no secrets.
And yet some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years, the ring passed out of all knowledge… ok, had to drop in a little Tolkien poetry.
If you dig for facts you can find them in common references across elite ancient schools with the highest level of martial skill and strength training – all of them had proven practices to heal their warriors as rapidly as possible.
This is common sense – one simply doesn’t make expensive elite warriors for disposable one-and-done fighting; they're made for being durable champions who deal death year after year, and can resume their craft as quickly as possible if ever they’re injured.
Self Health is where martial arts schools buried their treasure – these healing disciplines were often called foundation training. Foundation training exercises and practices were not novice boot camps, they were highly refined practices embedded in all elite ancient martial art practice forms – foundation training ensured energy cultivation for health and rapid healing, but also for activating progression in fighting skills developed in practice and expressed in battle.
Without foundation training it is impossible for any martial student to make elite progress. Foundation, by definition, is what everything else is built upon.
And this immediately explains the impotency of so many commercial martial arts schools today – ancient instructors got paid to produce rapidly highly-skilled, durable warriors; commercial martial arts instructors today get paid to produce slowly progressing students so as to retain them as long-term paying clients. And why few to no modern day students ever excel beyond their teachers... Doh!
In practical observance, it appears western martial arts instructors don't even know about essential foundation training principles and practices – they cannot share insights with their students they don't have. And old school, direct lineage Asian instructors never share their secrets with round eyes outside of family members, or the few chosen senior students expected to continue the lineage.
All round eye martial arts instructors and students today are left to discover these ancient foundation traditions, principles and practices on their own; most languish in unactivated progress well beneath their full potentials.
I was lucky and received ancient foundation principles, practices and training directly from a master teacher. I pay these gifts forward to my clients. Sharing foundation principles is fine but still not enough for anyone to immediately activate their own durable Self Health – these practices can only be learned and foundations achieved by doing, day by day.
Another lost insight is how ancient elite warrior martial artists strengthened, aligned and combined training intentions across Earth, Man and Heaven in foundation training. With proper alignment there is near infinite progression in highly skillful, enduring fighting prowess and Self Health renewal. There is always another step to take.
Elite warriors who trained comprehensively in Earth, Man and Heaven principles did so until they trained all as one: as above, so below – same same. And here it is clear emptiness means completely full. These principles can always be shared, and they always remain empty words until they are filled by direct practice built upon experience.
All you have to do is practice my foundation principles of Eat Simply, Rest Completely and Train Deeply to gain your own elite ancient warrior capacities for Self Health, and then express the skills you've cultivated on your own field of play.
We will face no life and death battles awaiting us season after season on Sundays, but we can still evolve like elite weekend warriors in perfect health and enduring wellness of regained youth…