Ego, Dereks perspective.
Derek Molyneux is no stranger to the world of martial arts. Derek has been training for almost 10 years now. Derek ran a successful business until turning his talents to writing amongst other things, he is the co. Author of the best selling “When the clock struck in 1916” a story of hand to hand combat on the streets of Dublin during the historical 1916 rebellion. In fact, it was an incident which occurred while running his business which started Derek on his journey to find Senshido. Deconstructing the ego has always been a big part of Senshido. Derek is a Senshido student for almost a year now, and this is Derek’s perspective on ego, in his own words.
Violence – its a horrible fucking bastard of a thing, a gut-churning sense of paralysis where everything just goes to shit… Napoleon famously once said that ‘no battle-plan survives contact with the enemy’… So why have one?
Look there’s no fucking easy way to say this… Fighting is shit.. Its fucking appalling. Losing or the fear of losing and looking like a dick is draining in the extreme. Dealing with the subconscious fear of falling at breakneck speed from the lofty towers of my motherfucking ego doesn’t help matters a bit. It’s all just gonna go to fuck – what can I do?…. Fuck it! just get comfortable with the horribleness – what other way is there? That’s before broken noses and limbs enter the cluster-fuck of an equation.
To teach yourself that its gonna be any other way is just to fool yourself. To anticipate that a fight is going to be anything else than a stomach wrenching lottery is about as effective as teaching somebody to drive a car or manage a crash by explaining what it feels and looks like on screens or a blackboard and then sending them out in the pissing rain with dodgy tyres and brakes, at night, with one broken headlight – and the wipers won’t fucking work. You might survive, just about – then again you might not.
Ok so back to the French one armed bandit’s battle-plan. Maybe there is a master strategy. But I’m fucked if I know what it is. Survive! The feeling of shit is finite. Maybe that’s it! That’s what I’m slowly learning. Its intimidating and awful but I hope to fuck I can stick with it. Only today for some fucked up reason a stupid scenario raised its unwelcome head – how quickly and suddenly it does that. Everything else gets shoved into perspective – I suppose that might have its advantages but at the time everything just goes into a tunnel – that’s it – thoughts of techniques get sucked out of your mind at warp speed.
Anyway today it didn’t kick off, but I was dealing with the unknown – out of my comfort zone and didn’t fucking like it. But it was a little different. There was something there that helped, just that little something, maybe some Neanderthal fucking gorilla Captain Caveman bastard in the back of my mind letting me know that we humans are equipped for this shit. That the fear, the butterflies and the dry-mouthing is ok – it will pass. The other guy will be feeling it too and probably much worse than you in spite of appearances so if it kicks off maybe he’s the one today that’s relying on a stupid unrealistic plan. At least I’m aware of the futility of even having one – other than to survive – by all means possible – and to do whatever it fucking takes, but only if you have to, and there is a universe of options, training was kicking in!
Fuck your ego – fuck it out the window – fuck it from a height. It drains you – it puts you under the type of pressure felt by a world class football team playing the underdog. You’ve everything to lose. With no ego you’re always the underdog – and that to me is an immeasurable advantage. That’s something its taken me a long time to get to grips with. Refreshingly its one of the most fundamental things that’s reinforced time after time with those I now train with.
I’ve tried all sorts of fighting systems. They are all hard as hell, great to do and hugely character building. But Senshido isn’t a ‘system’ as such and therein perhaps lies its greatest strength. At least that’s what I’ve picked up so far – as well as really getting to grips with the ego thing. That definitely helps…
That’s about it for now. It’s a tough road ahead but will no doubt be an enjoyable and worthy one. There’s some good people involved in this – really good people. A bunch of fucking characters in fairness. Everyday men and women – nice people – survivors. It’s good to be in their company. I hope I can remain worthy of it!
Derek Molyneux
“When the clock struck in 1916”
Close-Quarter Combat in the Easter Rising
is available from Www.thecollinspress.ie