Straight Shots

Interesting Read

2011-07-18T15:56:00.000-07:00

I wanted to re-post this article on here on my blog, but I'm late for a meeting at work.

Please click on the link and read the article. Its not that I agree or disagree with the article. I just enjoyed the topic and relate to the perspective.

Its funny (strange) how the 'don't-mess-with-me' hyper-masculine mma fan t-shirts have crossed over into Christian merchandise. I wonder if the guy that walks around wearing a shirt covered in skulls strung together with barbwire also walks around wearing a t-shirt of a buffed out Jesus telling me in no uncertain terms that I'm a pussy.

The discussions about masculinity and faith have been already written about thoughtfully. I just wanted to share an observation I've had over the years with churches and mma gyms.

I've been a Christian and a combat sports "gym rat" for going on 3 decades now and I hear unsettling discussions whenever I'm traveling inside both of those circles. I hear church leaders boast about a particular flagship ministry that's doing well for a target demographic. I also hear mma coaches citing their fighter's win records as proof of their gym's 'competitive advantage' over other gyms. Both circles compartmentalize their 'products' in order to 'sell' an idea to a potential customer that what they offer is in fact the best option to choose when compared to the 'other places' that offer exactly the same thing.

But why aren't the essential truths stressed more in both circles? Why do ministers and coaches alike resist to admit that other churches and gyms are as proficient if not better than their own with regard to certain aspects? Some churches have exceptionally talented people running youth ministries, but are lacking in adult ministries compared to other churches. As well in mma some gyms possess talented wrestling coaches, but lack an experienced person to teach the complexities of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Is it considered a heresy to go to different churches on different nights for different programs? In MMA circles, going to another gym outside of your own could get you banished from your gym.

Isn't it liberating to ponder the notion that the individual is the critical factor to finding value in both? Do I really need "pastor so & so" to preach to me in order to know God? Do I really have to have the big MMA promotion ex-champion teach me submissions? The answer to both is no. However, you got to learn from somewhere and someone with the right answers. But I question the authority of organizations and institutions that insist on marketing themselves as the best option for everyone. Blanket assertions suck.

Praying for Understanding

2011-07-12T17:18:00.000-07:00

I am fortunate enough to have a life where I can wake up next to my wife and kids every morning and say a quiet prayer to God. This morning was a little different. I woke up to my cellphone ringing at 3:45 a.m. only to hear the person on the other line dialed the wrong number. I looked over at the family God blessed me - quietly sleeping unfazed by the cellphone call. At that moment a deep sense of unworthiness occupied my mind that ached my heart a little bit. I kept incessantly thinking "God please don't let me mess this up." I felt helpless. Am I really doing, thinking, living the right way to justify God's favor? Once I realized how ridiculous that question came out, I began to reason - I am God's child via Justification by Faith through Grace. However, I am being sanctified daily through the renewing of my mind.

So here's what I got out of it. My perspective on God and life are exclusively framed by my desires and fears which originate from some sort of motive.

In the case of praying for my family, I ask God to protect them and bless them and ask God to guide them away from "missing the mark" - in other words doing their own thing without regard for God and His ways. My motive for this prayer is my love for them. However, I believe that God loves them more than I can ever understand, because God is the power that puts air into their lungs and pumps blood into their hearts.

I desire and try to rely on God to provide me the ability to bless my family the way He would want me to through my actions and words. My first mistake is thinking that God operates in some regular fashion under some prescribed level of rules that only the "real Christians" know about. At church, I used to think that other people can't possibly be as screwed up as I am.

But God is wild and mysterious. I both fear God and desire God out of the motive that I want God to be in control of my life. I believe unequivocally that God rules over all existence - whether the other creatures accept Him or refuse Him. I believe that God loves me more than I will ever fully know or appreciate, because I can remember all the remarkable experiences in my life where God was the only one who protected me and provided for me. My motive drives me to make the sincere attempt daily to show my love and trust in God by admitting that I am terrible at running my own life and I'm afraid of living without God in control.

But I can't love what I don't know. And its harder for me to trust God when I can't hear His voice or see His face. Yet I know deep down inside that learning to love God is the pursuit of my life.

I can learn about Him through His words and deeds in the stories found in the bible, in the life of those around me and finally in my sinful life. I am a sinner - saved by grace but unfortunately more monkey than human at times. I like the definition of sin as "missing the mark" - that description doesn't allow for qualitative human judgment. Its either you hit the target or you don't. If there's one thing I've learned about life over the years, its that I still miss the mark a lot and I wish I didn't.

Recently, I have been blessed to hear another side of God's message from some remarkable people. I hope you will try the links below and get some better understanding that will bless you like it blessed me.

Please check these clips out when you can.

URCC XVIII Relentless in Makati P.I.

2010-11-16T21:38:00.000-08:00

I do not own or operate a gym.

I have to my credit, one guy I train with.

His name is Nate Flores and I was his first MMA coach 6 years ago when Nate was 13 years old. I left the gym we both trained at in 2007 and I thought I would never train with Nate again...

In August 2009, I met Nate in the hallway of the Northern Marianas College where coincidentally I work and he recently started attending.

That's the start of the journey for which I am about to tell...

15 months of training together and a fight record of 2 - 0...

Fast forward to last Wednesday November 10th...

Nov.10, 2010 3:55 pm - The island of Guam

Nate and I stopped by Fokai Industries - Received blessing from Roman Dela Cruz President of Fokai Industries and a personal friend.

No.10, 2010 9:00 pm - International Airport Philippines

Arrive at airport to meet Wil Salazar to give him a present from his dad whose back on Saipan. Wil's telling us all about Nate's commercial on T.V.

We take a cab to the hotel. Thinking about the 4 pounds Nate needs to cut. Hoping that water logging trick works.

I'm sorry I didn't mention why we are there...

Nate is fighting in the co-main event for the URCC Flyweight Championship Belt

Nate and I are part-timers in the sport. We train 1/4 of the time other athletes and trainers work together.

I want to get the images out there in sequence to give a visual glimpse of this sureal weekend.

Nate and I arrive at the hotel Wednesday Night

Nate - 1st Night At the Hotel (The Giant bilboard ad can be seen outside our window)

Here's Nate with the awesome billboard as seen from our room.

A 19 year old from Saipan and you have your face on a 60ft billboard - Thanks MMA!

All through the night the URCC XVIII Relentless Commercial was airing on television. The experience was both very exciting as well as bit stressful to watch at times.

Nate at the GAB office getting his license to fight

Nate and his goofy coach

In the next 24 hours Nate cut to 145 pounds, weighed-in Friday afternoon, and then replenished his body back up to 153 pounds with timed meals and rest...

Fast forward to Saturday (Fight Day)

The band is above the Fighters entrance...

Getting taped up with plenty of time to wait...

No Pressure Nate - btw, Royce Gracie will be in the audience for your debut fight...

We are the 2nd to last fight of the night and the house is packed...

Below is the news flash from the day after the bout...

http://www.urccmma.com/index.php?channel=news&mode=relentless-in-spectators-eyes-by-alfred-gealogo

In the Co-main Event, Eric "The Natural" Kelly of Yaw-Yan Ardigma battled Nate "The Terrible" Flores of Predator Combat/Konflikt MMA who flew in from Saipan. This fight was for the vacant Featherweight Championship.
They did not waste their time feeling each other's distance as both came out swinging at the center of the ring with the technical striker Flores landing more flush shots.
Kelly would try to land strikes of his own but Flores took minimal damage.

The Saipan fighter would initiate the action relying on his superior boxing tagging Kelly with his hands.

"The Natural" would not back down though and forced Flores to get into a clinch where he quickly took the fighter down. Flores is no stranger to the ground as he stumped his opponent's attempts to pass his half-guard.

Kelly threw punches from the top position forcing Flores to turn and show his back. Kelly took the opportunity and forced a rear naked choke on his opponent.
"The Terrible" would fall short on his bid to take home the belt to Saipan as Eric "The Natural" Kelly is now the Featherweight Champion.

Now that the fight is over...

Other pics after the fight...

And the photo below is no photo shop...

Yes, we hung out with the legend Royce Gracie...

Actually, that was the second time we spoke with him...

The first time was earlier that night - backstage at the warm-up area minutes before Nate was to go onstage. Royce spoke with us briefly talking about a few things - including fight advice. The first man to do the equivalent of landing on the moon for MMA was givings us vale tudo advice...

Thank you God for my stay last weekend! After a weekend like I had, I am certainly aware that God exists - I'll never understand the ignorance of skeptics that go through life thinking that life is just a random series of unrelated acts and then you die. But then again, why should I care about waking somebody up when they are happy being asleep?

Fedor loses and fans lose out too

2010-06-30T15:47:00.000-07:00

Here's an excerpt from an article on sherdog.com. Pat Miletich was interviewed on his perspective on the recent Fedor loss to Fabricio Werdum last Saturday night.

"Pat Miletich: I watched in amazement as Fedor was submitted by Fabricio Werdum. My heart sank not for Fedor but for the reality of perfection that is not attainable in the sport of MMA. All experienced fighters know you’re going to lose if you’re fighting world-class opponents, but Fedor was different.

I remember when he came on the scene in the Rings organization. My fighters and I were competing there during the dark years of the UFC. Nobody even noticed Fedor at first, but that soon changed. He was wrecking name fighters standing up and on the ground. I found it puzzling how this guy, short and average looking, was able to beat guys like Ricardo Arona.

We all know what followed, as Fedor would go on to mow through great fighters in their prime in the Pride organization.

Today on all the forums, Twitter and Facebook, people are saying they knew he wasn't the best fighter in the world. Really? All I can say is, he wasn't (Saturday) night.

Fabricio Werdum was insistent in his interview that Fedor is the best in the world. I respect Fabricio for saying this. This shows true class from a true world-class fighter, and Werdum is a true fighter. What Fedor said was something only a man like he could say. Fedor said, "A man that does not fall, does not stand up.”

I just wonder who out of all those who are so critical of this man will stand in front of him when he stands back up?"

Amazing insight from a great talent in MMA. Pat Miletich's camp was the first truly MMA fight camp that dominated the sport at the highest levels. People also forget that Pat is a BJJ black belt.

Most people can't tell the difference between a good win and a bad loss. If you talk to fighters they would tell you that getting beat by a dominant fighter is acceptable if it was a competitive and close fight. In contrast, fighters will tell you that losing a fight because of technical errors or bad preparation on their part is more like they beat themselves than anything else.

I've been working with fighters for 3 decades from competing to coaching, but the mental aspects of the game - the motivations and the ambitions - are always dangerously close to warping a fighter's point of view on life and always impacts performance whether for better or worse. The thing I can help a young fighter out with most are the mental aspects of perspective and awareness.

Perspective and awareness... It's why I still roll and put on the gloves. Is there any activity other than fighting where an individual's self-identity/ego are one with one's performance?

Often times people (not the gym rats I know) will come up to me after an MMA event where I was corner for a training partner or refereed and they ask me why I don't fight anymore. I immediately think to myself, "You don't know me, where I've been, and you don't know what I'm doing at least 7 hours a week for the past five years." Then I actually smile and tell them something like, "It's a sport for the young men and women." It's a BS excuse for the uninitiated - those who have never been on the inside of the cage.

Perspective and awareness - Fedor said, "A man that does not fall does not stand up."

Whether it be in a ring or in a cage or on a mat, fighting exposes a lot truth about the inner person that nothing else does. I wish everybody interested enough in the sport to make uninformed opinions on fighters like Fedor got to train like Fedor for a few years.

There's hidden value found in rolling/sparring stand-up that I absolutely believe that those fans who love to watch it but don't do it truly lose out on the perspective of oneself in relation to everybody else and the awareness helps with all aspects of life.

Why Run Away Forrest Griffin?

2009-08-11T16:34:00.000-07:00

Looking back at last week's UFC 101, lots of people wonder why Forrest Griffin ran out of the octagon after he got beat. I don't know, but I don't feel bad for him one bit.

If Forrest Griffin was capable enough to run out of the arena, he was physically capable enough to stand there long enough for the referee to hold up Anderson Silva's hand and to formally take his defeat...

To give honor to his opponent...

To give honor to the process...

...and if Forrest would have stayed in the octagon and took it like a warrior he would have preserved his own honor in this commonly selfless act of humility that all fighters have to undergo when facing a loss.

But he ran out of there, losing the chance to be honorable in defeat.

I am 40 years old and I've had the displeasure to have lost some big matches in my life the past few years. Both times, I stood up long enough to see my opponent's hand go up in victory. One of those times I did it in excruciating pain with a broken arm held up by my gi jacket fashioned as a sling. My arm wasn't broken by a submission... I broke it during a fall in the finals of a judo tournament with a guy 80 pounds heavier and over 15 years younger than me.

But I waited long enough to see my opponent get his hand raised in victory. Right after, I was helped into a small car and driven most expediently to the local hospital for a nice shot of morphene. Good Times! And I don't just mean the morphine!
I stood there and represented my family name honorably in defeat with a broken arm at 37 years old.

Look at B.J. Penn after his lost to GSP earlier this year. He didn't know what was going on nor does he remember where he was after the 2nd round, but he instinctively knew to stand up on his two feet, to stay in the octagon, and to have the process done to him - to let the ref hold his hand knowing that it wasn't going to be raised.

There is honor in defeat just as there is dishonor in victory. I tell you, I had so much more respect for BJ Penn in that act of honorable defeat than in all of his victory celebrations combined. Because I know how hard that is to do that first hand.

In my life, I've had the blessed opportunity to compete, judge, and referee in the sport of MMA and I only just turned 40. I count that a blessing, because I know how important all those roles are in ensuring that the sport improve and grow. I love the sport. But that honor in defeat has been around for centuries.

Like BJ Penn said in a pre-event special,
"They say a true measure of a man is when he is at his lowest... You've got to stand up."

Because Forrest ran out of the octagon before Anderson Silva's hand was raised, I must say I regret ever being a fan of Forrest Griffin. I certainly am not going to buy his book.

The Beauty of Facing Inner Truth... Even If Its Ugly.

2009-08-04T21:47:00.001-07:00

I recently got back from visiting my hometown of Los Angeles, California. I haven't been there since December of 2007 when I had to bury one of my brothers.

My time there was truly blessed as this visit opened my mind and made me aware of particular facets of some personal prejudices I have ingrained in me.

One detail about my life thats come up recently is that I never really enjoyed the company of over 90% of the men I have met throughout my life. I never liked the lonely herd mentality that a lot of guys have - those who need a common identity in order to cover their insecurities. I never was one of those guys who needed to bond with other guys to feel like a man.

Its always the self-actualized men that I enjoyed being around. Men who TRULY didn't pace their life around the norm of living in a box of acceptable terms and attitudes - people not living to get a reaction off of others. Men who take care of themselves so they can take care of others they truly love.

I recently met a young man on a flight to Philadelphia. The guy's dad was a diplomat and his mother was a fashion model. He went to high school in Rome, dropped out of Harvard and is currently studying for his MBA at University of Pennsylvania majoring in Finance. Albeit, the man comes from money and priviledge, but he didn't act like it.

He is living an interesting life... He just got back from Mexico where he recently acquired a Mezcal farm. He has it setup to where a good share of the profits go to funding local schools. 10 years ago, I would have had the same striking and engaging conversation with the same guy. However, I would've counted him as an exception as most of my friends were fighters growing up.

Now that MMA is so popular, I have had recent experiences working out and meeting people entering into the fight game who have no clue what it means to deal with humility and humiliation. In my opinion, how can anyone call themselves tough when they never busted through the other side of adversity in life?

I used to feel a common bond and respect with people who went toe-to-toe with me. I still respect people I have fought, but lately its like I can care less if people fight now or not. Recent experiences have me re-thinking my prejudices...

Its easy to go in a ring or cage to fight when you have no experience accomplishing anything meaningful or beneficial in life. What's so hard about laying everything on the line when you are a living loser? I mean, what have you got to lose when you have nothing to show for anyway?

And I now have the displeasure of meeting fat dudes who are self-proclaimed experts at jiu-jitsu and MMA. How can someone be so delusional as to think they are living a healthy lifestyle when they are so obese? How can anyone know about leverage when they are carrying around the weight of two or three people? I don't think Carlos and Helio Gracie envisioned that all they were trying to promote would be expounded upon by full grown babies.

And don't get me started on most fight fans... "The biggest idiots on the planet."
How can a fan of the sport say that a fighter's Jiu-Jitsu is good or bad when they never rolled a day in their life?

Also, when guys talk to me nowadays they mostly express dissatisfaction with their life because:
- they are doing work they feel is inferior to their abilities
- they have relationships with women who they think don't appreciate or respect them
- they feel like they aren't respected enough in all their social circles

Full grown babies. Many men I meet seem to think that the key to the fountain of youth is to have an adolescent attitude. Now I don't think that I have matured or grown much wiser since my teenage days, but I have changed a little bit.

I now try to live to serve those I care about. I take care of myself so I can take care of them. I like the company of men who understand that particular philosophy in life.

So if you are a man and see me on the street - just wave and I will wave back. If we are closer, I may say something pleasant to you and give a seemingly sincere query about your life.

But be warned...
If you are not family or a professional colleague I truly respect...
If you're not someone I've rolled with or spilled blood with...
If you're not someone I have some spiritual connection with...

I most probably hate you for wasting my time.

I know my attitude sucks to many. But for right now its beautiful to me, because its a truth that allows me to be myself without any reservations or apologies. I can live in my own skin knowing that I surround myself with men I enjoy and respect.

I feel reassured knowing that I have excluded my contact with the type of men that, as Forrest Griffin would say, are big hairy vaginas.

Grandmaster Helio Gracie Passed Away Today

2009-01-29T15:39:00.000-08:00

http://www.graciemag.com/news/144/ARTICLE/13149/2009-01-29.html

The definitive inverview of Grandmaster Helio found on Graciemag.com

interview link

In this world of evil and darkness, there is this singular activity created by the Gracie Family that shines as a beacon of light - guiding people to live honest, humble lives while exercising a warrior's heart to never give up.
The first time I heard "leave your ego at the door" - I knew that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu was more than sport or martial art.
Gracie Jiu-Jitsu = Right over Might. The best system of self-defense. The ordinary man’s solution to serious life or death situations.
I thank God for Grandmaster Helio Gracie and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu.
I am forever grateful.

Philippians 1:27-30 (New Living Translation)
27 Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News. 28 Don’t be intimidated in any way by your enemies. This will be a sign to them that they are going to be destroyed, but that you are going to be saved, even by God himself. 29 For you have been given not only the privilege of trusting in Christ but also the privilege of suffering for him. 30 We are in this struggle together.

Is Red Belt REALLY the first jiu-jitsu film?

2008-12-03T17:22:00.000-08:00

I have been checking around and reading posts on forums about the recent movie Red Belt and Bazilian Jiu-Jitsu's popularity and it's pop referrence.

Here's a GREAT fight scene from an old James Cagney movie. There's a slew of variations of seoi nage, harai goshi, drop knee seoi-nage, tomoe nage, side control escape, an armbar attempt, some cool back work and a lapel choke from back mount.

It's amazing to me how much of that old movie had better fight work than most modern fight choreography.

Been thinking lately about the last couple of years and all that has happened in my life. In the end, I am glad to be spending a majority of my free time at home these past couple of months. No crazy training schedule to have to worry about.

I was doing some judo with a friend, but he got hurt so now it's been a couple of weeks since I last trained and its a little strange not having it take up so much of my time. I miss the people I trained with before who are now (like myself) busy with life's other experiences.

So now I will wait and think about what the next stage may be for this activity that I like to do so much.

Geek-Tard Post Alert: SQL 2K for Vista Business

2008-11-18T15:15:00.000-08:00

*** Make sure to uninstall sql 2005 trial before attempting ***

//in Vista:

-click start button
-in the search bar type: services.msc to search for program
-run services.msc
-(better to sort the list of services by name) scroll down and look for any services starting with sql such as,

"sql server sqlexpress"
"sql server active directory helper"
" sql server browser"

//for each service do the following:

select the service
right click to properties
select startup type (default should say disabled) : "Automatic (Delayed Start)"
hit the apply button

Now install SQL 2k. The aforementioned instructions should allow PCs with Vista Business to run any applications requiring sql 2k.

End of Geek-Tard Transmission...

Discussion on the Documentary Expelled

2008-09-03T23:45:00.000-07:00

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3 (Final)

Honest expression, being yourself,

2008-08-24T17:00:00.000-07:00

Concepts by Bruce Lee

It should be noted that Dan Inosanto and Erik Paulson are both BJJ Black Belts awarded by the Machados (Dan got his from John Machado and Erik recently was awarded his by Rigan Machado).

I have had the fortunate opportunity to train with great coaches throughout the years, but if anyone were to ask me what it is that I do I would have to reply that I am expressing myself - my own JKD - it can flow from armed combat to western boxing to western kickboxing to hapkido to taekwondo to kenpo to jun fan kickboxing to muay thai to wrestling to judo to brazilian jiu-jitsu to mma back to armed combat and cycle all over again. I can honestly say it is those things because I have competed under all those rules at least once in my life. I can also honestly say that at the same time, what I do is none of those things since I am not bound by any single system or ideology.

Bruce said, "Before I knew anything, a punch was just a punch and a kick was just a kick. Then when I started to get deep into it, a punch was no longer just a punch and a kick was not merely just a kick. Now that I'm competant at fighting, a punch is just a punch and a kick is just a kick."

He's talking about transcendance. Using the activity as a boat to get you across whatever river you need to cross in your life. Then simply discard the boat and move on.

I will always be thankful that I finished college and attained a bachelor's degree from Cal Poly Pomona - one of the most challeneging IT programs in the USA. That to me means more than any belt or championship, because I've seen fighters 10 years after their career - and most of them end up either hangers on to their past glory or they end up complete failures in relationships and life lessons. Very few can make it out of the ego trap and transcend.

A Saipan Game Mod for BF1942

2008-07-29T18:02:00.000-07:00

I used to play battlefiled 1942 on the PC - A LOT!!!

What was cool about 'bf1942' were the mods (modifications) that developers created that expanded/extended the gameplay further by re-enacting WWII battles not found in the original game...

I always wanted to re-create the battle of Saipan, but someone beat me to it!

check out the pics...

Man, I guess I'm going to have to find time in my busy schedule to try this mod out. Maybe next year!

You know what would be great? If I can take the basic map and tweak it so that it's more like a modern version of Saipan - you know, put in legal easements, street signs like 'string beans', make that crazy looking yellow bird tree thing that you see on the way up to capital hill - you know the bird face tree thing that people dress up for the holidays and graduation and whatnot...

That way I could chop that thing down, burn it, put a flamethrower to it, run it over with a tank, blow it up with a claymore mine, and do it over and over again - all for the name of art, of course!

Nerd Rock - The band Knee Jerk Reaction

2008-05-29T22:02:00.000-07:00

here's a funny video companion...

Cool Quotes

2008-05-27T17:16:00.000-07:00

Viktor E. Frankl's book Man's Search For Meaning is an essential reading for anyone who ever pondered the big question "What am I doing here?"

Below are some excerpts of his book I found on the web.

On Choosing One's Attitude

"Everything can be taken from a man but ...the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." p.104

On Discovering the Meaning of Life

"The meaning of our existence is not invented by ourselves, but rather detected." p.157

"What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general, but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment." p.171

"We can discover this meaning in life in three different ways: (1) by doing a deed; (2) by experiencing a value; and (3) by suffering." p.176

I read that book on the plane back to L.A. to bury one of my brothers. It helped me realize that for most people, the rat race of life ends with feelings of loss and fear of the great beyond. It also made me realize how brave my brother was in life and in death.

If the rat race gets to be too much, do what a good friend of mine told me to do 8 years ago...

...fall out of the race and make your own path

I choose to follow Jesus Christ in this life and in the next...

Namaste (that one's for my new friend Satya - have a safe trip back home next month).

What Drives You To Do What You Do?

2008-03-20T17:06:00.000-07:00

I made a big change a little while ago.
I left the Koru Gym Facility and the training program is now handled by the owner of the gym, Albert Ichihara.
But I never told anybody who was affected as to why I left.
My Answer: It was my time to move on.

Katelyn and I at the Memorial Park and Micro Beach

2007-12-12T18:44:00.001-08:00

It's still noon so this is what I did this morning. I took Jacob for an early morning walk then I took my oldest, Katelyn to McDonald's then to Memorial Park then Micro Beach then to Sugar King Park then to the video store - all before 11:00 a.m. I think I'm still on mainland time with all the stuff I've got done these past 2 days off. But I still have a bunch of other stuff to get done this afternoon!

Here's some highlights of Katelyn's morning...

Waking up in a good mood. She missed her Daddy when he was gone.

So we're at the parking lot of American Memorial Park when Katelyn decided that she didn't want to picnic at the park anymore and all she wanted now was to stay in the car and finish eating her sandwich.

I fought and I fought to convince her to step outside and eat at the park tables...

And the winner is...

Katelyn decided the only place she wanted to go outside and stroll around was on the Micro Beach side of the park. Here's an odd angle shot of Mañagaha Island as I carried Katelyn on my arm.

Here's Katelyn walking about.

In the background, I spotted some new structure being built on the beach that hadn't been there before. I asked Katelyn if she wanted a closer look. I didn't have to ask her twice...

She kept calling it "the model" as in, "Hey, Daddy let's go look closer at the model!"

Katelyn's awesome...

We had to get back to the real world and pick up some videos before Katelyn's naptime.

Having time off to spend with my baby is priceless!

Morning Walk with Jakes

2007-12-12T13:51:00.001-08:00

One of the things I missed most about being in L.A. was the morning walks with my baby boy Jacob... Katelyn likes to sleep in.

Jacob lets me surprise him each morning by letting me introduce something new in detail. Today, we're going to check out some papaya up close - he doesn't know that yet.

This is the entrance to our Uncle's farm.

Baby Jakes doesn't know it yet, but he's gonna get a close-up view of some papaya. I think we're going to need a ladder.

Well, I couldn't find a ladder tall enough for Jakes to check out the papaya from the previous pic. However, we did find a papaya tree short enough for Jakes to mess around with.

I caught Jake looking up at the sky, so I thought I would show you the clouds that he was looking at.

Here's the view from exiting the farm. Time to check on Katelyn to see if she's ready to go to the park again this morning.

Here's the view from our house. Pretty special for my island kids.

Jakes really liked it, but I think it's time to get back so he can eat bananas for breakfast.

Thanks for everything John

2007-12-09T22:15:00.000-08:00

Thinking of Brother Mark

2007-12-04T16:54:00.000-08:00

Thinking of My Brother Jesse

2007-11-05T19:20:00.001-08:00

Fascinating Perspective on the Holy Trinity

2007-11-05T15:47:00.001-08:00

"Dr. Michael L. Brown a messianic jew and founder of ICN Ministries explained the Trinity."

About the gym and the book the peaceful warrior

2007-10-29T18:19:00.000-07:00

I recently saw the movie version of Dan Millman's book way of the peaceful warrior. That's a book I remember seeing on book shelves when I was in high school back in the mid 1980's.

There was a part in the movie where it says: "A warrior doesn't concern himself with perfection, victory, or invulnerability. The warrior's way is about absolute vulnerability--to the world, to life, and to the Presence you felt. All along I've shown you by example that a warrior's life is not about imagined perfection or victory; it is about love. Love is a warrior's sword; wherever it cuts, it gives life, not death.” - Dan Millman

I am very content doing my own thing with people I truly care about. I'm happy being of service to others through the training and honestly doing that for this first time in my life - being happy with the journey and not the destination.

I've recently learned to love the rolling, the stand-up sparring, the learning, and the handful of guys I work with. I used to have stress training before with Caesar, because I was approaching the training as an older athlete chasing vain glory on the mat.

I'm not saying that competition is bad, in fact we have a couple of guys from the gym who compete. Since the gym opened in March, I always make it a point to emphasize that winning the fight isn't the point, it's being in that moment and giving the performance of a lifetime. And not for the crowd, and not for victory, and not for fame -

Think of us all as little tiny lights that turn on when we're born and glow for only a short moment in time.

For those of us who are fortunate enough to live a self-actualized existence, I think the reason for doing anything is clear...

We are put on this world to shine.

So shine on!

The Center of My Problems...

2007-08-19T22:15:00.000-07:00

Excerpts from: The Great Sin.
From Mere Christianity by C S Lewis

"There is no fault which makes a man more unpopular, and no fault which we are more unconscious of in ourselves. And the more we have it ourselves, the more we dislike it in others."

"The vice I am talking of is Pride or Self-Conceit: and the virtue opposite to it, in Christian morals, is called Humility... According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind."

"Does this seem to you exaggerated? If so, think it over. I pointed out a moment ago that the more pride one had, the more one disliked pride in others. In fact, if you want to find out how proud you are the easiest way is to ask yourself, 'How much do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take any notice of me, or shove their oar in, or patronise me, or show off?'"

"The point is that each person's pride is in competition with every one else's pride. It is because I wanted to be the big noise at the party that I am so annoyed at someone else being the big noise. Two of a trade never agree. Now what you want to get clear is that Pride is essentially competitive - is competitive by its very nature - while the other vices are competitive only, so to speak, by accident. Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better-looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever, or good-looking there would be nothing to be proud about."

"It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest. Once the element of competition has gone, pride has gone. That is why I say that Pride is essentially competitive in a way the other vices are not. The sexual impulse may drive two men into competition if they both want the same girl. But that is only by accident; they might just as likely have wanted two different girls. But a proud man will take your girl from you, not because he wants her, but just to prove to himself that he is a better man than you... "

"In God you come up against something which is in every respect immeasurably superior to yourself. Unless you know God as that - and, therefore, know yourself as nothing in comparison - you do not know God at all. As long as you are proud you cannot know God. A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you."

"...[Pride] comes direct from Hell. It is purely spiritual: consequently it is far more subtle and deadly... For Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense."

"Before leaving this subject I must guard against some possible misunderstandings:

(1) "Pleasure in being praised is not Pride. The child who is patted on the back for doing a lesson well, the woman whose beauty is praised by her lover, the saved soul to whom Christ says 'Well done,' are pleased and ought to be. For here the pleasure lies not in what you are but in the fact that you have pleased someone you wanted (and rightly wanted) to please. The trouble begins when you pass from thinking, 'I have pleased him; all is well,' to thinking, 'What a fine person I must be to have done it.'... The real black, diabolical Pride, comes when you look down on others so much that you do not care what they think of you. Of course, it is very right, and often our duty, not to care what people think of us, if we do so for the right reason; namely, because we care so incomparably more what God thinks..."

(2) "We say in English that a man is 'proud' of his son, or his father, or his school, or regiment, and it may be asked whether 'pride' in this sense is a sin. I think it depends on what, exactly, we mean by 'proud of'. Very often, in such sentences, the phrase 'is proud of' means 'has a warm-hearted admiration for'. Such an admiration is, of course, very far from being a sin..."

(3) "We must not think Pride is something God forbids because He is offended at it, or that Humility is something He demands as due to His own dignity - as if God Himself was proud."

"The point is, He wants you to know Him: wants to give you Himself. And He and you are two things of such a kind that if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble - delightedly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life."

"... getting rid of the false self, with all its 'Look at me'... and all its posing and posturing."

"If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed."

Hello Jack and the Trench Tech guys!

2007-07-15T00:41:00.000-07:00

I found out that Jack C. Reads my blogs! Trip out!

I had a great stay at the Guam Reef Hotel and talking to my old friends from Saipan. Catching up was great.

And I had to give a shoutout to Jeff Willingham From Apex Jiu-jitsu for giving me key details on Jeremy Williams' most excellent Triangle Submission - I always wondered how Jeremy could get a guy flat on his stomach while in his triangle.

Happy, but tired

2007-05-08T16:37:00.000-07:00

Jacob Seth is here and crying all the time at night... around the clock every 1 to 2 hours.

But God bless 'em. God bless 'em all. They all let me get back to sleep even though the boy screams like he's in WWII fighting a platoon of nazis. I say that because the way he looks sometimes reminds me of Winston Churchill. I often imagine him saying, "We will never surrender!" in a gruff voice.

D.C. is a great mom and she takes care of both children excellently considering her lack of sleep.

I am growing steadily concerned about my kid's future. I just found out this morning that the Governor of Saipan sent his son to the mainland - talk about lack of faith in this place. With life not getting any better here on Saipan, I regret the possibility of leaving this place worse than when I got here.

D.C. and I shortly after I moved to Saipan in 03'

But life often challenges my idea of the 'bigger picture' and reminds me of how elements are completely out of my control. I totally didn't want to leave my family, home, friends, and way of life in shiny happy Southern California. I remember saying a prayer on the top floor of a mall parking lot in the town I went to high school in - that prayer alone gave me the peace to leave home for Saipan. Since then, I got married, my wife gave birth to 2 healthy kids, I met many friends, I got my ground game established, I got to know my extended family, just to name a few.

All because of God's goodness and His way of things.

I am trusting in God who has done better than if I were to do things based on my own efforts.

Freedom and being in the moment

2007-04-03T22:10:00.000-07:00

I found this great interview with Matt Thornton President of SBGi who is a great inspiration and influence on my training.

I especially like these excerpts from the interview:

Interviewer: Can you explain awareness?

Thornton: Awareness is consciousness free of sub-vocalization or free from thoughts in the head is pure awareness… without thinking about the past or the future. 99.9% of people on this planet will spend a majority of their waking hours thinking about the past or future – they’re lost in thought. Awareness is being free from the Maya or the illusion of reality.

To wake up from that is to wake up from a dream and be in reality as it is… to be in the here and now…

That’s just the absence of thought.

There’s nothing you can do to make that happen… because it’s the absence of doing.

Interviewer: It’s like Zen Buddhism

Thornton: ...It’s the same thing that Christ said, “What good does worry do for you?” It does nothing for you. Worry is the thought of the future [and/or] regret of the past.

Be here right now in the moment… What’s here now?

"I train in combat sports to free myself of the burden of reality by discovering that reality is in essence free of burdens." - Me

Calm Down, Things Could Be Worse

2007-03-29T21:18:00.000-07:00

I just got off the phone with my friend Stanely who is fighting tonight. He calmed me down and long story short, reassured me that things could be worse. At least the Koru Gym is a place where ordinary people can train realistically in MMA in a way that isn't egocentric and doesn't cause bodily injury. Stan told me that it's good that non-athletes can have a place to train in solid training methods that help gain skills as well as promote a healthy lifestyle.

I had to stop and re-think about the criteria of who gets in the gym and who doesn't. For my own good, I think I need to let people in who have no problem upping the resistance. I just need to make sure that I'm getting good sparring and rolling time in for my own development.

If I don't make sure that I'm taken care of, the quality will go down, everybody's game will stagnate, the high standard for personal improvement will disappear, and it will all be nobody else's fault, but mine.

I feel better knowing that I am fully responsible for myself.

Nobody to blame. No excuses to be made.

I'll give it a month. If I think things are not getting better, I'm taking my stuff out of the San Antonio location and taking the Koru Gym concept, curriculum, and intellectual property (i.e. logo design, collateral material, etc.) along with me.

What's in a name?

2007-03-29T14:55:00.001-07:00

Tonight, two of my friends are fighting in an MMA event co-promoted by my former jiu-jitsu coach. I helped train them for this fight and I think I did the best that I could considering the short amount of time I had to work with them (2 months).

I had the offer to stay and train BJJ in Saipan at Gracie Barra as long as I helped coach the classes. My only rebuttal was that I felt unworthy of coaching. Who am I to teach BJJ basics at a Gracie Barra School? I would have stayed if only my coach 1) didn't have me focus on MMA coaching so much 2) he didn't have to leave Saipan for Guam.

Now I am coaching at a gym my friend opened and I feel at odds with it. At first I felt fine with the predetermined criteria. The gym was to teach non-fighters a mixed style of martial arts influenced heavily from my time at the IMB academy in Torrance, Ca. But now some of those non-fighters are not going to practice tonight so they can "support" the guys fighting.

Geeze, I trained those guys myself and even I am not going to miss practice, you know what I mean?

I never in my wildest dreams would I take off from practice on a friend's fight night unless I were helping corner - which is a whole other can of worms I really don't want to open right now.

I can't help it!!!

Why does everybody want to be a part of the entourage making his or her way to the ring and be in the corner for a fighter for the fight? I have one question to pose about cornering - what makes you qualified to corner? Get it? I know the real motivation behind it - people want to be associated with the fighter in front of a crowd. It's a selfish and dishonest way to get respect from the crowd without having to earn it.

I didn't want the co-owner of the Koru Gym to corner tonight, because I saw him fight last year at the shoyoroll jiu-jitsu tournament in Guam. When it came down to fight, he choked - pure and simple. Yeah I fought and lost there too, but I fought the whole 5 minutes - the whole round - never quit - didn't surrender - I was outclassed and outweighed twice my weight - but I fought to the end.

I'm not superstitious, but I think the ring is a place of honesty where when things get tough you can't fake your way to a win. I didn’t want a guy who chokes to be in my corner and I sure didn't want him to corner for my friends.

I would probably go watch after practice, but not take off practice completely. That's a side of non-fighters that I didn't expect - the lack of selfish commitment to the training. That's not to say that fighters aren't unfocused sometimes, but fighters usually have a love and deeper commitment to improving their game that non-fighters have. It's a strange contradiction. I mean, if you were no good at fighting, wouldn't you spend as much time with a good coach in practice so you can get the necessary feedback from training in order to be less terrible at fighting?

The other, more terminal, part of it is that I think I honestly would never go to the Koru Gym if I weren't the one coaching.

I thought about this while driving to work this morning. What if I came to Saipan yesterday, and I were looking for a gym to train in? I see there's Trench Tech that offers no-gi submission, boxing/kickboxing, wrestling classes and the opportunity to train with professional fighter Tetsuji Kato. Then there is Gracie Barra that offers gi-centric traditional Brazilian jiu-jitsu and competitive judo. There's Choke Chain that offers - I don't really know what they have to offer. Then there's the Koru Gym that offers a weak and non-threatening approach to MMA catered for non-athletic people.

My question is... If I dropped off the airplane yesterday, where would I train sighting the available coaches - not including myself? Much to my surprise, I find that the last gym I would train in would be the Koru Gym - the gym I currently coach and train in.

I wasn't a great fighter. I wasn't some champion. Nevertheless, I am a trained fighter and those many years of commitment and experience I have had with world champion fighters and coaches will forever be the gauge from where I will always evaluate my decisions in training and coaching.

So here I am, really trying to re-evaluate what it is I am doing. It's not about the money or reward - if that were so I would be begging my jiu-jitsu coach to come back to Gracie Barra.

So what is it all about?

It's about honesty. It's about owning up to mistakes. It's about not taking good hard earned money from people if you honestly cannot provide them the very best you have to offer. I wasn't a great fighter, but I am a fighter - all I have to offer is fighting. I don't see the point in watering down the training so that people can pretend to do MMA.

I think that in the near future an aerobic workout based on Mixed Martial Arts movements will become a fad in the USA. A taebo for MMA will probably come out soon and it will gain popularity as most people can't honestly see the value in 'going hard' in training.

I am 38 years old and I'm addicted to this stuff - training and the competition. Even if it's not publicly, I love getting on the mat and competing against a fully resisting opponent. It's like someone said, "It's not being the 'hardest' that matters, it's going your 'hardest' that makes it all worth while."

So what's in a name? Take the Koru Gym for example. I can critique it, because I created it. I didn't create it out of nothing; I just put 2 words together "koru" and "gym".

What's in the value of the name "Koru Gym"? Is it because it sounds catchy? It sounds Island-y and we're here on an island? The whole "growth, strength, peace" motto is somewhat marketable for it's Zen-like allusion to David Carridine's philosophy in the Kung-Fu T.V. show? [I friggn' HATED that stupid show!]

So what's in a name? Absolutely nothing. The name is not the object it symbolizes and the description of that object is not the actual thing itself.

I have a lot of thinking to do about where I am going with this gym thing. Part of me wants to just find some strong, athletic, good friends to spar and roll with at someone's garage. That may seem smalltime to some people, but it would be more honest than what I am doing now.

The Gracie Diet

2007-02-21T19:35:00.002-08:00

I thought I would post the Gracie Diet. For those of you who do not know anything about this diet, it's a combination-based diet from brazil created by Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu patriarch, Carlos Gracie over 50 years ago. Carlos is the brother and teacher of Helio Gracie whose son Royce was the first Ulitmate Fighting Champion. Now I don't know if would ever try this diet myself, but I think it's interesting to say the least. It boasts to stave off harmful bacterias and other causes of illness by neutralizing blood pH.

Why do Kickboxing?

2007-02-07T16:23:00.001-08:00

World Champion Baxter Humby

Commonly known as "The One-Armed Bandit", I first saw Kickboxing World Champion Baxter Humby back in 1998. He's a real nice fella who just sent me pics of his fight last month. If you ever get the chance to see him fight before he retires, please check him out. He's a great ambassador of the sport of kickboxing.

Being from Los Angeles, I've seen a lot of great fights there. But watching Baxter Humby fight is a truly unique experience. Baxter's originally from Canada and moved out to L.A. in the mid 1990's. When he was an up and coming fighter, the guys I trained with at the time would talk about a crafty, and deceptively powerful "one-armed kickboxer." I thought, "How could a guy with only one arm be any good at kickboxing?"
I thought it was some sort of gimmick - that his opponents weren't legitimate. That he wasn't for real.

Then one night back in 1998, I saw Baxter Humby fight in person. Baxter is no joke - he is the real deal.
There's no better blend of "ring strategist" with "otherworldy" leg power and an uncanny sense of timing. What I didn't know at the time was that he was born without his right hand, which explains his ability to fight so naturally one-handed.

I just found out that he's in the new Spiderman 3 movie. So now Baxter is breaking into show business after a great career kickboxing. How many guys - 2 arms, whatever - can say that about themselves in a lifetime? They should make a movie about him.

So why should anyone get into kickboxing? Well, I think that particular path (if taken properly) rewards you with a level of self-awareness and true humility that safe journeys can't.

It's easy to pick a sport - any sport. Do it long enough, and I'm sure you'll get into good physical condition. But being 'fit' doesn't mean that one is healthy. While the body can be as fit as can be, someone's attitude can still be selfish and unhealthy.

The rewards of truly knowing your substance beyond expectations takes a combination of adversity AND the right motive.

No self-help mantra or yoga or pilates can make you healthy if you do it to convince yourself that you're better off than people who don't.

Participating in challenging sports - even kickboxing - won't make you healthy if it's only to say to yourself that you're a superior human being.

Baxter is a sincerely humble and generous guy that has done inspiring things despite adversity. He probably was a cool guy to begin with. He'd probably tell you that Kickboxing helped. One thing I know for sure is that Baxter Humby is a healthy man.

Why do jiu-jitsu?

2007-01-29T23:00:00.000-08:00

Helio Gracie

With will power, courage, discipline and genius that insists on defying the impossible, he was the fundamental gear in the machine of the development of Jiu-Jitsu, the martial art that conquered the world through its efficiency.
Exerpts from an article written by Luca Atalla
http://www.graciemag.com/?c=146&a=6122

Rorion's Son Ryron Training with Grandfather/Grandmaster Helio

Rorion’s first-born comes from the United States to study Jiu-Jitsu for a season under Helio’s tutelage. Repeating his customary discourse, the master declares: “I’m not going to teach him Jiu-Jitsu. He already knows everything I do. The only thing he will learn here is to do the same thing, just without using force.”

And to illustrate his point, the instructor extends his customary invitation to visitors to visit the latest environment to be built at the ranch, the academy built on the far right of the house. There, he offers gis and puts on his own, tying it with a blue belt in place of the red one. His disdain for the color scheme of today is nothing new. When he fought the great Japanese champion Kimura, in his most famous fight, he wore the same belt. “He didn’t like it, he asked why I wouldn't use the black. I responded: “Because I like this one,” he recalls.

He says he is always getting better: "I don't have strength or stamina, but I keep evolving, using less force. I’m the best at the finer details, the subconscious relaxation”, he analyses. The explanation is as follows: “You might not want to use force and control that mentally, but if I stab you, you will become tense. To transform this relaxation into something instinctive is very difficult and takes a long time. I am relaxed even when I am sleeping. The minute someone tries to move on me, their tenseness warns me, and as my reflexes are quicker, I move forward and defend. Nobody can surprise me."´

If to most people a lesson like this one is as rare as a precious diamond, for a privileged group of students the story is different. Once a week the instructor goes to Rio de Janeiro to share his knowledge, through private lessons he teaches in the academy his sons Royler and Rolker manage in the high school Padre Antonio Vieira, in the Humaita neighborhood. He charges 200 dollars each lesson.

He does not attend to professional fighters, just to common people, who come from far away, such as Dr Jose Eduardo Camargo, a successful businessman from São Paulo who flies to Rio with the sole intention of learning from the master. Beyond him, Mrs. Maria Alice Dantas, Dr. Marco Aurelio Pacha and the writer Gustavo Barbosa, among others, also drink from the source. “I never liked teaching athletes,” he says. “Athletes don’t need it. The ones that need my Jiu-Jitsu are those skinny, scared, wimpy, insecure, defenseless guys.

Can you imagine that guy if he were sure he wouldn’t get stabbed, clubbed, stomped on, punched, kicked? He would learn how to get out of any situation and become invincible. His timid posture would change to become one of self-belief, and that is something priceless. It's as though you were to win a million dollars tomorrow. You will change completely,” he compares. “I still haven’t found a student that has wanted to sell, for any price, what they learned from me.

I created a means of providing people security", he says with pride, criticizing the Jiu-Jitsu taught in most academies: "There is no way to teach the method of the system in a group-class. Nobody learns the details, they forget about self-defense and made Jiu-Jitsu about competition, where only the strongest win. My own nephews, to whom I gave their diploma, know very well, but don’t teach the way they should,” he reveals with sadness.

Let Your Love Be Strong

2006-12-25T20:54:00.001-08:00

Let the world fall apart ... all of my life rests upon the love that created every breath I have been given.

"This one means a lot to me. 'Maybe I'm just idealistic to assume that truth could be fact and form, that love could be a verb, maybe I'm just a little misinformed.' I wrote this one after a long walk in the early morning before the sun came up. I was sitting out by the train tracks halfway between the ocean and the freeway. When everything in your life falls apart you begin to realize what's worth holding on to and who's got a hold on you. Let the world fall apart ... all of my life rests upon the love that created every breath I have been given."' – Jon Foreman (Switchfoot)

12. Let Your Love Be Strong

Oh! Gravity.
by Switchfoot

Lyrics:
In this world of news, I've found nothing new
I've found nothing pure
Maybe I'm just idealistic to assume that truth
Could be fact and form
That love could be a verb
Maybe I'm just a little misinformed

As the dead moon rises, and the freeways sigh
Let the trains watch over the tides and the mist
Spinning circles in our sky's tonight
Let the trucks roll in from Los Angeles
Maybe our stars are unanimously tired

(chorus)
Let your love be strong, and I don't care what goes down
Let your love be strong enough to weather through the thunder cloud
Fury and thunder clap like stealing the fire from your eyes
All of my world hanging on your love

Let the wars begin, let my strength wear thin
Let my fingers crack, let my world fall apart
Train the monkeys on my back to fight
Let it start tonight
When my world explodes, when my stars touch the ground
Falling down like broken satellites

(chorus)

All of my world resting on your love

"Seems like every story I can relate to starts off with a broken heart, broken dreams and bleeding parts. There's a story I know about a man named Israel who wrestled with God. From that day on he walked with a limp. I guess in a lot of ways I don't trust a man who doesn't have a limp. The future is yet unwritten. Write it well." – Jon Foreman (Switchfoot)

Brotherhood: Either you get IT or you DON'T.

2006-12-25T14:08:00.000-08:00

What makes a man call another man his brother?

Is it blood, is it through some spiritual connection, is it through reason?

I have been fortunate to have grown up in Southern California with many men that I call my brothers.

Accomplished men of great skill and talent, yet men who were more than the sum of their accomplishments.

I called them brothers not only because of my admiration for what they did. I called them brothers, because of who they were.

I spoke to one of them last night. He's my older brother. I really thought of him more of a friend than anything else. Throughout the years, I've struggled with watching his immense talent being overshadowed by his appetites.

But last night, I have to say that I rediscovered a feeling for him that I haven't had since I was a young boy.

Admiration.

I admire my older brother for his courage and dignity. For his humility and sincerity.

It's not what he does that makes him who he is...

It's who he is that makes him do what he does...

If I were to desribe my brother to other people now, I would use a term that I would never have used to describe him in the past...

Warrior.

He's more of a warrior than the guys I train with. He's more of a christian than many ministers I hear speak at a pulpit.

His talent is hindered, but not gone. He can still express it from his heart and mind. It lives forever in the memories of those who have had the opportunity to experience it.

AND it lives in the hands and hearts of his sons...

My brother lives this passage...

"Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." - Matt 10:39

I hope and pray that this holiday finds him closer to the God that created and saved my brother's life for one singular purpose...

He makes God smile.

Dr. R. C. Sproul on Free Will and Salvation

2006-05-16T16:58:00.000-07:00

Dr. R.C. Sproul

Excerpts from "The Door Interview", "R.C. SPROUL: Willing to Believe" by Arsenio Orteza

Regular guys don't sprinkle their casual conversations with words like "soteriology" (the study of salvation), "Pelagianism" (the heretical doctrine that man does not possess a sinful nature), and "semi-Pelagianism" (uh, the doctrine that man sort of doesn't possess a sinful nature). Fourth, regular guys don't get thanked in the liner notes to a Van Halen album, Van Halen III (seriously). Alas, the album is the group's worst, making the odds that other hard rock bands will follow suit and thank Dr. Sproul in their liner notes rather long ones indeed.

SPROUL: "...in this country there is that classical marriage or syncretistic blend between semi-Pelagian theology [the doctrine that man sort of doesn't possess a sinful nature] and American humanism."
INTERVIEWER: Uh, we've noticed that too.
SPROUL: It's downright un-American to think that we are really slaves to sin. Yet you have these polls that George Barna takes, and you see a majority of professing evangelicals saying that man is basically good. That's astonishing to me!
SPROUL: It's astonishing to me in light of evangelical history, because even semi-Pelagianism, of course, historically, would deny that man is basically good.

SPROUL: If you ask an American, "Are you perfect?," they'll say, "Nobody's perfect. Everybody has some flaws." They might even say that we're all sinners. But, if you begin to probe that and to explore the extent to which they think we are held captive by a sinful disposition, you discover that whatever the people are saying about sin, they think it's something that's really peripheral. It's accidental to our nature. It's not something that penetrates to the core. And I think that's true even in modern evangelicalism.
INTERVIEWER: Must one agree with Calvin in order to be a good Christian?
SPROUL: Well, I think you can be a Christian and still be semi-Pelagian.
INTERVIEWER: Our semi-Pelagian readers will be thrilled to hear that. In your book you say that semi-Pelagians are Christians, but just "barely."
SPROUL: (Laughs) All of us who are Christians are only barely Christians. But the thing, of course, that I had in mind there was that if a person conceives of that island of righteousness that's unaffected by the fall and that ability by which the decisive action is made that determines his eternal destiny - if a person conceives of that as the sine qua non of a righteous action that a fallen creature has to do to be saved, then the scary thing - the scary question is; is that person ultimately trusting in their own goodness to get them into heaven? If they are, then that would vitiate any affirmation of sola fide [faith alone], wouldn't it?
INTERVIEWER: We're still looking up sine qua non.
SPROUL: But again, let me just say, I think that the overwhelming majority of Arminians and other kinds of semi-Pelagians affirm sola fide and don't want to come to that conclusion. So, however they think about the free action that makes the decisive difference, they tend not to think of it as a meritorious thing or as an inherently righteous thing that becomes the decisive factor for which they are saved. Am I making sense?
INTERVIEWER: Yes. Now -
SPROUL: They don't want to say that. Maybe a few of them will, but, if they say that, then I think they are toast.
INTERVIEWER: Speaking of toast, you criticize Billy Graham in your book for building his appeal on semi-Pelagian assumptions. To a lot of people, criticizing Billy Graham is fightin' words.
SPROUL: That's an icon there.
INTERVIEWER: After all, an entire generation has grown up with the image of a football stadium full of people responding to a Billy Graham altar call as the defining public image of American evangelicalism. Most people would probably even say that no matter how theologically imprecise he may be, he's certainly more than made up for it with his evangelism.

SPROUL: - Billy would unequivocally stress the serious reality of man's profoundly fallen condition. He made no bones about our being lost in sin and in desperate need of the saving work of Christ. It was a simple sin-and-salvation message that I recall. But even back in the `50s and `60s, he would still say, "Ninety-nine percent of it God does, one percent you do. You have to make the response. Come up here and write your name in the Lamb's Book of Life," that kind of language...
INTERVIEWER: What do you see as the key difference... [with]...Billy Graham?
SPROUL: "Billy Graham has always humbly declared that he's a preacher, not a theologian."
"...I think Billy Graham is a guy who understood the absolute need for personal salvation, the power of the gospel, preached sin and salvation as faithfully as he knew how his whole life, and was not and never claimed to be a technical theologian. But I think that some theological defects came through in his preaching, and some of them have their roots in that whole revivalist tradition..." I have no problem with somebody preaching the gospel to mass audiences and calling them to repentance and to committing their lives to Christ. The danger that I worry about in the evangelical culture today is that what has happened - through no design of Billy Graham's, certainly - is that so many folks now understand the way of salvation as walking an aisle, raising a hand, praying the prayers, signing a card. That is, as responding to some particular evangelistic methodology.
INTERVIEWER: That's bad?
SPROUL: One of my great concerns is that we've got to understand the difference between a profession of faith and faith. Everyone who has faith is called to profess faith, but not everybody who professes faith has faith. We are not saved by a profession of faith. A lot of people, it seems to me, in the evangelical world, believe that if they have walked the walk, raised the hand, signed the card - that is, made some kind of methodological profession of faith - that they're saved. And that's scary!
INTERVIEWER: That's the second thing you've mentioned. Why is it scary?
SPROUL: Because salvation comes through trust in the gospel. Now, I don't think God requires that we ourselves understand how we come to faith in order to be saved.
INTERVIEWER: Our readers who don't understand how they came to faith will be relieved to hear that.
SPROUL: In other words, I believe that I came to faith through the pure, unvarnished, sovereign work of God, by an immediate, supernatural work of regeneration in my heart, that my heart was a heart of stone and utterly incapable of making any positive response to Christ until God the Holy Spirit changed my soul by regeneration. I believe that I was reborn before I believed. Now, believing that I was reborn before I believed doesn't make me saved, does it?
INTERVIEWER: Is this a trick question?
SPROUL: Just because my doctrine is right - and I believe it is - doesn't save me. Likewise, another person, who I believe comes to faith the same way I came to faith, through the sovereign, immediate work of the Holy Spirit - they may not understand all the nuances of that, and they may be deceived about how they came to faith, but that's not the issue that's going to keep them out of heaven. The question is, "Do they have saving faith?" Not how they understood how they got there.

INTERVIEWER: Do you consider yourself part of the Religious Right these days?
SPROUL: Well, I've never considered myself part of the Religious Left. But, at the same time, I've always considered myself a classicist - rather than a fundamentalist. And, to be perfectly candid, with the crisis going on today on evangelicalism and the way in which it's being, in many circles, redefined from its historic meaning, I'm not sure what the term "evangelical" means anymore, or that I am one. I know that I am one in terms of the classic, historic evangelicalism. But, in terms of how it's being redefined today, I doubt if I am one. And if you mean by "Religious Right" historic orthodoxy, then I would identify myself totally with the Religious Right. But if by the "Religious Right" you mean right-wing-Americanization stuff and everything -
INTERVIEWER: We do.
SPROUL: I'm politically conservative and even more conservative economically, but I have never been one to wrap the Christian faith in the American flag.
INTERVIEWER: Is that [a] scary thing?
SPROUL: When people do that, yes, that scares me.

Shopgirl on DVD and thoughts on loneliness

2006-05-14T17:41:00.000-07:00

I just watched the movie Shopgirl on DVD over the weekend.
Very thought provoking. Made me long for my home of Los Angeles. Some ariel shots of the skyline were breathtaking.

"Oh Ray, Oh Ray, Oh Ray" - funny stuff

Okay, now onto to thoughts on loneliness...

I guess whenever I feel lonely I wonder why.

Is loneliness a spirit?

Is loneliness a chemical in the brain?

Is loneliness an expressed byproduct caused by an internal stochiochemical reaction resulting from external hidden forces increasing pressure on internal hidden physical forces within the human psyche? Or is it just false perception?

If truth is based on variable conditions permutated over probable iterations to the nth degree [relative truth], then is the experience of loneliness a result of a real feeling based on truth/reality or is loneliness a falsely percieved feeling based on delusion/illusion?

Since the future hasn't happened yet and the past is schewed from years of wisdom, delusion, remorse, and regret - then am I qualified to know the truth of my own feeling of loneliness?

Is it then true that the soul is really at war with the perceived world over memories and dreams that never really existed?

Am I the guinea pig in God's experiment of life?

Are then guinea pigs the human representation of humans in the human experiment of life?

Or are guinea pigs simply guinea pigs in the guinea pig experiment of life?

Are guinea pigs being oppressed?

Do guinea pigs feel lonely too?

If so, I wonder why?

[This is just a mental exercise, since I believe in absolute truth. My faith happens to help me with questions regarding perceptions and reality. Without a deep and meaningful faith, I think I would be feeling needlessly lonely most of the time.]

The Upper 1%

2006-04-12T23:22:00.000-07:00

They say that in America, the Upper 1% possess 97% of the nation's wealth.

Friends in high places

2006-04-05T18:08:00.000-07:00

It's been weird not living in the USA these past couple of years. I tend to forget how the reality of combat sports has been part of my life for a LONG time. The pics were sent to me by my good friend and Muay Thai Champion Fabian Zuniga. He's a young guy I met when I came back into training in the mid 1990's. He writes me periodically to tell me the news that he's continually bringing out the best in himself. I think the greatest kick I get is hearing how much his dreams are being realized through his fighting career. His performance is through the roof and his sincerity/honesty/humility in the fight game is hard to find.

The guy he fought is William Syrapai - a former champion and muay thai phenom himself.
Fabian is definately a star on the rise.

I miss being around fighters. I mean, I'm in the islands and I know Tetsuji Kato - who is also a great guy by the way. And there is my jiu-jitsu coach who has also been around combat sports most of his life. Outside of that, everyone is new to the game. It's hard to find friends in the game that have time in it. It's not that the new people entering the game aren't cool to be around, it's just some of the hype can be SO big that 'the day in day out' part of training isn't as big a priority. When you get too old to compete, there is only a couple of ways to stay connected to the fight game. 1) keep in shape with it as a sport. That way you'll always keep learning while ensuring what game you still have isn't losing as much edge. and 2) pick up a bucket and learn to corner with experienced people.

There was a Judo development coach who came in from New Zealand 4 weeks ago. He was a cool guy. The crazy thing is that he thought I was ten years younger. That would put me at 27 years old by his guess-timation - still old by combat sports standards.

Question: So at 37 years old, what's a washed out ex-fighter to do?

Answer: Have fun with it. And if it no longer floats my boat, find something else to do ;>

Nerd Humor

2005-11-14T17:45:00.000-08:00

THE COMPUTER PROGRAMMER
A man was crossing a road one day when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog, and put it in his pocket.

The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful princess, I will tell everyone how smart and brave you are and how you are my hero." The man took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it, and returned it to his pocket.

The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful princess, I will be your loving companion for an entire week." The man took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it, and returned it to his pocket.

The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a princess, I'll stay with you for a year and do ANYTHING you want." Again the man took the frog out, smiled at it, and put it back into his pocket.

Finally, the frog asked, "What is the matter? I've told you I'm a beautiful princess, that I'll stay with you for a year and do anything you want. Why won't you kiss me?"

The man said, "Look, I'm a computer programmer. I don't have time for a girlfriend, but a talking frog is cool."
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Asked how his pet parrot died, the mathmatican answered
"Polynomial. polygon."
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The USDA once wanted to make cows produce milk faster, to improve the dairy industry.

So, they decided to consult the foremost biologists and recombinant DNA technicians to build them a better cow. They assembled this team of great scientists, and gave them unlimited funding. They requested rare chemicals, weird bacteria, tons of quarantine equipment, there was a God-awful typhus epidemic they started by accident, and, 2 years later, they came back with the "new, improved cow." It had a milk production improvement of 2% over the original.

They then tried with the greatest Nobel Prize winning chemists around. They worked for six months, and, after requisitioning tons of chemical equipment, and poisoning half the small town in Colorado where they were working with a toxic cloud from one of their experiments, they got a 5% improvement in milk output.

The physicists tried for a year, and, after ten thousand cows were subjected to radiation therapy, they got a 1% improvement in output.

Finally, in desperation, they turned to the mathematicians. The foremost mathematician of his time offered to help them with the problem. Upon hearing the problem, he told the delegation that they could come back in the morning and he would have solved the problem. In the morning, they came back, and he handed them a piece of paper with the computations for the new, 300% improved milk cow.

The plans began:

"A Proof of the Attainability of Increased Milk Output from Bovines:

Consider a spherical cow......"

Chet Murthy, Cornell
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Memories of being a soldier...

2005-11-02T21:53:00.000-08:00

“A soldier’s relationship to his gun will forever infect every other activity he will use his hands for during the course of his life. Whether holding a woman in his arms, building a house or changing his baby’s diaper, his hands will always operate with the muscle memory of holding and firing a rifle.”… “We realize that even without ever killing anyone with his weapon the murder-lusting soldier is an animal whose spots will never change.”
- from the new movie, Jarhead

On this Veteran's day I think about...

Troops dying…

My being a Veteran…

My fellow soldiers I served with...

My soldering days…

How my mind plays those memories like it was someone else who lived that life...

As a fellow comrade, my prayers go out to the children who lost their Papa and my heart goes out to the women who lost their husbands.

Jiu-Jitsu in the Northern Marianas Islands

2005-10-30T17:24:00.000-08:00

People are people so why should it be, you and I should get along so awfully? - Depeche Mode

I went to high school in the 80's in the L. A. area, and I always thought that Depeche Mode and that particular song really sucked [I was into metal at that time]. It's just something that came to mind when I was thinking about the state of jiu-jitsu in the Northern Marianas Islands. I thought I would write down a couple of memories of that time 17 years ago when Gracie Jiu-Jitsu first entered into my consciousness.

I've lived in Torrance, California for years as an adult and I grew up frequently visiting family and friends from the Rolling Hills/Torrance/Carson area ever since I was a kid. Torrance is the first widely recognized place on the planet to teach Gracie jiu-jitsu outside of Brazil. It's the place where Helio Gracie decided his son Rorion would move the family's Gracie Jiu-Jitsu style - now known as the martial art that revolutionized the world.

Back in the mid 80's I remember rumors started to spread about a house garage in the old town Torrance section where there were these amazing foreign guys who would roll around the mats in kimonos or gi's and submit these big, tough guys - some of these guys were well respected expert martial artists with diverse martial arts/ combat sports backgrounds. I actually passed by that house on a few occasions around 1987'-88' where I would visit my close friends Jeff Stevens and Glenn Nakaya, who lived around that area at the time. Glenn's dad was a judo Black Belt and Glenn told me that Judo was pretty gnarly if used in a street fight - (one particular story about his dad fighting on the beach in Orange County clearly comes to mind, but I might share that some other time). I knew many people personally who studied with Royce, Rickson, Rorion, Royler throughout those years and they are all very good people who went on to lead productive and sucessful lives.

The real effect of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu as a lifestyle, as I have observed, is that it makes good people even better people - not just in fighting, but in moral character and in the pursuit of truth.

Those who are fortunate enough to train in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu are blessed with the benefit of being part of the global Gracie Jiu-Jitsu family and are welcome to train alongside Gracie Jiu-Jitsu legends in Brazil and all over the world.

But many people to this day do not know that it was Helio's older brother Carlos Gracie Sr. who was the only Gracie family member instructed by Mitsuyo Maeda (aka Count Koma - Count Combat) to black belt level. And it was Carlos Gracie Sr. who taught his brothers, Helio Gracie included.

Mr. Maeda, sensei of Carlos Gracie

And going back further to the roots, black belt Mitsuyo Maeda (1880-1941) initially came to Brazil as an ambassador of the Kodokan Institute to spread the word of the Kodokan at the request and vision of his sensei, the legendary Jigoro Kano.

Prof. Jigoro Kano (age 22), Sensei of Mitsuyo Maeda

Jigoro Kano, who was small and weak, began to practice jiu-jitsu when he was 18 years old with the purpose of not being dominated because of physical weakness. He learned atemi-waza (percussion techniques), and katame-waza (domain techniques) from the Tenjin-shin-yo ryu jiu-jitsu style and nague-waza (throw techniques) from the Kito ryu jiu-jitsu style. Based on these ancient samurai techniques he made a profound study taking the force and the rationality as bases. Besides that, he created new training techniques to enjoy jiu-jitsu as a competitive sport for physical fitness, the cultivation of moral principles and to strengthen the mind. Adding new aspects to his knowledge of traditional jiu-jitsu, Prof. Kano established the Kodokan Judo Institute, with physical education(competition), moral training(discipline) , and mental conditioning(concentration) as its 3 objectives. With the establishment of the Kodokan dojo, in 1882, Jigoro Kano began teaching his new art - judo.

Prof. Jigoro Kano - Founder of Judo

Please don't misunderstand me at this point. I am NOT inferring that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu comes from Judo. That would be a superficial and meaningless statement akin to comparing an apple to an orange. Judo and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu are separate forms of martial arts. I am merely pointing out that many geniuses took what they were initially given and improved upon it the way they thought was best! From Prof. Carlos Gracie Sr. to Prof. Helio Gracie to Prof. Rolls Gracie, etc. From Prof. Jigoro Kano to Sensei Mitsuyo Maeda to Sensei Isao Okano, etc.
etc. etc. etc. and so forth... The list of innovators can go on and on when you look at the rich history of both Judo and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu...

The great [and still often missed] opportunity is when you look at the evolution of deadly efficient throwing techniques found in Judo and the evolution of deadly efficient ground techniques found in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. Both are complimentary.

And both Judo and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu today are constantly adapting while adhering to the fundamental principles of using leverage and timing against a resisting opponent

Now, back to the present. Caesar Whitt is my current instructor on Saipan and he is a 3rd dan Judo Black Belt as well as a Gracie Barra Jiu-Jitsu Purple Belt. Sensei Whitt is the only certified Gracie Barra Representing Prof. Carlos Gracie Jr.'s Gracie Barra Jiu-Jitsu Organization in the Northern Marianas Pacific Region.

And Caesar Whitt's sensei just so happens to be the son of the founder of Gracie jiu-jitsu...

Prof. Carlos Gracie Jr. - Head Instructor of Gracie Barra Jiu-Jitsu Worldwide

It's funny how Gracie Jiu-jitsu has been a point of referrence in my life ever since the late 1980's. Although my wife and my newboron child are from Saipan, I long to get back to the states and test my new skills against my old comrades in arms. God willing, I hope and pray to be back there soon.

All I could say to those of you living on Saipan... now is a special time to train in martial arts and it will not last. Train with Sensei Caesar Whitt while you can. Sensei Whitt is a great Judo and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu instructor on loan from his home in Guam - and he isn't going to stay in Saipan forever.

Even though I don't know what may become of me tomorrow, I know that this past year training with Caesar Whitt cannot be taken away. He has given me priceless skills and the gift of an inheritance into the Gracie Barra Jiu-Jitsu family and the family of Japanese style competitive Judo.

More importantly, I have discovered I have a brother in this world I never knew existed. And if it wasn't for coming here to Saipan at this moment in time, I never would have met him. Caesar Whitt is like a brother to me, because he reminds me of my brothers back home. He exhibits the exact same integrity and ideals. And because of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu and Judo, I can feel close to home even though I am actually so very far away from it.

Life is really a bizarre and exciting journey...

And people wonder why I believe in God... Go figure....