The Warrior Priest Podcast: Recent Episodes
Warrior Priest
Standing at the intersection of conflict and belief to better understand the human condition. Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/support
The complaint of the depressive individual, “Nothing is possible,” can only occur in a society that thinks, “Nothing is impossible.” No-longer-being-able-to-be-able leads to destructive self-reproach and auto-aggression. The achievement-subject finds itself fighting with itself. The depressive has been wounded by internalized war. Depression is the sickness of a society that suffers from excessive positivity. It reflects a humanity waging war on itself. - Byung-Chul Han, The Burnout Society
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Like is the digital Amen. When we click Like, we are bowing down to the order to domination. The smartphone is not just an effective surveillance apparatus; it is also a mobile confessional. - Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics
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“That kindness is invincible, provided it's sincere- not ironic or an act. What can even the most vicious person do if you keep treating him with kindness and gently set him straight”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
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We are mud people with a holy breath sweeping through us. That is a comfort, Jesus says. Not tree people so much, or zebra people, or pomegranate people, but mud people. There is a primality in it. It is an image we can get behind. It is not nice. It is not a florid Renaissance sketch, but something we can imagine seeing daubed on a cave wall before someone blows the wick out.
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“What is addiction, really? It is a sign, a signal, a symptom of distress. It is a language that tells us about a plight that must be understood.”
Alice Miller, Breaking Down the Wall of Silence
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Technology is our new god. What would a refusal to worship look like? Paul Kingsnorth offers a vision of resistance, which I discuss in this week's episode.
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If God gave us what we asked for all at once, it would wipe us out. Too much reality. We have to chew on one piece of manna at a time. God’s announcements to the heart are so prestigious that too much and we are floored. And there are lots more that feel nutty and restrictive in their eccentricity. Then a year later or more and that, in turn, blossoms into bare, unadorned wisdom. So be wary of begging God to make too many pronouncements, to act for you too early. One simply doesn’t know the power of unadorned facts until they descend upon us like a heavenly storm.
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“I myself have resolved to follow the path of righteousness henceforth. More than anything, devote yourself to learning and act in accordance with the teachings of the past.” - Katsu Kokichi, Musui's Story
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“I realized that this was true for both China and Japan: every one of those who had been brought to ruin or lost their lands had been punished by Heaven for neglecting the proprieties between sovereign and subject, the bond of affection between parent, child, and brother, and for wallowing in greed and extravagance. All the more wondrous, then, that I have survived thus far without mishap. Indeed, I am overwhelmed by the mercy and goodness of Heaven that I even hesitate to show my face to my fellow men.” - Katsu Kokichi, Musui's Story
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It was not long then until there was the spirit coming, by God’s power, the holy breath, going under the hard stone to the corpse! Light was at that moment opened up, for the good of the sons of men. The many bolts of Hell were unlocked. The road from this world up to heaven was built. Brilliantly radiating, in such a way that the guards, tough soldiers, were not at all aware of when he got up from death and arose from his rest.
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Many and powerful are the agents who would bar the door to the key to the universe, many who would throw a veil over him. Moses, you recall, was hard to see. David, perhaps more so. None of this has been easy. And yet there lies between us and Jesus two-thousand years of war, famine, disease, and death.
Jesus is God. He is the turning point of history, which is why there is no more misinterpreted or maligned or slandered figure. And, most of us have a bone to pick with Jesus too.
Where can we be with God in this season of death? We pray for help, some daily, and a few, many more times than that. We ask for a heart that is ready to receive God. “Help me, Jesus,” we beg. “Give me some direction.”
“Or, maybe, you can’t.” The unspoken prayer.
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Those who do not want to live under God’s government will not be forced to. That would erase the principle of love upon which the cosmos is founded — no one will be sent away from the presence of God who wants to stay. So God’s people have prayed for millennia that there will be no such people. But we know it happens, and that there are too many to name.
Why would anyone want to turn away from God? There are many ways, but rather than try to explain, we pray instead for repentance, and that they, like us, would be transformed. We pray that they may be saved, yes, but even more than that, we pray that they may be changed, to become, in a word, like God.
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David was a stone in the path upon which the Paradise King trod.
This King is the earth shaker. He is the cloud rider. He is the guardian of widows and orphans, and a servant-king who withholds nothing from his people. His face is young, yet old beyond the reckoning of this or any age, for he hails from eternity past. It is a beautiful face, full of humility and adoration and power. And he is crowned with purest golden light. He is the morning star and his eyes burn. They blaze with immortal fires, and there is laughter there, laughter and springtime and joy enough to set the whole cosmos to singing.
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After his death, the people waited for a prophet like Moses to appear because Moses had told them to watch.
“Yahweh your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers.” Moses had said, “To him, you will listen.”
And so, the invitation is in front of you too, to hear him. “Come,” Jesus says, “and follow me. Come and learn how to live. Come with me, and I will heal your heart. Follow me, and I will make you human again.”
Many before you have accepted the invitation. There is Paul, the persecutor, who saw Jesus on the throne of God and was blinded by the revelation. There is Polycarp, whose blood put out the fire. There is Irenaeus, who stood like a lighthouse on the edge of a stormy sea, and the waves were perversions of the Gospel of Jesus, and yet he did not yield. There is George, the red-crossed knight, who offered up his head to an emperor rather than renounce his faith. There is Ephraim the Syrian, John the Golden Mouth, and the Venerable Bede. They are your ancestors. They are your family. They have passed the Good News of Jesus from door to door, from generation to generation, like small buckets of sacred treasure. Now, at last, it comes to you, and it is time for your hearts to expand with the inexhaustible joy of God’s love; the love of him who leads you through the Sea of Death onto the welcoming shores of Paradise.
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The gods came down. Slinking, slithering, prowling, whispering, they sought out earthly kings. And so, Pharaoh Merneptah heard a voice in the dark and the voice said his name. He woke, and there was Ptah with a plan. The old kings of Uruk also were tutored. Ayala had the fish creature, Adapa, for an advisor. Alaglar had Uanduga from the sea. In his time, Hammurabi met Shammash, and from that god recovered the knowledge the flood had destroyed. The trend never stopped. Descartes saw lights in his tent, and a creature gave him his method. Oppenheimer set off his bomb, and Krishna spoke, “I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.” These had a plan: to rule and remake humanity. The ruling was easily done. The remaking was harder. Harder, but not impossible.
The enemy has always worked to remake humanity in its image, an image of ancient jealousy and ravenous pride.
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... we must start in the most difficult place: in the beginning. We have to start where the story is not broken or befouled, when wild waves cooled sun-soaked shores and the choruses of birds carried over ebony cliffs, who knows how far.
It was a wild world, all welter and waste. Unrestrained rivers carved crooked lines across sprawling green plains. The earth birthed bejeweled fruit, and untended forests clawed in vain at the roots of mountains. And God loved it, because he created it.
That is just a small part of the story of the Bereshit, the “beginning” as the Hebrews call it. It is an old story, the first story told by God, and God is very old, and he is not always easy to understand. But, old things are often hard to understand.
For this reason, old stories are abandoned, because they allude us. New stories take their place, stories that are not so wild, or weird, or hard to hear. In general, the more remote a story is, and the more work we must do to understand it, the more likely it is that it will suffer mishandling.
And almost every witch, sorcerer, scientist, and pseudo-philosopher has some interest in mishandling this story. It is not hard to see why. In the beginning, you see the end. If you want to control how the story concludes, you attack it at the very start. - Donavon L Riley. Homily on Creation
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Almost everyone can agree that one of the big differences between us and our ancestors of five hundred years ago is that they lived in an “enchanted” world, and we do not; at the very least, we live in a much less “enchanted” world. We might think of this as our having “lost” a number of beliefs and the practices which they made possible. But more, the enchanted world was one in which these forces could cross a porous boundary and shape our lives, psychic and physical. One of the big differences between us and them is that we live with a much firmer sense of the boundary between self and other. We are “buffered” selves. We have changed. – Charles Taylor, Buffered and Porous Selves
Almost everyone can agree that one of the big differences between us and our ancestors of five hundred years ago is that they lived in an “enchanted” world, and we do not; at the very least, we live in a much less “enchanted” world. We might think of this as our having “lost” a number of beliefs and the practices which they made possible. But more, the enchanted world was one in which these forces could cross a porous boundary and shape our lives, psychic and physical. One of the big differences between us and them is that we live with a much firmer sense of the boundary between self and other. We are “buffered” selves. We have changed. – Charles Taylor, Buffered and Porous Selves
Article Link: https://tif.ssrc.org/2008/09/02/buffered-and-porous-selves/
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This is the profound morality of fairy-tales; which, so far from being lawless, go to the root of all law. Instead of finding (like common books of ethics) a rationalistic basis for each Commandment, they find the great mystical basis for all Commandments. We are in this fairyland on sufferance; it is not for us to quarrel with the conditions under which we enjoy this wild vision of the world. The vetoes are indeed extraordinary, but then so are the concessions. - G.K. Chesterton, Fairy Tales
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The Way of combat strategy can be likened to the craft of carpentry. Comparing samurai with carpenters is related to the subject of “houses.” We speak of noble houses, warrior houses and the “Four Houses.” We also talk of the collapse or continuation of a house. In the arts we refer to a school or tradition as a house. It is because the label “house” is employed as such that I draw parallels with the carpenter’s Way. The word “carpenter” (dai-ku) is written with the two ideograms meaning “great” and “craft.” The Way of combat strategy is also a “great craft,” which is why I relate it to the carpenter’s endowments. Study the content of these scrolls carefully if you seek to become accomplished in the craft of war. Train assiduously, with the teacher serving as the needle and the student as the thread.
Miyamoto Musashi, Book of Five Rings
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“Never fail to have this attitude of mind, go forward without hurry, learn the essence of things through frequent experiences, taking advantage of every occasion. Fight against all kinds of people and be aware of their mind. Follow a road that is a thousand leagues long one step at a time. Be without haste and be convinced that all these practices are the duty of a bushi. Be victorious today over what you were yesterday; tomorrow be victorious over your clumsiness and then also over your skill. Practice in accordance with what I have written without letting your mind deviate from the way.”
― Miyamoto Musashi, The Complete Book of Five Rings
Spotterup Article: https://spotterup.com/mastering-the-art-of-self-control/
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I got lost in the tall grass of my thoughts after promising at the front end of the podcast that I wasn't going to do it! So, I discuss confidence versus overconfidence, finding your passion, and being a life-long student.
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The Child that was ere worlds begun
(… We need but walk a little way,
We need but see a latch undone …)
The Child that played with moon and sun
Is playing with a little hay. - G.K. Chesterton, Aleteia
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“Any passion can become an addiction; but then how to distinguish between the two? The central question is: who’s in charge, the individual or their behavior? It’s possible to rule a passion, but an obsessive passion that a person is unable to rule is an addiction…If in doubt, ask yourself one simple question: given the harm you’re doing to yourself and others, are you willing to stop? If not, you’re addicted. And if you’re unable to renounce the behavior or to keep your pledge when you do, you’re addicted.”
Gabor Maté, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts
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“the spirit of wickedness in high places is now so powerful and many-headed in its incarnations that there seems nothing more to do than personally refuse to worship any of the hydras' heads.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, quote from The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays
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Myths, Lewis told Tolkien, were "lies and therefore worthless, even though breathed through silver."
"No," Tolkien replied. "They are not lies." Far from being lies, they were the best way sometimes the only way of conveying truths that would otherwise remain inexpressible. We have come from God, Tolkien argued, and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Myths may be misguided, but they steer however shakily toward the true harbor, whereas materialistic "progress" leads only to the abyss and the power of evil.
Building on this philosophy of myth, Tolkien explained to Lewis that the story of Christ was the true myth at the very heart of history and at the very root of reality. Whereas the pagan myths were manifestations of God expressing Himself through the minds of poets, using the images of their "mythopoeia" to reveal fragments of His eternal truth, the true myth of Christ was a manifestation of God expressing Himself through Himself, with himself, and in Himself. God, in the Incarnation, had revealed Himself as the ultimate poet who was creating reality, the true poem or true myth, in His own image. Thus, in a divinely inspired paradox, myth was revealed as the ultimate realism.
Links: https://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/art/j-r-r-tolkien-truth-and-myth.html
Link: http://www.tolkien.ro/text/JRR%20Tolkien%20-%20Mythopoeia.pdf
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“After all, I believe that legends and myths are largely made of 'truth', and indeed present aspects of it that can only be received in this mode; and long ago certain truths and modes of this kind were discovered and must always reappear.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
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In this episode, I read three early Anglo-Saxon texts: The Lorica of Loding, Precepts, and Vainglory. Each poem offers encouragement and hope to those who are in need of protection, wisdom, and guidance in spiritual and earthly matters. They also offer us another way to see the world, which to modern eyes, may seem strange and even fantastical.
Links:
Lorica of Loding:https://acollectionofprayers.com/2018/08/01/the-lorica-of-gildas/
Precepts & Vainglory: https://oldenglishpoetry.camden.rutgers.edu/
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Hope is not a wish. It is not optimism or naivety. It is an assertion. It is telling the world, “No, this is not the way things will be; things will be better.” For both Marcel and Tolkien, it is only with hope that we banish despair.
You do not haggle with or beg the darkness. Like a blazing torch, you must shine hope brightly and fiercely. - Jonny Thomson, The Secret to a Good Fairy Tale
Link: https://bigthink.com/high-culture/tolkien-marcel-and-hope/
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“Obviously there is no need of fighting to overcome this single tyrant, for he is automatically defeated if the country refuses consent to its own enslavement: it is not necessary to deprive him of anything, but simply to give him nothing; there is no need that the country make an effort to do anything for itself provided it does nothing against itself. It is therefore the inhabitants themselves who permit, or, rather, bring about, their own subjection, since by ceasing to submit they would put an end to their servitude. A people enslaves itself, cuts its own throat, when, having a choice between being vassals and being free men, it deserts its liberties and takes on the yoke, gives consent to its own misery, or, rather, apparently welcomes it.” (Étienne de La Boétie, The Discourse on Voluntary Servitude)
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“…physical attacks lead to a corresponding increase of trust in political leaders and submission to them. This effect is likely the same whether the attack be a surprise, known to political leaders yet allowed to happen, or directly orchestrated by these same leaders who stand to benefit from the increased trust and submission…False flag operations are used because people generally do not have access to the details, so they are prone to rely upon what they’re told, and thus are easily deceived. People will, for the most part, believe what they are told in times of crisis, and so government officials, whether their motives are good or evil, capitalize on or completely fabricate the crises.” (Feardom: How Politicians Exploit Your Emotions and What You Can Do to Stop Them, Conor Boyack)
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In the relentless battle-space of spiritual warfare, where the fires of sin and temptation constantly threaten to burn down our faith and lives, Christians are called by God to stand as warriors of faith. We take to heart the words of Psalm 119:11, “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” Like King David, who faced the giant Goliath with nothing but a sling and his unwavering trust in God (1 Samuel 17), we stand against the giants of our time, the adversary’s of the Lord, armed with an unshakable faith that comes from the Holy Spirit and God’s Word. - Donavon L Riley
Link: https://spotterup.com/praying-down-evil-the-christians-battle-cry/
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We are raised and educated to believe that failure should be avoided at any cost. The harsh truth is that we cannot be successful in everything we do, but we can strive for excellence as long as we embrace the lessons of failure. Failure is a part of life and can’t be avoided, so how can we learn from failure and use it to succeed?
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That wise man sang, the word-ready warrior,
and he retold this legend: “He who elevates himself
in this perilous moment through his overmastering pride,
heaving up his lofty spirit, he must be humbled
after his passing journey, crushed down low,
dwelling fixed in torments, encompassed with serpents.
That happened many years ago in God’s realm
that overweening mounted high among the angels,
the struggle of the far-famed. They heaved up a crime,
a severe expedition, polluting the heavens,
despising their betters, those that thought too deceitfully
to rob the power of the regal throne from the Majestic King,
as was not right, and then set themselves over
that delightful land of glory, upon their own judgment.
That fate the Father of First-Creation resisted them in war—
that struggle became too grim for them. - from "Vainglory", author unknown
Link: https://oldenglishpoetry.camden.rutgers.edu/vainglory/
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“Brotherhood has nothing to do with feelings; it has to do with how you define your relationship to others. It has to do with the rather profound decision to put the welfare of the group above your personal welfare. In such a system, feelings are meaningless. In such a system, who you are entirely depends on your willingness to surrender who you are.”
― Sebastian Junger, War
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“For most of human history, freedom had to be at least suffered for, if not died for, and that raised its value to something almost sacred. In modern democracies, however, an ethos of public sacrifice is rarely needed because freedom and survival are more or less guaranteed. That is a great blessing, but allows people to believe that any sacrifice at all—rationing water during a drought, for example—are forms of government tyranny. They are no more forms of tyranny than rationing water on a lifeboat. The idea that we can enjoy the benefits of society while owing nothing in return is literally infantile. Only children owe nothing.”
― Sebastian Junger, Freedom
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“The most alarming rhetoric comes out of the dispute between liberals and conservatives, and it’s a dangerous waste of time because they’re both right.
...
If you want to make a society work, then you don’t keep underscoring the places where you’re different—you underscore your shared humanity,”
― Sebastian Junger, Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging
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“What would you risk dying for—and for whom—is perhaps the most profound question a person can ask themselves. The vast majority of people in modern society are able to pass their whole lives without ever having to answer that question, which is both an enormous blessing and a significant loss.” ― Sebastian Junger,Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging
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It’s natural to have regrets, but this does not mean that you should live in a state of regret.
Many people say that you shouldn’t regret anything, but I think what they mean is that they don’t regret how things have turned out even if they had to go through some difficulty and hardship to get there. So we do not regret the outcomes.
We do not regret what we have done. This is only possible if you live intentionally and accept that mistakes happen. Learning occurs through those mistakes. Learning is how improvement happens. And how could we ever regret improving our lives. - Miyamoto Musashi, Dokkōdō
Dokkōdō Link: https://edlatimore.com/dokkodo/
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Integrity means always staying true to your values, even when faced with temptation or adversity. It means never compromising your principles for personal gain. It’s about walking the path of righteousness, no matter how challenging it may be. In a world where the temptations to serve our egos often overshadows our focus on personal honor, it takes a special kind of martial artist to stay grounded and maintain their integrity. - Donavon L Riley
Article link: https://spotterup.com/integrity-the-backbone-of-a-true-warrior/
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There is no reason why someone is chosen to be a scapegoat beyond the immediate imperative to restore order. Once the mimetic process pushes a society to the height of the disturbance, the mechanism of bloody pacification begins to work. In the first step, a person is identified as guilty of causing chaos, and all are sure of his guilt. He, then, must be sacrificed to restore social peace, and the mimetic behavior returns in the form of mob action. Once the sacrifice is completed, the social animus returns to normal, and the one – once considered guilty by the crowd – is raised to the plateau of deity. Then the cycle begins once more.
*** I erred at the beginning of the episode, and should have said "Imitation is the highest form of compliment."
Link to my new blog and the podcast, The Area of Operations: https://spotterup.com
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When we step onto the mats, we become part of something greater than ourselves. We become part of a lineage, a brotherhood, a sisterhood, a family that stretches back through time. In this family, respect is not an option; it’s a non-negotiable requirement. It’s a virtue that must be embraced and upheld by each and every member, regardless of their rank, experience, or skill level.
Bushido Link: https://www.artofmanliness.com/character/knowledge-of-men/the-bushido-code-the-eight-virtues-of-the-samurai/
Welcome to The (Martial Arts) Jungle: https://spotterup.com/welcome-to-the-martial-arts-jungle/
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First, stop trying to be the person you think other people want you to be. Second, stop listening to people who aren't where you want to be. These are symptoms of the hurt child's mind.
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“Every event has two handles - one by which it can be carried, and one by which it can't.” - Epictetus, Enchiridion, 43
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The Holy Spirit is no tame pet to be leashed and controlled. Oh no, he is more like a raging wildfire, consuming everything in his path. The Holy Spirit is the sledgehammer that knocks holes in the fortress of our hearts and brings us crashing down to the reality of God's grace.
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“When microdosing, I notice a lot of differences in my energy level, motivation and focus, but most importantly, I really feel it brings more color to my life. I think more creatively and easily make connections. This leads me to experiment more, in different areas of my life. For instance, when I was doing music photography, I would be more open to different techniques, do double exposures, and use the light differently. I just feel I have more ideas, more fluidity in my creative processes and don’t overthink things as much. I just go for it.” - Susana, a photographer and visual artist from Amsterdam
Blog Link: https://microdosinginstitute.com/inner-work/microdosing-and-creativity/
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In this topsy-turvy world, where truth is often obscured by a haze of deceit and propaganda, only the Holy Spirit can navigate us through a treacherous landscape of news and social media, separating fact from fiction for us, and exposing the charlatans and demagogues who seek to manipulate our minds.
And so, holding up the Word of God like a neon sign in the desert of despair, the Holy Spirit illuminates our path and guides us through the darkest of nights. He brings us preachers to remind us that we are not defined by the opinions of others or the whims of popular culture, but by the radical and scandalous love of our Lord Jesus Christ.
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“The State takes the place of God… the socialist dictatorships are religions and State slavery is a form of worship.” - Carl Jung, The Undiscovered Self
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So off rode Sir Geraint, keeping at some distance behind the lady, the knight, and the dwarf. At last, after passing through many woods, he lost sight of them as they disappeared beyond the top of a hill. Sir Geraint rode up, and saw below him, in a valley, the one street of a little town. On one side was a fortress, so new that the stone of which it was built was still white; while on the other side stood a gray old castle, fast falling into decay. He saw the three people he was following enter the fortress... - Sir Geraint and Enid
Link to Sir Geraint & Enid: https://www.heritage-history.com/index.php?c=read&author=warren&book=arthur&story=geraint
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Ask a narcissist if they are dependable and they will say, I'm the most responsible person you know, you can always count on me. And they can be. But when the rubber meets the road (an old saying about being put to the test), narcissists seem to wiggle out of accountability. Why?
Narcissists will gladly be responsible for the things they deem worthy, especially when it provides an opportunity to be the center of attention. However, when others place responsibility on the narcissist, the narcissist sees this as an attempt to control them. This violates one of their personal mantras: no one will have power over them. So they escape from all liability. How?
- Intimidate/Blame. The narcissist begins by bullying the person endeavoring to hold them accountable. Frequently they resort to name-calling and belittling to assert dominance over the other person. Once a subordinate position has been established, they blame the person for attempting to make the narcissist look less than superior.
- Accuse/Project. To circumvent any accountability, the narcissist preempts the attack by accusing another person. Usually, they pick an overly responsible, co-dependent person who idolizes the narcissist. Then the narcissist projects the things they are answerable for onto the other person. Thus escaping before the attack.
- Argue/Exhaust. This is the simplest tactic with great immediate results. When confronted, the narcissist picks one small detail and argues it to the umpteenth degree. If the other person argues back, they pick another tiny point and persistently wear down their opponent. Exhausted, frustrated, and annoyed, the other person gives up holding the narcissist liable.
- Deny/Rewrite. One way of avoiding responsibility is for the narcissist to deny they have any. Even if the item is written down, the narcissist will make excuses and rewrite history. Frequently they take the victim role by saying they were forced into being held accountable when in actuality they willingly did so. This tactic often leaves the other person questioning themselves and their memory.
- Divert/Attack. This method begins with an outburst over something very insignificant. Then, the narcissist exaggerates the point to incite the other person and draw their attention away from what really is happening. Whenever the narcissist is fueling a small fire, it is to keep the focus off the inferno somewhere else. The diversion is done to drain resources, energy, and time so the narcissist can attack when the other person is vulnerable.
- Fear/Avoid. Narcissists have the ability to take a person's small fear and turn it into paranoia. Their charisma is put to destructive use as they weave a believable story with an intense dreadful outcome. Once the other person is frightened, the narcissist uses the other person's terror as justification for avoiding responsibility. They often cite that the other person is reactionary and therefore any requests from the other person should be discounted.
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Rescue/Retreat. This tactic is the most manipulative of the bunch. First, the narcissist rescues the other person from a dreadful situation. Having gained the other person's loyalty, the narcissist waits. Eventually, the other person confronts the narcissist about a lack of responsibility, and then the narcissist retreats. The withholding of love/attention/time is so dramatic that the other person becomes horrified and assumes responsibility so that the narcissist will return. Once secured, the narcissist then accuses the other person of not appreciating the rescue. The other person feels bad and succumbs to the wishes of the narcissist even further.
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Author Unknown
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Public education is designed to create obedient citizens who follow orders without questioning authority. John Taylor Gatto, in his book "Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling," argues that public education is not designed to teach children to think critically, but rather to be obedient and follow orders. He states, "Schools are intended to produce, through the application of formulas, formulaic human beings whose behavior can be predicted and controlled." This is supported by Neil Postman in his book "The End of Education," where he writes, "The central task of education is to implant a will and facility for learning; it should produce not learned but learning people."
The full manuscript for this episode can be found on the website: https://wordpress.com/post/thewarriorpriestpodcast.wordpress.com/2005
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“Neither necessity nor desire, but the love of power, is the demon of mankind. You may give men everything possible health, food, shelter, enjoyment but they are and remain unhappy . . . for the demon waits and waits; and must be satisfied. Let everything else be taken away from men, and let this demon be satisfied, and then they will nearly be happy as happy as men and demons can be. . .” Nietzsche, The Dawn
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The opposite to courage is not cowardice: that, rather, is the lack of courage. To say a person is a coward has no more meaning than to say he is lazy: it simply tells us that some vital potentiality is unrealized or blocked. The opposite to courage, as one endeavors to understand the problem in our particular age, is automaton conformity. Rollo May, Man’s Search for Himself
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Trauma can be a difficult obstacle to overcome, but in this episode, we will explore the insights from Theodore Roosevelt's book, The Strenuous Life, published in 1899, that can help us in our trauma...
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In the same way, our own wounds are not a cause for shame, but for God’s glory. They are not a hindrance to God’s mission, but a means of fulfilling it. We are all wounded in some way, whether physically, emotionally, or spiritually. We have all experienced pain, loss, and suffering. We have all been betrayed, abandoned, or rejected. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
But the good news is that Jesus has taken our wounds upon himself. He has suffered for us, died for us, and risen for us. He has conquered sin, death, and the devil for us. He has reconciled us to God and to one another. He has given us the Holy Spirit, who strengthens us in faith to forgive and to be forgiven, to love and to be loved, to heal and to be healed.
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Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways. - Sigmund Freud
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The warrior ethos has been a defining feature of human society since the dawn of civilization. The idea of a warrior, one who is willing to sacrifice their own safety for the protection of their community, has been a source of inspiration for countless generations. The warrior ethos provides a sense of purpose and meaning to those who follow it, as well as a deep sense of connection to something greater than oneself.
The warrior ethos has been present throughout human history, and it has been reflected in art, literature, and philosophy. From the writings of Sun Tzu to the heroic epics of Homer, the concept of the warrior has been a central theme. Even in modern times, the warrior ethos remains a powerful force. Professional fighters, for example, embody the warrior spirit by training tirelessly and putting themselves in harm's way in the octagon.
However, the warrior ethos has become increasingly rare in modern society, which is marked by division, alienation, and dehumanization. Politics, health, leftist ideologies, and attacks on time-honored traditions have contributed to a cultural divide that threatens to tear apart the fabric of society. The warrior ethos can help to bridge this divide by providing a set of values and principles that can unite people across political and cultural boundaries...
Link to full transcript: https://thewarriorpriestpodcast.wordpress.com/2023/04/05/0148-midweek-debrief-finding-meaning-in-an-ethos/
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Similarly, the Nashville School Shooting was a paradoxical moment for the Christian community. Audrey Hale, a self-proclaimed atheist, targeted and murdered six Christians at her former school because, unlike her, they refused to deny their humanity and faith. In the face of such tragedy, it can be difficult to find comfort and hope. But the only hope of Christianity is in the face of death and evil. The martyrs of Nashville remind us that our faith is not a safe thing, but a risky thing. It is a faith that risks everything, even life itself. But it is in this risk that we find true life and true hope.
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“Adventure shatters the oppressive, insistent reality as if it were a piece of glass. It is the unforeseen, the unthought-of, the new. Each adventure is a new birth of the world, a unique process. How can it fail to be interesting?”
José Ortega y Gasset, Meditations on Quixote
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Jiu Jitsu is like a philosophy. It helps me learn how to face life... To understand our society, to relate myself to people, to compete in an actual self-defense tournament, to feel confident to walk on the street and to be able to help people, to be strong enough to forgive - Rickson Gracie
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In baptism, we are given a new identity, a new purpose, and a new destiny. We are no longer slaves to sin, death, and the devil, but heirs of God's kingdom, with a mission to proclaim the gospel and to serve our neighbor in love." And when the devil comes with his temptations, interferes in our lives, and accuses us of sin and unbelief, we tell him: 'I am baptized, and in that baptism I have been forgiven, justified, and sanctified. Your accusations have no power over me, because I belong to Christ.’
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"…the lack of meaning in life is a soul-sickness whose full extent and import our age has not yet begun to comprehend.” Carl Jung, The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche
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...this story reminds us that we can always go to God with our prayers and our petitions. Even when we feel like outsiders, even when we feel like we don't have a place at the table, even when we feel like our requests are too small or too insignificant to matter, we can still come to God in faith and trust that he will hear us and respond.
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All children are creative. All children experiment with imaginations.
As we grow older we are beaten down by systems, rules, and social norms. We are told to color between the lines, stay in our lane, and most importantly, not to rock the boat. By the time we’re adults we are so used to it we don’t even realize what’s at stake.
The War of Art will help you recognize Resistance when it creeps into your work, often in completely predictable but comforting ways, and beat it back.
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So, we take comfort in God's promise of a savior. We trust in his grace and mercy, even when we’re in full rebellion against him. And we go out from here into the world, with the assurance of his presence and the power of his Spirit, and even though we, like Noah, aren’t exactly saint material, we are chosen in Christ Jesus to be his hands and feet in a rebellious, destructive, world that is being put to death by God. We are chosen to be the mouth of God, warning this generation of impending doom and the promise of eternal salvation in Jesus Christ, today and always.
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This is the message of the gospel, the message that runs through the entire Bible no continues into the present. We are sinners, but God still loves us. He still provides for us. He still seeks us out, even when we are hiding from him. And he has provided a Savior, Jesus Christ, who has paid the price for our sin and made a way for us to be reconciled to God.
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The medicinal use of mushrooms dates back thousands of years because of their varied and uniquely adaptive benefits for health. Now, in recent times with functional medicine and holistic nutrition going mainstream, we’re seeing a resurgence of interest in these marvelous superfoods.
https://www.realmushrooms.com/7-medicinal-mushroom-benefits-for-health/
https://holistictherapiesdirectory.com/blog/5-health-benefits-of-psilocybin-mushrooms
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“For nothing is self-sufficient, neither in us ourselves nor in things; and if our soul has trembled with happiness and sounded like a harp string just once, all eternity was needed to produce this one event—and in this single moment of affirmation all eternity was called good, redeemed, justified, and affirmed.” – Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power
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Lombardi’s methodical coverage of the fundamentals continued throughout training camp. Each player reviewed how to block and tackle. They opened up the playbook and started from page one. At some point, Max McGee, the Packers’ Pro Bowl wide receiver, joked, “Uh, Coach, could you slow down a little? You’re going too fast for us.” Lombardi reportedly cracked a smile, but continued his obsession with the basics all the same. His team would become the best in the league at the tasks everyone else took for granted.
Article Link: https://jamesclear.com/vince-lombardi-fundamentals
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So faith looks at Jesus because he calls himself the Book of Life. In that book, all the ink is erased from the ledger. There are no entries for what’s owed and what’s been paid. In the Book of Life, there are no outstanding debt entries. There is only the one word written across the page in large, blood red letters: Forgiven.
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“Chivalry is a flower no less indigenous to the soil of Japan than its emblem, the cherry blossom; nor is it a dried-up specimen of an antique virtue preserved in the herbarium of our history. It is still a living object of power and beauty among us; and if it assumes no tangible shape or form, it not the less scents the moral atmosphere, and makes us aware that we are still under its potent spell. The conditions of society which brought it forth and nourished it have long disappeared; but as those far-off stars which once were and are not, still continue to shed their rays upon us, so the light of chivalry, which was a child of feudalism, still illuminates our moral path, surviving its mother institution.”
― Inazo Nitobe,Bushido: The Soul of Japan
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“Here’s how he works.” the old pastor says. “Your heart was a tin can lying in the weeds rusting, and the Lord Jesus came along like that sanitation guy in the park, with an old cloth bag and a stick with a nail in it, and he stuck it in that tin can and he put it in his bag.”
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“Sometimes prophecies seem to consist in man’s ability to experience his own wretched fate so deeply that it becomes a symbol of something larger. It is in this sense that one can compare Nietzsche with the ancient prophets. He felt the agony, the suffering, and the misery of a godless world so intensely, at a time when others were yet blind to its tremendous consequence, that he was able to experience in advance, as it were, the fate of a coming generation.” (Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, Walter Kaufmann)
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No matter how terrible our lives may be, and our lives have been quite terrible, and no matter how far we fall, and we have fallen all the way to rock bottom by this point, and no matter what disaster overtakes us, and there are too many to count, we have one enormous knowledge and consolation, which is a heavenly revelation that overtakes us; that of all the terrible things that can happen to a human being, the worst is when we are in pain and despair and have nowhere to express them. It’s like walking around with a gun to our heads or a cattle prod pressed against our backs.
So we are encouraged today to have faith like the Canaanite mother. To accept the fact that a new identity is forged for us by God’s charity. The example of the Canaanite woman reveals this to us, that our connection to our Savior is direct, and that he will not only listen to us express our pain and despair, but he will do something with them beyond what we believe is reasonable or even possible. He will remove them from us.
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In Anglo-Saxon England a warrior owed complete fealty to his chief. A warrior was stunned unconscious during a battle in which his chief died. He revived after the battle and found himself chiefless. Several years later he recounts his plight.
“Wulf and Eadwacer” is an Anglo-Saxon poem found in the 10th century Exeter Book and famous for its difficult interpretation. I believe this poem is essentially an expression of wife and mother’s grief.
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This is the savior of the world. From the very beginning of creation, God planned to become as close to us as our own flesh and blood. Even before stars twinkled on the prairies this was his idea, to go down and dirty, to come right into the mess with us. So here he is, in the mess. He gets filthy and hangs out with sinners. And here is God's voice, "This is my beloved son."
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In science convictions have no rights of citizenship, as one says with good reason. Only when they decide to descend to the modesty of hypotheses, of a provisional experimental point of view, of a regulative fiction, they may be granted admission and even a certain value in the realm of knowledge—though always with the restriction that they remain under police supervision, under the police of mistrust. —But does this not mean, if you consider it more precisely, that a conviction may obtain admission to science only when it ceases to be a conviction? Would it not be the first step in the discipline of the scientific spirit that one would not permit oneself any more convictions? - Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Book V, Aphorism 344.
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And amongst all the stories of doom and gloom why don’t we see Jesus on our television screens? And I don’t mean American Jesus. I don’t mean the Jesus used by political fools to justify unjust wars and killing unborn babies, who smile their toothy smiles as they explain why they have to take more and more from us until we can’t even breathe without having the air in our lungs taxed. I mean the real Jesus who comes with grace and peace. The real Jesus who comes to seek and save the lost. The real Jesus who says the last will be first and the first will get none. The real Jesus you will never see on tv because he won’t be a spokesman for Pfizer or Ratheon, and he’ll never endorse Joel Osteen.
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“Sometimes, we don't get what we plan for. Sometimes, everything can go wrong even when you do everything right. You're going to fail...and that's okay. The question is what you do with that knowledge. If you don't even try because you might miss your goal, you miss out on life. We are all going to face defeat, and more than just once or twice. How you react under those circumstances is what matters- do you give up? Do you push on? Do you give it your best shot for your own peace of mind even when you know it's a lost cause? That, to me, is the real measure of perseverance; it not only shows us who we are but also forces us to think about what we could become.” ― Kyle Carpenter,You Are Worth It: Building a Life Worth Fighting For
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At least one account has survived of a Christmas Truce gone bad: the story of Private Percy Huggins, a Briton who was relaxing in No Man’s Land with the enemy when a sniper shot to the head killed him and set off more bloodshed. The sergeant who took Huggins’ place, hoping to avenge his death, was then himself picked off and killed.
In another account, a German scolded his fellow soldiers during the Christmas Truce: “Such a thing should not happen in wartime. Have you no German sense of honor left?” That 25-year old soldier’s name was Adolf Hitler.
Neither was high command pleased with the festivities. On Dec. 7, 1914, Pope Benedict had implored leaders of the battling nations to hold a Christmas truce, asking "that the guns may fall silent at least upon the night the angels sang." The plea was officially ignored.
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The thrill of baptism is that on account of Jesus, there’s no pressure at all to go it alone. Instead, the will of the Son shines on our desolation. That’s his testament. That’s his redemption. That's his promise. We’re in this with him. Whether we believe it’s true or not, even when the odds are a million to one, his will is done. We are in this with him. We’re not doing this on our own. We’re not made to go it alone, that’s why so many people are so miserable. They pass through church like lonely ghosts. They pass through your home like lonely ghosts. They pass through life as if they’re a lonely tourist, which is the worst way to pretend you’re alive when we know that there’s no life apart from Christ.
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Maintain a clear-sighted view of your circumstances, eschew biases and preconceived notions, and practice decisiveness. Learn to trust your intuition. When relying on only a "partial feeling," your gut - often referred to as the "second brain" - will indicate that something is wrong.
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The money and habits, the whispers and gossip, the crashing and burning, and the lying that only the good die young are how we end up hung up on everything and anything, everyone and anyone who promises to reverse the curse that we were born with but can’t escape because we’re locked up in the cages that we made for ourselves.
That’s why we can’t wait to listen to what God has to say, to see his face shine on us. But we don’t have to plead our case because he already knows all of our thoughts and all of our ways, so before we get a chance to say anything he says to us: have faith, you’re forgiven, you’re loved, you’re safe in the name of Jesus Christ forever. The curse that you’re born with is reversed so that now you can call it all a gift.
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In contests of strategy it is bad to be led about by the enemy. You must always be able to lead the enemy about. Obviously the enemy will also be thinking of doing this, but he cannot forestall you if you do not allow him to come out. In strategy, you must stop the enemy as he attempts to cut; you must push down his thrust, and throw off his hold when he tries to grapple. This is the meaning of "to hold down a pillow". - Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
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Bad dreams, war scars, and missing a tooth are all reminders that we don’t trust God to take care of us and that we don’t trust God to use us to take care of each other too. But everyone can be changed by God. Everyone one is changed by God’s Word, whether they know it or not. Anyone and everyone, no matter how disconnected, disjointed, or disappointed is taken care of by God; we Christians are living proof.
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The body of the Way of Strategy from the viewpoint of my Ichi school is explained in the Ground book. It is difficult to realize the true Way just through sword-fencing. Know the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. - Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings, chapter one
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We act like we're so much better than other people in other places, but
who told us that we're so special? Who told us we're so special that our facts can't be facts without censoring us? Who said that we're so special that we get to deny basic biology, expose our children to degenerates and perverts in their schools and call it progress? Who told us we're so special that we get to call good evil, and evil good for the nation, and if anyone says otherwise we'll accuse them of spreading misinformation?
Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
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Which dystopian writer saw it all coming? Of all the famous authors of the 20th century who crafted worlds meant as warnings, who has proved most prophetic about the afflictions of the 21st? George Orwell? Aldous Huxley? Kurt Vonnegut? Ray Bradbury? Each of these, among others, have proved far too disturbingly prescient about many aspects of our present, as far as I’m concerned. But it could be that none of them were quite as far-sighted as the fairytale spinners. - N.S. Lyons
Blog Link: https://theupheaval.substack.com/p/a-prophecy-of-evil-tolkien-lewis
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Every bone broken, all the sticks, and stones that were thrown at you are because of Christ Jesus. All the moments when you feel so alone are because of Christ Jesus. That you only drink so you can try to cope is because of Christ Jesus. Every bloody nose and all the mud-caked clothes are because of Christ Jesus. When you feel like you're down inside a hole that's because of Christ Jesus. Every single scuff and every single scab that makes you who you are are because of Christ Jesus.
But why? How? What does that mean, "because of Christ Jesus"?
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Today, there is little one can do without the state, or what Nietzsche called the “coldest of all cold monsters”, either taking its cut, dictating how it’s to be done, or at the very least, watching and recording our every move.
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Why? Because we can't be allowed to live free. We can't be allowed to live like sheep to trust in Jesus as the only shepherd we need. We must be glued to our screens. We must be part of the machine. We must believe in science that contradicts the words of Christ. We must trust what we see on the news. It's not propaganda, it’s the truth, everything is exactly what it seems. So stay glued to your screens.
Or, you can listen to and take serious the words of our Lord and Master who says, “Do not put your trust in princes or in a son of man, in whom there is no hope.”
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“In Brave New World the soma habit was not a private vice; it was a political institution…” writes Huxley. “The daily Soma ration was an insurance against personal maladjustment, social unrest and the spread of subversive ideas. Religion, Karl Marx declared, is the opium of the people. In the Brave New World this situation was reversed. Opium, or rather Soma, was the people’s religion.”(Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited)
“I have found that, to make a contented slave,” writes Douglass “it is necessary to make a thoughtless one…He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery is right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man.” (Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass)
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There's no "musts" or "shoulds" with Jesus. There's only his love that says: Come, and receive all you need for body and life from me. I will wash and feed you. I will bathe you in my blood that's supreme red, creates a new life for you, and raises the dead. I will do all this for you because I love you. I created you to love and be loved. I redeemed you to love and be loved. I sustain you in my love so that you can love freely, selflessly, without worry because I will always give you more of love and every good thing than you can imagine or will ever need.
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“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.”The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety, Alan Watts
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You can wish all you want. You can wish on shooting stars, or maybe they're just satellites. You can blow apart a million dandelions until they don't grow in your yard anymore. But your wishes will never come true. Instead, look to the Lord, and expect all you need from him. He gives you all you need in due season. He opens his hand and satisfies the desires of every living thing.
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You need the strength to let go of your past and get back on your feet. You need the vision to see that the path that you walk is the one that you need. You need the courage to dream while you're still broken in half and there's nothing left deep inside. You need the patience to wait for the day that you pray for, and for God to give you a sign. You need help, so God comes to you to help in every need. How do you think you’ve made it this far? He is your health and salvation.
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“…a totalitarian society is one in which an ideology seeks to displace all prior traditions and institutions, with the goal of bringing all aspects of society under control of that ideology. A totalitarian state is one that aspires to nothing less than defining and controlling reality.” Rod Dreher, Live Not by Lies
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But, don't give up. Don't lose hope. Our God is strong, and the Holy Spirit is a consuming fire that will burn away all our sicknesses, diseases, and even death. And yes, the days are hard and the nights are long. But our God is a fighter, so when it's dire, the Holy Spirit burns brighter in the dark. Remember, you're baptized into Jesus Christ, and he is the light of the world; so you're more than just a survivor stumbling around in the dark. In Christ, you are a conqueror.
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Sir Orfeo is a 1944 booklet which reproduces the text of the Middle English poem as edited and amended by J.R.R. Tolkien, together with an editorial note also by Tolkien. Tolkien's translation of it was later published in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl and Sir Orfeo.
Although the booklet does not identify Tolkien's editorship, a copy held by the Bodleian Library in Oxford includes a note in Tolkien's hand which states that it was prepared for a naval cadets' course in English that ran from 1943-1944.
The number of copies printed is unknown, but was probably small. In his J.R.R. Tolkien: A Descriptive Bibliography, Wayne G. Hammond reported that "Five copies have been located." The lack of known copies of Sir Orfeo may be due in part to the fact that Tolkien is not recorded as editor, making it unlikely that many booksellers would identify the Tolkien connection.[1]
The poem is a Celtic retelling of the Ancient Greek myth of Orpheus, King of Thrace, who went to the Underworld (here the Otherworld) to save his wife Eurydice (Heurodis) from Hades (Fairy King).
In 2004, the text of the 1944 Sir Orfeo was reprinted in Tolkien Studies: Volume 1, edited by Carl F. Hostetter.
A musical rendition of the Middle English text: https://youtu.be/eaEiu10DS_4
A reading of the Middle English text: https://youtu.be/kllYoonQFXI
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“No longer to accept anything at all, no longer to take anything, no longer to absorb anything—to cease reacting altogether. This fatalism…can preserve life under the most perilous conditions by reducing the metabolism, slowing it down, as a kind of will to hibernate.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo
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We know mammon is lying to our faces, and we know it brings unnecessary drama into our lives, but we keep buying what it’s selling. No wonder we're so confused. Fake smiles, fake friends, fake breasts, fake jewelry, fake health, fake wealth, and fake happiness. We’ve become fake people living fake lives because we don’t want to see the real truth.
And if we do want the truth for a change we've got to reject what’s fake and walk away from it, and go somewhere to hear and learn the brutal truth. We’ve got to listen to the God who punctures all our illusions. But, who wants that? Who wants to buy what God's selling?
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Regardless of what culture teaches us, the distinction between man and woman is very real, and it not washed away in baptism. It is clarified, deepened, and called very good by God. What baptism does wash away is the cultural brainwashing and juvenile thinking that has emasculated men for decades. It washes away "Happy Wife, Happy Life.” It washes away "Yes, Dear." It washes away the cartoonish stereotype of the fat, buffoonish, man-child who needs a wife-mother to clean up his messes.
Baptism washes away our depression and aimlessness. It washes away our inability and impotence. Baptism washes away our ungodly dependency on pornography, drugs, video games, and junk food; the things the world pushes on us to keep us blinded to the fact that we are not misbehaving little boys, we are washed in the blood of the Lamb; washed to live as free, godly men who are identified by strength and grit, wisdom and self-sacrifice, charity and yes, even as dangerous to the wolves at our doors.
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But, regardless of what culture teaches us, the distinction between man and woman is very real, and it not washed away in baptism. It is clarified, deepened, and called very good by God. What baptism does wash away is the cultural brainwashing that has emasculated men for decades. It washes away "Happy Wife, Happy Life.” It washes away "Yes, Dear." It washes away our depression and aimlessness. It washes away our inability and impotence. Baptism washes away our ungodly dependency on pornography, drugs, video games, and junk food; the things the world pushes on us to keep us blinded to the fact that we are not misbehaving little boys, we are washed in the blood of the Lamb; washed to live as free, godly men who are identified by strength and grit, wisdom and self-sacrifice, charity and yes, even as dangerous to the wolves at our door.
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But in the Church, Jesus reconstructs sinners from personal destruction. He remakes us, rebuilds us, and resurrects us so the demons that hide in the cracks can't get ahold of us, the devil can't break us, and hell will never know us. And we got all this from the blood that was spilled. We get all this from the blood poured down our throats at the Lord's Supper. We get all this from Jesus in his Church.
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The episode uploaded before I realized I’d missed some throat clearing that needed to be taken out of the audio, so I went back and edited the episode then republished it but Spotify and Apple podcasts haven’t updated the episode yet, so I apologize if you listen to the unedited version of this 🙏
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Was Alexander the Great an alcoholic? Did Odysseus take opium in the land of the lotus-eaters? Was the romance of Anthony and Cleopatra an alcohol-fuelled orgy, and was the Oracle at Delphi the world’s first rehab?
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We hear people preaching that hatred's the real problem with our society, but hating straight, white men and Christians is common. Coca-Cola is telling people they should be less white. The company's advertisements preach tolerance but if you disagree with their message, they attack and demonize you. Soldiers died for this country and every one of us benefits from their sacrifice, but we repay their service by giving welfare to the bums and forgetting about the veterans. Black folks and white folks are being divided by the news, but no one is saying how we're all made by the same Creator and loved the same by Jesus Christ.
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A bonus episode about sobriety, setting a standard and standing fast when others avoid conflict, consequences, and us.
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What do athletes and fitness fanatics share in common that can be their greatest asset but also their ultimate downfall?
Perfectionism and obsession. When this leads to over-training. You want to be training more than everyone else. Working harder than everyone else. You put in the hours even when your body is crying out for you to stop. It’s a fine and difficult line. So how do you know when you’re overtraining? How do you know when you’re doing more harm than good?
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No matter what goal or challenge we take on in life, there tends to be that moment that occurs along the journey where you make a decision because you are forced with a choice of quitting or not quitting. The goals, the timelines, the processes are different for each of us, but we typically have to rely on pure will, guts, determination, and remember “our why” in order to be successful with the personal or team mission you are trying to accomplish. The process that we have to consider is how do we best utilize our past, present, and even the future to help us get through what feels like sticking points in personal, professional, team, or military selection goals. - Stew Smith
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This message, this confrontation between God and his people is why the prophets were executed by the people that they were sent to preach to. This message, which was born, lived, and ministered to his people, is why his people executed him on a cross. This message makes fake saints into haters and real sinners into saints. This message isn't safe, but it's good. It’s good because it points you to the God who loves you a d cares for you and not to the culture who could care less whether you live or die. It’s good because it points to the truth that is revealed to you by God’s Word; Savior Jesus. The Lion of Judah. The Protector and defender of your life and life everlasting.
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Ethos is a derivative of the same Greek word for ethics, and for the warrior comprises a code of conduct that guides his values and actions. It is often an oral code, passed down from one warrior to the next. Warrior ethos dictates not just how a warrior should behave towards his enemies, but also how he should relate to his people and overcome his own weaknesses. It is a philosophy that must balance the encouragement of active aggression with voluntary self-restraint. This tension lies at the core of warrior ethos.
https://www.thecollector.com/warrior-ethos-spartan-samurai-sioux/
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God's Word creates life, so we invent abortion, suicide, and euthanasia. God's Word creates man and woman, so we invent over one hundred different genders.
God's Word is the big T truth, so we invent our own truths.
God’s Word gives us leaders so we invent rebellion, banana republics, and civil war.
God’s Word gives us marriage and family, so we invent divorce, domestic violence, and child abuse.
God’s Word gives us everything we need to care for our body and life, so we invent pharmaceutical drugs, processed foods, slavery and war.
God’s Word gives us good weather and a world teeming with life, so we invent climate change, environmental movements, and doomsday cults.
God’s Word sends us his preachers, so we invent other gods and religions, praying to ourselves, preaching to ourselves, worshipping ourselves, inventing our own sacraments, trying to absolve ourselves, trying to save ourselves from God’s Word and his preachers.
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“First off, don’t let the force of the impression carry you away. Say to it, ‘hold up a bit and let me see who you are and where you are from — let me put you to the test’ . . .”
— EPICTETUS, DISCOURSES, 2.18.24
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Jesus is not, as so many paint him, and even Christians do this now, Jesus is not an impotent, feminine, passive, weak individual. He is the Lion of Judah. He is our shield and fortress; a mighty warrior, as the psalmist writes, who fights for us against sin, death, and all evil.
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“There are a few things to keep in mind when faced with a seemingly insurmountable obstacle. We must try: To be objective. To control emotions and keep an even keel. To choose to see the good in a situation. To steady our nerves. To ignore what disturbs or limits others. To place things in perspective. To revert to the present moment. To focus on what can be controlled”. - Ryan Holiday, The Obstacle is The Way
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And you need not think that you will have God's word and gifts forever because your ingratitude and contempt will not make them stay. So seize and hold fast, wherever you can, whenever you can, to God's word and gifts because those who don't will soon discover that God has taken away even the little that they have.
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An old man was doing his daily walk along the beach one morning, when he spotted a young boy crouched by the water, scooping something up from the sand and throwing it into the sea.
The beach was normally empty at this time of day, and so the old man stopped to watch for a while.
He noticed that the boy kept on shuffling a little further down the beach, then repeating this same action again and again – stopping, scooping, throwing, moving.
“What are you doing there, boy?” the old man asked, walking closer.
“I’m saving these starfish that are stranded” replied the boy, “if they stay on the beach they will dry out and die, so I’m putting them back into the ocean so they can live.”
The old man was silent for a few seconds.
“Young man” he said, “on this stretch of beach alone, there must be more than one hundred stranded starfish. Around the next corner, there must be at least one thousand more. This goes on for miles and miles and miles – I’ve done this walk every day for 10 years, and it’s always the same. There must be millions of stranded starfish! I hate to say it, but you’ll never make a difference.”
The boy replied “well I just made a difference for that one”, and continued with his work.
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There's only one thing, one person, who makes you a Christian, and it's not you. It's Jesus Christ alone through the work of the Holy Spirit because the Father wants it. That's the only thing that translates sinners into Christ's kingdom.
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In this episode, I ruminate on what it's like to get old, and what that means for training and life.
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...without Jesus Christ, you would be right to revile God for evil. In that case, you should try to run out of this world and find some better god. But your mistake was to run to what you imagined was a god while the true God was coming into the world to end evil.
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When Christians confess together their belief in the forgiveness of sin, it's like pinching themselves to make sure that what they heard isn't a dream. Absolution seems somehow illicit, frightening, and joyful all at once. Can this be true? May God just forgive me? Can a word of promise accomplish what's promised? Is it right? Is it binding? Will it last? Is it legal? Is it even possible for the God who knows all things and counts the hairs on our heads to forget something, especially something as obvious as our selfishness?
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In his fictional world of Middle Earth, J.R.R. Tolkien has adapted old world ideologies by removing the parts he deemed to be un-Christian and in doing so created a warrior’s code for the new world.
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Deliver us from evil, we pray. That's what Jesus taught us to pray. But, in Greek, the petition in the Lord's Prayer is this: Deliver is from the evil one. Evil is not an abstract concept. It's not an outdated, old-fashioned idea like swinging a dead cat over your head to ward off evil. Evil is personified and personalized as the work of the evil one. The devil, Satan, the father of lies, the Prince of Darkness masquerading as an angel of light.
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For the Anglo-Saxons, a man’s value to society was dependent on his ability to take his place in the social order: to pledge unshakeable loyalty to his lord and in return for the lord to prove his value as a leader by rewarding loyal warriors with gifts and status. This transaction is what imbued a man with his “worth”, or weorð in Old English, and this was what constituted honor. The warrior class separated themselves from “ordinary” folk based on a sense of honor, defining themselves as the geweorðode or those “made worthy”.
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What you need redeeming from, deliverance from, is your slavery. You are in bondage. You are in a pickle. And I tell you, soberly, you are in a big pickle. In the end, there's no escape. But there is deliverance. There is redemption. There is a way for you to get into the wedding feast.
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“There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will.” – Epictetus, Discourses
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You have to remember, that in Jesus' day, there was a great fight going on. Who's the hero of the Bible? Who's the big kahuna in the Bible? Who's number one in the Bible? The two front runners were Abraham or Moses.
The big fight is finally about whether the Bible, the Old Testament as we call it, was finally about Moses or finally about Abraham. But, there was even a fight about why Abraham was so great. What makes him the father of us all, which is what this parable is all about, so that it is into his bosom you will be taken in heaven? Not Moses' bosom, but into Abraham's bosom. And that's where heaven actually is.
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Nihilism consists in an inability to find value and meaning in the higher aspects of this life and world. It empties the world and purpose of human existence. Nietzsche defines nihilism as: “the radical repudiation of value, meaning, and desirability” - Friedrich Nietzsche, Will to Power, Book I: European Nihilism
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Many techniques of meditation try to achieve the same results, but often they rely on a relatively passive way, involving the body only marginally. In this way, since relaxing becomes more mental effort ("Now I must relax") rather than a natural, physical process, they end up producing more paranoia than harmony. On the contrary, what martial arts point out is that individual harmony can only begin with one's body. - Daniele Bolelli, On The Warrior's Path
0112: Midweek Debrief - The Body As a Temple: https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/embed/episodes/0112-Midweek-Debrief---The-Body-As-a-Temple-e1j2f6v
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Is the Holy Spirit a what or who? Well, we have good news, he's a who. Usually, it's kind of hard to keep this straight because whenever we use the word spirit, we think of a what, a thing. So we say: I've got school spirit or something like that. Well, that's a thing. It's not necessarily an object. But, it's still a thing, and usually when you say you’ve got spirit or you’re spiritual, it means something you can feel like an emotion. But, here, at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit really is a person and we know that because of the way that the Holy Spirit has been given to us, which happens first in baptism: I baptize you in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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Rather than being confined to a separate dimension, martial arts should be an extension of our way of living, of our philosophies, of the way we educate our children, of the job we devote so much of our time to, of the relationships we cultivate, and of the choices we make every day. - Daniele Bolelli, On the Warrior's Path
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The real problem is that the Holy Spirit knows you have to get over your hate for Jesus. This is what actually has to happen to you. This is the comfort the Holy Spirit has to provide. And you will not have the comfort of a true and certain conscience until you know truly and certainly what Jesus Christ is actually saying to you...
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Rather than being confined to a separate dimension, martial arts should be an extension of our way of living, of our philosophies, of the way we educate our children, of the job we devote so much of our time to, of the relationships we cultivate, and of the choices we make every day. - Daniele Bolelli, On the Warrior's Path
Book Link: https://www.amazon.com/Warriors-Path-Second-Philosophy-Mythology/dp/158394219X
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What is that Name? The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And where did you first receive this Name? In baptism when you were baptized into the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That means you take this Name and use it. In the midst of tribulation you call upon the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit who are not righteous by the law and award, but are righteous according to mercy, which pours out of them in love and gives you the Name.
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...when any martial art shifts its intent and focus from the reality of combat to the requirements of success in a game, it becomes watered down to become only a shadow of its former self; indeed, the notion that success in competition can be equated to success in an actual armed encounter, is, at best, delusional. - Ben Miller, The Best Defense is a Good Offense... Really?
Article Link: https://outofthiscentury.wordpress.com/2016/03/14/the-best-defense-is-a-good-offense-really/
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That's why God never asked if you wanted to be confirmed. Such a question would be inappropriate. This is not for you to decide. You're a sinner after all. You can no more make a lifelong commitment to God than you can make a commitment today to your future wedding plans, what kind of a career you will choose, or what kind of a grandparent you will be. It's all by God's grace and mercy that you are confirmed in baptism and brought here today to confess before witnesses that, yes, for Christ's sake, God is good to you, keeps his promise to be your God, and holds you in his grace and mercy all the days of your life.
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"...masters of the past have warned against attempting to overcome an adversary through fury, passion, and aggression. For instance, in an addendum to Johann Liechtenauer’s Recital on the Longsword, a medieval author notes that a person who fences “wittily and without all wrath” will “seldom lose.” - Ben Miller
https://outofthiscentury.wordpress.com/2016/03/14/the-best-defense-is-a-good-offense-really/
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So what does it mean for you now, who lives after the end? It means that the answer you have to give to all the books and all the people who are trying to project through the signs: When is the end going to come? When is the end going to come? And you have to say: I'm sorry to tell you this. You've missed it. It's already gone. It's already passed. And you failed. You flunked. You did not get prepared. You did not have oil in your lamp. You thought you could get ready for this, but you're not ready for this.
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...the idea of “emphasizing offense over defense” becomes extremely problematic when applied to the martial arts, or to individual armed combat. Except in the rarest of cases, the human individual, as a holistic being, does not have the luxury of sacrificing a limb or a major organ in the pursuit of victory—that is, if they wish to maintain the ability to defend themselves, and to be of full service to their family, to their nation, to humanity, and to themselves. - Ben Miller
Article Link: https://outofthiscentury.wordpress.com/2016/03/14/the-best-defense-is-a-good-offense-really/
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I'm going to lay down my life. When the wolf comes, the wolf is coming for me instead of you. I'm actually going to stand there and take it. When I say I'm going to lay it down and pick it up, I'm now telling you what it means for me to know you, how well I know you, and how I've chosen to never unlink myself from you. So when you ask: Am I a good sheep, I'm going to tell you again: I took it all for you. When I lay down my life I do it with all your sin on me. I do it because I know you. And by this, you will know me: I call you by name. That's the word that's going to be in your ear, not: What have you done? So when I pick up my life, I pick you up with me. I own you. Not as property, but I own you as someone who calls your name over and over again.
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By contrast, today, when the herd animal in Europe is the only one who attains and distributes honours, when "equality of rights" all too easily can get turned around into equality of wrongs - what I mean is into a common war against everything rare, strange, privileged, the higher man, the higher soul, the higher duty, the higher responsibility, the creative fullness of power and mastery - these days the sense of being noble, of willing to be for oneself, of being able to be different, of standing alone, and of having to live by one's own initiative - these are part of the idea "greatness," and the philosopher will reveal something of his own ideal if he proposes "The man who is to be the greatest is the one who can be the most solitary, the most hidden, the most deviant, the man beyond good and evil, lord of his virtues, a man lavishly endowed with will - this is simply what greatness is to be called: capable of being as much a totality as something multifaceted, as wide as it is full." And to ask the question again: today - is greatness possible? - Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good & Evil, 212.
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God gives himself in the for-youness of his body. God is found deep in the flesh. Why? To help dying you. Jesus' death saves only when it is preached for you. Otherwise, his cross casts a long shadow of judgment over history. But, when the cross is preached for you, Jesus comes to you now, awful and joyful.
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Just a few decades after Japan’s warrior class was abolished, U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt raved about a newly released book entitled Bushido: The Soul of Japan.He bought five dozen copies for family and friends. In the slim volume, which went on to become an international bestseller, author Nitobe Inazointerprets the samuraicode of behavior: how chivalrous men should act in their personal and professional lives.
Article Link: https://china.usc.edu/sites/default/files/forums/Samurai%20and%20the%20Bushido%20Code.pdf
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Behold, not the Son of David, but the Lamb of God. This is the new word, the second word, or Gospel, of John the Baptizer's sermon. When the Gospel arrives, whether on a donkey or in an over-packed U-Haul. Christ comes to speak a new word. From Christ's mouth comes an absolute promise: "Repent, and believe the Gospel."
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If you want to succeed in life, you have to be a good fighter. Why? Because you need to fight to achieve valuable things in life. While you could achieve some things without much effort, there is always a price to pay to get the valuable ones. They won't just come to you out of thin air.
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Perseus cautiously entered, crouching low to avoid the sloping roof, slimy green and dripping with water. The foul stench made his stomach heave. He crawled further in, peering ahead in the gloom. The distant snoring of the Gorgons, and the soft hissing of the snakes that crowned their heads, reached the anxious warrior. The air turned bitter, the cold stinging his body like a swarm of wasps. He crept silently on, using the shield to reflect the way ahead. Suddenly, he tripped on a rock and a low grunt of pain escaped his lips. He froze, listening, peering. What was that?
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How does one get dead people to worship God? How does one get dead people to give God his due, especially when they delude themselves that they're alive and going places? What would bring them in? What would church them, as we say today? What, after all, do the dead like to do?
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This book is meant to help you get ahead in life by realizing that you are not the same person, and that you shouldn’t let the past retard you from growing spiritually and emotionally. You have more control over your mind than you might think. Hopefully you are inspired by reading this book; 365 pages of thought-provoking suggestions are here to help you healthily revisit the past, to keep you focused on the rewarding present, and hopeful for a better tomorrow.
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What happens when Jesus comes revealing himself to faith for faith? Religious leaders and the crowd will consider him to be the scum of the earth. He speaks too boldly, too uniquely. His words expose, tear down, and annihilate everything that gets in the way of him reconciling sinners to himself. In the same way, Jesus' preachers are foolish in the world because in the end his preachers are garbage and scum, just as Jesus planned it.
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“The state is merely the modern pretence, a shield, a make-belief, a concept. In reality, the ancient war-god holds the sacrificial knife, for it is in war that the sheep are sacrificed…So instead of human representatives or a personal divine being, we now have the dark gods of the state…The old gods are coming to life again in a time when they should have been superseded long ago, and nobody can see it.” Carl Jung, Nietzsche’s Zarathustra
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No wonder so few of you actually want the raw, naked truth—getting to the truth about yourself, God, the world, good and evil, life and death is out of your hands. The truth God wants you to hear is the very thing you spend your days trying to avoid, just as you try to avoid a car accident or hail storm.
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“If the individual, overwhelmed by the sense of his own puniness and impotence, should feel that his life has lost its meaning…then he is already on the road to State slavery and, without knowing or wanting it, has become its proselyte.” Carl Jung, The Undiscovered Self
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The truth is, the kind of freedom Jesus offers is a burden that most Christians are simply unable to shoulder. But, what if it's not your burden to carry?
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While disciplined following of operating procedures is a powerful tool for development, excessive discipline can kill free thinking and creativity. Discipline is a guideline that must be married to acting with adaptability and common sense. Such freedom allows operating procedures to best support teams and their mission.
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Sin asks: WHAT is life all about? Answer: Surrounding myself with people and things that make me happy.
Faith asks: WHO is life all about? Answer: Jesus, because Jesus is Life.
He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He is the only Way that your eyes will ever be opened to see what is real and true, and what is a lie.
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How much risk is too much risk? Can a lack of aggressiveness sometimes be an issue? How about being too aggressive? How easy is it to take the concept of “default: aggressive” too far? Why is it important to make sure you and those around you clearly understand the “why” of the task, the mission, and the roles and responsibilities of those involved?
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Mayhew distinguishes between the moral duty of the Christian to submit to lawful authority and the citizen’s duty toward “lawless, unreasonable” tyranny:
Those who resist a reasonable and just authority, which is agreeable to the will of God, do really resist the will of God himself; and will, therefore, be punished by him. But how does this prove, that those who resist a lawless, unreasonable power, which is contrary to the will of God, do therein resist the will and ordinance of God? - Eric Patterson, Jonathan Mayhew: Colonial Pastor against Tyranny
https://providencemag.com/2020/10/jonathan-mayhew-colonial-pastor-against-tyranny/
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The days are very dim and very dark. Satan is attempting to build hell on earth. His servants significantly outnumber God's children. They have all the world's money, power, and influence at their command. But, you have Christ, the one who has defeated sin, death, and hell. He has overcome the world.
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What does training “hard but smart” mean? What can individuals, groups, and teams do to promote effective, productive training? How does personal improvement fit in to training, and how can it produce good leaders? Can an individual or team be “too busy” to train? How can you train yourself and others when time and opportunities are limited? How can you ensure training is educational and not just a “test” of capabilities?
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“All-too-many are born: for the superfluous the state was invented.” Everything about the modern state was corrupt: education (“they steal the works of the inventors and the treasures of the sages for themselves”), the media (“they vomit their gall and call it a newspaper”), and most of all, politics. Nietzsche characterized politics as a mad rush for power, which squandered the talents of great men, who were forced to pander to the lowest common denominator.
Article Link: https://michaelkleen.com/2017/01/06/nietzsche-and-the-state-2/
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So then, how can Jesus' cross be the one thing you've waited for all your life? Can it be that in the cross God has found a way to stop you from chasing other hopes and dreams, bad lovers, little gods, and all? Has God found a way to plant you where you belong in this old, dying world? Is Christ's ugly cross the very thing that will finally get you to belt out the old blues song with Etta James: "At last, my love has come along"?
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Hungry, violent, lonely, godless: thus the lion-will wants itself. Free from the happiness of slaves, redeemed from gods and adorations, fearless and fear-inspiring, great and lonely: such is the will of the truthful. - Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra: Second Part
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God not only started and preserved the world's course by speaking, he also interrupted the world's course by speaking a new word. He does this without apology because he's angry and determined to change the course of what we've done to his creation. The interruption is decisive and final with the crucifixion of Jesus.
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The man of knowledge must not only love his enemies, he must also be able to hate his friends. One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil. And why do you not want to pluck at my wreath? You revere me; but what if your reverence tumbles one day? Beware lest a statue slay you. - Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra: First Part.
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Jesus alone is Lord over fear. Fear knows him as its master. Fear gives way to him alone. So look to Christ when you're afraid. Think of Christ. Keep him before your eyes. Call upon Christ and pray to him. Believe that he is with you now, helping you. Then fear will grow pale and fade away, and you will be free. Through your faith in this strong and living Savior, Jesus Christ, you're free of fear.
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If the Comanches were better known for cruelty and violence, that was because, as one of history's greatest warring peoples, they were in a position to inflict more pain than they received. - S.C. Gwynne, Empire of the Summer Moon
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Far too often, we think about eternal things only when they are thrust upon us. We are reactionary creatures. We foolishly trust that the fail-safes of our government and culture will save us. That is until we sense a real threat. Then our default reaction is to panic. Few people have the resolve to stand strong when the storms of life come. And those who try to stand without Christ are swept away in the floodwaters because their strength and resolve are built upon shifting sand. They prepared for temporary things. They did not prepare for the more important things that carry eternal significance.
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Though no one would be able to even estimate the date of his birth until many years later, it was mostly likely in 1848, making him twenty-three that year and eight years younger than Mackenzie, who was also so young that few people in Texas, Indian or white, knew much about him at the time. Both men achieved their fame only in the final, brutal Indian wars of the mid-1870s. Quanah was exceptionally young to be a chief. He was reputed to be ruthless, clever, and fearless in battle.
Excerpted fromEmpire of the Summer Moonby S.C. Gwynne.
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When the nation and its people are held captive by an oppressive, morally and spiritually bankrupt government and society, then Christians and their families must push as hard against the government and society as it pushes against them. That's how a marriage and family with Christ at its center lives.
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Though they did not know it at the time — the idea would have seemed preposterous — the sounding of "boots and saddle" that morning marked the beginning of the end of the Indian wars in America, of fully two hundred fifty years of bloody combat that had begun almost with the first landing of the first ship on the first fatal shore in Virginia. The final destruction of the last of the hostile tribes would not take place for a few more years. Time would be yet required to round them all up, or starve them out, or exterminate their sources of food, or run them to ground in shallow canyons, or kill them outright. - S. C. Gwynne, Empire of the Summer Moon
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In those moments, when you want to give up, and family and friends don't show up for you, and you're sure you don't have the strength to get up again, you're going to wish, you're even going to pray, that you could be un-baptized. No more sin or Satan. No more wrestling with temptations. No more asking God, "Why have you abandoned me?"
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The Church doesn’t need to search for the next, best, newest thing that will satisfy her until Jesus comes, because she is always given to by her Creator. She's given time and patience. The gifts of salvation are given to her to quiet and calm her fears. She's given life because her Savior speaks to her and serves her with absolute devotion.
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For those unfamiliar with the term, zugzwang is when you place your opponent in positions that force them into positionally or materially worse positions, irrespective of what move they choose. Each move leaves them worse for the ware until there is nothing left but the checkmate. - Adisa Banjoko
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Only in Christ does death equal victory and weakness equal strength. Long before Christ would say to his disciples, “Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:39), these children were already resting securely in the arms of their Savior, the infant child Jesus.
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Santa Claus. Santa Claus is a nice enough idea. A white-bearded, old man comes from the sky to reward good little children, but withholds his gifts from the naughty ones. That’s Santa in a nutshell. That’s not God, but it does describe Santa Claus. But that’s how most people envision God. They imagine that he's very much like Santa Claus. And like Santa, they also believe that God is a white-bearded, old man who comes from the sky to reward good people and punish the naughty ones. But, Jesus isn't Santa Claus. Not even close.
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The story about Jesus' birth, the true story, just wasn’t as nice as we make it out to be in children’s Christmas pageants. For example, in his Gospel, Luke gives a hint at the shame suffered by Joseph and Mary. He writes that there was “no room for them in the inn.” Now, despite the sweet-talking and all the hoop-jumping we go through to clean-up the story, the text doesn’t say there was no room. The text says there was no room for them. And this should cause us to do a little head-scratching.
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"He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby becomes a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee." - Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146.
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Every sin of every sinner. No one's sins are kept away from this Lamb who was slain but lives. And like John, you are witnesses. You are put on the stand to testify to your little corner of this world. You are witnesses to Jesus – proclaiming, preparing, focusing your preaching on pointing this dying, messed up, terrorized, sin-filled world to its Savior.
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Christianity is called the religion of pity. Pity stands opposed to the tonic emotions which heighten our vitality: it has a depressing effect. We are deprived of strength when we feel pity. That loss of strength which suffering as such inflicts on life is still further increased and multiplied by pity. Pity makes suffering contagious. - Friedrich Nietzsche, The Antichrist
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When your bones grow weak, Jesus still loves you. When the blood dries off your veins, Jesus still loves you. When your love slowly fades away from this earth and you are embraced by the dirt, Jesus still loves you. God's love is more than father, mother, friend, or anyone else could love you, even more than you are able to love yourself… because God is love and his promises to you are unbreakable, even into eternal life.
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Solzhenitsyn's audacious claim was that suffering had refined him, taught him to love. It was only there, out of the experience of intense suffering, that the prisoner began to understand the meaning of life and first began to sense the good inside himself.
*** Never eat chocolate covered espresso beans after drinking espresso, before recording a podcast - Donavon
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How many of you have become indifferent about God’s love because your expectations remain unmet? How often do you become disappointed and in your disappointment, break away from God’s love for you? Be honest. Don’t you do this whenever God doesn't meet your expectations? Isn't this your response when God doesn't give you the answer you want when you want it? Don't you stop caring about God’s love for you that's demonstrated in Christ Jesus because you're not seeing the good things he promises?
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“I don’t call it humble as much as I call it a very clear definition as to what ego is. The more confident I have become, the more in control or aware I am of my ego. Because I am so well prepared for physical confrontation, my ego is less confrontational. I feel less of a need to prove myself. The ego is everywhere. It is a beautiful thing, but most people don’t talk about it enough to even understand it.” - Ryron Gracie
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So listen now, before it's too late. "Blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit."
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The warrior ethos in the Lord of the Rings is about cultivating virtuous masculinity. It helps develop men who can protect, provide and procreate with an ethical, moral and competent ideological, theological and sociological ethos. The toxic kind of masculinity being lamented today is often a caricature of the worst of masculinity, unmoored from it’s virtuous center. - Eric Blauer
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God gave you a hunger at your baptism into Christ so that now, every gravy smeared plate, every wine stain on the couch, every pie crumb ground into the carpet incites you to give thanks for God’s gorgeous, fatherly heart made solid.
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*** Apologies. I was thinking about too many things at once and said this is the Banned Books Podcast, Midweek Debrief #89. I crossed the streams. If you're here for The Warrior Priest Podcast, you followed the right link. Enjoy!
Komaromi agrees that we have to start somewhere in our rebellion against contemporary atomization. The individual standing alone against the machine will be crushed.
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You are not to allow someone else to violate your body or the body of another person. You will not allow someone to violate the body of those who are weak, needy, fatherless, poor, and oppressed. You will not allow someone to be bullied, attacked, and harmed in their body. You have a biblical mandate to steward God's temple, your body. You have a command to steward the temple that God has given to other people too.
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The tarantulas, of course, would have it otherwise. “What justice means to us is precisely that the world be filled with the storms of our revenge”—thus they speak to each other. “We shall wreak vengeance and abuse on all whose equals we are not”—thus do the tarantula-hearts vow. “And ‘will to equality’ shall henceforth be the name for virtue; and against all that has power we want to raise our clamor!”
You preachers of equality, the tyrannomania of impotence clamors thus out of you for equality: your most secret ambitions to be tyrants thus shroud themselves in words of virtue. Aggrieved conceit, repressed envy—perhaps the conceit and envy of your fathers—erupt from you as a flame and as the frenzy of revenge.
Friedrich Nietzsche: On The Tarantulas
On The Tarantulas: http://www.michaelhoskinson.com/nietzsche-on-the-tarantulas/
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"[My father] believed that he was accountable before God, not before people. It didn't matter to him when other people didn't understand why the did the things he did. He acted in the sight of God. And you know, the Bible gave him strength because it is full of stories of the prophets and others going beyond the border of what was comprehensible or understandable to people, for the sake of obeying the Lord." - Marketa Benda
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The apostle Paul writes that the goal of the Christian life is: “That by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” That's your goal. That’s your Christian life. The resurrection of the dead, BY ANY MEANS POSSIBLE. Might that include taking certain earthly risks? Of course! Might that include giving up on temporary things so that you might be raised bodily from the dead? Of course!
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Marriage and family offers three gifts that are urgently needed for believers struggling within a totalitarian order. The first is the fruitful fellowship of love... the second gift is freedom... the third gift is the dignity of the individual within family fellowship.
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But, for now, we hear the Lamb’s voice in His Word: “Take, and eat. Take, and drink.” He is here. He’s brought all of heaven with Him. All the angels and archangels, and all the company of heaven. Here, in the Lord's Supper, is our heaven on earth. That’s because Jesus gives us access by his blood to Himself and to the Father who sits on the throne.
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It is up to us today to take up the challenge, to live not by lies and to speak the truth that defeats evil. How do we do this in a society built on lies? By accepting a life outside the mainstream, courageously defending the truth, and being willing to endure the consequences. These challenges are daunting, but we are blessed with examples from saints who've gone before.
Vaclav Havel, The Power of the Powerless: https://www.nonviolent-conflict.org/wp-content/uploads/1979/01/the-power-of-the-powerless.pdf
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Jesus is the true reformer, and the work of the Holy Spirit and God’s Word of forgiveness is the true Reformation, and like the Reformation of the 16th century, the work of Christ is not only a spiritual, but also a social, economic, cultural, scientific and political reformation.
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We have to throw away this crippling nostalgia for the future, especially the habit we Americans, a naturally optimistic people, have of assuming that everything will ultimately work out for the best.
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God's Word tells us that because we refuse to admit the truth, that we're all insane, that each of our worlds doesn't match God's reality, that our worlds don't match the reality of God and us revealed by Jesus, the truth about reality is a mystery to us.
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Everybody says that they have no choice but to conform... and to accept powerlessness. But that is a lie that gives all the other lies their malign force. The ordinary man may not be able to overturn the kingdom of lies, but he can at least say that he is not going to be its loyal subject.
https://www.amazon.com/Live-Not-Lies-Christian-Dissidents/dp/0593087399
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You're a loser. But, for Jesus, that means you're just the kind of person He wants sitting with him at his wedding feast. You don't deserve to be here, and that's exactly how God's grace works.
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Today's left-wing totalitarianism once again appeals to an internal hunger, specifically the hunger for a just society, one that vindicates and liberates the historical victims of oppression. It masquerades as kindness, demonizing dissenters and disfavored demographic groups to protect the feelings of "victims" in order to bring about "social justice."
Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents: https://www.amazon.com/Live-Not-Lies-Christian-Dissidents/dp/0593087399
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God created you to live together, in concrete, physical relationships, serving and sacrificing for the health and well-being of the person standing in front of you. God created you for communion. You're created and planted in the world by God to produce good fruit not fairy gold. Whether you're changing diapers, serving on the front line, harvesting wheat, responding to a car accident, or comforting a worried friend, that's what God has chosen for you to do with the life He's given to you and the lives he's entrusted to you.
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“You are not a king, my young friend. You are a conqueror.”
“Observe my kingdom,” Porus explained, “governed with wisdom and justice. The people prosper and are happy. The land flourishes and yields its bounty. Men are free to speak and to exercise their ambition.
Steven Pressfield's Blog: https://stevenpressfield.com/2020/12/warrior-episode-thirty-two/#transcript
Virtues of War: https://www.amazon.com/Virtues-War-Novel-Alexander-Great/dp/0553382055
The Afghan Campaign: https://www.amazon.com/Afghan-Campaign-Novel-Steven-Pressfield/dp/0767922387
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The forces of evil have Satan on their side. But, he only knows how to hate, threaten, and destroy what God creates. On our side, we have Jesus Christ, the Lord Almighty, the God of armies dressed for battle, who will crush the head of the ancient serpent. And, as the apostle writes, “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
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The unwise man thinks that he will live, if from fighting he flees; but the ails and aches of old age dog him though spears have spared him. - Havamal 16
https://www.amazon.com/Poetic-Edda-Lee-M-Hollander/dp/0292764995
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Forgiveness releases to God what rightly belongs to him. Since God is “the Judge of all the earth who will do what is right,” releasing to God's judgment the one who sinned against you places the offense in the purest context of judgment. Forgiving releases the grievance and the offender to God’s all-knowing perspective and to his justice and mercy. This honors Jesus by placing matters into His nail-pierced hands to uphold His judgment, as He chooses, in His time.
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“None but cowards give up an undertaking once begun,” answered Siegfried. “Go back to Rhineland yourself, if you are afraid; but you must go alone. You have brought me thus far to meet the dragon of the heath, to win the hoard of the swarthy elves, and to rid the world of a terrible evil. Before the setting of another sun, the deed which you have urged me to do will be done.”
Siegfried's Story: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/6866/6866-h/6866-h.htm
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God's Word and Spirit have created a humble heart in you so that you can overcome fear, live boldly for Christ, and lay down your life for Him because you know Jesus' final victory is at hand.
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Fear is not only debilitating, but its existence also destroys the cohesion of a command. It is the responsibility of a commander to identify the limits of courage, break the paralysis of fear, and motivate his soldiers to continue with the mission. Courage conquers fear. - Maj. Dick Winters
Conversations with Dick Winters: https://www.amazon.com/Conversations-Major-Dick-Winters-Commander/dp/0425271544
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Christ saves you through his body, the Church, because you're a member of his body. You are that hand or foot that Jesus can't live without, and that can't live without his life-blood.
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I don't think we'll get rid of schools anytime soon, certainly not in my lifetime, but if we're going to change what is rapidly becoming a disaster of ignorance, we need to realize that the school institution "schools" very well, but it does not "educate" - that's inherent in the design of the thing. It's not the fault of bad teachers or too little money spent, it's just impossible for education and schooling ever to be the same thing. - John Taylor Gatto
Why Schools Don't Educate by John Taylor Gatto: https://www.naturalchild.org/articles/guest/john_gatto.html
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Christ’s love for you is the mortar that binds you to each other and to God. Suffering is the proof test and the gift that leads to the resurrection to eternal life.
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“Condition for being a hero. If a man wants to become a hero, the snake must first become a dragon: otherwise he is lacking his proper enemy.” - Nietzsche, Human, all too Human
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The enemies of God are not coming to invite you to a picnic. Instead, they are mustering for battle. They will not come unprepared to fight and win. They're coming to take from you what God has given to you: your body, possessions, and life. They're coming to attack Jesus' faithfulness and love towards you. But you don't have to be afraid. You don't have to flee the battle. You have been dressed in the armor of God and handed the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God.
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“The poorest way to face life is to face it with a sneer. There are many men who feel a kind of twisted pride in cynicism; there are many who confine themselves to criticism of the way others do what they themselves dare not even attempt.” - Theodore Roosevelt
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As God said to Israel in the days of King Jehoshaphat, and announces to you again today, "You will not need to fight in this battle. Stand firm, hold your position, and see the salvation of the Lord on your behalf… Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed… go out against them, and the Lord will be with you.”
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My goal today is to create a form of jiu jitsu that will empower the entire person, both on and off the mat. If I can make a nervous person feel more relaxed than they've ever felt before, I'm changing them from within in a way that a psychiatrist or a pill never can. - Rickson Gracie, Breathe
Book Link: https://www.amazon.com/Breathe-Life-Flow-Rickson-Gracie/dp/0063018950
Rickson Gracie Interview on Jocko Podcast: https://youtu.be/mt_8doJ6M4k
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When we refuse to make war against evil, to expose those who tempt believers, then the evil grows more and more monstrous. But, throwing aside fear, the faithful are bold to proclaim their faith in the face of opposition and affliction. Then, those who wage war against the Church have a hard time destroying the Spirit's work.
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You must meditate, you must pray, you must be thankful, you must give. I think those things are very important spiritually for you to be at peace with yourself. Once you’ve tried to improve spiritually, physically, and mentally your are in a good way. - Rickson Gracie
Interview Link: https://www.bjjee.com/articles/rickson-gracie-on-using-the-principles-of-jiu-jitsu-to-live-your-life/
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Many churches today want to avoid the 800 pound gorilla in the room. They’re obedient to government and culture instead of Christ. They’re about works-righteousness instead of the Gospel. They’re obsessed with making the world a better place, even though that’s not the primary mission of the Church. Churches today are more worried about complying with the government and marching in step with culture than obeying God’s call for them to be conformed to the image of the Son.
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Men of Athens, will you send your sons to contest the monster, Philip? Or have you grown so fat and happy that you care not, and instead dispatch hired troops, who are not of our blood or kin? Will these mercenaries, who fight only for profit, possess the will to hold Philip back? Or will the day come when we awake to discover that we have ceded future liberty to current ease? - Demosthenes
The Warrior Ethos, by Steven Pressfield - https://www.amazon.com/Warrior-Ethos-Steven-Pressfield/dp/193689100X
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Government and religious leaders to this day still want you to believe that your safety and security comes from their power and authority. This is, of course, a lie that too many people blindly accept as truth. Christ, on the other hand, tells you that all power and authority is found in God alone.
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No matter how much it hurts keep going, because when you look back and realize that you could have given more it will be more agonizing then any pain you may have been feeling in those brief moments. - Kevin Ross
https://thesoulassassin.com/
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The only thing too old for jiu-jitsu is the question of whether or not you are too old for jiu-jitsu... - Chris Zahar
https://www.jiujitsutimes.com/four-reasons-to-stop-asking-if-you-are-too-old-for-jiu-jitsu/
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“Only great pain, the long, slow pain that takes its time... compels us to descend to our ultimate depths... I doubt that such pain makes us "better"; but I know it makes us more profound... In the end, lest what is most important remain unsaid: from such abysses, from such severe sickness, one returns newborn, having shed one's skin... with merrier senses, with a second dangerous innocence in joy, more childlike and yet a hundred times subtler than one has ever been before." ― Friedrich Nietzsche,The Gay Science
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The more of us set out together, the thicker our ranks, the easier and shorter will this path be for us all! If we become thousands—they will not cope, they will be unable to touch us. - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Essay Link: https://www.solzhenitsyncenter.org/live-not-by-lies
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We are approaching the brink; already a universal spiritual demise is upon us; a physical one is about to flare up and engulf us and our children, while we continue to smile sheepishly and babble:
“But what can we do to stop it? We haven’t the strength.” - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Link to essay: https://www.solzhenitsyncenter.org/live-not-by-lies
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One of a fighter’s greatest and most difficult tasks is dealing with fear. I always get nervous before fights and at the beginning of my fight career I rejected... - Sylvie von Duuglas-Ittu
https://8limbsus.com/muay-thai-thailand/fighters-fear-like-feathers-stroking-face-how-to-accept-it
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Winners are not created in a vacuum, after all. There are countless variables operating, most of which go unnoticed by the viewer. Of these factors, the value of losing is perhaps most often overlooked.
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1974900-mma-psychology-the-psychology-of-losing-in-mixed-martial-arts
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"...this is exactly the most pitiful aspect of tyranny. It is impossible to let go of it.”
Hiero, or "The Tyrant" - A Discourse on Despotic Rule, by Xenophon: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1175/1175-h/1175-h.htm
Anabasis, by Xenophon: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1170/1170-h/1170-h.htm
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Because every once in a while, somebody brings me my lunch tray and my meds and he has a black eye or his forehead is swollen with stitches, and he says: "We miss you Mr. Durden."
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It should be a furnace in which steel is forged. Ideally, it’s also a family to celebrate with.
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“We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.” Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
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How is freedom measured in individuals and peoples? According to the resistance which must be overcome, according to the exertion required, to remain on top. The highest type of free men should be sought where the highest resistance is constantly overcome: five steps from tyranny, close to the threshold of the danger of servitude. - Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
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The idea is to take some Joe on the street who's never been in a fight and recruit him. Let him experience winning for the first time in his life. Get him to explode. Give him permission to beat the crap out of you. You can take it. If you win, you screwed up.
Nietzsche’s nightmare – the rise of the untermensch, a world ruled by mediocrity:https://angrytunbridgewells.com/2015/04/01/nietzsches-nightmare-the-rise-of-the-untermensch-a-world-ruled-by-mediocrity/
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Let us beware of waking the dead and disturbing these living coffins!
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Trophies are placeholders, participation awards are pointless, and losses are lessons.
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The good news is... there's a new group, but the first rule about this new group is you aren't supposed to talk about it.
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The well-travelled know how slicing
sorrow can be by one’s side,
short a struggle-friend, however dear. - The Wanderer
https://oldenglishpoetry.camden.rutgers.edu/the-wanderer/
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"Open your eyes," Tyler says, and his face is shining with tears. "Congratulations," Tyler says, "You're a step closer to hitting bottom."
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How much respect has a noble person for his enemies! And such respect is already a bridge to love. After all, he demands his enemy for himself, as his distinction; he can stand no enemy but one in whom there is nothing to be despised and much to be honored. - Friedrich Nietzsche
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"Maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves." - Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
https://www.amazon.com/Fight-Club-Novel-Chuck-Palahniuk
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Things aren’t always going to go your way and pay off. All I am saying is with the right thought patterns you can put yourself in the best frame of mind leading up to a fight. This stuff can be applied to any aspect of your life! - Ellis Barboza
https://www.muaythaimagic.com/training/mindset/5-steps-to-develop-unstoppable-mental-toughness-for-muay-thai
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Today, the New Normals are presenting us with a “choice,” (a) conform to their New Normal ideology or (b) social segregation. What do you imagine they have planned for us tomorrow?
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Then you're trapped in your lovely nest, and the things you used to own, now they own you.
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"I am that which must always be overcome." - Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Second Part
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It's easy to cry when you realize that everyone you love will reject you or die. On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone will drop to zero. - Chuck Palanhiuk
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And if you cannot be saints of knowledge, at least be its warriors. They are the companions and forerunners of such sainthood. - Friedrich Nietzsche
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We teach that to effectively execute this technique, students must first take stock of their own shortcomings, and "cut away" selfish desires, pride, and wickedness.
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How to achieve balance in training and life, and enjoying living in the tension between humility and ego.
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“Man has had to fight for every atom of the truth, and has had to pay for it almost everything that the heart, that human love, that human trust cling to. Greatness of soul is needed for this business: the service of truth is the hardest of all services.” – Friedrich Nietzsche, The Antichrist
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“To call the taming of an animal its “improvement” is in our ears almost a joke. Whoever knows what goes on in menageries is doubtful whether the beasts in them are “improved”. They are weakened, they are made less harmful, they become sickly beasts through the depressive emotion of fear, through pain, through injuries, through hunger. – It is no different with the tamed human being…” - Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
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Christianity without Bushido is morally deficient...
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A noble type of man and woman is not subject to the morality of the herd. Herd morality favors mediocrity. Therefore, standing beyond good and evil is rising above the herd.
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Bushido is the path to pursue justice as one who is thirsty pursues water...
https://www.amazon.com/Bushido-Soul-Japan-Inazo-Nitobe/dp/1534793844
https://www.amazon.com/Bushido-Christianity-Rev-Takemi-Sasamori/dp/1533476675
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The earth has become small, and on it hops the last man, who makes everything small.
The Last Man is an individual or a collective that partakes in a path of decay and feels perfectly comfortable in doing so, to the point where any opposition to this feeling on the part of another person makes that individual fit for "the madhouse."
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The mere pursuit of material wealth is meaningless, and that one should live a life based on spiritual values and faith.
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Self improvement is self destruction...
“Let the youthful soul look back on life with the question: what have you truly loved up to now, what has elevated your soul, what has mastered it and at the same time delighted it? Place these venerated objects before you in a row, and perhaps they will yield for you, through their nature and their sequence, a law, the fundamental law of your true self…for your true nature lies, not hidden deep within you, but immeasurably high above you, or at least above that which you normally take to be yourself.” - Untimely Meditations, Friedrich Nietzsche
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Is Christianity compatible with the martial arts and the ancient samurai code of Bushido? The Reverend Sasamori Takemi, Methodist minister and pastor of the Komaba Eden Church in Tokyo, Japan and inheritor of three ancient martial arts traditions, unequivocally answers: "Yes!" In Bushido and Christianity, the Rev. Sasamori weaves together elements Japanese history, lessons from the Bible, and his own personal experiences growing up in a samurai family to trace where Bushido, the martial arts, and Christianity intersect and shows how following these 'Ways' can lead to a more fulfilling life. The Rev. Sasmori has over forty years experience as a pastor and over seventy years of training in traditional Japanese martial arts. He is regularly featured in the media in Japan and is a sought-after lecturer on the connection between Bushido and Christianity worldwide. His life's mission has been to bridge the cultural divide between East and West.
https://www.amazon.com/Bushido-Christianity-Rev-Takemi-Sasamori/dp/1533476675
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“A man’s maturity is to have regained the innocence of a child at play.” - Friedrich Nietzsche
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If you want to change the world, don't back down from the sharks.
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“…how ready they themselves are at bottom to make one pay; how they crave to be hangmen. There is among them an abundance of the vengeful disguised as judges, who constantly bear the word “justice” in their mouths like poisonous spittle, always with pursed lips, always ready to spit upon all who are not discontented but go their own way in good spirits…The will of the weak to represent some form of superiority, their instinct for devious paths to tyranny over the healthy – where can it not be discovered, this will to power of the weakest!”
Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality
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None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.
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What does it mean to focus on fundamentals as a martial artist, citizen, in our vocations, and for ourselves?
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It's always hard to understand things while we are in the middle of them. It's only when we look back that these things become clear, if ever. Just hold onto God, know that whatever you are going through He can help you through it. He can use it for your benefit as well as others, just have faith.
Kevin Ross' website: https://thesoulassassin.com
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“You don't want to be in a place where there's no challenge. You might even quit your job if there's no challenge. Say, 'Well, that's a good job. It gives you security,' and you think, 'God, I can't stand this. It's eating away at my soul. It's all security and no challenge.' So why do you want a challenge? Because that's what you're built for. You're built to take on a maximal load, right? Because that's what strengthens you, and you need to be strong because life is extraordinarily difficult.
"(Why is that?) Because the evil king is always whittling away at the structure of the state. And you have to be awake and sharp to stop that from happening so that you don't become corrupt. And so that your family doesn't become corrupt. And so that your state doesn't have to become corrupt. You have to have your eyes open, and your wits sharp, and your words at the ready. And you have to be educated. And you have to know about your history. And you have to know how to think. And you have to know how to read. And you have to know how to speak. And you have to know how to aim. And you have to be willing to hoist the troubles of the world up on your shoulders. And what's so interesting about that, so remarkable. And this is something that's really manifested itself to me as I've been doing these public lectures. I've been talking about responsibility to people, which doesn't seem to happen very often anymore, and the audiences are dead quiet. And I lay out this idea that life is tragedy tainted by malevolence, and everyone says, 'Yeah, well we already always suspected that, but no one has ever said it quite so bluntly, and it's quite a relief to hear that I'm not the only person who has those suspicions.'
"Then the second part of that is the better part, and it's the optimistic part, which is despite the fact that life is a tragedy tainted by malevolence, at every level of existence there's something about the human spirit that can thrive under precisely those conditions if we allow that to occur, because as difficult as life is – and as horrible as we are – our capacity to deal with that catastrophe and to transcend that malevolent spirit is more powerful than that reality itself. And that's the fundamental issue. I think that's the fundamental issue of the Judeo-Christian ethic, with its emphasis on the divinity of the individual.
"As catastrophic as life is – and as malevolent as people can be, and that's malevolent beyond belief – fundamentally, a person has, in spirit, the nobility to set that right and to defeat evil. And that more than that the antidote to the catastrophe of life, and the suffering of life, and the tragedy of life that can drive you down and destroy you, is to take on exactly that responsibility, and to say, 'Well, there's plenty of work to be done, and isn't that terrible?
"There isn't anything so bad that we can't make it worse, but I have it within me to decide that I'm going to stand up against that. I'm going to strive to make the world a better place. I'm going to strive to constrain the malevolence that's in my own heart, and to set my family straight, and to work despite my tragic lot for the betterment of everything that's in front of me.' And the consequence of that – the immediate consequence of that – is that when you make the decision to take on all of that voluntarily – which is to stand up straight, by the way, with your shoulders back – to take all that on voluntarily, as soon as you make that decision, then all the catastrophe justifies itself in the nobility of your striving. And that's what it means to be an individual.” - Jordan Peterson
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What are we willing to do, and suffer, for the sake of a hit of dopamine? What are the consequences of failure to distinguish concrete reality from virtual reality? What must we do to stop giving bullies our lunch money?
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Despite the fact that fighting is supposed to enable the men in Fight Club to rise beyond their innocuous existence, it in fact reinforces social order and power relations.
Fight Club & Nietzsche: Overcoming Emasculation: https://youtu.be/NpxHFNvlUmU
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How do we define family and friendship? What are the consequences when we don't have people we can call on when we're in trouble and need? How can we create and nurture relationships that strengthen, encourage, and empower others?
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Before we decide to go to war with the world, maybe we should take a hard look at ourselves...
https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/episodes/26-Steven-Pressfield---Selflessness-e9talg
https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/episodes/23-Steven-Pressfield---Tribes--Gangs-and-Terrorists-e9dltn
https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/episodes/24-Steven-Pressfield---Tribes--Gangs-and-Terrorists--part-2-e9j183
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The Great Reset, the morals of multi-national corporations, and the question, "Who's going to stand up and fight back against injustice?"
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Very often people will ask me about the effects of body type on jiu jitsu. It appears that many people hold the belief that there is an optimum body type in jiu jitsu that confers advantage over other body types. Even a moments reflection will reveal that this is false. A look at the medal platform at the world championships will always show a wide variety of body types which are represented in no particular order of success. If I ask you to name for me the five most successful jiu jitsu champions of all time, I guarantee your list will show big disparities in body type. There is no dominant body type on the medal stands. There is however, a dominant body ETHOS. Champions always maximize the ability of whatever body they have been born with to perform the skills of the sport. Whilst there is no one body type that dominates the sport, there is a need on everyone's part to maximize what you can do with your body that will improve your jiu jitsu performance. Everyone's body has an optimal weight and conditioning that maximizes its performance for a given activity. It is your duty to find what that is for you and to maintain yourself close to that ideal (getting closer if competition is near). Thus any body type can win a world championship, but only one way of maintaining that body of yours will maximize your ability to perform the skills you hope to win that championship with. Here are three EBI champions. All three are very different somatotypes - Garry Tonon is a classic mesomorph. Gordon Ryan an ectomorph and Eddie Cummings an endomorph masquerading as a mesomorph. Yet all three have found a way to maximize their very different bodies to perform the skills they needed to win. Thus any body type can win a world championship, but only one way of maintaining it will maximize your chances of doing so. - John Danaher, Body type and BJJ.
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When times are troubling, when people abandon us, and when we struggle to move through hardships, is there anything to be thankful for?
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The foundation of a Nabeshima samurai should be in knowing this fact; in being deeply resolved to return this blessing by being useful; in serving more and more selflessly when treated kindly by the master ; in knowing that being made a ronin or being ordered to commit seppuku are also forms of service ; and in aiming to be mindful of the clan forever, whether one is banished deep in the mountains or buried under the earth. - Yamamoto Tsunetomo, Hagakure: Book of the Samurai
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“Politics becomes even more of a magnet for self-aggrandizing sociopaths and liars than it already tends to be by nature, and men with no meaningful political power or authority waste their time and energy trying to convince complete strangers to convert to their way of thinking, even when those strangers have different group identities, different religious beliefs, and completely incompatible or opposing ideas about what is good or “best in life.”
― Jack Donovan,Becoming a Barbarian
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Meditation on inevitable death should be performed daily. Every day when one’s body and mind are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand-foot cliffs, dying of disease or committing seppuku at the death of one’s master. And every day without fail one should consider himself as dead.
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The Empire sells superficial identities that are fleeting, synthetic, empty and unsatisfying. In a world of single, spoiled boys who have been able to walk away from any commitment or association — lifetime brotherhood is a radical idea. Collective honor is a radical idea. Working to help people you know and care about instead of strangers is a radical idea.
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“You must retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties. AND at the same time…You must confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.” U.S. Navy Vice Admiral James B. Stockdale, originator of the Stockdale Paradox
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The man who shuts himself away and avoids the company of men is a coward...
Hagakure online: http://3yryua3n3eu3i4gih2iopzph.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/pdf/hagakure.pdf
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Ancient societies gave the highest status to their heroes. Our society gives the highest status to victims. How did we get here? What defines a hero, what defines a victim, and why is the latter more popular today than ever?
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To be prideful about your strength while your mettle is not yet established is likely to bring you shame in the midst of people. You are weaker than you look.
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A noble man should be silent, thoughtful, and bold in battle - Havamal 15
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Kyuzaemon has always been a severe man, and even if I were cleared by the investigators, he would probably have me executed as a coward right before his eyes. In such a case, dying with the bad reputation of having run away from a place would be extremely regretful.
The Hagakure: http://3yryua3n3eu3i4gih2iopzph.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/pdf/hagakure.pdf
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What do we do every day to prepare for the next challenge or crisis? How does our preparation help us to not be overwhelmed when the moment comes that we need to react to things out of our control?
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What is called winning is defeating one’s allies. Defeating one’s allies is defeating oneself, and defeating oneself is vigorously overcoming one’s own body.
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Do we understand what true love is? Are we willing to do whatever is necessary to love someone for their good?
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It is good to breathe these things into their ears even when they are too young to understand.
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Why You Want Cops to Have a Warrior’s Mindset
by Ayman Kafel
Over the past several years, the term “warrior” has been used, labeled, demonized, idolized, and applied to all kinds of professions. These days when someone mentions the word “warrior,” typically, it is synonymous with members of the military, sports figures, MMA, UFC, and others. The term “warrior” in the law enforcement community has been a taboo title. It went as far and removing the word completely from the culture and replaced with words like “guardian” and “sheepdog.”
In the law enforcement community, when the word “warrior” was used, it was referred to as a mindset. The warrior mindset. Political correctness demonized it in the profession and associated it as part of the “militarization” of police. Across the country, that word was wiped out from any curriculum at police academies. It meant that police officers were too aggressive for modern society, it meant police officers will only use lethal force, it meant police officers will think of themselves as above their fellow man.
The warrior mindset is far from that. The core beliefs of someone adopting the warrior mindset are discipline, respect, selfless service, honor, courage, and integrity.
A warrior mindset, at a deeper level, helps individuals realize the true enemy is not external forces but the internal. Weakness, fear, jealousy, greed, ego, laziness, and many other negative traits are recognized as the enemy of the warrior mindset. Miyamoto Musashi once said, “If you wish to control others you must control yourself.” Think about it, Musashi did not mean literally “control” people, he was referring to the idea of the “self.” To have a warrior mindset is to look inward and defeat those negative traits in our hearts to be an effective officer in the community.
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When the crime itself is unclear, the punishment should be light.
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**“The coward believes he will live forever
If he holds back in the battle,
But in old age he shall have no peace
Though spears have spared his limbs.”**
― Hávamál 16
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There is nothing felt quite so deeply as giri, but what is "giri" and what can it teach us about ourselves in the present?
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Every fighter faces total exhaustion in the ring someday. Instead of panicking and getting beat up, you can learn how to fight tired and box your way through exhaustion.
The sport of boxing is forever characterized by endurance and exhaustion. To ever be a good boxer, you will have to eventually face the challenge of fighting beyond your limits. Your body will be pushed beyond a point of exhaustion you never thought was possible. Spiritually, you must have the heart to dig deep inside yourself and find energy you no longer have. Technically, you must find ways to fight without exerting energy. If you can do this, you will have successfully learn how to fight when you are tired. - Johnny Nguyen
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Look at the human condition. It is unseemly for a per- son to become prideful and extravagant when things are going well. Therefore, it is better to have some unhappiness while one is still young, for if a person does not experience some bitter- ness, his disposition will not settle down. A person who becomes fatigued when unhappy is useless.
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The voice tells us not to work today and it gives us a reason. Our daughter’s dance recital starts at seven; this headache is killing us; the boss wants us to organize the Penske file.
This is not self-talk, it’s self-sabotage.
https://wordpress.com/block-editor/post/thewarriorpriestpodcast.wordpress.com/615
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Hagakure is the essential book of the Samurai. Written by Yamamoto Tsunetomo... These philosophies are centered on loyalty, devotion, purity and selflessness, and Yamamoto places a strong emphasis on the notion of living in the present moment with a strong and clear mind.
Hagakure Link: http://3yryua3n3eu3i4gih2iopzph.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/pdf/hagakure.pdf
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Where did the Warrior Ethos come from? Why would anyone choose this hard, dangerous life? What could be the philosophy behind such a choice?
https://www.trngcmd.marines.mil/Portals/207/Docs/SOI-W/MCTB/Student-Resources/Reference-2_The_Warrior_Ethos.pdf?ver=2018-10-12-135250-303
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The United States is headed down a dangerous road. Without modern-day warriors, who will protect the people? Who will step up when the citizens need it?
https://havokjournal.com/law-enforcement/the-death-of-the-modern-day-warrior/
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The idea of killing "the enemy" appeals to some people, and is glorified in the entertainment industry in television, movies, and music. But, as horrifying as it is, is there a benefit in killing, or is it all bad?
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“Ours is not an age that wants heroes. Ours is an age of envy, in which laziness and self-involvement are the rule. Anyone who tries to shine, who dares to stand above the crowd, is dragged down by his lackluster and self-appointed “peers”.” - Robert Moore & Douglas Gillette, "King, Warrior, Magician, Lover"
https://academyofideas.com/2020/06/how-to-be-a-hero-psychology-of-heroism/
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Emotions have the power to set us in motion, often to our detriment, but it doesn't have to be that way. We can choose to control our emotions, rather than allowing our emotions to control us.
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How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight? - Tyler Durden
https://www.muaythaischolar.com/too-old-to-fight/
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In a battle, you meet many versions of yourself, some old some new. - Johnny B.A.N.G. Reilly
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Learn more about the tragic story of August Landmesser, the man who refused to salute Hitler.
Link: https://allthatsinteresting.com/august-landmesser
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Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Dylan Thomas, Do not go gentle into that good night
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January 22, 2020
TODAY MY GRATITUDE HAS PUSHED THROUGH MY FEARS
Today my gratitude has pushed through my fears, as a severely abused child fear of cruelty and threat to life is expected when life gets a little peaceful. My abusers were narcissist and these deformed people are never at peace and hate to see another in this elusive state they never seem to be able to attain. The jealousy drives them to disturb those immersed in the gratitude state, those emotionally crippled by thought insignificance scream at the constant insulting consciousness that taunts them, they are in perpetual agitation and grind their teeth psychologically with rage at their incarceration with no release date in sight.
My first abuser would attack me and beat me out of my enjoyment of enjoying my presence of being gifted to be alive and in balance with my balanced and well put together anatomy, grooming my mind. Always when the bruises calmed down their fire and lumps would shrink and lose their presence to my touch, would i hear her breath quicken with words of complaint for some small thing i over looked to keep tidy. The next thing i knew is the room would change its angles, i would see lights and things would smudge as if what was a painting is now vandalised, my eyes stopped working and then there was a familiar smell of my own blood. This bomb site i called my life, and it always happened when i was quiet.
FEAR was my soundtrack that did not let the better tuned emotions become my music. This emotion that made my muscles twitch, my jaw flex, and my fists clench, always kidnapped me when things were quiet, as soon as i acknowledged peace, anticipation of what usually happened next snapped me back into the paranoia that something painful was going to happen. Sometimes i would make it happen so i would not be surprised, but since the age of eight i have strived to enjoy a little peace and today at 55, my work is paying off. Gratitude pushes through all my bodies muscle memories and i feel all of me relax and give thanks, i give thanks for my muffling of angst.
https://johnnybangreilly.com/blogs/news/today-my-gratitude-has-pushed-through-my-fears
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We're not broken because we survived. We kept getting up. We hoped in the face of horror so that now we don't fear failure. We're challenged by it to grow.
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So before you jump to a conclusion and align with a side, take a step back. Put yourself in someone else’s shoes, think about these situations happening to you or someone that you love and care for. At the very least, it should give you a more balanced perspective on most situations.
Love, compassion and understanding will free us all.
https://thesoulassassin.com/blog/perspective
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Whether we’re striving for a new job, more meaningful relationships, or personal enlightenment, we need to actively want something more in order to live well. In fact, neuroscience shows that the act of seeking itself, rather than the goals we realize, is key to satisfaction. - Olivia Goldhill
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"As I’m driving, I’m listening to a singer, who is my favorite singer, who, I didn’t know him at all at the time, Peter Breinholt.
Right as I was approaching the first off-ramp that would lead me to a life of chasing down pedophiles and sex traffickers, and everything else, this song comes on, that, before this moment didn’t have much meaning to me, it wasn’t necessarily my favorite song that Peter Breinholt sang. It is called ‘Lullaby’. It tells the story of a parent figure who is talking to a child, who is having some kind of nightmare of something bad happening to them. The parent comes into the room, he soothes the child, and then what the parent keeps saying is “They won’t come around here no more, they won’t come around here no more…”, meaning these monsters, the nightmares. I thought “you know what, because of what we did, and, again, I didn’t do anything spectacular on this case, but because of our efforts, the monsters won’t come anymore to this little boy.” - Tim Ballard
https://ourrescue.org
https://www.amazon.com/Operation-Toussaint-Tim-Ballard/dp/B07MGZPRFR/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2NZZR2MIWXTGL&dchild=1&keywords=operation+toussaint&qid=1595112911&sprefix=operation+tou%2Caps%2C179&sr=8-1
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Does the average man or woman come across as a strong individual who is armed with the character traits to face up to the challenges of life, or to paraphrase the author Richard Weaver, does “the typical modern have the look of the hunted”? (Ideas Have Consequences)
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Just like a boxer with his fists, try to have your principles ready at all times.
Spotter up in-depth tactical solutions: http://spotterup.com
The Little Book of Stoicism, by Jonas Salzgeber: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MY2VFQD?ref_=k4w_oembed_ty69xO9VG5giEd&tag=kpembed-20&linkCode=kpd
*** I don't know why I blanked on it, but Marcus Aurelius ruled from 161-180.
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At that moment, I knew this is where I belonged - in an old, battered, run-down gym with a blood-splattered canvas covering an uneven boxing ring. This was now my home. - Billy Moore, A Prayer Before Dawn
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Men will find themselves judged, cursed, and crushed for their intelligence and honesty in a world of declining values, declining manliness, and declining desires for achieving a worthy place in the world.
Hell, even a dull hell awaits men without courage and a vision, or the objectivity to stand back and understand what every man must pursue. Critics will attempt to publicly injure risk takers and will ask how dare they.
Men should never stop trying to become fully developed persons. Attempting to truly live means men will also experience tremendous shocks to the soul, shocks that wound us severely. The delicate instrument of love will close off some of our injuries from further insult but we must have enough courage to see the operation through, and have enough to pursue the path of being alive! Wandering, questioning, doubting, unbelieving and believing, coming, going, dying and growing. We must never stop.
Michael Kurcina, We Fight Monsters
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We breed boys to be sheep and allow wolves to be shepherds, and if we don't right that wrong, we're going to have a nation of weak hearts when it's time to fight the heartless.
Michael Kurcina, We Fight Monsters
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“If you serve too many masters, you'll soon suffer.” ― Homer, The Odyssey
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When I open my mouth, am I complaining?
Does what someone does outside of my sphere of influence really matter to me, or am I being tricked into feeling a false sense of outrage?
If it really does matter to me, what steps have I actually taken to do something about it (besides posting articles on Facebook)?
Am I contributing to the conversation in a positive and helpful way?
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The lesson taught at this point by human experience is simply this, that the man who will get up will be helped up; and the man who will not get up will be allowed to stay down. This rule may appear somewhat harsh, but in its general application and operation, it is wise, just, and beneficent. I know of no other rule which can be substituted for it without bringing social chaos. Personal independence is a virtue and it is the soul out of which comes the sturdiest manhood. But there can be no independence without a large share of self-dependence, and this virtue cannot be bestowed. It must be developed from within.
http://monadnock.net/douglass/self-made-men.html
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Revolution: A political upheaval in a government or nation-state characterized by great change.
Rebel - A person who resists an established authority, often violently.
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“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”
Rudyard Kipling, Interview with an Immortal
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“You have to decide that you are going to be in control, that you are going to do what YOU want to do. Weakness doesn’t get a vote. Laziness doesn’t get a vote. Sadness doesn’t get a vote. Frustration doesn’t get a vote. NEGATIVITY doesn’t get a vote. ”
“You are declaring martial law on your mind: MIND CONTROL.”
https://youtu.be/q5SHjSnynzw
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Joseph Goebbels presents Nazi propaganda as the model for the rest of the world, calling it the “background music” to government policy because a modern state, whether democratic or authoritarian, cannot withstand the subterranean forces of anarchy and chaos without propaganda.
https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/goeb59.htm
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If you want to find a place of equity, where you're not judged by the color of your skin, gender, sexual orientation, political ideology, or religious belief, sign up for jiu-jitsu.
GoFundMe for 10th Planet BJJ - Long Beach: https://www.gofundme.com/f/rebuild-10p-long-beach?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link-tip&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet
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There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. “Love your enemies.”
https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/loving-your-enemies-sermon-delivered-dexter-avenue-baptist-church
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Why do people act against their best interests and consent to their enslavement?
...it has been common to assume that the masses are purely victims in their enslavement, unable to mount any form of resistance due to the threat of force wielded by those in power. In the 16th century, the French philosopher Etienne de La Boétie challenged this view in his essay The Discourse on Voluntary Servitude. All governments, he argued, including the most tyrannical, can only rule for extended durations if they have the general support of the populace. Not only are those in power vastly outnumbered by those over whom they rule, but governments rely on the subjugated populations to provide them with a continual supply of resources and manpower. If one day enough people refused to obey and stopped surrendering their wealth and property, their oppressors would, in the words of La Boétie, “become naked and undone and as nothing, just as, when the root receives no nourishment, the branch withers and dies.” (Étienne de La Boétie, The Discourse on Voluntary Servitude) Hence mass submission to even the most oppressive political regimes is always a voluntary servitude, one based on popular consent. As de La Boétie explains:
“Obviously there is no need of fighting to overcome this single tyrant, for he is automatically defeated if the country refuses consent to its own enslavement: it is not necessary to deprive him of anything, but simply to give him nothing; there is no need that the country make an effort to do anything for itself provided it does nothing against itself. It is therefore the inhabitants themselves who permit, or, rather, bring about, their own subjection, since by ceasing to submit they would put an end to their servitude. A people enslaves itself, cuts its own throat, when, having a choice between being vassals and being free men, it deserts its liberties and takes on the yoke, gives consent to its own misery, or, rather, apparently welcomes it.” (Étienne de La Boétie, The Discourse on Voluntary Servitude)
https://academyofideas.com/2018/03/how-we-enslave-ourselves/
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Why do we have a strong tendency to obey those in positions of power? Why do people obey commands that seem both bloodthirsty and stupid? Are those who in the face of corrupt power, who are willing to stand up and refuse virtuous, or villains?
https://academyofideas.com/2017/03/psychology-of-obedience/
https://youtu.be/OWMkmljltvo
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Brute force is not enough to maintain tyranny, rather a tyrannical regime will only maintain power if they can control the minds of their subjects.
https://academyofideas.com/2017/01/the-individual-vs-tyranny/
Previous podcast on Fear & Social Control: https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/episodes/45-Academy-of-Ideas---Fear--Social-Control-edrc0j
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When each person strives to outdo the other in devotion, the marriage is ideal and worthy of envy, for such a union is beautiful.
“In marriage, there must be complete companionship and concern for each other on the part of both husband and wife, in health and in sickness and at all times, because they entered upon the marriage for this reason as well as to produce offspring. When such caring for one another is perfect, and the married couple provides it for one another, and each strives to outdo the other, then this is marriage as it ought to be and deserving of emulation, since it is a noble union. But when one partner looks to his own interests alone and neglects the other's, or (by God) the other is so minded that he lives in the same house, but keeps his mind on what is outside it, and does not wish to pull together with his partner or to cooperate, then inevitably the union is destroyed, and although they live together their common interests fare badly, and either they finally get divorced from one another or they continue on in an existence that is worse than loneliness.”
Musonius Rufus
And, for those who don't know...
Gaius Musonius Rufus was a Roman Stoic philosopher during the reign of Nero. Rufus is considered the Roman Socrates and was the teacher of Epictetus.
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In our thinking, if we can recognize self-defeating thoughts as they come up, block them, and then respond with a productive counterpunch, we can avoid trouble and live a good life.
https://modernstoicism.com/the-epictetus-club-part-one/
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How can fear be used as a tool to manipulate others? How do those in positions of power, past, and present, effectively use fear to control certain aspects of society?
Transcript: https://academyofideas.com/2015/11/fear-and-social-control/
JP Sears, Awaken with JP: https://youtu.be/QcUAG6t5aN8
Academy of Ideas, Fear & Social Control: https://youtu.be/w_ybzC2wP7Q
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While so many people are eager to express, and act on, their fear and anxiety at this time, what about working to strengthen ourselves both inside and out? To build our toughness and resistance as much as possible?
http://www.thestoicmom.com/stoicism-parenting-and-modern-life/seeking-wisdom-in-a-pandemic
https://modernstoicism.com/a-roundup-of-resources-on-stoicism-and-covid-19/
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There is always a countermove, always a way through, a path is always there for those willing to look for it then take it.
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Who decides what's essential? Who are the arbiters of truth and morality? How long do we put the needs of the few before the needs of the many?
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In this episode of the podcast, Marcus Aurelius and Aesop on hatred and reconciliation.
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In this episode of the podcast, encouragement from Admiral William McRaven to never, ever quit.
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Donavon Riley reads Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and Aesop's Fables and discusses honesty and the friendship of wolves.
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The rotten pretense of the man who says, 'I prefer to be honest with you'! What are you on about, man! No need for this preface - the reality will show. It should be written on your forehead, immediately clear in the tone of your voice and the light of your eyes, just as the loved one can immediately read all in the glance of his lover. In short, the good and honest man should have the same effect as the unwashed - anyone close by as he passes detects the aura, willy-nilly, at once. Calculated honesty is a stiletto. There is nothing more degrading than the friendship of wolves: avoid that above all. The good, honest, kindly man has it in his eyes, and you cannot mistake him.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.15
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The wolves said to the dogs: 'Why, when you are so like us in all respects, don't we come to some brotherly understanding? For there is no difference between us except our ways of thinking. We live in freedom; you submit and are enslaved by man and endure his blows. You wear collars and you watch over their flocks, and when your masters eat, all they throw to you are some bones. But take our word for it, if you hand over the flocks to us we can all club together and gorge our appetites jointly.'
The dogs were sympathetic to this proposal, so the wolves, making their way inside the sheepfold, tore the dogs to pieces.
Aesop's Fables, "The Dogs Reconciled with the Wolves," or, "The Wolves and the Sheepdog"
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Donavon Riley reads Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and discusses how failing to exercise self-discipline can help us become better at self-discipline.
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Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Book 5
“At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: ‘I have to go to work—as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for—the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?
‘—But it’s nicer here…’
So you were born to feel ‘nice’? Instead of doing things and experiencing them? Don’t you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order, as best they can? And you’re not willing to do your job as a human being? Why aren’t you running to do what your nature demands?
‘—But we have to sleep sometime…’
Agreed. But nature set a limit on that—as it did on eating and drinking. And you’re over the limit. You’ve had more than enough of that. But not of working. There you’re still below your quota. You don’t love yourself enough. Or you’d love your nature too, and what it demands of you. People who love what they do wear themselves down doing it, they even forget to wash or eat.
Do you have less respect for your own nature than the engraver does for engraving, the dancer for dance, the miser for money or the social climber for status? When they’re really possessed by what they do, they’d rather stop eating and sleeping than give up practicing their arts.”
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and Aesop's fables. In this episode, what is the value in moderation?
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Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 3.6 If you find in human life anything better than justice, truth, temperance, fortitude, and, in a word, anything better than your own mind's self-satisfaction in the things which it enables you to do according to right reason, and in the condition that is assigned to you without your own choice—if, I say, you see anything better than this, turn to it with all your soul, and enjoy that which you have found to be the best.
But if nothing appears to be better than the deity which is planted in you, which has subjected to itself all your appetites, and carefully examines all the impressions, and, as Socrates said, has detached itself from the persuasions of sense, and has submitted itself to the gods, and cares for mankind—if you find everything else smaller and of less value than this, give place to nothing else, for if you do once diverge and incline to it, you will no longer without distraction be able to give the preference to that good thing which is your proper possession and your own.
For it is not right that anything of any other kind, such as praise from the many, or power, or enjoyment of pleasure, should come into competition with that which is rationally and politically or practically good. All these things, even though they may seem to adapt themselves to the better things in a small degree, obtain the superiority all at once, and carry us away.
But to you, I say, simply and freely choose the better, and hold to it. But that which is useful is the better. Well then, if it is useful to you as a rational being, keep to it. But if it is only useful to you like an animal, say so, and maintain your judgment without arrogance. Only take care that you make the inquiry by a sure method.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 3 (tr Long)
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The Dog & His Reflection A Dog, to whom the butcher had thrown a bone, was hurrying home with his prize as fast as he could go. As he crossed a narrow footbridge, he happened to look down and saw himself reflected in the quiet water as if in a mirror. But the greedy Dog thought he saw a real Dog carrying a bone much bigger than his own.
If he had stopped to think he would have known better. But instead of thinking, he dropped his bone and sprang at the Dog in the river, only to find himself swimming for dear life to reach the shore. At last, he managed to scramble out, and as he stood sadly thinking about the good bone he had lost, he realized what a stupid Dog he had been.
It is very foolish to be greedy.
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Donavon Riley reads a reflection by Mia Kang and discusses self-care, depression, and embracing life's dichotomies.
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Donavon Riley concludes his reading and discussion of Norman Maclean's book, Young Men and Fire: A True Story of the Mann Gulch Fire. In this episode, last thoughts and feelings, the end of time, and hope.
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Donavon Riley discusses the power of nostalgia and the importance of choosing the right heroes.
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Donavon Riley continues to read and discuss Norman Maclean's book, Young Men and Fire: A True Story of the Mann Gulch Fire. In this episode, we enter a different time zone, of art and truth.
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Donavon Riley discusses fear, adaption, and where to find comfort when we're panicked.
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Norman Maclean's book, Young Men and Fire: A True Story of The Man Gulch Fire. This episode, the nature of catastrophes, how we react to tragedy, and how we can respond to fear and panic.
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Richard Rolle's 14th-century poem:
The limbs that move, the eyes that see,
these are not entirely me;
Dead men and women helped to shape,
the mold that I do not escape;
The words I speak, the written line, these
are not uniquely mine.
For in my heart and in my will, old
ancestors are warring still,
Celt, Roman, Saxon and all the dead, from
whose rich blood my veins are fed,
In aspect, gesture, voices, tone, flesh of
my flesh, bone of my bone;
In fields they tilled, I plow the sod, I walk
the mountain paths they trod;
Around my daily steps arise - the good,
the bad - those I comprise.
by Richard Rolle c 1300 - 1349
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Donavon Riley discusses developing a competition mindset, the importance of sticking with a gameplan, and finding happiness [even] in defeat.
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Donavon Riley finishes reading and discussing the Epic of Gilgamesh. This episode, Gilgamesh confronts his own mortality. What can we learn from our mortality? How can it change us and our way of seeing others?
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses, "Are You Trapped by Modern Society," by Bjorn Andreas Bull-Hansen. Do you feel that you’re not living the life you want to live? The game is rigged and you are going to lose. But, what happens if you just leave?
https://bull-hansen.com/2016/02/26/are-you-trapped-by-modern-society-part-i/
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Donavon Riley continues to read and discuss the Epic of Gilgamesh. This episode, Gilgamesh suffers the death of Enkidu. How has the language of brotherhood, so prevalent in ancient cultures, all but disappeared from our relationships at present? How has not contemplating our mortality contributed to the devaluing of life? What is the purpose of our lives?
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses the Epic of Gilgamesh. This episode, Enkidu is seduced, Gilgamesh receives visions, and a friendship emerges from conflict.
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Donavon Riley discusses the consequences of embracing weakness and doubt and using failure to become mentally, physically, and emotionally stronger.
Kevin Ross on the Joe Rogan Podcast:
https://youtu.be/XiWYB_xTd9k
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses the Epic of Gilgamesh. This episode, we're introduced to Gilgamesh and Enkidu, civilization and savagery, and the world as it is versus the world as we want it.
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses an article by Marty Skovelund Jr., "The Philosophy of Inanimate Objects." Also, thoughts on upcoming episodes, moving from self to sacrifice, and what happens when we stop chasing after what everyone else wants.
https://gillespie.coffee
https://havokjournal.com/culture/the-philosophy-of-inanimate-objects/
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Donavon Riley discusses learning to manage fear in competition and what experience can teach us about expecting the worst, losing, and breaking through mental barriers.
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses philosopher and author, Sam Harris' reflection on his experience learning Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
https://samharris.org/the-pleasures-of-drowning/
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Leo Jenkin's article, "You're Not Entitled to Your Own Opinion." Is everyone entitled to their own opinions, regardless of the time and energy they've invested (or not) in forming their opinions? How does a sense of entitlement alter our opinions, and our self-identity?
https://havokjournal.com/culture/youre-not-entitled-to-your-own-opinion/
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Elizabeth Fagan's meditation on living the warrior's life. Are you showing you every day? Are you putting your heart into the work? Are you disciplined enough to do the things you don't want to do?
https://www.instagram.com/mselizabethfagan/
https://youtu.be/XiWYB_xTd9k
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Donavon Riley finishes reading and discussing Sebastian Junger's book, Tribe. This episode, what happens to people in a society that doesn't offer them the chance to act selflessly? How does a lack of connectedness contribute to peoples' selfish behaviors?
https://www.sebastianjunger.com/tribe-by-sebastian-junger
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Sean Fagen's meditation on fear, "The Only Thing That Scares Me Is A Complete Lack Of Fear." What is your relationship with fear? Do you allow it to control you? Or do you use it to your advantage?
https://www.instagram.com/seanfagan/
https://www.instagram.com/themuaythaiguy/
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Donavon Riley continues to read and discuss Sebastian Junger's book, Tribe. What would you risk dying for? What conversations and activities are necessary for the healthy functioning of a society? What is the beauty and the tragedy of the modern world?
https://www.sebastianjunger.com/tribe-by-sebastian-junger
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses a meditation from osulifestyle. What happens when we see resentment and hatred as a virus? Why do we not see forgiveness as real strength? What happens when we understand that forgiveness is a weapon that liberates us from resentment and hatred?
https://www.instagram.com/osulifestyle/
https://linktr.ee/osulifestyle
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Donavon Riley continues to read and discuss Sebastian Junger's book, Tribe. This episode, why do mental health issues, such as depression, increase as wealth grows? What are the social and psychological causes of suicide?
https://www.sebastianjunger.com/tribe-by-sebastian-junger
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Sebastian Junger's book, Tribe. How do we become adults in a society that doesn't ask for sacrifice? How do we become men and women in a world that doesn't require courage?
https://www.amazon.com/Tribe-Homecoming-Belonging-Sebastian-Junger/dp/1455566381
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses "Selflessness" from Steven Pressfield's book, The Warrior Ethos. What is the difference between living for one's self and living for a group? How can a selfless life benefit us, and more than that, how does it provide us with real wealth?
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In this episode, Donavon Riley reads and reflects in Scoti Domeij's article, The Gifts of Brokeness. This week, it's all about digging down to the roots of Christmas and finding joy in pain.
https://havokjournal.com/culture/family/the-gifts-of-brokenness/
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Donavon Riley continues to read and discuss Steven Pressfield's book, The Warrior Ethos. This week, more thoughts about tribes, gangs, and terrorists. What happens when we choose an enemy that we wouldn't consider worthy of our friendship given different circumstances? Why does adhering to a warrior ethic matter in our daily lives? How does compromising our morals (in order to combat the enemy) affect us?
https://stevenpressfield.com
https://www.amazon.com/Warrior-Ethos-Steven-Pressfield/dp/193689100X
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Steven Pressfield's book, The Warrior Ethos. This week, it's' all about tribes, gangs, and terrorists. What defines a tribe? Are we hardwired to think and behave tribally? What happens when "shadow tribalism" occurs within a tribe?
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Donavon Riley reads and discusses Ryan Holiday's book, The Obstacle Is The Way. This episode, what does it mean to practice objectivity, and why is it so important for us to distinguish between observations and perceptions?
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley discuss defeat, injuries, and what can be learned from losing a fight after Donavon's second major competition, and we catch up on Bill's physical therapy following injury and surgery.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read and discuss Miyamoto Musashi's "The Way of Walking Alone." At the end of his life, having hung up his swords and embraced pacifism, Musashi wrote down a summary of all his wisdom and experience in Dokkodo, The Way of Walking Alone. In theses 1-6, Winter and Riley discuss acceptance, desire, self-control, jealousy, and regret.
https://anchor.fm/dashboard/episode/e911hr
https://www.historyoffighting.com/miyamoto-musashi.php
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley wrap up their reading and discussion of Beowulf. This episode, Beowulf is an old man, but only he has the courage to fight the dragon. So, of course, we talk about courage but also mortality and what our choice of heroes say about us.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their reading and discussion of Beowulf. This episode, Beowulf helps us think about what happens when we get too comfortable and need to be rescued from our prosperity and from true evil.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their reading of Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney. This week, we meet Grendel and Beowulf. When times are good and evil attacks who will defend us?
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read Seamus Heaney's translation of the epic poem, Beowulf. This week, they get sidetracked talking about Shield Sheafson, examples worth following, and the problem with weak piety.
Beowulf translated and read by Seamus Heaney:
https://youtu.be/AaB0trCztM0
https://youtu.be/Zsxxg5P-DnY
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley wrap up their reading of James B. Stockdale's lecture on The Stoic Warrior's Triad. This week, they discuss good and evil, helping others, and why we can only be a victim of ourselves.
The Stoic Warrior's Triad: https://www.usna.edu/Ethics/_files/documents/stoicism1.pdf
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their discussion of The Stoic Warrior's Triad, by James B. Stockdale. This week, good and evil, fear and guilt, and the example of Pigeye.
The Stoic Warrior's Triad: https://www.usna.edu/Ethics/_files/documents/stoicism1.pdf
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their discussion of The Stoic Warrior's Triad, by James B. Stockdale. This week, good and evil, what's beyond our power, and our tragic addiction to external things.
The Stoic Warrior's Triad: https://www.usna.edu/Ethics/_files/documents/stoicism1.pdf
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their discussion of The Stoic Warrior's Triad, by James B. Stockdale. This week, we dive deep into why Stoic philosophy just works, what happens when Stoic philosophy and Christian theology are mixed together, and why the Stoics may have become so popular amongst moderns.
The Stoic Warrior's Triad: https://www.usna.edu/Ethics/_files/documents/stoicism1.pdf
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read and discuss Jame's B. Stockdale's paper, The Stoic Warrior's Triad. In episode one, Stockdale begins his discussion about how Stoicism helped him survive as a prisoner of war for seven and one-half years.
The Stoic Warrior's Triad: https://www.usna.edu/Ethics/_files/documents/stoicism1.pdf
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley discuss fear, honor, and shame after Donavon's first major competition and Bill's first week back on the mats.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read and discuss Inazo Nitobe's, "Bushido: The Soul of Japan." This episode, they talk about self control, discipline, and Riley goes on and on (again) about the Stoics.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their reading of Bushido: The Soul of Japan, by Inazo Nitobe. This week, they discuss honor, shame, and spend a lot of time on the Stoic understanding of moral dialogue.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue their discussion of Inazo Nitobe's "Bushido: The Soul of Japan." This week, what's the worth of courage in a society that doesn't consider it of much value? Also, what are the consequences for an individual and society when courage is used as a cover to justify evil?
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley continue to read and discuss Inazo Nitobe's "Bushido: The Soul of Japan." This week: What is righteousness? Why is doing one's duty for others important? How does holding to a code of ethics and living a life of discipline affect us for the better?
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In season two of The Warrior Priest Podcast, Bill Winters and Donavon Riley read Inazo Nitobe's "Bushido: The Soul of Japan." What is bushido? How can Nitobe's explanation of the "Military-Knight-Way" help us formulate our own code of ethics and morality. Also, what is the benefit of knowing that "to know and to act are one and the same"?
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley wrap up their reading of Cyrus the Great, by Xenophon. This week, they discuss the definition of courage, what courage has to do with influencing a person's character, and why there's no such thing as a neutral position in our lives.
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Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read and discuss The Warrior Ethos by Steven Pressfield and Cyrus the Great by Xenophon. The focus of their discussion this week is the question: What is love? What can we learn from a warrior culture about love and how can it improve our relationships today?
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This week, more from The Warrior Ethos by Steven Pressfield and Cyrus the Great by Xenophon. Bill Winter and Donavon Riley dig into the topic of honor and why it's so important to live honorably, with integrity, and develop a good character.
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In this episode, Bill Winter and Donavon Riley read and discuss The Warrior Ethos by Steven Pressfield and Cyrus the Great by Xenophon. The focus of their discussion is on how shame, honor, and love can help us enjoy a good life.
Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/donavon-riley/support