Category Archives: Mysticism

Not strong in body, mind, or spirit? 

Are you a keyboard warrior, an Apple adventurer, or a Samsung swashbuckler?

Not living out loud? 

Look, this is YOUR LIFE we’re talking about.  This is serious business. 

It’s a CRIME not to be the best you can be! 

So, never mind excuses — what’s your alibi? 

Your Alibis: Mettle Maker #261

• “What were doing when the accident occurred?”  To avoid injuries, warm-up thoroughly for at at least 8 minutes before you train. Do 2-3 minutes each of (a) jumping rope or footwork (b) light calisthenics and (c) shadowboxing, forms, light heavy bag work, or 8 minutes of MBF.  Here’s a fun MBF warm-up: 8 minutes of as low-intensity 4-rep sets of HSPU, Shots, Spike Sprawls, and Side Deadfalls.
• “Can you account for the whereabouts of your muscle mass?”   There’s no alibi for not getting stronger.  Pick up heavy objects on a regular basis and you will get stronger.  In 2020 I added 8.3 pounds of muscle — in just 12 months! — using just 3 lifts and 2 carries.  Here are pics of the 75 lb weights I made for farmer walks, to add to my redneck deadlift machine, etc.  Get there. For more tips on getting strong on a budget, buy my book Martial Grit.  Also available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, etc.
  

  $50 bucks worth of stuff from Home Depot: 4 buckets with lids and 6 bags of gravel

  

  My redneck deadlift machine with with two weights loaded.

  

  

  Two of the four finished “weights”

  

  Tamp down the gravel a few times during the process

  

  It takes about 1.6 bags of gravel to fill a bucket to 75 lbs
• “Can anyone corroborate the effectiveness of your technique?”  Do I have distance learning programs?  You bet!  But you can only so far.  Sooner or later you need a partner.  If you want a partner but you don’t have one, open up a new tab in your browser and go put a call-out on Facebook or what-have-you, run a Craigslist ad, or whatever, and get there.  What are you waiting for?
• 

  Laurel on Cold Mountain

  “When was the last time you had intimate contact with the Earth?”  The evidence is in — contact with the outdoors improves mental and physical health, increases attention span, moderates mood, fights depression, and more.  Does five minutes on lunch break help?  Is it good to park at the back of the lot and increase your walk time from the car into the grocery store?  Yes and yes.  But try getting out there for a few days — with the cell phone off — and you’ll thank me.  Get dirty!

• “Would you say that you’re on good terms with you-know-who?”  This month’s spiritual symbol is The Staff.  All characters history, myth and fiction who carry a staff — Moses, Aaron, Gandalf, Rafiki, Hermes, and so forth — are intermediaries between the Humanity and the Divine.   Are you carrying the staff?  Are you God’s mouthpiece to the world?  Are you ushering Love, Truth and Justice into the world?  Are you carrying the messages of humanity back to God in prayer?  If not, what are you going to do about it?

TWO MARTIAL ARTS DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMS AVAILABLE. 100% free and operated through my non-profit, Cabal Fang is martial arts for personal development, self-defense and fitness. Bobcat Frontier Martial Arts is just $19.99/month and that’s your choice if you’re interested in Frontier Rough ‘n’ Tumble — the fighting arts, survival skills, lifeways and ethos of the colonial and indigenous peoples of North American during the frontier period (1607 – 1912). What are you waiting for — enroll today!

Yes, I’m a member of the clergy and yes, my favorite film is Pulp Fiction.  Why?  Well, watch the video and find out.

Last week’s mettle maker was wrapped around the idea of “walking the earth” so if you find my Pulp Fiction video interested you and/or you’re intrigued by the symbolism of “walking the earth” here’s a re-post. 

Walk the Earth: Mettle Maker #260

• Before you train, warm-up thoroughly for at at least 8 minutes.  Do 2-3 minutes each of (a) jumping rope or footwork (b) light calisthenics and (c) shadowboxing, forms, light heavy bag work, or 8 minutes of MBF.  Here’s a fun MBF warm-up: 8 minutes of as low-intensity 4-rep sets of HSPU, Shots, Spike Sprawls, and Side Deadfalls.
• Farmer walks to the death.  I had been on a weightlifting plateau for a bit.  But when I took the advice of the legendary Dan John and expanded my heavy carries to include farmer walks (I’ve been doing Bearhug Carry for a couple of years — see below) all my numbers starting going up again.  Plateau broken!  Here’s a good Farmer Walk program:  Train every other day.  Start with a light weight.  Walk off 25 yards, rest 1 minute, walk 25 yards, rest 1 minute and then walk as far as you can (“to the death”).  Next session, add 5 lbs to each side.  When you get to a point where you can’t get 3 x 25 yards, de-load 10% and start the progression again.  Pro tip: Bend your knees when you pick up the weights, as if you’re deadlifting.
• Circumnavigate your opponent’s jab.  Try this jab counterpunch drill on your heavy bag.  Set timer for rounds of 3:00/1:00 and practice your L. Jab counters — just make sure you really imagine that hand coming at you.  Round 1: Slide inside to avoid opponent’s jab as you fire your own jab back at his nose.  Next iteration, Jab twice.  Next iteration after that, Jab thrice.  Then reset to 1 Jab and continue.  Assuming you’re a righty, you should be circling the bag in a clockwise direction.  Round 2: Slip outside and Jab to “the mark” (solar plexus), and come back with an Right Hook to the body and a Left Hook to the jaw.  Round 3:  Slip outside and Jab to “the mark” (solar plexus), then weave inside and fire a 1-2 to his nose.  If you’re still feeling chipper, switch stance and do all three rounds again with hands reversed.  If none of this makes sense, sounds like you could stand to take one of my classes or sign up for one of my distance learning programs (see below).
• Go on a wild plant walk.  Why?  So you can impress your friends and wow the ladies with your cool horticultural know-how, of course!  But mainly to build a connection with the world around you, to get out from in front of your laptop screen, and to maybe save yourself in a survival situation.  Get yourself a sturdy blank book (or make one out of paper grocery bags like I did) and start pasting in leaves and adding sketches.  You’ll know hundreds of species before you know it.  Get dirty!
  

  Cockspur Hawthorn a.k.a. Crataegus crus-galli

  

  Cockspur Hawthorn a.k.a. Crataegus crus-galli

  

  Wild rose — Rosa multiflora (East Asian invasive species)

  

  Here’s a shot of my plant ID book

• Walk the earth.  This month’s spiritual symbol is The Staff.  All of the figures from history, myth and fiction who carry a staff — Moses, Aaron from the Bible, Gandalf, Rafiki, Hermes with this caduceus, the Hermit card from your Tarot deck, and so forth — walk the earth with integrity, chastity, poverty and obedience.  Integrity is the condition that manifests when you are unified in your thoughts, desires, actions and beliefs.  Poverty is the state of putting material possessions, money, and worldly things at the bottom of your attention.  Chastity is the healthy ordering of your sexual desires.  Obedience is alignment of one’s entire being with Logos — the Divine Order of the Cosmos — or Christ.  And here’s the incredible thing: if you do those four things, nothing else matters.  Remember in Pulp Fiction when Jules says “I’m going to walk the earth” and Vincent says “you’re going to be a bum”?  Jules has seen and acknowledged a miracle, and he can’t go back.  He has apprehended the ultimate truth, which is simply this.  It doesn’t matter what you do, but rather how you do it.  

TWO MARTIAL ARTS DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMS AVAILABLE. 100% free and operated through my non-profit, Cabal Fang is martial arts for personal development, self-defense and fitness. Bobcat Frontier Martial Arts is just $19.99/month and that’s your choice if you’re interested in Frontier Rough ‘n’ Tumble — the fighting arts, survival skills, lifeways and ethos of the colonial and indigenous peoples of North American during the frontier period (1607 – 1912). What are you waiting for — enroll today!

No preamble this week kids, let’s dig in.

Walk the Earth: Mettle Maker #260

• Before you train, warm-up thoroughly for at at least 8 minutes.  Do 2-3 minutes each of (a) jumping rope or footwork (b) light calisthenics and (c) shadowboxing, forms, light heavy bag work, or 8 minutes of MBF.  Here’s a fun MBF warm-up: 8 minutes of as low-intensity 4-rep sets of HSPU, Shots, Spike Sprawls, and Side Deadfalls.
• Farmer walks to the death.  I had been on a weightlifting plateau for a bit.  But when I took the advice of the legendary Dan John and expanded my heavy carries to include farmer walks (I’ve been doing Bearhug Carry for a couple of years — see below) all my numbers starting going up again.  Plateau broken!  Here’s a good Farmer Walk program:  Train every other day.  Start with a light weight.  Walk off 25 yards, rest 1 minute, walk 25 yards, rest 1 minute and then walk as far as you can (“to the death”).  Next session, add 5 lbs to each side.  When you get to a point where you can’t get 3 x 25 yards, de-load 10% and start the progression again.  Pro tip: Bend your knees when you pick up the weights, as if you’re deadlifting.
• Circumnavigate your opponent’s jab.  Try this jab counterpunch drill on your heavy bag.  Set timer for rounds of 3:00/1:00 and practice your L. Jab counters — just make sure you really imagine that hand coming at you.  Round 1: Slide inside to avoid opponent’s jab as you fire your own jab back at his nose.  Next iteration, Jab twice.  Next iteration after that, Jab thrice.  Then reset to 1 Jab and continue.  Assuming you’re a righty, you should be circling the bag in a clockwise direction.  Round 2: Slip outside and Jab to “the mark” (solar plexus), and come back with an Right Hook to the body and a Left Hook to the jaw.  Round 3:  Slip outside and Jab to “the mark” (solar plexus), then weave inside and fire a 1-2 to his nose.  If you’re still feeling chipper, switch stance and do all three rounds again with hands reversed.  If none of this makes sense, sounds like you could stand to take one of my classes or sign up for one of my distance learning programs (see below).
• Go on a wild plant walk.  Why?  So you can impress your friends and wow the ladies with your cool horticultural know-how, of course!  But mainly to build a connection with the world around you, to get out from in front of your laptop screen, and to maybe save yourself in a survival situation.  Get yourself a sturdy blank book (or make one out of paper grocery bags like I did) and start pasting in leaves and adding sketches.  You’ll know hundreds of species before you know it.  Get dirty!
  

  Cockspur Hawthorn a.k.a. Crataegus crus-galli

  

  Cockspur Hawthorn a.k.a. Crataegus crus-galli

  

  Wild rose — Rosa multiflora (East Asian invasive species)

  

  Here’s a shot of my plant ID book

• Walk the earth.  This month’s spiritual symbol is The Staff.  All of the figures from history, myth and fiction who carry a staff — Moses, Aaron from the Bible, Gandalf, Rafiki, Hermes with this caduceus, the Hermit card from your Tarot deck, and so forth — walk the earth with integrity, chastity, poverty and obedience.  Integrity is the condition that manifests when you are unified in your thoughts, desires, actions and beliefs.  Poverty is the state of putting material possessions, money, and worldly things at the bottom of your attention.  Chastity is the healthy ordering of your sexual desires.  Obedience is alignment of one’s entire being with Logos — the Divine Order of the Cosmos — or Christ.  And here’s the incredible thing: if you do those four things, nothing else matters.  Remember in Pulp Fiction when Jules says “I’m going to walk the earth” and Vincent says “you’re going to be a bum”?  Jules has seen and acknowledged a miracle, and he can’t go back.  He has apprehended the ultimate truth, which is simply this.  It doesn’t matter what you do, but rather how you do it.  

TWO MARTIAL ARTS DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMS AVAILABLE. 100% free and operated through my non-profit, Cabal Fang is martial arts for personal development, self-defense and fitness. Bobcat Frontier Martial Arts is just $19.99/month and that’s your choice if you’re interested in Frontier Rough ‘n’ Tumble — the fighting arts, survival skills, lifeways and ethos of the colonial and indigenous peoples of North American during the frontier period (1607 – 1912). What are you waiting for — enroll today!