Robert Mitchell Jr.

These are the Wrestling Dice (TM) that I used to create one of the drills in this week’s T.I. Get yours http://www.mitch.store

If you’re new in these parts, these weekly T.I.s support my martial arts programs — Cabal Fang (non-profit martial arts for personal development) and Bobcat Martial Arts (Frontier Rough ‘n’ Tumble martial arts).

Every month we pick a new martial focus and a new spiritual symbol (there are 12 of each) and that’s what these T.I.’s revolve around.  October ’20’s martial focus is wrestling, spiritual symbol is the Luminaries, and the monthly constitutional is as follows (previous months can be found here).

October 2020 Constitutional

Sit-out Push-ups (25)
Ploughs (25)
Pikes (25)
Neck Crunches (25 ea. direction)
Zombie Squats (50)
Bear Walks (100 yards)
Jackknifes (25)

Do all or part of the T.I. and post in the comments.  People who engage have been to get discount coupons for books and merch from Mitch’s General Store.  Now on with the show…

Grace: Martial Arts T.I. #228

• Warm-up thoroughly for at at least 8 minutes. Do 2-3 minutes each of (a) jumping rope (b) light calisthenics and (c) shadowboxing, forms, or light heavy bag work, or 8 minutes of MBF.
• 50 Sit-outs. If you know how to do both long and short Sit-outs, great — you’re intermediate or advanced.  Do 25 of each AFAYC.  If you’re a beginner, watch the video below and do 50 Short Sit-outs slowly and carefully.  Beginners remember — slow is smooth and smooth is fast, so start slow and and speed up only as you get smoother.
• 9 minutes on the floor bag.  Put a floor bag in the middle of your training space and set timer for 1 minute intervals.  Lock bag in Bottom Scissors AHAYC for 1 minute.  Then get into Side Control with the “head” of the bag on your right.  Hands out to the side — the floor is lava! — insert your L knee into opponents imaginary “guard” to take Top Saddle.  Then extract R foot with good form and go t0 Side Control with head of bag on your left.  Go back and forth for one minute. For the next minute, pop into Shin Ride, punch-punch, switch to other shin (or into Hamburger Ride) punch-punch, and repeat until timer beeps.  Keep going until you’ve done 3 sets of each.  If you liked this drill, get yourself some wrestling dice like the ones in the picture and create thousands more just like it on the fly.
• Practice moving through the world gracefully.   Embrace the idea of “grace” at its most philosophic and esoteric level, aiming for grace in thoughts, desires, actions and beliefs.  Strive for physical grace both on and off the mat, when performing martial techniques, putting away groceries, or walking the dog.  Be graceful in your thoughts, thinking through things with care rather than like a bull in a china shop.  Be graceful in your emotions, not giving yourself over to every craving and desire.  And be graceful in your spirit, recognizing that none of us is perfect and that patience, forgiveness and love are almost always the answer.  After all, it is only by the grace of God that we are here at all.  Moving through the world gracefully should be central to martial arts.  If it ain’t, you’re probably doing something wrong.
• The Luminaries.  This ancient symbol, like all the best ones, amounts to more than the some of its parts.  It reminds us that there are two primary lights — lights which can be understood intellectually, emotionally, scientifically, and mystically — and we get out of synch with them at our peril.  Intellectually there are two sides to every argument, and you must engage the other side with sincerity.  Emotionally we must remember that we are possessed of both a conscious and a subconscious, each illuminating the light and dark sides of ourselves.  Scientifically we cannot behave as if we are machines immune to the phases of nature.  Do you sleep all day, stay up all night, ignore your body’s needs for adequate sleep, sun on your skin, and so forth?  Do you even know what the current moon phase is?  Finally, and most importantly, we must see the luminaries mystically.   There are two lights — God, who lights up Heaven, and you, who light up the World.  You must be as much like God as you can, following His example and lighting up the World with all your might.
• Journal.  Meditate on these ideas and exercises and then write about what you did and thought in your journal.  If it ain’t in the training journal it didn’t happen!

TWO MARTIAL ARTS DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMS AVAILABLE. 100% free and operated through my non-profit, Cabal Fang is a martial arts for personal development, self-defense and fitness. If 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) — is more to your liking, check out Bobcat Frontier Martial Arts, my for-profit martial art project. Click either photo to get started today!