"JIN" Compassion
"Jin" Compassion. Virtue #7 of the "8 Virtues of Bushido"
"Through intense training and hard work the true warrior becomes quick and strong. They are not as most people. They develop a power that must be used for good. They have compassion. They help their fellow man at every opportunity.
Jin is a virtue that REALLY speaks to me because it was through my Martial Arts training that I have been able to develop more compassion for mankind, creature and planet. Allow me first to define "compassion" se we are crystal clear on my point.
"compassion" - sympathetic pity and concerns for the sufferings and misfortunes of others
The greatness that I developed for myself through Martial Arts training was done through discovering and facing my weaknesses and flaws. The same type of weaknesses and flaws that every living being has from the most innocent new born baby to a dying tree in a forest that no one visits. Training in the Martial Arts is a LIFE enlightenment of emotion and the thing that almost triples this heightened development of training in Martial Arts is...
...FIGHTING with Martial Arts!
My greatest experience with a true development of compassion was when I was about 20 years old. I was attacked from behind by a person with a weapon who struck me in the back of the head with intentions on killing me. Thank God his weapon had no affect on the "hard head" that my mother always told me I had. It cracked my head open and sent blood pouring down my face but other than that, all that it did was get my attention.
I turned to my attacker and "laid hands" on him. ...and elbows, and feet, and knees. He tried to fight back but my Martial Arts training and street fighting experience allowed me to easily disarm and beat him like he was a slow moving 8 year old kid. It didn't take much time for me to disarm and drop him like a sack of potatoes to the ground where he was at my mercy.
Note that this person was heavily affiliated and representation a mass of people who had been harassing and attacking me every since I was about 10 years old. I had been standing up to them since childhood and never backed down. However, I had yet gotten to take one of them out for good like I had always wanted to, and now was my chance. This "gangsta" had attacked me from behind with a weapon and now I was bleeding from the head. I had every LEGAL and MORALE right to six under this clown. And more importantly, I had the SKILL! I would FINALLY get to show that I was real in all that I did and was NEVER playing a f**cking game with any of them! It was time for him to go have a talk with God about his behavior on earth and I was arranging the meeting!
I prepared my mind to release a detailed collection of Martial Arts strikes that surely would close this dude's eyes for good while simultaneously taking revenge for the child in me. I drew back to deliver the first strike I looked down at him on the ground to sight my target area, but when I looked at him slumped over, I no longer saw a target. I could only see a person who was hurt and in need of help. He was no longer a threat to me. He was no longer running his mouth. He was no longer mean. All that I could see was the balled up and scared child that he probably used to be. Scared and in need of protection.... protection BY ME! ...FROM ME.
At this moment I could see that I was the monster now towering above the victim. In an instance all of the hate left my heart. All of the anger faded away. I no longer could see him one of "them". He was simply a person who I could either take advantage of and destroy, or reach out to save. What he had done no longer mattered. Only what I could and would do. So I decided to do what I wanted to do. And that was to spare him.
It was because of my expert Martial Arts ability and toughness that I was able to dominate my attacker so much, that my mind did not have to enter an emotional state of fear and panic that would have led me to kill my attacker. Instead, my abilities allowed me to calmly and easily dominate a person who was trying to kill me, and see his behavior as that of a stupid, defenseless child as I physically converted him into exactly that. I made a divine decision above even the law and morality which would have said I was perfectly ok to kill a man that day.
The development of true Martial Arts combat skills give us the power to exist on a heightened level when it comes to a fight with another being. Having this advantage to "easily beat down" another allows us to keep our mind at a logical and sensible state where it is normal to panic and/or "go crazy"! This allows us to think sensibly and feel other emotions besides hate and anger during stressed moments. It allows us to feel compassion.
To end this story I would like to point out that the man who attacked me from behind ended up becoming a respectable and friendly associate of mine who I can still talk to today. That is so much better than having his affiliates after me for the rest of my life. And it was an act of compassion that saved his life and bought me a lifetime of safety.
And THIS, ...is a "way" of "The Warrior's Edge"!
