On The Beauty of Combat

Watching a technically masterful fighter is almost as much a pleasure as fighting a technically masterful fighter.

It may not seem graceful or complex or demanding or technical to the common observer, but if you know what needs to be done in training and what minute movements the body is making in that second, all just to apply perfect technique, to have perfect 'form', you appreciate it like almost nothing else in the world.

To put it in perspective, it is the fighter's equivalent of performing Beethoven's "Moonlight" Sonata, or performing Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake"; a thing of absolute and intricate beauty.

Add to this the fact that, unlike the vast majority of other types of performance art, some guy is actually trying to physically interrupt your performance with his own version of 'Kick To The Head in E minor', and perhaps you begin to understand the degree of admiration I have for such highly skilled fighters.

Like my father once said on the subject of the intricasies of good stand-up fighting, "It is a ballet of violence."