Kung Fu and Life: Content to Be Me

During the weeks leading up to Chinese New Year, I was noticing how people’s satisfaction ranged, ebbed and waned during all the training. It’s very interesting to see how people react when put through pressure, pressure to perform, pressure to produce, pressure to bring it up to the next level. I noticed that pressure brings out the best or the worst in all of us. Fortunately, most people that I’ve trained rise up to the occasion and are able to be triumphant over their own personal issues and self-doubt when put under pressure. Transformation of the self is something that we all want, but in truth, we cannot change ourselves to be something that we are not. Everyone has to learn how to become happy with what and who they are instead of wishing to be someone or something else. We can only make ourselves better versions of what we are. Everyone is born with different gifts and abilities, and sometimes it takes a long time for us to recognize what we have and to be happy with that.

It reminds me of a story that my teacher had related to me. A few weeks before Chinese New Year, we were practicing together, and I had said to him that I was content with what he was teaching me, and actually I didn’t need any more at the moment because I could only absorb so much. He said this reminded him of a story. When he was much younger, he had gone to visit an old master herbalist here in Chinatown who has now passed away, and they were talking about medicines and so on, and there was another gentleman in the herbal shop, and they started talking about what it takes to be happy. They said, 知足者常樂! To be content is to be happy. My Sifu said he didn’t quite get it at the time, but now looking back upon it many years later, he understands, and I’m trying to grasp the understanding of what happiness has to do with being content.

I see in a lot of people that what breeds unhappiness is people’s discontentment with what they are, as opposed to what they have. Having stuff, having toys and junk, the big car, the house, the trophy wife, the two and a half kids, the six figure bank account and so on, those are all fine and well and I wish them for everyone, but that will not bring happiness. Only being content with one’s inner self is happiness. Quite often in martial art training, you have people looking at other people and what they can do, what they have, what they’ve achieved and so on. That’s fine to gain inspiration and motivation to work harder. It’s another thing to be covetous or envious. Most of us don’t understand that, as I’ve stated before in other blogs, we are not created equal. I don’t want to offend the Constitution or anyone else. I am a patriot. But I truly feel that everyone is special and unique. Therefore, in order for you to be truly happy, you must understand that you are unique and special, and there’s no one else like you on god’s given earth. Even twins differ. Identical twins are not as identical as you may think. Their mindsets and looks are slightly different, even if minutely so. They are not carbon copies of each other. Even the carbon copy that you have deteriorates over time as you run it through the copy machine. No butt prints please. So this comes back to the question of what is true happiness and if we take this statement, 知足者常樂!, I think it really boils down to understanding the gifts that the individual has. Some people can run fast. Some people can jump high. Some people are incredibly strong and some are not. Some are tall, and some are short. Some have blue eyes, and others are green, and some are brown.

So, coming back to Chinese New Year, there are lots of lion dancing teams all over the world as well as here in Chinatown NYC, and they’re all awesome and they’re all great. Everybody puts on amazing shows with lots of effort and energy, and I applaud all of them and they are spectacular to watch. I myself, being slightly older and from a different generation, learned a very classical old school Fut Shan style of lion dancing which is fierce in nature, powerful, and utilizes the movements of your Kung Fu training to move and animate the lion. This is a much older method that many don’t play too much these days because of trends and other more acrobatic and dynamic types of performances. And I think it’s great, but I can’t do that kind of stuff. First of all, I’m not 90 pounds and 5 feet tall, so those type of movements don’t work for me. Even though they are inspirational in nature and awesome to watch, I’m still awe of them and applaud them. But I’m not envious and rather on the contrary, I’m very content with the old school style that I’ve learned, be it good or bad, because it is unique.

So in the context of Kung Fu, I see a lot of people that are not content with what and who they are and are always looking at their classmates or other stylists and hoping, wishing and wanting what someone else has. As I had mentioned before, for motivation and inspiration this is ok, but wouldn’t it be better to focus on the attributes that you have rather than chasing after what you don’t have? Because in all honesty, it’s not yours, just as yours is not theirs. In order for us to progress and be happy and make headway in our training, we must learn to be content with what we have. Because if not, eventually we run the risk of not only not being able to emulate what the other individual has, but ultimately losing what we have.

It’s important to be satisfied with what you have at the moment without losing sight of where you came from and how much effort it took from you and others involved in your progression, evolution and growth. Don’t lose sight of where you’re going, but maintain that satisfaction, that happiness that you do have something, and even though it may not be what you want, it’s better than what you had in the beginning, which was flat out zero. This is what students always forget. They can’t maintain their mentality; they can’t maintain their level of satisfaction; they can’t maintain their level of progressive growth. They can’t maintain the mindset that’s required. That’s a happy mindset, knowing that even though the efforts that you put in at this moment may not come to fruition immediately, they will eventually. Once you forget this, you’ve lost the entire investment that you’ve put into your training from day one. You’ve thrown it all away just because you’ve adopted that s*@!$y loser mindset. Are you a winner or are you a loser? The distinction is defined in the mind of the person.

The true test is being content with what you have and not looking left, looking right or looking behind and thinking about what you don’t have and what would make you happy. If you have to think about what would make you happy, then you don’t really have true happiness because you’re not content. True happiness is being content with what you have rather than chasing things that you don’t. That’s how you have to play your weapon, your form, your Kung Fu. This is how you learn the item. This is how you learn yourself. Be content practicing and being part of that process. The ten moves I learned from my Sifu the other day were moves I learned 20 plus years ago, and someone else would argue that I just keep doing the same thing. But for me, when I do it with my Sifu, everything is brand new again because it’s brought to another level. This is not only because of the skill but because of the individual’s contentedness with where they are as a person. You have to be psychologically happy with your place, your lot in life, which most people are not. Are you content to sit and do one or two or three movements? Are you content with the single cup of coffee and the egg tart or are you envious of the other guy across the room having the giant 72 ounce Texas steak with fries? If you don’t have the concept, that understanding of being content, then nothing will ever satisfy you. A lot of times when I go to see my teacher, we do absolutely nothing except sit there and stare at each other and make some small talk completely unrelated to martial arts and Kung Fu. Then other days, we turn the entire world topsy turvy and make everything old new again. I am and he is content, i.e. happy, with either side.

This is not to say you should be content with your bad habits. A lot of people may misconstrue what I’m saying. You have to be able to recognize what is right and what is wrong. You have to train yourself to see the difference. Otherwise, you always go back to your default. You have to reset the password so you don’t go back to who you were before, who was not a bad person but who is not the person that you’re supposed to be now. We have to send you to AA… A-holes Anonymous. You must strive on a daily basis to remove yourself from that, the gravitational pull of your default reaction, and adopt a new one. In order for you to become content and be happy, you have to recognize that what you were content about before was not necessarily right. It’s good to change the socks, because after a while they smell. You have to learn how to adapt and change. Don’t use saying that you are content to lie to yourself that you are really content with what you have when you’re really just placating your ego and sweeping the issue under the rug. My Sifu is always fond of saying to me, “Don’t lie to yourself. Do it right,” and I chant this to my class on a regular basis. What this means basically is doing the right job all the time, being meticulous, having the right focus when you’re practicing and executing your movements. Doing everything to the T with clear mental and physical definition and not letting yourself slide or being spoiled or saying, hey, that’s good enough. In that way, when we practice properly in the right mental state, we can reach a level of contentedness and/or happiness because we did the best job that we could at that moment in time, putting aside the fact that it could be better, faster or stronger. Being content and being complacent are not the same thing. You don’t have to say that you’re content. You just know from the inside out that you’ve done your work.

When you know that you’ve done your best and are not just giving it lip service, and you know that you put forth your best effort, you never have a regret. It’s horrible to live with regret, but a lot of people live there, at the cul de sac of Shoulda Woulda Coulda. I shoulda did it, I woulda did it, I coulda did it. That’s all called regret. You’re living with regret because you didn’t do it when you should have done it. Do everything 100% all the way. If not, you will regret losing the chance. Don’t lose the chance. Get out of that cul de sac and move to a better neighborhood. When you don’t do your best, when you don’t do things with the right attitude, even if you do them, you do them with a tainted, contaminated frame of mind and it’s already besmirched. It’s already dirty because it wasn’t approached with the proper mind, proper heart and proper attitude. I don’t know what’s worse, living in the cul de sac of Shoulda Woulda Coulda, never trying at all, or trying, but doing it half-ass and not putting forth genuine effort. In my opinion, I think both of them suck and neither way will lead to a contented, lasting happiness. And I think this is what that Chinese statement means. 知足者常樂! To be content in all things is a lasting happiness. It’s not the child getting a piece of candy or chocolate and being happy for the moment. That’s not real happiness. Real happiness comes from a state of contentedness. It comes from who you are which is defined by your actions. This is not only long lasting but is also self-perpetuating. When you do things from the right place, the right way, with the right attitude, it only propagates that feeling to continue.

I see this all the time, especially when I teach my teenagers. They come to me in this pristine, untouched, virgin-like state because they haven’t been beaten down by society or “The Man.” They come on the floor happy. They’re happy to receive; they’re happy to work hard, and therefor that makes me happy to teach them. So happy begets happy and then the whole world spins round. I’m able to do things that I can’t do with other individuals solely based on their mental and spiritual status. Put all physical limitations aside because we all have limitations. How you get over your so-called limitations is being content with who and what you are. It’s about your personal energy, and you are in charge of your personal energy. It’s your incorrect perception that’s killing you, not the lack of being like somebody else.

Writing this blog made me remember a special I had seen a couple years ago on 60 Minutes or something. I remember them saying that for the average individual to achieve a level of contentment or happiness monetarily speaking, they estimated that it only took $75,000 a year to have everything that you needed, and anything in excess of that was too much. Yet many people have this kind of money but are still not happy. So, is $150,000 going to make you happier? I don’t know because I don’t have either. But I was just lying down eating my candied lotus root, staring at the lion heads on the wall, looking at my coffee cup, thinking, it’s not that bad. I’m not on a yacht in the south of France with a bunch of naked girls, but it’s not that bad. It’s cold and rainy, but it could be worse. I don’t necessarily think having more makes you happy.

No one’s telling you not to get a new haircut or not to buy a brand new pair of shoes or a new outfit. You can do your best to change whatever you want to change, but without finding the happiness or contentedness with the hand that you’ve been dealt, no matter how hard you work, you always end up undermining your progress because in the back of your mind you’re always wishing you were someone else. You can go and do whatever you want, but the truth of the matter is you are who you are wherever you go and whatever you do. In order to progress, you have to acknowledge what you are. That’s a bitter pill to swallow sometimes. But playing the blame game, blaming situations and/or other individuals for your issues and problems, will only create more discontent. If we focus on the external, we forget to work on the internal self. The truth of the matter is we don’t have control over any external circumstances, but we do have ultimate control over ourselves. So, you first and foremost need to be content, i.e. happy, with you, and then s*** starts to fall into place.

Don’t be a head case. No regrets. Do everything 100%. Move out of Shoulda Woulda Coulda. Whatever your task is, it doesn’t matter. One piece of form is not better than another, it’s up to the individual to make it work. No one is saying you shouldn’t want more, but you should also be cognizant of what you have before you lose it. Kung Fu is not an item, it’s the spirit. Don’t seek the item, seek the spirit. Learn to be content and happy with what you have and not ask for more. Be happy you’re you; I’ll be happy I’m me. I guess the bottom line is that knowing yourself is loving yourself. Loving yourself is being content with who and what you are. And being content with who and what you are is true happiness.

- Sifu Paul Koh 高寶羅