ATTN: The Willow Sword

[Serpent]

I read on Richard Mantis' thread about your challenge result against Reemul. First off, kudos for your candid honesty.

Anyway, I was following vaguely during the buildup to this challenge, but I never heard about it or the result before now. To be honest, I'd forgotten about it! Can you tell me what happened. How you both matched up, what went down, etc. Or direct me to a previous thread where you've talked about the match?

Thanks in advance.

[The Willow Sword]

i will skip all the mud slinging that went on on both sides and get right down to the challenge itself and the reasons for which i lost.(these arent excuses). Reemul and i met at his school,,and we started the challenge,,and reemul proceeded to overwhelm me and after about two short rounds i conceded. at the time i had support from my teacher at SD regarding the challenge,although it was loose support, i still was going to have a disciple from the school accompany me. my teacher then reversed his decision to send one of the other disciples and told me that i was on my own and that he really didnot want any part of the thing. and he did not want me going to represent the school...so i am like okay. after that my spirits were down,,i was not expecting that so when i went out to reemuls school my heart was not in the right place. and my center was real off center. i will also share with you and others that i felt something when i was standing in front of reemul that i shouldnt try to really fight this guy and to not to attempt to hurt him at all,,for whatever reason in my psyche ,,this was the message my internal self was giving me.(note: not that if i had given it my full on that i would have defeated him,,i feel now that had i been in good spirits and truly ready for the match i would have been a better opponent for reemul ,,but i still think that i would have lost and come out of it more hurt). his training regimen is really awesome and it is something that i wish more kung fu schools would do. which is one of the reasons why i left the SD school and am now an independant and a new student of illusionfist.
any way the fight itself was sloppy on both parts,,but reemul had the upper hand,,,,i kept on thinking that i should have done this and i should have done that. but i guess that we all have those thoughts when we emerge from the ring. at any rate it was a great experience andtruly enlightened me to some things and now my training is different and much better suited to what i really want to do.

through all of this i still respect and will always cherish what i DID do at the SD school....however i have noone really to blame but myself on the outcome of this fight. i blame myself for thinking that i had a true support system at the school and that i allowed that to effect me the way it did. i have no more ill will towards my former teacher in this respect. we both said what we needed to say to each other and the bridge is not burned between us. i have always defended the quality and quantity of what is taught at SD but i too feel that it is not what it claims to be. as they say there are NO bad schools just bad teachers,,not that my former teacher was a bad one,,in fact in the SD relm he is the best there is,,its just that my training needs and my path does not go in the same direction as his. any way i have rambled on with this. just know that making a challenge is no light thing,,it is serious and you had better be prepared to follow through with it and back yourself,,other wise you are just another choad mouth boxer. no matter what the outcome of the challenge just know also that when confronted with a greater opponent the best way to deal with it is to be humble in the face of it and take your hits and SURVIVE through it. i dont think it be anyones destiny to die in the ring,,,not in these times anyway.

Many Respects,,,The Willow Sword

[Serpent]

Thanks for your honest response. You certainly seem to have learned a lot, so I would suggest that you didn't lose in any way. Well done.

:)

[Fu-Pow]

Willowsword-

Nice post. I always wondered what really happened with the challenge match. I'm glad to hear that you have left your Shaolin-Do organization. Now the real training can begin.

Good luck to you and I hope Illusionfist turns out to be good teacher.

Yau Sam (much heart)