True Warrior Training

When most people think about or have the desire to learn to become a warrior they usually have no concept of what it actually entails.  Well how could they?  If one has not become the embodiment of a warrior then one cannot fully comprehend that state of being.  That is truly what it is, a state of being.  I explained a little of this in the article series called Roots of the Warrior quite a while ago.
This short article isn’t about becoming a warrior.  Rather its focus is the misconception concerning training.

Typically when someone starts a path towards growing into a warrior and embracing a life of a warrior, they want to delve right into learning how to fight and use weapons.  It’s an ego thing.  Even if someone has become proficient at fighting and weaponry, this is a far cry from a warrior.  The training path of a warrior must begin far earlier than learning fighting skills.

Before learning weapons and fighting techniques and dynamics, a growing warrior must learn to be proficient in the arts of Survival, Adaptability and Ingenuity.  The skills, mindsets and layered understanding of:

• Navigation & Travel --- modern and primitive
• Tracking & Hunting
• Wild Edibles & Foraging
• Finding food in general --- modern world and primitive
• Keeping oneself clothed --- in all seasons --- protection from elements
  • Also what types of clothing is best for all situations
• Keeping oneself cleaned and groomed --- yes even most pre-tech cultures were well groomed
• Keeping oneself healthy --- health is wealth and without it we can accomplish little
  • Knowing what to eat
  • How to eat
  • How to live
  • Internal health, external health
  • Body health in all its systems
  • Mental health and well-being
• First Aid
  • On self and others
• Medicine --- primitive and modern
• Shelter construction --- for all seasons and environments
• Fire Craft
• Water Craft
• Tool Making
• Observation & Awareness
  • Of self
  • Of others
  • Of surroundings
• Knowing one’s own mind and heart
• Communication skills --- verbal, body language – modern & primitive
• Reading people
• Adaptability --- the art of adapting to any situation that arises in order to survive, persist and accomplish
• Ingenuity --- along with adaptability --- the creative art of making full use of what is available
• In short – the art and skill of being fully self-reliant for duration's of time in both the modern environments of human and the primitive environments of this planet

If someone is incapable due to ignorance of keeping themselves alive and well in the primitive regions of this world, just as the modern ones, they are not a warrior.  Even if they are an exceptional fighter, they are just a fighter.   All of the above skill sets are far more important for the entire lifestyle of a true warrior than knowing how to fight and wield weapons.  One must be able to survive and fully live in the natural elements, just like the modern ones, to remain alive, strong, well, wise and centered if one is to have the realistic opportunity to fight for a cause and purpose.

Like I said, anyone can learn to fight, but that doesn’t make them a warrior when the natural world could easily kill them with the strength of their own ignorance and lack.

In most pre-technological cultures around the world; Native American, Celt, “Viking”, African, and Asian for example, all started warrior training at home and most with the mother.  Kids learned first skills of the household and then skills to survive and live off the land away from the home long before they ever began studying to fight.  By the time they began training to fight they were more proficient at the above listed skills that most adults today.  Even Special Forces today, around the globe are highly trained in the arts of primitive survival.

If you want to become a warrior you will need the diligence, patience and fortitude to broaden your training far more than fighting dynamics.  Otherwise just stick to fighting.  It takes far less time, energy, dedication, brain-power and layered development of the self to gain proficiency.