St. Petersburg, FL

mygomjabbar

mygomjabbar@hotmail.com

Mizong Luohan kung fu, Eagle Claw kung fu, Northern long fist styles, Xing Yi, various Chinese weapons (short staff, long staff, broadsword, daggers)

Jan '06 - May '07: Shoto Kan Karatedo, Japan Samurai Dojo, Pinellas Park, FL

June '07 - Present: Northern style kung fu - Chinese Martial Arts Center, Seminole, FL

ICMAC 2008 - 4th place in Novice Women's Traditional Hand Forms.

Watch

Learn

Teach

Train

Endure

Kung fu, videogames, writing, reading, drawing, dancing, paintballing

Martial arts, history, science, geology, paleontology, dinosaurs, poetry, mathematics, physics, geophysics, paintballing

Numetal, techno, industrial, heavy metal, alternative rock, darkwave

A Touch of Zen, Come Drink With Me, Kung Fu Panda, Gladiator, The Last Samurai, One-Armed Swordsman, 36th Chamber of Shaolin, Practical Magic

Karatedo: My Way of Life by Gichin Funakoshi, Miyamoto Musashi: His Life & Writings by Kenji Tokitsu, American Shaolin by Matthew Perry, Dune series by Frank Herbert, The Homeric Hymns trans. by Michael Crudden, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

"Mind over matter: if you don't mind, it doesn't matter." -Shifu Tim Bush

"Some weapons you cannot hold in your hands. You can hold them only in your mind." - Bene Gesserit Axiom

"Sweat blood. Gasp for breath. Struggle in pain." - Mizong Luohan saying

"Physics is like sex. Sometimes it has a practical result, but that's not why we do it." - Richard Feynman

"Ecology is the science of understanding consequences." - Frank Herbert

"To hell with circumstances. I create opportunities." - Bruce Lee

" 'Mastery is achieved by hard work and continued determination, not by excuses.' This is a rule to live by for everyone. Keep up the hard work." -Shifu Dan Schmidt

"Sweat more now. Bleed less later." -Master Ye Yu Ting

"It occurred to her then that mercy was the ability to stop, if only for a moment. There was no mercy where there could be no stopping." -Dune

"...Pay heed, you ally of mortals, giver of flourishing youth,
and from on high shed down a gentle light on our life
and martial strength to give me power to drive from my head
the bitter taint of cowardice, power to thwart with my mind
the soul's deceitful impulse, and power besides to hold back
the fierce might of spirit that pricks me to enter chill strife -- but grant,
Blessed One, courage to stay in the painless laws of peace,
evading the enemies' broil and the violent spirits of death."

Homeric Hymn to Ares,
trans. by Michael Crudden


Jade green pool spring water's clear.
The spirit of itself brings
dark mysteries to light.
Meditate on emptiness:
it's all the more quiet.

- Han Shan, 8th century

The strong gods pine for my abode,
And pine in vain for the Sacred Seven.
But thou, meek lover of the good,
Find me, and turn thy back on Heaven!

-Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Brahma"

"I have learned that you cannot climb a mountain by standing on other people's shoulders and that words can hurt more than blows and are longer lasting. That wishing, trying, and actually doing are not the same. That challenges, obstacles, and hardships are opportunities for growth and for tempering one's character. That excuses are unproductive; 'talk doesn't cook the rice.' That when we point one finger at others, there are three pointing back at us. And that living in the past and worrying about the future have no place in the fabric of a martial artist."

-Master Nick Scrima, on 25 years of practicing martial arts



The mold-brown moss green trunk of my wake
Spreads through trees on the morning lake

And, through a wafer mist between the shores
Grows bubble branches, budding from the oars -

Till it hangs tremulous and wide, and I
Stop rowing, watching it as slowly die,

Winking in rhythm - but the trees remain,
Imperfectly reflected, subtle stain

Deep as the sunken trees no one can see
That ride beneath us like the green ash tree

At the lost roots of the world, in morning air -
Air quiet as this lake, trees everywhere.

The boat drifts on its image into theirs,
And they part to receive it, unawares.
-John Peck, "Rowing Early"


I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

-Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear

“We go forward. We go back.” - Leto Atreides II, Children of Dune

"So far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain. And so far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
-Albert Einstein

"Intellectuals solve problems, geniuses prevent them."
-Albert Einstein


I found a boat tailed grackle dead in the fork
of a live oak. I brought my son to see
the writhing maggots, trails moving up the tree.
One week and he was hollow as a sock,
his elegant beak upturned as if the crook
of branch had caught him falling, his free
flight and rash songs ended. By January,
he was a gray mat blending with the bark.

God's wonderful will is that each good thing
must die, son; even your loveliness is bound
toward death. But have this double faith: depend
on the love of one who is also falling
and the fact that when that raucous bird came down
something black-sheened rose to scavenge the wind.

-Scott Ward, "Last Easter", Wayward Passages


"Concentrate every minute like a Roman - like a man - on doing what's in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice. And on freeing yourself from all other distractions. Yes, you can - if you do everything as if it were the last thing you were doing in your life, and stop being aimless, stop letting your emotions override what your mind tells you, stop being hypocritical, self-centered, irritable. You see how few things you have to do to lead a satisfying and reverent life? If you can manage this, that's all even the gods can ask of you."

-Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Book 2.5

Working on my B.S. in Geophysics and a minor in mathematics, studying kung fu, writing poetry, and not killing myself out of sheer clumsiness are my primary occupations right now. I love quotes obscenely (see above), am too curious for my own good, and am just clever enough to get myself into trouble.

That, and while I'm getting better at them, I still hate pushups.