What has MAP given you?

Like most the young people that joined MAP, I had some weird notions about the world. I joined MAP at 18, I'm about to turn 32.

Slip and Hannibal kept us straight. The mods wisely banned us when we said anything very stupid.

I was honestly a bit of an incel and this space with thoughtful adults, especially wise older men who gave us space to say stupid things but converse with us with logic and experience. Even idiots need a safe space to work through their stupidity.
I think without that, I wouldn't have become a more empathetic and mature adult and wouldn't have met my wife.

I got to go to MAP meet and meet you wonderful people and made great friends with Holku. See different and new approaches to "martial arts". I used to thing the "softer" styles were a joke but now I see the "art" and enjoy the "art" of styles.

On the dark side of things:
Simon and JWT allowed me to intrude on their sessions when I lived in Wycombe:
You guys night not realise but at the time i was in debt, couldn't afford food (despite being employed), honestly on the edge of suicide.
Your kindness with your time kept me going and kept me connected to people and something I loved (martial arts).

I get to train with Chadderz now regularly and he come for Sunday roasts at my house! A life long friend!
he's one of the best instructors I've ever had which is purely down to his dedication, especially as we started at the same time. An honour to know and train with him.

I'm about to have my first child, and thats in part to MAP.

Now I try to recreate the environment of MAP in real life with the younger people I train with and give them that same space and guidance.

 

Great thread and a beautiful post from Mangosteen.

 

*looks around*

What's all this sentimental tripe????


Wotcha everyone!!

MAP was a place where I found a group of awesome folks with the same obsession as me! From casually finding it one day I became engaged with folk from all around the world - sometimes I was even nice to them

I have made lasting and genuine friendships with JWT, Chadderz, Shroom, Mitch, Jules and so many others.....I'm even still friends with Master Betty and too many others to mention actually!!

MAP also gave me one of my closest friends, confidantes, and a man I am beyond honored to have represent my HAVOC system in Simon "Bulldog" Sheridan - an absolute superstar of a teacher and practitioner

My days on MAP are really behind me, as my new projects keep me pretty damn busy, but I do still keep an eye out.

Hope you are all doing great and keep on blasting guys!!

 

MAP has given me the chance to connect with people I both agree and disagree with, who often, convince me to change my mind, and allow me the opportunity to grow mentally.

Also Reddit is full of weirdos, the atmosphere here is definitely more constructive!

 

I find that I don't frequent MAP nearly as often as I once did, yet it's impossible to ignore the monumental debt of gratitude that I owe to this forum and its members. It's not merely a note of thanks for information and advice; rather, it's an existential gratitude. Throughout some of the most chaotic times of my life - which included divorce, the deaths of family members, and complex physical and mental health issues - MAP served as a kind of intellectual sanctuary. Logging in here often felt like coming 'home.'

It was here that I could really assemble the scattered fragments of my thoughts and hone my writing. Some of my early contributions to the forum were naive, even shockingly so. But ignorance is an indelible feature of the human condition, especially in youth. Though not as young as some when I first joined here over 15 years ago, my thoughts back then were still embryonic, liable to all the errors and oversights that accompany our earlier stages of mental and emotional development.

Perhaps most profoundly, MAP served as a springboard that guided me towards the discovery of what now constitutes the central endeavour of my life. It was the early ideas here that would later metamorphose into my current business, where I now find myself engrossed in the pursuit of researching and teaching the science of flexibility - something that I absolutely love to do. I even administer my own forum, which seems like I have come full circle.

My physical practice with martial arts has diminished over time, largely due to the capricious nature of my health, but the spirit of that practice endures. I still take part in weekly online sessions with Bill Wallace and continue to dabble in boxing and kickboxing. I'm comfortable with who and where I am now, and while MAP did not sculpt my identity in its entirety, this forum undeniably acted as a crucible in which I could distil a more authentic version of myself. It's an unceasing process, a lifelong endeavour towards self-discovery and actualisation. Most of all, I'm really enjoying that process these days.

To sum up, I'm not just grateful to you all; I'm fortified by the collective wisdom and camaraderie this community has offered. The debt is one that cannot be settled, and it rests in the ledger of my life as an unfathomable gift.

 

Wow.
MAP is, without a doubt, a treasure of wisdom in these days of social media, where conversation is replaced by people virtually shouting over each other.

As others have said, I too don't get on here as much as I once did, though I certainly try to pop by a few times a week, if only to browse.

Names and aliases, too many mention - from heated disagreements over history or concepts, to in-person meets at events - MAP "IS" still a fantastic platform for actual discussion on martial arts and associated topics. I'd love to see the vibrancy of old return.

A huge salute to the Admins and Mods, past and present for nurturing this environment!

 

Not sure, I have seen some of those, just not sure if it was on MAP, but then I am old and forgetful so.....

I was going to answer the question "What has MAP given you?" with "a headache" but that is mostly because of eye issues and reading web pages that anything on MAP.

But seriously I have learned many things on MAP, great resource, great forum.

 

MAP opened my eyes to other MAs and let me see the similarities and differences between them (in my neck of the woods at the time there wasn't much more than karate, judo and TKD so I'd never get the chance to try something else and form my own opinion) - I remember seeing a username in a different forum and thinking "why are you posting on a thread in there?" then seeing some fantastic discussion come about from it. I still have nightmares about some of the ninjutsu forum arguements though.

I wish I'd saved some of the old "history of MAP" journal entries from back in the day too. Names like Cooler and ghostsuit (the original creators of MAP), then hongkongfuey and YODA, Saz, and Aegis. The less said about my tenure the better like.

Wow, I've just realised that I'm coming up to 20 years on here. *sigh*

 

Over 20 years here also. Joined in my 20s when I was deep in kungfu. Having spent my teenage years in judo as a hobby, my 20s allowed me to dedicate more time.

It definitely was a driver to give me perspective on martial arts and training along side martial arts. My big driver was self defence and I was easily able to get a consensus on where to look to read up more on the subject.

I was a member of many forums, MAP definitely had the most balanced contributers. Other forums usually had a bias to certain styles which skewed opinions.

So 20+ years later in training solely in BJJ, but whenever I hear people talk about other styles (sometimes down about other styles) I feel my experience here gives me a balanced perspective.
There are many styles and clubs which provide a variety of usefully training and sometimes useless training.

Most commonly it's about how much people enjoy their time in the journey.

It's sad to see that it is a lot quieter nowadays as places like Facebook groups and Reddit take the bulk of the focus, and usually very skewed perspective based on the way social media caters for superficial responses.

I still drop in here and for many years even when I couldn't train due to family commitments, it was always a place to observe a balanced perspective. This gave me direction to my return to martial arts 8 years ago.

I've seen people go to war on here, sometimes threads with weight on one side, We've had many crazies (let's be honest, it as spices debate up every now and then) but some regulars at war then come to mutual agreement, some change their mind, but some remain at polar opposite. That's humans, we aren't all compatible, but every time I see a medium reached

Keep MAP alive with the balance, that is what is of most value in this corner of the internet.

 

I have been on here for 18 years, met many of the members at MAP meets and learnt lots from them.
I have trained with several away from the MAP meets too and always an interesting learning curve.
I suppose MAP has been a vehicle to air opinions and share training ideas and photos thru the years with often like-minded people.
Like a lot of others I drop in occasionally now as there are only so many things you can circle back too before you realise that either you wont change others minds or ideas and that a lot of topics have already been visited from pretty much every angle.

Stay safe out there MAPers and hopefully see you all soon at the next MAP meet.

 

I guess I'm the new guy around these parts, but for a while MAP gave me a fun location to post classic boxing fights, and occasional get into discussions about different and exotic arts that quite frankly I have not had the time or budget for, which is nice because any one martial art can take up a lot of both.

I'd like to take a moment to thank all for 1 listening to me drone on about my primary art, boxing, something I have loved for almost my whole life and put great effort into refining. To be able to call oneself a boxer, And be called a boxer by others, is no small task. We don't get colored belts, or trophies unless we bleed for them in my world.

But also, just reading old threads here has greatly expanded my knowledge of my first art that I will always love, old school Shotokan, and more recently my "post COVID" arts Tai Chi and Xing Yi, of which I still know very little, but can actually use now!

I would like to move onto a ground art like Judo or BJJ soon. I've been getting back in shape and improving my health back to when it was better and MAP's crowd, even though it's small nowadays, works for me. Very glad i registered here, and maybe someday some new younger bloods will join up. But if not, the site will always be a great resource for leaning both martial arts, and how NOT to treat people online...all present company excluded of course. I recently read some really old threads in the Ninjutsu forum...I'm glad we don't have some of those people around. I've never seen such jerks talk to each other outside a sports arena.

Stay safe and keep warm this winter.

-G

 

MAP, and the quality of opinions that it brings has really changed the way I approach training. There are some opinions I've really gelled with, my first senior judo club was a result of a suggestion on here. (though I'm glad I ignored the advice not to train with a traditional JJJ instructor whose classes 'look like they're pretending to do BJJ', best instructor and role model I've ever had!).

Meeting everyone at the meet ups has been amazing, and I very much hope to do more in the future. While the level of instruction on offer at the event is always top notch, the social side of them is probably my favourite aspect.

On a professional level it's introduced me to some great sources of knowledge, with members like Icefield and Van Zandt, whose opinions always get me thinking.

Hope everyone is well!

 

Through MAP i learnt many things about various styles and available instructors that are out there in the early 2000s, before we really had facebook and all that stuff. It's amazing MAP is still around

 

I was a newbie, a fencing guy that went off piste as it were and tried some Martial arts for 10 odd years to see how other arts approached problems in training teaching and the division between sport and martial arts and self defence. I was aware of MAP some 5 years prior when I was researching martial arts in general and then took the plunge and joined and was pleasantly surprised by the level of nuance and knowledge of some of the older forum posters.

Also I preferred the format and still do.

Modern social media forces you to express yourself in soundbites and small and limited flashes of knowledge, a format which allows misinformation and outright bullshitters to get away with an outsize presence all out of proportion of the sum of their knowledge and experience, while in MAP any extraordinary claims are scrutinized by slogging arguments and counter arguments, often over days which grinds down away at charlatans, over walls of text, like some sort of intellectual war of attrition, with snake oil merchants who when exposed for what they are, could only are resort to predictable ad hominem attacks only to get banhammered by Mods. It was awesome.

I particularly miss Hannibal's interventions. I remember finishing one late shift and wearily logging on to MAP to see if they was any juicy posts before watching some late night trashy film with some popcorn and falling asleep. I didn't watch the film but I did munch all through the popcorn as I watched Hannibal posts pop up mercilessly take apart some obnoxious charlatan with the regularity of an artillery barrage, with far less wordcount than I could ever do. SDA just like in JKD, but in forum format.

I don't post here anymore as back involved in coaching fencing far more seriously than I was before. I did my personal Musha Shugyo as it were so I don't really Box/kickbox or do Tajiquan anymore. But I do log in here from time to time out of curiosity to see if there's anything new going on.

 

I may not be the most prolific poster here on MAP, but I'm coming up on 20 years(!) on the site. Back in the old days, MAP was my primary source for all things martial arts. It played a key role in getting me hooked, informed my initial choice to get started in traditional budo, and then years later also provided the impetus for me to switch to BJJ. The internet landscape has changed a lot since then, but I do miss forums being the main source of online information, as I believe the format is more conducive to mature and thorough discussion.

Throughout my years at MAP I have interacted with a lot of great people, had my preconceptions and biases challenged, and been inspired by the journey of the members here in arts both similar and different to mine. I used to frequent the old MAP arcade back in the day, and it saw me through many an otherwise boring night of studying. I also feel that MAP indirectly played a role in my career change from musician to scientist. The realization that martial claims should be backed up by a healthy amount of evidence and pressure testing bled over into my philosophy of life in general and spurred me on toward a career in evidence based medicine. The many friendly (and occasionally not-so-friendly) debates I had and observed here definitely honed my ability to form a cogent written argument, and this skill serves me well professionally today.

Huge thanks to all the admins and moderators both past and present for all the work you have done to foster the community here. I'll see you all in 20 more years