Equilibrium is a difficult state to achieve. There are so many forces of discombobulation and chaos in and around us, that we are astounded when we see someone who is able to find balance and maintain it for more than a few seconds. But why does it take so much discipline and practice to achieve?

Our bodies are built to stand upright, and our basic symmetry should mean that it is easy to do so, whether on two feet or one, on our hands or our heads. Perhaps it is simply a matter of education: For the masses, who are not taught to live in balance from early childhood, the body and mind lack the conditioning required.

Hatha Yoga teaches that conditioning the body conditions the mind, and vice versa. It is lucky in this age of information that more and more people are able to discover the ideas and principles of balance. As more minds become conditoned towards equilibrium, more bodies will follow, and vice versa.

So, despite the current prevalence of imbalance (in the martial arts world and the world at large) we have more potential than ever before to evolve rapidly into harmony and equilibrium.

With temperatures in Europe, and especially Ukraine around or below zero, the cutting off of gas supplies is leading to misery and will almost certainly end in deaths. Rather than analyse the Russian motivations for this tactic, I would first call on readers to simply observe a moment or two of silence for those affected. Perhaps, in this way, we can achieve some clarity about our role in this crisis and what we can do to change it.

One of the chief things I have learned in my life so far is that, at the core, we are all one. There is no separate source of life force for blacks as opposed to whites; no “good guy” creator competing with a “bad guy” creator. Even the inanimate objects like rocks and trees all come from the same common source - where else?

In this light, can we comfortably sit still while innocents are being slaughtered anywhere in the world? It makes no sense to thank “g-d” that we are not the ones being bombed, when it is the same “g-d” that created our brothers and sisters facing fire, fear and death!

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968), wrote in his Letter from Birmingham Jail:

“I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea.”

This means that our efforts to rid the world of terror cannot rightly employ malevolent weapons and indiscriminate killing. As the US war in the Arab world spreads, so too does the evil we are nominally against.

As in medicine, it is the root of the problem that must be addressed. Another excerpt from Dr. King’s letter is germane to the case of Gaza:

“Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, … If (their) repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history.”

To blame the population of the occupied territories for violently lashing out is to ignore this fact. I in no way condone or seek to justify the actions of Hamas. I simply believe, based on my own limited point of view, that:

1) There are more effective ways of healing the ill of terrorism than by using the same tools on an amplified scale, and

2) An effective and sustainable self defense strategy always begins by looking at your own behavior - independent of the “rightness” or “wrongness” of the opposition.

I will let Dr. King, who is eminently more eloquent than I am, conclude this post:

“Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an “I it” relationship for an “I thou” relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man’s tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness?”

Last night, as I listened to the sound of exploding fireworks from the safety of my appartment in Frankfurt, Germany, I could not help but think of the people in their homes in Israel (and Gaza), Afganistan, Iraq and several African nations listening to similar sounds, but with a very different and more sinister source.

“How could people be so insensitive?” I thought as I lay there. This morning, the streets are filled with trashed and detritus - rather than debris, rubble and body parts. So, other than being a waste of time and money in my opinion, is there really anything wrong with shooting fireworks at the turn of the year?

My feeling now is that, as long as we make it a point to remember the existence of ongoing wars and violence, and teach our children to appreciate the lack of them in their lives, the end of the year fireworks are at least acceptable. But only if the above conditions are satisfied!