Changing Paths - The Struggle Between Apollo and Dionysus

 

As soon as I graduated high school, my father suddenly expected me to go to college—a word he had never once mentioned before, nor had he ever shown interest in my grades. It wasn’t surprising that I had my own plan: I wanted to become a professional boxer. That dream lasted until the night I met Rocky Graziano and Jake LaMotta. I had fought in the New York Golden Gloves and had been fighting for the past three years. My whole life was fighting. However, spending just one evening with my boxing heroes was enough to show me that boxing would waste my potential. I admired what they had done for Italian Americans, but their words and outlook turned me off. They were tough, yes, but not high-thinking men. Still, I couldn’t help noting how LaMotta lived well into his 90s in excellent shape, body, and mind.

Realizing boxing wasn’t my path left me scrambling for direction. I was finishing high school with poor grades, working at a grocery store, and feeling like my options were shrinking. But as life often does, it opened unexpected doors. I started revisiting my hippie parents’ music—The Rolling Stones, The Doors—just as punk rock was exploding in my neighborhood. At the same time, I experimented with drugs that expanded my consciousness, and once I had rejected boxing, it was as if my mind suddenly became thirsty for everything I had missed as a poor student. I read voraciously, diving into literature, art, and philosophy.

When my friends started at community college, I tagged along. One visit to the art school there hit me like lightning: this was where I belonged. I applied immediately and was accepted the next semester. In art, I discovered the part of myself I had buried while busy fighting. It was my soul yearning for expression, and I dove in without hesitation.

The lesson I took away from this was the importance of courage. In America today, we glorify Special Forces as the ultimate symbol of courage. At the same time, we’ve systematically devalued artists—sometimes justly, given the excesses of the music industry, but often unfairly. Life is always a tug-of-war between two broad paths: Apollo, the god of order, structure, discipline, and Dionysus, the god of chaos, art, and intoxication. For years, the rock star—Dionysus—was the cultural ideal, until the decadence, drugs, and self-destruction of that image pushed society to swing back toward Apollo: military fitness, warrior order, discipline. That swing isn’t necessarily bad, but America has a habit of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

When times got rough in my own life, I, too, threw myself into Apollo’s camp, becoming a warrior. But eventually I realized that path was intellectually and creatively narrow. My soul kept calling me back to Dionysus. Like many people, I carry both within me—maybe too much of both—and reconciling them isn’t easy.

The punk rock movement was crucial for me. At a time when high school graduation forces you into choices, punk declared that all choices were meaningless, a liberating starting point. From there, I built a framework of meaning by looking to evolution and primitive cultures. What mattered to early humans—art, hunting, family, fighting—must be inherently human. That became my criteria for value. This perspective led me into woodcarving, tai chi, meditation, martial arts, cooking, and nutrition. These became the foundations of the life I’ve built—simple, rooted, and guided through the modern cacophony.

Society often seeks placeholders for meaning. For many, religion fills that role. In America, college has become another placeholder: a socially approved symbol that reassures others you are on the “right path.” Many people don’t want to wrestle with what’s truly valuable—they just want the security of what society values in the moment, and they project that onto you.

But ultimately, life is about balancing expectations: your own and those of others. To survive, you must demonstrate value to those who hold resources, whether in services or goods. Sometimes that’s noble, sometimes it bends toward vice. Either way, the challenge is to carve your own path between Apollo and Dionysus, between survival and expression, between order and chaos. That’s what I learned when I changed paths.

A Conversation With a Taos Pueblo Member That Changed Everything

 

When I first moved to Taos, I thought I was just moving closer to the mountains. I hadn’t grown up camping or hunting—city life had kept me far away from those things. I loved the outdoors, but when it came to animals, I had always drawn a hard line. Killing them? Absolutely not. Eating them? Well, that was different.

At least, I thought it was.

On a construction site in Taos, I worked under a site supervisor from Taos Pueblo. We often talked while we worked—about life, about the land, about traditions. One day, our talk turned to killing animals. I argued fiercely against it, but he didn’t let me off easy. He confronted me directly, "If you were starving and you saw a rabbit, would you kill it?" I said, "No".

“You eat meat, don’t you?” he asked.

The question hung heavy in the air. In that moment, I knew he had me cornered. Either I stopped eating meat altogether or I admitted that I was benefitting from something I didn’t have the stomach to face.

That conversation never left me.

Not long after, in Canada, I found myself with a group of hunters. They handed me a shotgun and welcomed me into their world. When one of them shot a deer and it still moved on the ground, instinct—or maybe courage—pushed me forward. I took out a knife and cut its throat. The others nodded in respect. Then came the ritual: slicing open the chest, taking a bite of the heart. That was my initiation. Read the full story here.

From then on, I understood hunting as more than just pulling a trigger. It was navigation, patience, teamwork, carrying heavy loads, and—most of all—respect for the animal that gave its life. I hunted a bit in Mississippi, got lost in the woods once, and discovered firsthand how steep the learning curve really was.

But whether or not I hunted often, I found my place with hunters. Around the fire, cutting up meat, cooking it, sharing stories—I felt at home. Hunters, I discovered, are grounded people. Skilled, resourceful, and bound together by something old and primal.

For me, hunting became more than a hobby. It became a way of reconnecting with something my DNA seemed to remember—a way of life older than cities, older than stress, older than all the anxieties of modern life. In the act of hunting and cooking, I felt healed, as though I had finally stepped back into rhythm with the world.

And to think, it all started with one conversation, thirty-five years ago, with a man from Taos Pueblo who probably never knew he changed the course of my life.

Walking Through Back Pain: What My Latest Injury Taught Me

 

A few days ago, I tweaked my back trying to pull off a flashy weightlifting move I picked up from a Dagestani wrestler. I was training with one of my employees — who happens to be excellent at proper form — and she’d been giving me pointers all session. But during a break, I spotted a 45-pound plate and thought, “I’ve got to try that technique.” Instead of bracing properly and using what I know, I swung the weight around…and my back gave out.

At 60, this isn’t my first round with back problems. My history with back pain goes all the way back to the 1990s when I worked for a moving company. Years of heavy lifting led to my first real back injury. Later, I thought switching to desk jobs would help, but sitting all day only made things worse. The pain became so severe that surgery seemed like the only option.

Over the years, I’ve tried steroid injections, rest, and every pain-management method you can think of. But interestingly, once I found work that didn’t chain me to a desk, my back improved dramatically. That experience taught me something critical: our bodies aren’t designed to heal through avoidance — they heal through movement.

This latest injury reminded me of that lesson. I haven’t taken a single painkiller (though I did use Tiger Balm once). Instead, I’ve been walking, stretching, and staying as active as I can without pushing too far. I’ve scaled things back, but I haven’t stopped moving. Now, just a few days later, the pain is still there, but I can feel myself turning a corner.

The truth is, you can’t sidestep back pain — you have to walk through it. Too often, people rush into surgery or long-term treatments that may not be necessary. Our bodies are built to recover, as long as we give them the chance.

One story that inspires me is that of Willie Pep, the legendary boxer. After surviving a plane crash, he was back in the ring training within six months. Years later, doctors discovered he had actually fought with a broken back. His body healed because he demanded it to. That’s how the human body works — for millions of years, before modern medicine, survival depended on our ability to repair ourselves.

So that’s where I am today: moving through the pain, trusting the body’s design, and reminding myself that healing isn’t about babying an injury — it’s about giving your body the right conditions to do what it already knows how to do.

Walking every day and the unforgivable algorithm of the universe

I walk slowly through trails many days per week, mainly along the Rio Grande gorge, and in minimal shoes on rocky trails with my dog, who is very much a taskmaster and not one who likes to sit around the house much. She forces me to get outside, and I comply because I understand the algorithm of the universe.  Video of a typical walk

Every time I walk on these uneven, shifting surfaces, I toughen my feet and activate my toes to prepare better for impact with the ground, thereby lessening the impact on my knees. This helps heal my knees, even though the uneven surfaces are challenging on them, but I know how the unforgiving algorithm universe impacts my body. When you understand the algorithm, you slow down your descent into bodily decay. 

We are all on a descent into bodily decay, and that is the algorithm of the universe. However, the speed at which one descends is key. When you engage in something consistently, your body adapts and repairs itself to meet the demands placed on it. Living on the planet requires a physiological organism to meet the demands of life; your mitochondria multiply to increase energetic output and thus consume more glucose. Your heart rate meets the demands, increasing blood flow, and your bones also remodel to accommodate those demands.

Not only does this benefit my physical health, but it also mentally prepares me. While I'm walking, I'm thinking about what needs to be done, but what is essential? What should I give my time to now? 

Conversely, sitting on a couch or playing video games all day, your mind and body scale down since the demand is minimal. Since there's very little demand, your body is like an energetic accountant. It decides it doesn't need to rebuild muscles. It doesn't need to grow more mitochondria, so it won't. Thus, your body decays faster. I wish we didn't talk so much about metabolic health and just focus on activities, especially demanding ones. 

I mean, that's really it. It's not rocket science, and I think that sometimes, especially among health influencers, it gets turned into rocket science. It really isn't rocket science; it's just a simple concept. I know I'm the one using terms like 'allocation resources' and 'unforgiving algorithm,' but it boils down to putting yourself in demanding situations that are slightly uncomfortable often. It doesn't have to be so painful that you want to die, but the key is REPETITION. Repetition is not a once-a-week thing; it should be at least three times a week, four times a week, five times a week, week after week. It might seem overwhelming at first, but take it one day at a time, and your body will have your back, literally.

Kung fu is more than technique and form

The martial arts you typically see in movies, tournaments, and dojos are cosplay. They are theater, which lack the essence. 

The martial arts that I do, the kung fu that I do, are about spiritual growth and living the path of life. Often, we see martial arts portrayed through competition sports demonstrations, where you are dressed in some outfit from some weird era that most likely never even existed. While they can still be done with good intentions, all those things are not the martial arts I practice.

The martial arts I practice are a way of life. Before one gets triggered by the statement about martial arts being a way of life, usually the next thing said is, “We don’t train for fighting.” So let me state unequivocally that martial arts are for fighting, but only because life has fighting in it. The martial arts I practice don’t mean winning fights or having an excellent record. Records are of little concern to me. I would rather have more losses than wins if it meant I had profound wisdom. 

Moreover, people confuse the pursuit of perfect form with the path of wisdom, as if great form is the highest achievement. These people become obsessed with form and are limited spiritually. 

A good example of this I learned was a dojo where I practiced for a few years. They were all obsessed with technical proficiency, without even attempting to marry it to a practical application in self-defense. So it became an obsession with technical proficiency, which somehow was a proxy for spiritual development, and it wasn’t long before they proved that they were spiritually constrained.

While I went on my own and began training during my hikes on the mesas of New Mexico, I often didn't do much of the form, but the spiritual intention and emptying of my mind became the primary practice. So while I did little typical "martial arts" training, I was still heavily and deeply training my intention and working on my heart.

In Chinese martial arts, there is often a desire to write about these different types of concepts like Yi, Shen, and such through forms and practices ad nauseam, and when you read the books, there isn't much in there that applies to life or that discusses the true training of intention. 

Admittedly, it's a complex topic and not easily captured in words, but I do feel the need to try to do that. When I often see "martial artists” wielding a machete and trying to cut brush or a small tree, I see someone who doesn't understand true intention, yet they could win a Wushu competition with a sword or look furious while doing partner training. They don’t have death in their hands. You can see what I am describing in the commitment of the cut when there is resistance. When I watch these people cutting, there is less follow-through as the blade goes through the material. Intention is particularly relevant in handgun training. While handguns are not my focus, when I was training with them, there was this type of trigger pull that, if done without proper intention, the bullet doesn’t hit the target, or if it is feeble, the bullet can actually get jammed or stove-pipe in the port. 

The Tai Chi Classics speaks on this, stating that when you attack, you are to have the viciousness of an eagle grabbing its prey. This is good, but how many dojos do you enter where they take you to that abyss?  Also, can you even recognize what that looks like?

Luckily, I had a grandfather who was very physical and not abusive towards me, but he did get into fights, and his example of viciousness was excellent. He could see something with authority and command, and I often don't see that in training in many martial arts. I'm not picking on one martial art; ironically, Aikido people developed that, but because of a pseudo-moral philosophy, they cannot adapt it to modern applications.

That is why living life, cooking, hiking, playing with animals, and playing rough-and-tumble full-contact games, like football, and even bullies, are essential to developing this intention. How else can you learn this? If not, how to stop a bully when you're younger, as I said before, many, many times, even though I talk about it a lot because it was a trauma I experienced, it also pulled the best out of me. 

Working with young men is also part of martial arts training. When I switched to working in healthcare in 2003, I found this path to be rich in martial wisdom. Battling disease and preventing disease are also part of this path, but often, those things are not included in martial arts training.

The things I'm talking about don't require one specific teacher, per se, and I don't even know if there is one teacher who can teach you all those things. That's why martial arts teachers are overrated. 

Recently, while working in Indian country, I met a couple of wise Native American elders. They are not martial arts instructors, but they convey much of what I'm talking about now, and maybe martial arts is a small part of that, or vice versa. I don't know another name for a teacher on the path of wisdom. I always thought it was martial arts, and then there was also religion. So maybe there's another path without a name that I'm still learning about.

Reading Carlos Castaneda this year has been helpful because he captures much of what I'm talking about. Some things are universally included in martial arts, like wisdom, violence, and working with youth. But some things are exclusively outside the martial arts path, like the chaos of life itself. When training in martial arts, don’t fall for the stereotype we see on TV; explore the parts outside of the controlled arena. 

My Path in Qi Gong

The seeds of my path in Qi Gong were sown as I grew up with hippie parents in a working-class section of Brooklyn. Of my grandparents, one was a low-level gangster, and the other was a Veteran of D-Day. My father started smoking pot in the mid-sixties, and I grew up dancing to the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles, etc. So I had this weird mix of free-spirit hippieness and a not-so-healthy dose of working-class pragmatism. My parents were into alternative healing, and my father even took Tai Chi from Robert Chuckrow in Westchester, NY. I attended a few classes but was so young and hyper that it didn’t grab me.
 

When I started karate in 1979, it was mainly for self-defense, but I did become interested in the Asian aesthetic and some martial wisdom—as much as a teenager could. 

Then, as an awkward high schooler, my need for self-defense grew and overshadowed any aesthetic musings. My experience with trauma and feeling alienated was in full bloom. When my karate school closed, I got darker and more aggressive, which lasted for a few years. At that time, I met Rocky Graziano, Jake La Motta, and a few other famous boxers. After that experience, I felt kind of turned off by fighting. Even as a 17-year-old in pre-politically correct days, hearing the N-word shouted out when a Black former Heavyweight champion entered the room didn't sit right—adding to that their faces had been remodeled from being hit there so many times. 

After fighting in the Golden Gloves Tournament at Madison Square Garden and my experiences with some boxing champs, fighting was not a great life choice. I also met a girl who was into dancing and art, and my friends turned me onto Pink Floyd’s music; their albums, The Wall, Wish You Were Here, and Dark Side of the Moon, notably Eclipse, showed me a vision of understanding psychological pain and alienation and being in tune with the Universe seemed like the right path. Then, I started taking drugs to explore a shamanistic union with nature. I went to art school to pursue this further. I spent the next 10 years pursuing a vision of art that was trying to become in tune with nature. I attended a College in a mountain town in New York State. This was my first experience in the mountains. So, journeying to the mountains and taking psychedelics became a passion. I became frustrated with the school’s demands and wanted to be a free spirit. I lost my pragmatic side. 

After a series of profound life changes, I left everything in NY and decided to hitchhike to California as a free spirit, taking a copy of the Tao Teh Ching with me. I eventually landed in Taos, NM, and some truly magical things sparked a spiritual transformation. Unfortunately, I was on the receiving end of some nasty experiences and witnessed the backstabbing all too common in the art world. To be clear, I was also not in a mentally healthy space either. So I left Taos and headed to Seattle just when grunge took off, and I felt at home there. After more backstabbing experiences in the art world, I began questioning what art even offers me. I also became friends with the girlfriend of Alice In Chains’s Lead singer, Demri. I saw her 3 days before she was to die from a drug overdose. She looked like an old woman. When I heard she died, I knew this path wasn’t for me. The pursuit of fame is a black hole filled with backstabbing and an ever-present gravitational pull toward an early death. 

It seemed like the universe was looking out for me, and this theme kept coming up in my life; I knew I needed a change, and martial arts saved me once as a young man. So, I knew it was something I needed again.  I attended an Aikido school in Seattle. I learned a great deal, but the teachers demanded a large amount of money for testing. When I said I didn’t know if I had it, the teacher yelled at me. I knew right there I was done with that school. Moreover, I was experiencing some pain from injuries as a young man, so I spoke with my Naturopathic Doctor, and he suggested I take Tai Chi. I had already been doing a lot of acupuncture for the pain, so it seemed like a natural progression. 

I loved Tai Chi and began practicing every day. I started reading every book on Qi Gong I could find, knowing this was my path. My chronic wrist pain and early exposure to Asian healing methods seem to come to fruition in my study of Tai Chi and Qi Gong. 

This started me getting involved in health; my wrist injury was the main instigator of this pursuit, leading me to understand more about the human body and Chinese Medicine. I became fascinated with the body and Qi Gong and opened the door to a path that unified nature, health, and the body. A friend in my Tai Chi class told me about a Qi Gong master named Dr. Wong. I immediately attended his class that Saturday. Dr. Wong began discussing Traditional Chinese Medicine theory and how Qi Gong was an integral path.  

Soon after, I attended the famous Energetic Retreat in Washington State, where I first met Fook Yueng. Fook Yueng is a renowned Qi Gong master who demonstrated some serious skills even in his 80s. At that retreat, I also met Gao Fu, a famous Chen Tai Chi Master who was also in her 80s. Both these masters were so healthy and fit that I knew I needed to commit to this path. I also thought to myself that I felt like my old art school days of tripping in the mountain, but I was able to do it without drugs, and more importantly, it was positive and healing with no adverse side effects. 

Through a long, committed practice, I have learned to trust my body. The wisdom and the Qi are there; it always gives you what you need if you listen.

The Unforgiving Algorithm of The Universe

I have been experimenting with break falls in Aikido using Tai Chi for muscle repair and incorporating dietary protocols to repair muscle. Break falls are used when a throw is hard, and you land with your body directly onto a matted floor. Falling is tough and jolts your body, and many people get injured.  Many older students, who are, mind you, not much older than me, have cautioned me from doing too many break falls, and all of them have difficulty with parts of their body, such as shoulders and knees.

At 59, I feel really good. I do have a minor shoulder injury that I've been using acupuncture and massage to heal. Weirdly, for some unknown reason, in Aikido and other martial arts, many people do not take advantage of science-based methods of body restoration like nutrition, massage, acupuncture, and therapeutic movement.

This whole experiment is fun. I'm figuring out how to use quality protein intake, nutrient timing, Tai Chi, acupuncture, and massage therapy to heal my body and allow me to access my full potential. Specifically, going to regular acupuncture has afforded me quicker recovery, which allows me to work harder with fewer layoffs. So I can make exponential progress in skill development and body toughness. The injuries that used to make me take two or three days off heal faster, and I can return to training in a shorter period of time. 

During that time, I am not doing Aikido; I'm going for a hike, and I walk my dog, Ripley, at least two to three times a day. Sometimes, I get up to 14,000 steps per day, and I average about 10,000 steps per day. 

Another key ingredient in this is I am not stopping at all. For many years, I used to think oh, don’t push it and rest. Now, I just keep moving through it all. I have found this promotes faster healing. Rest is counterproductive and even detrimental. That said, I will go lighter on any area that feels strained, and I am careful not to reinjure those spots but I keep moving. It is important to note that overworking can backfire, so strategic rests are built into this.  

This exploration of body development has led me to an exciting discovery about nature and the universe. 

We all know the universal law of what goes up must come down, but few know the harder you work to improve, the greater you can handle tough shit and the more luck you have. Now, here is the unforgiving part: the less you work (even if it is a little bit), is a contagion because the more you let up on something, you atrophy, and then your overall capacity decreases. Your old injuries come back. The longer you sit, the greater the chance that those nagging injuries return.  

To understand it, you must understand how large data sets influence the mean. It is not about binging with a 6-mile hike on Saturday and sitting around all weekend. Consistent effort has a bigger impact on the average than one or two big activities. So, walking your dog 2 miles per day, EVERYDAY will have a great impact on your health than one 6-mile hike once per week. This is how you fool your body into doing more. You tweak the mileage little by little. Start off walking your dog 1 mile per day, every day, then increase it a little over time. The algorithm takes over because your body will tell you to do more; it will get bored with 1 mile. Then, you will have a consistent baseline to increase the mileage.   

The same algorithm can be applied to muscle building, school grades, and so much more. It is also how to improve in your career. Little improved changes over time are how the universe operates, so why wouldn't it work for you? especially knowing that the exact opposite momentum is true. That is not by making these little changes; you are declining gradually. Many people find themselves unhappy with their lives or seemingly all of a sudden with 30 pounds of extra weight. This only happens gradually. The cause is often found in the small details of one's habits, like extra snacking, extra beer or soda, or taking a rest too often. 

The tortoise knew this, and the hare did not.