mr. miyagi, in his defense of daniel-san, employed some jiu jitsu-like moves to fend off attackers.
jiu jitsu is a form martial arts which focuses on using an opponent’s force against them. an individual may be charging at you. you take advantage of their momentum and trip them so that they fall to the ground with force. thus, your opponent’s actions caused their own harm.
now, it is time to step into the dojo. mr. miyagi is here for a lesson in the art of mental jiu jitsu. “do not give into fear of your opponent’s mental attack on you. you must focus. your intelligence, morality and values are within you. you must focus and bring them out. remember your roots!.”
when those are mentally attacking you, you need to take the time and understand what they are doing. don’t be intimidated by them. once your anger and fear wears off, you will get clarity. with this clarity will come the brilliance. how is your opponent attacking you? can you flip it in your favor?
the following is an example of a mental jiu jitsu victory for the ten commandments.
the aclu, the american civil liberties union, took a case involving the display of the ten commandment at a public courthouse. the basis was that an individual viewed the ten commandments as being offensive and somehow in violation of the first amendment. a businessman, mr. john menghini, a defender of the ten commandments, exercised his mental jiu jitsu and gave the aclu a moral beat down.
mr. mengini got the ten commandments monument moved to a private location. “the beauty of this move is that now, far more visitors to the courthouse actually view the ten commandments because it is more visible than it ever was on the courthouse grounds,” he said. “i thought, if every church and synagogue in america would proudly display god’s law, as this one church did, maybe our culture could turn a corner and come back to its judeo-christian roots.” theonomy. “he tried to think of a constructive way to fight back. while contemplating his options, he realized that public displays of the ten commandments seem scarce even on catholic-owned property.” cite thus, his mental jiu jitsu led him to the clever way of getting around the aclu. this was private displays of the ten commandments. since they were on private property, the aclu could not sue on first amendment grounds to have them removed.
menghini devised a way to “erect ten commandments displays, possibly as fast as the aclu could remove them from the public square. he would display them at parishes, catholic institutions and on highly visible private property where the aclu and the courts have limited jurisdiction regarding free expression.” cite he founded a project moses to do so.
“If courts yield to the aclu and we are forced to remove the ten commandments from civic display, we shall make every effort to keep them in the public eye. indeed, this is the rationale of project moses,” said archbishop james keleher of kansas city, kan., a member of the project moses national board of advisers. cite.
in sum, we all have the ability to exercise our mental jiu jitsu. do not give into fear! you must focus! let your intelligence, morals and values bring out the best of you! take your opponent’s force and use it against them in a positive way.
be well!!!
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The Ten Commandments Project 