I have skill with a bow, it seems so natural, and like some of my race I was taught at a early age. First it was to hunt, then when I left the tribe, it was to survive. You learn something when your skill determines if you want to eat. You learn awareness, you learn determination, you learn to not be distracted from your goal. Everything is about the slow moment before the action. In that moment you decide to kill something to live.Â
You cannot hold back, you cannot do half effort, doing less than you can do is disrespectful to the creature you take life from. That is what I was taught, a very traditional tribal way of looking at the hunt. It has been so long since those early lessons, and perhaps I forgot what is important about it. But I know things now that, that scrawny child with messy hair never knew, my own strength. Somewhere along that journey, my own strength became something I feared, because it was different. Because it marked me apart from others.
I hid that part of myself, I conformed, and followed my new tribe of adventurers. I did not want to be marked as different, I wanted to be, accepted.
That not only disrespected my opponents, but also, disrespected myself. Tonight my partner asked me to train against her. I asked her to keep me safe, from myself, to protect me from my own gifts. Only then can I let go and see, just how far these talents of mine will take me.
You cannot hold back, you cannot do half effort, doing less than you can do is disrespectful to the creature you take life from. That is what I was taught, a very traditional tribal way of looking at the hunt. It has been so long since those early lessons, and perhaps I forgot what is important about it. But I know things now that, that scrawny child with messy hair never knew, my own strength. Somewhere along that journey, my own strength became something I feared, because it was different. Because it marked me apart from others.
I hid that part of myself, I conformed, and followed my new tribe of adventurers. I did not want to be marked as different, I wanted to be, accepted.
That not only disrespected my opponents, but also, disrespected myself. Tonight my partner asked me to train against her. I asked her to keep me safe, from myself, to protect me from my own gifts. Only then can I let go and see, just how far these talents of mine will take me.
