I once had someone tell me that the best compliment is getting copied. It sounds really nice – until you are. I recently had someone send me a video of another art doing the wedge, teaching the wedge. It literally was my words being used. At first I chuckled, then I thought, ‘OK, at some point they will recognize where it came from.’ I’ve always been a stickler for that – saying where things come from, and then trying to adapt or improve them.
There was none of that. The Pramek wedge is now part of a few arts – that one wasn’t the only one who’s done it. I know of 4 right now that are actively teaching the wedge, using Pramek, teaching it with diagrams, but giving no kudo’s. This happened before – back in 2007, I saw people teaching some of my methods within the RMA community but acting as though they had been taught by other people, even down to the words.
When that happened, I took a few years off to further develop Pramek. If people couldn’t appreciate the source, then they didn’t deserve the materials.
I’m a little older now.
A little more patient.
Days go by and in 2011, I hear about human equilibrium seminars being taught, using my terminology and phrases, and now the wedge. These days, I chuckle. I guess having a goal of people stealing your stuff and teaching it is a lofty one. But, I still don’t like it. I do like being ahead of everyone and being chased. I don’t like people who are undeserving being attributed our work. Which is why, in late August, there will be a change in Pramek that will turn us into an organization unrecognizable to the people who know us, and a force people aren’t ready for in the martial art industry.
There are a few people out there who know what I’m working on. I’m not going to give away all the secrets.
But, here’s a few.
It won’t just be ol’ Matt teaching Pramek – it will be some pretty amazing people teaching it who are as legitimate as they come. You’ll want to learn from these people…candidly, some of you won’t even want to buy my stuff and you’ll buy theirs first. It used to be just me but I’ve always said Pramek isn’t about me, it’s about the system, and we will show that.
Pramek won’t just be about combatives – I say we are a full spectrum system and organization, and people will see just how full spectrum we are. We will be releasing videos at a lightening pace from all different directions – and it’ll go on a for a long time. No organization will keep up with our pace of information being put out in video, written, and some other forms of communication that people haven’t thought of and some people have dreamed of but not been able to pull off.
Our reach will be beyond what it has been in a major way and people who never thought they would become part of Pramek will.
When you’re one person running everything – you get taxed with time, effort, and stretched thin. It’s exhausting…Pramek is too large for that, it’s too large for me. So we have been building an organization that will be able to fully explore what we’ve worked on, developed, adapted, coordinate with. And it’ll take people a long time and a whole lot of money, plus a lot of pride swallowing to keep up with us. By then, it’ll be too late. Pramek was always been about adaptation – now you will see evolution.
We haven’t put out a video in a bit because we don’t feel we have the structure to really disseminate what we have. It is better to hold back, organize, create a plan, get the right people – and then push forward for everyone to succeed. So, keep an eye out – I might be quiet on the comm’s, but we are legion you don’t expect and soon we’ll let everyone know 🙂
Email me, call me, if you want to chat I’m always around! Matt