Silat Sharaf : The Balance of Life and Death
Core Principles of Pencak Silat Sharaf
Author : Steve Hanafi (Silat Sharaf Practitioner, Malaysia)
1. Silat as a Way of Life
Taught since kid and practiced till one’s final breath, it is more than just a martial art
Silat is not just an art, but also a way of living
How it translates into your life, how you interact with other people, how you treat other beings. Your mindset and mentality – dominance in any aspect of work or war, the mentality to always win with a minimal resource as possible, the mentality to use only the best, and be the best. Being a good leader, a good member of the society, giving something back to the people around you and also the community. Having the attitude of a Pesilat, patience, good manners, ethics, kind but also vicious, not letting others be bullied or oppressed when you have the power to stop it. How it translates into your daily life, how it affects your thinking, decision making, and the actions that you take.
2. Civilize the Mind, Make Savage the Body
It is important to develop both physical and mental strength and skill
The mind is the ultimate weapon. It trumps any other weapons. No matter how strong or how skilled a person is, but if they’re as dumb as a rock then its no use. The mind is the computer, the processing system. No great machine has a shitty system, only a capable mind can direct the body towards success. Strategies and tactics are crucial when it comes to outsmarting and defeating an enemy and securing victory, in which none can be done if your mind is not weaponized for success.
You must reprogram your mind and make it capable of all your worst enemies can do, but with the ethical emergency stop button that defines the clear line between you as a law-abiding citizen and other criminals. You need to be able to free your mind from its social conditioning of good and evil; match their brutality and surpass it whenever you choose. And only after that should you work on your body; work on your strength, endurance, and ultimately your combative skill.
3. Violence is Prioritized over Technique
Any technique is useless if it is not backed with violence. When you’re fighting to take down an enemy, violence of action is necessary. No matter how flashy, flowery, or if it is the Ultimate Technique of Jiujitsu-Taekwondo-Muay Thai-Karate no Jutsu, but if it isn’t backed with violence, it is of no use. If you continue in your socialized training methods, you will never be able to defeat a sophisticated killer who is determined to execute you…regardless if you are much higher skilled technically than they are.
Quality Training + Violent Intent = Functional Skill
Techniques without violence are static and useless. Back your training up with violence in mind during training, visualize the adversary, and how your attacks affect them and vice versa.
4. Love all life and Prepare for Death…Either Yours or Your Adversaries
In Silat, we teach and are taught lethal ways to deal with our adversaries. Why? The answer is simple because we want to end the fight as soon as it begins. We don’t want to spend 10 minutes fighting one adversary while their backup arrives or while they figure out how to get back at us and take us out. It is the mindset that should be instilled into every Pesilat (Silat pratitioner) that the more prolonged the fight, the more resource it will cost. Resources are as valuable as it is scarce. That is why the techniques taught are simple, brutal, and made to kill. However, this doesn’t mean that a Pesilat walks around his daily life killing everyone who messes with him. Every being is respected just like every life is.
5. Your Loss Isn’t Just Your Loss
When we train, we put heavy emphasis on making the opponent unable or unwilling to fight, and that includes having to use a lethal amount of force. And surely, when we train, we visualize the heavy consequence of losing. Losing in a fight doesn’t just mean broken bones, cut wounds, or just loss of property, it can mean going to the ICU, losing your life, or worse your loved ones. That’s why in our system we emphasize that if you lose, the people around you lose too. Your wife loses her husband, your kids lose their father, they lose their source of love and income, and that is detrimental by how you train.
6. Improving is The Key to Survival
Anything that refuses to do so perishes. One must always seek ways to improve themselves as an individual. Improve on their strength, on their mindset, strategies, and fighting skill. Silat is an art that has gone through many phases of evolving, the ones that remain stagnant are either too arrogant or dumb to realize that constantly evolving is the true way of Silat.
7. Always Seek Peace, but if War Comes, Fight to the Bitter End
If violence is imposed upon you or your loved ones, then return it with deadlier force
Walk away from any useless argument, from any useless form of showing who’s the alpha shit, from getting involved in useless shows of aggression. . When others show aggression, ignore it. Always find a way to walk out with the least amount of violence, for it is more profitable for you.
But violence, violence is different from aggression. When violence is imposed upon you, return it 10 fold. And never hesitate. A moment of hesitation can cause a lifetime of regret.
These are the core principles of Silat Sharaf, principles that are taught and emphasized during our training, lectures and among members. A strong core is what builds a strong system.