About this Book

Taekwondo originating from the whole life is for the victory. The defeat in the extremely opposed situation of violence means the death, which refers to losing your life. Owing to these reasons Taekwondo begins in the heart of absoluteness of winning, where it also ends.

This fact is natural, simple and essential. Even when the transcendence over the victory or defeat are to be discussed, it will be empty in Taekwondo unless it has the power to surpass the opponent. In addition to that, it will be emptier to build up your character in it. Because you can build up your character only through training, and this consists in process of developing yourself. A development has its goal. At first, Taekwondo develops yourself to get enough power to surpass your opponent at first, then to realize meaning of life extended into the training and to get this shapeless completion later.

In this way, Taekwondo is for victory because it is for man's whole life. Then it will be meaningless to ask more why a man's activity that is called "Taekwondo" is for his life.

By the way, not in every case a defeat implies giving up his life actually. For the victory and the defeat are mixed and tangled with each other in a variety of life styles and life conditions in many cases, and so the implication of the victory or the defeat is not absolute in life. Therefore it is required that Taekwondo man embracing the whole life should get much knowledge and good sense to enlarge himself up to what is not Taekwondo and he needs also both the transcendental and contemplative attitude and the capability of wise judgement and decision.

The yardstick of the judgement in Taekwondo is both simple and complicated. You must win the battle that is necessary for survival, for lives of all, or for the justice. On the other hand, you should transcend the victory or defeat to contemplate the battle for your instant honor or those concerned with your emergent emotion or desire that can be avoided. This kind of distinctive judgement is the start point of Taekwondo man's activity in life, which is due to that man's life is essentially distinctive though everything exists nondistinctively.

There are two different aspects of Taekwondo's contemplation that transcends the victory or defeat. One is the transcendence for the victory and the other the transcendence over the victory or defeat.

Although you have the branch road to a life or a death under your very nose, you should not fall into utter confusion but do your best with usual calm mind. There is neither attachment to the life nor fear of the death. Your fear can neither enable you to increase your ability you don't have, nor can the attachment bring you farther away from the death. This is the transcendence for the victory.

On the other hand, the life and the death don't stand distinctively as fundamentally different. The living and the dead change into each other circularly and endlessly so that it is not absolutely meaningful to live. The absoluteness of the life for you is a mere sort of illusion like a mirage caused by that you live and desire to live. To win and to lose are also same as such. Isn't there anything more than a life or a death that we can get at most with a victory or a defeat? This is the transcendence over the victory or defeat itself.

These two aspects of Taekwondo's transcendence are different features of a thing, so they are finally same. This knowledge endows us contemplation on that man's life and the change of nature are not different.

These features of Taekwondo show what the religion and the TAEWKONDO are same and different about. A religion is a transcendence out of life through a relief on one hand while the TAEKWONDO implies the transcendence to inside the life through positive practices. There is nothing distinctive at the end of the difference finally. Thus, Taekwondo is not something for the victory but for lives of all, however, once concerned unavoidably with the victory or defeat it means the oughtness of not losing. Taekwondo as skill consists in this oughtness. In this manner, Taekwondo coming from the boundary of life and death leads us to the center of absoluteness of the victory. This is the direction of transcendence Taekwondo implies. The boundary of the life and death exists everywhere in life. Accordingly, the whole life of Taekwondo man lies in the absoluteness forward the victory.

Then what is the ultimate meaning of the winning and the losing? To win is to get what you want, to do what you wish, thus to complete your own life and, otherwise, it is to lose. To ask what is the true victory, ask youself first what you want from your heart. The best victory for you as a true Taekwondo man is not to make proud of only yourself over your opponent defeated. The victory, in which you and he can coexist, is the best one. All kinds of the ethics and Taekwondo's skill beloing to this victory, which is the essence that enables TAEKWONDO extended onto what is not Taekwondo. Taekwondo always spreads toward the man's life, which is its start point again. Its charateristics are like those of life circulating. As Taekwondo constantly extends around and back to the center of life, the victory and the defeat many people cling to are nothing more than the unavoidable process included in it.