I was rocking my Mayan cut bloodwoods for the Epiphany festivities.
hey man! i think its insanely rad that youre into martial arts and body modification.
Thank you.
I’ve been training in martial arts since I was 12. I train with Marrese Crump. You should look him up. He’s shooting a movie with Tony Jaa right now (Tom Yum Goong 2) and then I’m co-producing with The RZA with Marrese and Anderson Silva and a few others after that (Formless).
I’m into body modifications because I’ve been around them my entire life. They are part of my culture. Tattoos, stretched ears, other mods… these aren’t fashion statements to me, they are cultural statements.
Thanks for following!
My 1” Bloodwood spirals from Bare Bones Organic. They are in Thailand, but they also sell on eBay (lannaart). I absolutely love EVERYTHING I’ve gotten from them so far! Them and Omerica Organic in the USA are my favorites!
what was the first body modification you got? are any of them specifically of ceremonial significance, or mainly just cultural?
They are all ceremonious in a way that they signify a major event and/or accomplishment in my life. I received my first one when I was 18 the weekend after graduating from Infantry School, the second one being around 21 when I graduated from the US Army Intelligence Academy and so on. After I left the Army is when I started stretching my ears and stretched them to 12mm over 2 years and stayed there for the longest. I then moved up to 16mm after my son was born and then up to 26mm after my daughter. I’ll be stopping here for quite some time.
It’s a great question because I recently found an artist that will be essentially covering all my tattoo work so far with solid black ink and any modifications over those areas will be scarification and tattooing in the new areas. It marks a ‘cleansing’ of sorts in my life where I rid myself of a lot of sources of negative energy so everything going forward in my life and on my body will be on a ‘clean slate’, but still a reminder of my past. It actually happened a while ago so getting the work done is overdue.
I also discuss these matters with my family, elders and some mentors as to advice and guidance and will raise my children in a similar structure, with them being more educated on these matters than I was when I was growing up. Unfortunately, the answers to more than a few of my questions was “I don’t know, that’s how it’s always been done.” So I’m excited to give my children a great head start with knowledge about themselves, their culture and its traditions AND meanings, and life in general.
Thanks for the question!
