“Outgunned and outwitted, it became a physical and mental battle in which you’re continually losing, yet you cannot quit. You’re not expected to win, but you have to keep going.” – Roy Dean
It’s Not That Serious Or Is It
One quote that sums up what it’s like to be a martial artist in life. The fight is always internal before it’s external. When someone asks me why do you train so much? Are you training to compete? I usually say I just like training but honestly I believe martial arts is synonymous with life. Always prepared so I don’t have to get prepared, war ready in the presence of peace, but I don’t want to come off all philosophical.
I am a Father, I am a Brother, I am a Son, I am a Friend and I love, protect and provide for those that I love. What better way than to be ready for those that you love. The resilience that I am building, the freedom I am gaining from being disciplined and learning to trust others and myself makes it worth it. Every fight requires your full attention and the life you want requires your focus to be distracted in a fight and life has dire consequences.
I don’t have to list these consequences, you have seen professional fighters and you have experienced hardship in life. It’s painful!
Investing In Loss
Successful fighters have techniques and combos that work for them, but it appears that great champions are those who can accept and understand defeat. When I read this… I reflected on what I learned from playing sports, what I learned from being an entrepreneur running a business for the first time, and experiencing injury for the first time in my life.
I studied my defeats in order to take on more feats, letting go of my ego allowed me the chance to learn where I went wrong, accountability gave me the ability to grow from the pains of losing, playing victim, and continuing to gain skills to correct my mistakes but I needed to know what it was that I influenced in the first place. Whether you believe it or not you always have something to do with what happens to you and what’s happening for you.
In the end whenever that is… I can then say I’ve learned virtually all I could, my technique is almost perfect!
The Middle Path Through Trauma
I remember having a guest on my podcast, who said “ Trauma is an experience, it’s not necessarily good or bad”. Trauma is deemed bad only to victims but champions find a way to shape a positive perspective around their traumas. In which I have done the latter, sharing my “bad experiences” with shoulder injuries in martial arts many may say that I should give it up or at this point I have formed a trauma bond to combat training because I don’t see a valid reason to stop.
My grandma told me words of encouragement and she always says “There’s always a way”. And that way is to move forward. In combat understanding positioning, pace control, timing, and defense, dodging, and footwork is what martial artists emphasize as moving forward in battle to win. I just took a better angle, changed my pace and timing, and learned to work around and through my injury. I went to physical therapy to strengthen myself and rebuild confidence. That was the angle I took, training with a mindset to get a little better with my technique every day on the mat, and trusting in my time input.
There’s always a way and pain and suffering is to turn you to the middle path. Pain is to show what’s distracting you and suffering is to show what’s truly controlling you.
Warrior and a Hippie
I will never consider myself a fighter even if you see me cage fighting. I’m a martial artist but if I had to split myself, I will say I’m a warrior to others and a hippie to some.Connecting toughness with gentleness and creativity. I only believe in fighting for something that I truly believe in and I believe that combat and life are synonymous so there is no end to training and that I can always perfect fundamentals and details becoming a greater warrior because just like the body is perishable, so are my skills.
Trying to learn everything or a lot, it’s all about reading, studying, learning and growing in this life and in martial arts. It’s about creating harmony outside of us and within us. Being a warrior isn’t just having the body to look the part, it’s essentially a state of mind. I’m ultimately finding that place where I don’t think about putting one foot in front of the other when I go to open doors to more opportunities. I lose my fear of failure by taking one step at a time and I hope you find martial arts life changing as much as I did.
Book I read: “30 Years, 80 Coaches, Fighters,Hools, Sensei, and Lessons[not] Learned” by Bart Martin
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