It might sound harsh, but most people are holding back… not just on the mats, but in every aspect of life. They’re NOT maximizing their efforts and, therefore, NOT maximizing their successes. (Yes, including me!)

The question is WHY?

Or is it? Maybe before asking why, I should ask if you even agree? Perhaps you believe you ARE giving 100%… even if you’re not. It’s a common misimpression.

How does this happen?

In this episode, let’s dig deep to figure out if we’re truly working towards our dreams or just going through the motions. Along the way, I hope you’ll discover there’s more power in you just waiting to be unleashed!

Oh—two videos are mentioned in this episode. If you’d like to check them out, here are the links…

• One Tip for Powerful Punches
• Self-Defense Tip: Finish the Fight

Okay—check out the show, then let’s get out there and start throwing some full power punches!

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Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

Stop Pulling Your Punches

Here’s a video of the podcast. If the player doesn’t work, you can click this direct link.

As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, and welcome to Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better. Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. I’m so glad you could stop by.

Today, Stop Pulling Your Punches. The reason this topic is on my mind…

The other day, I was working with a student, a young man, and we were throwing sidekicks on a bag. And he’s a hardworking student. He was sweating. He was giving it his all. He was pivoting well. He was kicking hard.

But overall, I had to give him like a B+. This is not an A performance. Why?

Well, the fact is that he wasn’t extending his leg all the way. The pivot wasn’t 100%. Sticking out that heel wasn’t 100%. And therefore, it wasn’t a complete kick. It wasn’t his full potential for a strong side kick.

Now, this is not the first time that I’ve addressed this type of issue on the physical front. I have a video, I believe it’s called, One Tip for More Powerful Punches. In that video, I comment on the same phenomenon.

When you see people set up in front of a heavy bag very often, they “short arm” their punches. They just kind of stand there and their hands are very active, but their torso is not. And so the tip very simply was to give yourself a little more space and try to extend that shoulder for a full punch.

Now, of course, I’m not innocent. I am guilty of short arming my punches and kicks over the years. And in particular, when I started grappling, so 15 years ago, I remember I was rolling with my coach, and I was just happy to get good positions, get to a mount, get to his back. But if I got my arm around his neck to set up a choke, I’d let that go. If I got near an arm bar, I wouldn’t fight for it.

When the round was over, I remember my coach being very frustrated. He looked at me and he said, What is this? A nice guy contest? Guilty again. Yes. I absolutely admit that physically, I was not finishing techniques. I was not in the hunt for the tap, for the win.

Psychologically, of course, that’s the problem. I didn’t want to be a jerk. I was new to grappling. I certainly didn’t want to hurt him, because I didn’t know what I was doing necessarily. So I don’t want to hurt somebody. I’m out of control.

I didn’t want to come off as too aggressive, or like I’m trying to win. I’d like to think that my ego is in check and I was just enjoying the learning experience. But at the same time, that doesn’t make me the best of sparring partners, because I am allowing falsity into the workout.

The worst thing you can do for your partners is to give them a false sense of confidence, a false sense of skill, letting them think they earned an escape, when really you just gave up on the attack.

So, yeah, I needed to make some adjustments to make sure I was being a good sparring partner, and to ensure that they would be good sparring partners back to me. I don’t want people short arming their punches or shortening their kicks, just to make me feel good. I need that honest feedback of for what’s working and what’s not.

So overall, in a nutshell, if you have to leave early, the big advice today is stop pulling your punches, because the magic of martial arts is in the finish.

The magic is in that last 10%, 5% of effort, where you do fight to win, where you fight for the success. Of course, that’s the magic in everything in life, going for the finish, not holding back, giving something your full effort and attention.

I think I can prove this, because most of us are very excited when we see something, see a person working at full capacity. As opposed to what we normally see– I think it’s just part of human nature– where people hold back a bit. I think most people are working short of their potential on the mats and off– half-hearted, half-assed.

People seem to have this natural tendency, including me, to do the minimum to get by. Whatever your goal is, they seek the minimum– what do I have to do to get that goal?– and not necessarily looking to do more than that.

My proof for this is that when people go the extra mile– well, let me back up, when people give 100%, you notice. If people give 100% and then do more than that, like extra credit, you really notice. And that can be in any walk of life.

That could be getting a waiter or a waitress who greets you well, gets the order correct, is timely, checks up on you during the meal, makes sure you have everything you have, brings you the check on time. When they tick every box of a professional waiter or waitress, you notice. Why do you notice? Because you’ve had so many lousy waiters and waitresses.

So I’ve had that experience, whether it’s at the dentist’s office or at a car mechanic. You get used to this mediocre level of service, attention, competence, and you just kind of think, well, that’s the way it is. Until you meet that person who’s really good at what they do, and they tick every box of professionalism, and you realize, like, wow, I’m inspired by this. I notice this. I want to be like that.

My other proof that most people aren’t working at full capacity, I think, would be in the sports world. Playoffs. I’m not much of a sports guy for regular season sports, because I’m not always convinced they’re going at 100%. They’re nursing injuries or whatever. The big crowds aren’t as big. They know they have a long season. They can make it up later. But during playoffs, I know that they’re trying hard.

During the Olympics, I know it’s now or never, these people have to put up their best performance right now. We pay money to see people working at 100%. That’s maybe how rare it is to find people not pulling their punches.

So, when you find people, if you went and paid for a ticket at a professional basketball game or at the Olympics, and people weren’t working at 100%, I think that’s when the crowd starts to boo, throw stuff, because you feel cheated. I paid to see you work at 100%. I want that inspiration in my life. And if you don’t get it, boo. So, that’s number two.

My third proof that most people aren’t working at full capacity, I think, is animal attacks. Whether it’s on Instagram or wherever, when you catch these little “caught on tape” type clips of a bear tearing up a campsite, running after somebody, or a shark attack, or any animal– it could be a spider– animal attacks are incredibly gripping entertainment. Why? Why can’t you look away?

I think it’s because of the commitment level. The animal is not in the off season. That animal is either protecting their young or they’re hungry, and they’re fighting for their life. So what you’re seeing there is a primal example of 100% effort. Biting down, holding on, trying to kill somebody. And man, that’s exciting. And perhaps inspiring.

So, overall, I think the rule is simple. If you give a minimal level of effort, you’re going to get minimal results. If you give more, you’re going to get more.

And if you can make a habit of giving your best and going all the way with what you’ve got, then you will figure out what your best really is. You will fulfill your potential. Doesn’t mean you’re always going to be the champ. Doesn’t mean you’re always going to win or survive or get what you want. But your results will be maximized.

Okay, now, this can get tricky because you may feel that you are already doing that. That you’re giving all you’ve got…

You’re exhausted after class. You’ve saved as much money as you can, etc., etc. You may feel like you are already a hard worker. And the reason this is tricky is that’s true! You may be a hard worker. You may know lots about your subject of expertise. You may have the courage to show up and try new things. You may practice a lot. You may be brave enough to ask questions and seek mentors and coaches.

But all of those measurements don’t necessarily equate to success. The problem here is when you reflect on what you’re doing, you’re measuring the wrong qualities. Gee, I’m sweating. So does that mean I worked my best? Maybe not. Did you try new things? Did you ask the right questions? Did you put yourself in uncomfortable situations or are you just repeating the same things that always work for you?

Bottom line is if you’re only measuring what you want to measure and you’re not measuring what you don’t want to measure, you’re going to get bad feedback. So I would suggest the one measurement that you should always include in your reflections is: Am I winning? Is what I’m doing working?

Now, don’t get me wrong, you don’t want to be that person in your martial arts class who’s always trying to win, who can’t drop it down a little bit to learn something. That would come off like maybe you’re a jerk. Like you just treat everything like a competition. Because that leads to only repeating what works for you. You’re never going to learn something. So the measurements can’t just be, am I always winning?

But am I always learning? Now, definitely if you are not winning– if you are losing, failing, not getting the tap, not getting the point, getting knocked down– yes, you are learning. You should be learning from your reflections. But if you’re never including, hey, here’s me winning– here’s me getting the tap, finishing the choke, scoring that knockdown– then you’re not learning from the wins. So your learning experience is very limited.

So I don’t want you just to measure by sweat or by new information. Please measure, are you getting the results that you should be? The tap, the point, the knockdown. Whatever that is in your life, make sure you’re measuring successes. You should have some.

If you’re not getting those successes, those wins, the points that you’ve got to ask, is it because I’m actually not giving 100%? Is there a 10%, 5% margin that I’m just not using? I’m not going to my limits. Why? New reflection…

Why are you stopping short?

Why aren’t you getting that choke and the tap? Why are you pulling your punches? Are you not sure it’s the right move? Are you not sure you have control of it? Are you not sure how you’re going to feel if you’re that guy who can finish things? Do you think people are not going to like you if you’re successful? Do you have a fear of success?

All of these, of course, are mental blocks, not physical blocks. That young man who was throwing sidekicks could extend his leg. And once I made some observations, he did extend his leg. So it was a mental block for some reason that he wasn’t extending his leg, not physical.

So, yes, it’s going to be scary sometimes to suddenly go 100% if you’ve made a habit of going 85% or 90% even. That last 5% of effort may likely change who you are, how you see yourself, how others see you. It’s going to change things.

Right now, you might have a status where you’re pretty good. That’s your identity. That’s how people see you. Like, yeah, you’re pretty good. If you push for that extra 5%, you might find yourself failing more and feeling silly all of a sudden. People may notice like, Hey, you’re failing more. You’re not as good as we thought.

You have to be brave enough to look at that. And accept that and say, Well, that’s okay, but at least I know what my limits are. On the other hand, you might go from, Yeah, I’m pretty good, to, I’m better than I thought. I’m getting more success.

And how is that going to change your identity? How you see yourself and how others see you? Some people may love it that you’re coming into your own and up kicking up to a new level. Others may not. They feel more comfortable with you right where you were.

That’s where they met you. That’s where they like you. And now you’re up a notch. And they’re not going to follow you up there. They can’t or won’t. And they prefer that you came back down to their level. So you may not want to deal with that. And that’s your choice. But at least be aware of what you’re doing.

Now, to be fair, there are a couple of considerations here to not necessarily excuse why you’re not working at 100%, but maybe explain why you’re not working at 100%. Here’s one of them…

Yin and Yang. Every extreme holds the seed of its opposite. If you look at the YinYang, it’s not just the black side and the white side swirling into one another– there’s often the little dots of the opposite color right in the middle of the other. So what does that represent?

Well, for the sake of this discourse, this rant, I would suggest that that is the vulnerability inherent in going to an extreme. So very simple example. If you’re short-arming a punch, you’re also shortening the amount of time that you are vulnerable to a counter. Your elbow is close enough to your body that you can pull that back to a defensive shield pretty quickly.

The longer your arm goes, the longer amount of the time is that that hand is away from your body. The longer your body is open for a counter underneath that arm. And the longer it’s going to take for that hand to come back to being defensive.

So quite literally, on a physical level, the more extreme that you reach out that punch, the longer you are vulnerable. You may already sense that instinctively and pull those punches a little bit back, just so you’re not vulnerable to being countered.

Definitely with kicks, you may feel even more of that fear, because you’re on one leg, you’re sticking your leg out there, your groin is exposed, it just feels more vulnerable. So you just don’t throw it 100%. I get that.

However, I believe the point of practice– these are not real fights yet that we’re talking about– in a practice session, in a martial arts dojo, there’s no reason why you can’t throw that 100%, risk that vulnerability, just to see if it works. To see how big a risk you’re really taking. To see what you can get away with and what you can’t.

So that you can be more wise in when you employ 100%, deploy, and when you decide to pull that a little bit shorter. You want that wisdom.

I believe you can always do less, if it comes to a real fight or some high stakes situation. You can always do less. But we should be training to always do more. So you have the option.

If you only practice at 85%, and then in a real situation you feel even more intimidated, now you’re working back at 65%, you’ve really shrunk your abilities. If however you practice at 100%, and then a real life situation scares you back to 85%, well at least you’re at 85%, not 65%. That’s my logic anyway.

So one, the yin and the yang, the inherent vulnerability of going out to an extreme at 100%. That’s one reason to be fair that you may not be operating fully.

The other reason may be you simply don’t know about it. You didn’t realize that you’re not doing 100%. And that’s usually because your challenge is at too low of a level. You’re in a comfort zone, and you may not even realize it.

Let’s say, for instance, at your school, you’re coasting at your 90%. I mean, 90% is still working hard. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t mean to say coasting, but you’re operating at 90% of your potential. And let’s just say all of your partners, they’re working at 80% of here and 85% there, 60% there, and it just happens that your 90% is able to dominate everybody else’s half-hearted efforts.

So you think you’re doing great. That must be good enough. You must be 100% because nobody’s beating you, or at least not enough to take it too seriously. So you build up a false sense of confidence, like me with my grappling coach. Your partners, by not giving you 100%, have allowed you to believe that your 90% is 100%, and you don’t even need to question it. No good.

Think about breaking boards. Let’s say you put up one or two boards. I’m betting you are healthy and strong enough that you don’t need 100% of your power and speed to bust through one or two boards. So if you only set up one or two boards, you’re going to get by for the rest of your life at 80% effort. Because the challenge is just that low.

But if you challenge yourself and put up four or five boards, I’m going to bet that your 80% effort won’t cut it. It might break your hand. You’re going to need to push your limits on speed and power and focus and courage to bust through that four or five boards.

So by raising the challenge, you had to push yourself to a higher limit. So this is what we should be doing on all fronts. Give yourself higher challenges to force yourself to find your failure point. Know what your 100% is. Then you can back up a little bit and strengthen up your resources to maybe come back stronger the next time. And then increase your limitations.

This is what a good martial arts program should be doing. It should be a safe place to raise your level of challenge to force you to work at 100%. To get to the place where you fail, but you know you gave it everything you had.

Alright. Now let’s talk about self-defense. I have addressed this topic a little bit in a video called, Self-Defense TIp: Finish the Fight. And the big takeaway, if you don’t want to go watch it, was this thought: A fight is not over when you say it’s over. The fight’s over when the other guy says it’s over.

Somebody comes running up to you on the street, and you give them a big palm heel to the nose. You may think, That’s good, that’ll stop them, that’s enough. They may not think so, though. The other guy might just walk through it and still be swinging at you.

So the fight’s not over just because you thought it was over. He’s still going. So now you have to do something else, and maybe something else. Hopefully you have that opportunity.

So we should be training to go farther and farther with our techniques, with our combinations, with our power and speed, to go to our limits. Because, like I said, we can always do less, but we should be preparing to do more, to go all the way. And I do believe that how you do one thing is typically how you do everything.

So let’s say at work, maybe you don’t love your job, so you’re doing like 70-75% of your effort there. Maybe you’re bored in your relationships, so you’re kind of pulling back 75-80% there. Maybe you’re diet or saving money, you’ve pulled back on some of your efforts there, you’re like, I don’t know, 80-90%.

So now you’re in martial arts class, and you’re used to that kind of level of effort, that’s who you are. So you’re kind of given 70-90% somewhere in there in martial arts class. That’s not necessarily going to be your best life. If that’s the goal to live your best life, you’re already cheating yourself.

So, at least in the martial arts class, if that’s a safe space for you to push your limits, and to risk vulnerabilities, and risk new identities, and kind of expose who you really are and what you can really do, if you can give 100% in that martial arts class, then maybe you can come back to your diet, relationships, finances, your job, and kick it up a level over there too.

Maybe your martial arts training can inspire everything else that’s going on in your life. That’s why I say that even a little martial arts can make your whole life all better. Let the martial arts influence the rest of your life. Push yourself in martial arts, and then push yourself in the rest of your life. Or back that up…

Reflect and think about where am I not giving 100%?

Where am I showing up and doing all the hard stuff– I signed up for this, I show up for that, seems like I’m working hard, I think I’m still learning. Where do I give myself a pat on the back for not giving up, but I’m still not getting the results that I wanted? I’m not winning.

Are you getting the results that you wanted? Find those areas and figure out why not. Is it because you still have 10%, 5%, 1% that you’re holding back? Are you pulling your punches?

My advice would be to redefine what 100% means to you. Whatever you’ve got in your life right now, that’s the result of the efforts that you’ve made thus far. If you suspect that you’re not heading towards what you really wanted, that you’re not going to get it, the time’s running out, you’re getting tired now.

I’m 54 now. I’m getting tired. So I have to be really honest with myself. When I reflect on, Okay, where am I? What did I want? Am I doing the work? Am I doing the right work? Am I giving 100%?

I got to be honest. Sometimes I think, Nope, you can do more here, you can do more there. So that’s why I’m talking about this, because this is right from my own heart. I know I have to do more in certain categories of my life.

So redefine this for yourself. What is 100% to you? And you can start simply. I’m all about starting simply. Go to a heavy bag. Hit it with 100% of your effort. Don’t say, I already do. I already do hit it really hard. I’m asking you to take another look at it. Is it really as hard as you possibly could? Are you really bringing up every muscle fiber, every bit of your breath, every bit of your imagination, every bit of effort, mind, body, spirit, to slug that bag or kick that bag or knee that bag?

If you don’t trust the safety of your hand or your foot, then give it an elbow, give it a knee. But redefine what 100% feels like, looks like, and own that. Set that new marker for yourself, like, Oh, that’s what 100% is from me. Risk it.

If somebody’s watching you then in class, going after that bag, slamming it harder and faster than you ever have before, I bet they notice. And now we’re back to that thought that you’re either going to feel silly because you’ve never revealed that much power before. They may think you look silly. They may not like this new change, this new you, this new more powerful you.

On the other hand, I’m hoping you’re going to love it. You’re going to feel like a million bucks instead of 900,000 bucks. You are going to own a new identity where you are more powerful than you thought. That’s what you should give yourself.

So don’t give up on your goals quite yet. If you’re not getting what you wanted, if you’re not the toughest guy in your class, if you can’t get that tap, if you’re getting punched more than you’re punching them, if you’re losing at tournaments, if you’re not the belt that you want it to be– go down all the goals that you’re thinking about, those dreams that you have, and it could be anything, and really take a look at it.

If you’re not there yet, don’t give up until you know for sure you gave it 100%. This would be my last challenge here to you. First, redefine what 100% really is. Then ask, is that my 100% for the goal that I want the most? Have I been giving it that 100%?

If it’s yes, you really have been giving it 100% and you still haven’t gotten it, and you want to walk away from that goal, Mazel Tov. That’s totally fine. I think you’ll be able to live with that. There are certainly goals that I’ve had, that I walked away from. I felt that I gave at that time 100% of what I had. And therefore I’m okay with it.

But there are a couple of other goals where I didn’t give 100%. Where I chickened out on making that connection or pushing it or spending whatever it was. And now that I’m older, I look back and think, That was bad. That was stupid. I’m ashamed of that. But I can’t let that linger for long because now what matters is where you are today, where I am today, and how I’m going to use that past, learn from it, and act for the future. And I hope you can do that too.

And last little note, be patient with yourself. Not all goals are meant to be right away. So if you’ve now redefined what 100% is for yourself, that doesn’t mean suddenly you’ve got a huge bank account or that you’re suddenly world champion of your sport. It may take time to get where you want to go.

If you’re trying to play a musical instrument, you haven’t really been giving it 100%, and now you are, give it some time. It takes time to save money, it takes time to build skill, it takes time to build trust, it takes time to nurture a good relationship. But bring 100% to all of those tasks, all of those goals, and maximize what you’re going to get out of them.

Alright, I think I’m going to catch my breath here. Let’s wrap this up…

I definitely would say, as I have gotten older, it is easier and easier to see other people identifying who’s giving 100% and who is not. I think those 100-percenters really stand out. And when you see the people who are giving 100%, who aren’t pulling their punches, I get goosebumps. It makes me tear up. I want to support them. And even if I never see them, it makes me feel like I want to give 100%, that there’s still time, and I can do that too.

On the other hand, you see the B students. You see the people who are at 90% or less. And it hurts. To me, it hurts my heart. It feels like they’re wasting time, and I don’t want to waste my time. It feels like they’re missing opportunities, and I don’t want to miss opportunities, so I just feel empathetic. Or sympathetic.

I don’t want to be disappointed in myself. I don’t want to feel like I’ve wasted my time, that I was fearful. I want to feel that when I’m dead, when I’m dying, I gave it 100%. And I want you to have that same feeling. I don’t want you to have those regrets that you pulled punches, that you didn’t extend that kick. It’s a horrible thing to have to go to the grave with, I believe.

So, give more and then get more. Take the risks and push yourself into those uncomfortable areas. Allow vulnerability in your practice. Seek to redefine who you are and what you can do.

I think if you do this, I believe if you do this, you stop pulling punches, you’re going to find out that you’re faster than you thought, you’re stronger than you thought, you’re tougher than you thought. And all that’s going to add up to living a happier life than you thought.

Okay, that’s it. Take a moment to pick a goal right now that you’ve been thinking about your whole life, working on your whole life, recommit to it at 100%. This is it. Win or lose, whether you get it or you don’t, at least be proud of yourself for fighting for it.

Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #124: Stop Pulling Your Punches [Video Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Many people worry that they won’t have the courage to fight back against a real-life attacker… and that includes martial arts students!

It makes sense, really. You can build strong muscles and practice cool moves all day long, but when fear strikes, you might still find yourself curled up in a ball and frozen solid.

Don’t let that happen to you!

In this episode, I’ll share some tips to help you face your fears and build your courage… no matter what threats come your way. (Believe me—you’re not alone. I need these tips, too!)

If you’d like even more advice on overcoming fear—particularly when sparring—check out this video: How to Reduce Fear in Sparring and Fighting.

The good news is that you’re already brave… you’re already a fighter. Believe it! The big trick is simply not allowing anyone or anything to make you forget it.

Okay—let’s get started! Let me know what you think!

To LISTEN to “How to Build Courage in Martial Arts,” here’s the link.

• Play the audio podcast below… or download to your device.
• Subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher or Google Podcasts or Spotify.

To WATCH the video version or READ the transcript, scroll down below.

If you’d like to support this show, share the link with a friend or leave a quick review over on iTunes. Thank you!

Oh—and don’t forget to sign up for free email updates so you can get new shows sent to your inbox the minute they’re released.

Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

How to Build Courage in Martial Arts

Here’s a video of the podcast. If the player doesn’t work, you can click this direct link.

As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, again! Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #123 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Great to be back on video, I’ve missed you. I’ve been busy training, been busy teaching, but I’m here now. And, if I’m going to be honest, feeling a little old. Let me tell you why.

In the mail, I got this lovely note. Yes, and what does it say? It says, Andrew, because they really know me. Andrew, make a plan that celebrates your life. And who is this from?

Why, it’s a cremation service. Yes, I’ve finally reached the age where there are officially people waiting for me to die. They can’t wait to burn my corpse. So now I’m walking outside every day, looking up, seeing if today’s the day.

Are there any vultures? How bad do I look? Have I lost weight? Anyway, I keep this on my desk. I didn’t throw it out because it reminds me that life is short and life is crazy. Live while you can, my friend.

If you have to leave the episode right now, that’s what you needed to know. So live.

What I’d like to talk about, if you’re still going to hang around though, is courage. It takes courage to live in this world, doesn’t it? It takes courage to go after your goals. And it will certainly take courage to defend your life or to defend your goals if someone tries to stop you.

I bring this up because I get this comment either through video reactions or through email quite often. Someone will write, Dear Sensei Ando, I am afraid that I won’t be brave enough to fight back if I’m ever attacked. I’m afraid that I don’t have the courage to stand up for myself.

Whoa. All right. Let me make this simple, okay? And then maybe if you want to cut the episode short and you want to take off, okay. To me, this question is just missing one thing, context.

There are incidents every day where people with no martial arts training defend themselves successfully. Could be multiple attackers, could be a weapon involved, but people who did not see trouble coming finding a way to survive, finding a way to win. And it’s not just in the world of self-defense.

There are people who have been wiped out one way or the other and rebuilt their lives. Whether it was addiction and drugs, whether it was bankruptcy and financial ruin, whether it’s disease, the pandemic, whether their town was bombed in a war or invaded.

Throughout history, human beings find ways to pull themselves back together and move forward. And if they can do it, I believe I can do it. And if I can do it, I believe you can do it.

So the context here is situations that put us in emergency mode. Code red.

When necessity is strong enough, you will fight. When desperation is high enough, you will find a way to fight back.

That’s what I believe. In those moments of extreme crisis, your strengths will be revealed. And I believe you will overcome fear. I think fear is something we can just imagine when there is no crisis. So of course, it seems like we’re going to be overwhelmed.

But you’re not giving yourself enough credit, my friend. If you were attacked by a shark, I have no training for that. You probably have no training for that. But I’ll bet you’d fight. I’ll bet you’d fight hard.

So tap into that. Believe in that.

You have an emergency mode that, if things are truly, truly bad, you have resilience, you have toughness, you will fight your fight. I’m not guaranteeing you survive. I’m not guaranteeing you win. But I guarantee you’ll fight.

So, moving on again, episode number three within one episode. The fact is most life is not emergency mode. This is where the problem comes in.

So, if we’re not put in extreme crisis, how do I have the courage to go after what I want in life? How do I do it? There are so many things that we want to do, but we don’t have to do. And therefore, we end up floating, just floating in indecision and inaction. And we don’t get what we want.

And we just float. And over time, that starts to build, I think, resentment and bitterness, self-loathing. I don’t think it’s a healthy path.

So the question here today is, how do we build courage to take action in our normal life? Again, presuming that emergencies got that covered. But what about normal life?

Let me give you my theory about courage. I think courage is rooted in safety, a feeling of safety. So, for example, this is a sliding scale, your courage and feelings of safety.

Let’s say I say, hey, I knock on your door, come out here quick, you got to fight this guy. And you look over, and the guy is a hundred pounds less than you. No weapon. Imagine that feeling.

Now, I knock on your door, pull you outside, say, hey, you got to go fight this guy. And this time, the guy is a hundred pounds bigger than you. Two hundred pounds bigger than you. And he’s got a knife.

You probably don’t feel the same. The feeling of courage is going to be different because your feeling of safety in that situation is different.

Same thing if you’re on the street, and you hear a call, like, I’m going to get you. I’m going to kill you. And you look over, and it’s just one thin guy by himself. Versus, we’re going to get you. And you look across the street, and there’s a gang of people with bats and guns.

Now, what’s interesting here to me is that in any of these situations, you are always the same person, same history, same skills, same smarts, same everything. And yet, in a moment, you can be led to feel completely differently.

You project your performance in what’s about to occur. And your prediction of failure or success immediately affects your entire organism and sets off different hormonal responses.

So, as we move through our normal life, we’re assessing threats, we’re assessing possibilities, then we assess our capability to survive that situation or to succeed in that situation, and that immediately provides us a level of courage.

So, I think that’s how this mechanism works. It’s all about the odds. If you think you’ve got great odds, then you’re going to be pretty courageous and take actions.

If you think the odds are totally against you, you might freeze up and do nothing. And that’s why we have to be careful, since my main topic is usually self-defense. This type of dynamic will get you killed.

Fear and doubt are never going to help your performance be its best.

If you allow yourself to believe that you have no chance, if you believe you’re going to die, then you shrink, right? You shrink physically.

I think you want to start curling up and hiding. You shrink psychologically.

You start thinking, I can’t do this. I can’t figure it out. I can’t solve this problem.

You add more tension. You get tunnel vision. You’re less aware. You don’t move as well.

And you hesitate. All of those things are going to get you killed.

So, the bottom line is, if, as you’re moving through life, normal life, if you believe you’re going to lose, if you believe you’re going to die, then you’ve just increased the odds that you’re going to lose or you’re going to die.

But, if you believe you have a chance to win, a good chance, if you believe you have a chance, a good chance to live, then you’ve just increased the odds that you’re going to win or live.

I think it’s that simple. I didn’t say easy, but simple.

These things go together. Your courage and your projection of how safe you are in any given context.

Now, let me immediately throw in a flag here on the topic of delusion. That is a common criticism that you’re going to find in the world of martial arts, right? Including myself.

People put up videos sharing technical tips or ideas for self-defense. Different styles showing off their training methodologies. And immediately, you’re going to see comments under those videos saying, these guys are crazy. This is a cult. They’re engaging in fantasy. None of this stuff is going to work.

Okay, fair enough. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion. But I have a question for you. Is it better to believe that you have a chance and then take action on that belief? Or is it better to not believe that you have a chance, that you’re not prepared for this situation, and not take action?

I’m talking about self-defense. When you have no choice but to engage an attacker or a threat, you couldn’t talk your way out of it. You couldn’t run. In that moment, you have this choice.

Would you rather believe that you can handle it and make a move? Or would you rather succumb to fear and doubt and freeze and shrink up?

I think the answer is pretty obvious. I personally would rather be deluded and ensure my maximal performance than to doubt myself and freeze up and do nothing.

So there is a place for delusion even, I think, in training. Now, don’t take that out of context. Don’t take this the wrong way. I’m not saying you should train for delusion or you should seek delusion. Of course not. That’s not my first choice in my training.

If you’re training, the goal should be true confidence. A true set of skills. That you are training your body and your mind and your heart, your spirit, to handle situations.

So that’s not just confidence that comes from good, honest training, that comes with feedback. It comes also with making peace with the universe or your God. You believe you have a mission, you believe that your causes are righteous, that you fight for good reasons.

This requires having your morality put together. You know what you’ll fight for, you know what you won’t fight for. So if you are pushed to fight, you know it’s for a good cause. You believe in it.

It requires that you’ve managed your ego. You’ve had enough losses in your training, and you’ve had enough victories, and you’ve had enough injuries or setbacks, that you can face all of it. You’re not afraid of any of those things, because you’ve experienced them over and over again.

So you’ve learned in short to do your best, put up your best performance, no matter what the threat is, even if it’s completely overwhelming.

So these are the choices that we are given, that we’re allowed in life. As we move forward, you have these choices…

First choice, be afraid. Be frozen. Do nothing. Hope for the best. Lay and pray.

Next level up, yeah, I’m going to upgrade to delusion. Believe that you can handle situations. Believe you’ve got those skills, because at least your physical response, your psychological response, will make you relaxed enough, aware enough, creative enough, and confident enough to make that first move and at least try something.

But that is still a far cry from the number one goal, which should be training for true confidence. Training to try no matter what. Training to go down swinging.

It’s not about winning or losing. You just are programmed to try, to fight. Win or lose, live or die.

Now, if it’s true that courage requires safety nets, then the question is how do we build them? How do we construct these safety nets? I’m glad you asked.

I have five quick tips that might help…

Tip number one, seek challenges. Create emergency mode situations in your life.

I’m not talking about being reckless here. I’m talking about seeking challenges that will push you out of your comfort zone to force you to reveal not just your strengths, but also your fears.

Like I said, there’s always goals in our heads that we don’t pursue. So set a goal for yourself, a goal maybe that you’ve been thinking about for years. And now, what is the but? I want to do this, but what?

I would like you to figure out exactly what you’re afraid of. If we can’t identify the fear, we can’t face it.

So whatever it is, you’re afraid of losing money, you’re afraid of ruining your reputation, you’re afraid of failing again, pursuing a particular goal which is just going to confirm that it’s not meant for you and you’re going to feel like a loser.

Whatever that fear is, name it so you can face it.

Tip number two, protect yourself. Now let’s start finding out a way to face that fear and build that safety net. Let me give you an example.

It’s a little embarrassing, but when I was a kid, I played little league, played for several years, pretty good at it, all star, until puberty. Over one summer, it seemed like every other dude my age hit puberty, and I didn’t.

So when we came back for the next season, everyone was taller, bigger, and had stubble. I do believe some of them had aftershave on. I didn’t even know what that was.

Now, the problem there was, when I got into the batter’s box and I’m staring down some pitches, those balls were flying past me beyond anything I’d ever seen before.

And unfortunately, a couple years earlier, I had a friend who I saw right next to me get hit in the face with a baseball, and both of her front teeth got knocked out, fell right on the ground at our feet.

So I have this image of being hit in the face with a baseball and losing my teeth. And now that everyone’s bigger, stronger, faster than I am, every time I went up to that plate, all I could imagine was getting hit in the face with that ball and losing my teeth.

So I quit. I quit. I quit baseball. Now, not a great loss for the sports world, but it hurt me because I knew I had quit out of fear. How could I have protected myself?

Sure. I mean, I guess we didn’t have enough money. If they had a helmet with one of those masks in the front, the iron gate on the front of my teeth, I would have kept playing baseball.

I may have been terrible, but at least I wouldn’t have quit out of fear. It would have been other incompetence athletically. But I didn’t. I didn’t have that equipment, so I left.

Years later, side note, I was dragging around that shame, and I did go to a batting cage, crank up that pitching machine as fast as I could, and stood there until I could stare down those balls and start making contact with some of them, so I feel like I redeemed myself.

But the bigger point here is, how can you face your fear? If you already named it, now what do you have to do? Is it a piece of equipment? Is it consulting a lawyer? Is it doing some research?

Is it saving up a little nest egg and having a little backup money? Is it taking on a partner? Someone who can take that journey with you and accomplish the goal with you?

There are many different ways to approach a problem or to achieve a goal. So get creative and figure out what kind of helmet you need to build to get through that next step.

Martial arts example again, if you were like I was and primarily a stand up martial artist when the UFC started and you saw people being taken to the ground, pinned and unable to get up, well that was frightening. I could name that fear right away.

I don’t want to get pinned on the ground and choked. So what did I do? I faced a smaller fear, sign up for a BJJ class and start learning how to grapple.

So again, figure it out. Name your fear and then build your plan to protect yourself.

Tip number three, attack. Let’s talk about martial arts again, sparring, fighting, wrestling. You don’t know what your attacker or partner, opponent is going to do. You don’t know what move they’re going to do and you don’t know when they’re going to do it, which creates anxiety. This feeds fear, the unknown.

What’s going to happen? I don’t know. When’s it going to happen? I don’t know.

So attack. Win or lose, do it on your timetable.

When’s this going to happen? Right now, I’m attacking. What’s going to happen? This is going to happen. I’m going to lead the dance.

I’m not going to wait around to see your best move when you’re ready for it. I’m going to force the issue, put pressure on you, and perhaps cause you to do something predictable.

If I throw something up at your face in an attack, there’s a good chance you’re going to raise at least one hand to try to stop that. So now you become a little more predictable. Crazy, chaotic life becomes a little more controllable, which makes me feel safer.

So I find because life is so crazy, who knows what’s going on with the economy, culture shifts, diseases, relationships, betrayals, new friends. So much is out of our control, can’t be predicted.

So don’t wait around and hope that the wind is going to blow your way, that trends are going to go your way. Just get out there and start making moves. Attack.

Get clear on what you want, get clear on what you want, and then get moving.

Tip number four. This one might be a little odd at first, but hang with me. Make some noise.

I have another video where I talk about trigger words. And I don’t mean it in the way of being hurt and victimized by something someone says. I mean talking to yourself as like a trigger to fire, to take an action.

Maybe when you’re under stress and you’re freezing up and your mind is spinning, you need to focus by just training yourself to maybe say go, go, go or fight, fight, fight.

Create a mantra for yourself. Create a code word for yourself that says, all right, I recognize that I’m slipping. I’m starting to have a performance that’s going to be subpar. So here we go…

Here’s my keyword, my trigger word to get me back in action, to back on the attack. It may just be as simple as taking a breath and exhaling. One big breath might do it for you.

It might be more guttural, more primal. You may want to grunt, caveman style. I’m all for that.

Yes, even if you’re in the middle of a business meeting and you know you have to get up and contradict the boss or whatever it is, if you have to go, cough, whatever you have to do, make some noise. I mean, think about the concept of kiai. Kiai in karate. A spirit shout.

You are building up the spirit with your voice, with your breath, to engage the rest of your body, to start some movement.

Think about battle cries in general. We are not the first generation to face stress. I would say back in the day, if you had a spear and a shield and a small village and you are being attacked by the neighboring village or some army, you are outnumbered, your family is behind you, your home is behind you, and all you have is this spear or an axe and you have to go running into that battlefield to fight, into this field of butchery.

People have done this, you know, millions. So what do they do? They bang on drums and they scream and they bring up that spirit to go fight.

So in whatever way you find appropriate, I would say, find a word, find a sound, find a mantra, shout it out, do what you got to do to get some noise out of your body. Don’t let the fear freeze you. Free up your heart, free up your muscles by making some noise.

Tip number five, practice.

You know, martial arts, I’ve watched a lot of videos, I’ve listened to a lot of teachers, been to seminars, talked to a lot of people. And almost all of the conversation, all of the content is physical. It’s technique talk, it’s style versus style talk, it’s mechanical. There’s a much smaller percentage of that material that addresses psychology and emotions.

And look, I know a lot of people who have put in the time physically, but if you go slap them in the face, it’s likely they’re going to freeze up and fall apart, as if they have no training. But that’s only because they’ve been focused on the mechanics and the muscle, and not on their mind and their heart.

So I would say it’s very important to practice your psychology of fighting. Practice the emotions, practice your courage. And it can be as simple as just closing your eyes or sitting down somewhere, and use your imagination. Play the what-if game.

Imagine the most terrifying situations you can. Shark attack is a good one. Imagine whenever you want being pulled out of your car at a red light in a mob scene, gone crazy. And just see it, visualize it.

I think even with imagination, you’ll feel your heart race a little bit, you might feel a little clammy. You can trick yourself into actually starting to get a little nervous. And in those moments, practice your trigger word. Practice taking control of your breath. Visualize how you’re going to stand. What expression is on your face. How you want to move. What you’re going to say.

It can be as extreme, of course, as an actual battlefield. Or maybe you’re preparing for a job interview that’s got you nervous. And you want to just bring up a little courage. Great, then just imagine it.

Imagine walking in. Imagine how you’re going to sit. Rehearse it.

Maybe now take your imagination and in a safe space, like a dojo or your living room or in the shower when no one’s around. Whatever you have to do, rehearse the movement.

We have kata and forms and drills for the physical parts of our martial arts, the physical parts of fighting, and we do those ad nauseum over and over and over. But where are your reps for emotional strength? Where are the reps for building courage?

It’s, I would say, not just as important, I’d say it’s more important. Because if you freeze up psychologically, if you have no spirit, doesn’t matter how big your muscles are or how many times you’ve practiced those techniques.

So, rehearse, get the reps in with your mind and your heart.

Alright, let’s wrap this up.

Don’t forget, the first point is probably the most important. In extreme crisis, there is an emergency mode that I believe you will find yourself in. It will click over and you’ll be ready to fight.

But we don’t have to wait for code red to be at our best. As these fine people at the cremation service have reminded me, life is short. Therefore, consider life to be an emergency.

We’re always in code red. Every moment could be your last.

If you treat life like an emergency, if you accept that it’s just a matter of time before you are dropped in a box or you are slid into a furnace, I think you’ll find the motivation to get out there and do your thing. And do it now.

Attack life before it attacks you.

Alright, enough said. The clock is ticking, my friend. Get out there and make your moves before the Grim Reaper makes his move on you.

Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #123: How to Build Courage in Martial Arts [Video Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

The art of Tai Chi Chuan is often criticized (or even mocked) in modern martial arts circles. Of course, much of that criticism comes from people who have never researched or practiced the art whatsoever!

Typically, the critics have only seen Tai Chi Chuan students being defeated in competitions and then concluded that the art’s strategies and techniques offer no value to a serious martial artist.

NOT SO!

To be fair, many teachers of Tai Chi Chuan prefer to practice the philosophical aspects of the art more than the practical, which can definitely lead to trouble in the realm of self-defense. However, that does not mean the art itself is lacking in profound and valuable concepts.

One concept that I find extremely helpful is the “double-weighted error”. Even as a mere admirer of Tai Chi Chuan, as opposed to a formal student, my understanding of this classic piece of advice has changed my practice for the better.

Right or wrong, I hope this concept will change yours, too!

To LISTEN to “Lighten Your Load – Tai Chi’s Double-Weighted Error,” here’s a link.

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To WATCH the video version or READ the transcript, scroll down below.

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Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

Lighten Your Load – Tai Chi’s Double-Weighted Error

Here’s the video. If the player doesn’t work, click this direct link.

As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome my friend. Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. This is episode #119 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Let me ask you, have you ever felt stressed out, overwhelmed, like you’re carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders? Well, of course, you’re human. And the fact is that life is heavy. And when it comes to self-defense, someone trying to injure you or even kill you, well, that’s about as heavy as it gets.

Today I want to break down the four different ways, the four different categories of weight in this world.

Why does life get so heavy? And I also want to share three tips to help you unload some of that weight or, hopefully, avoid it altogether.

Now, this whole discussion was inspired from the art of Tai Chi, or Tai Chi Chuan. In the classics of Tai Chi, you will find a term, double-weighted.

Now, the idea of being double-weighted is an error. It’s something you want to avoid in your practice, whether it’s alone or with a partner or in a real fight.

Now, let me say right up front, I am not speaking today as a student, formal student of Tai Chi. I’ve dabbled, but I’m certainly not an expert. I wouldn’t even call myself a formal student.

I am an admirer, and as someone who has read about and dabbled in practicing Tai Chi, this concept was inspiring. So, I’m just going to share my thoughts, my understanding of this concept. And if it doesn’t match up with what the experts say, well, guess what?

When it comes to the Chinese martial arts, even the experts disagree. We don’t know exactly what the old masters meant when they wrote it down. And if the experts can disagree, then I feel much better about sharing my humble opinion.

So, here’s what double-weighted means to me and how I’m using it in my practice.

First of all, you might find some people who think that double-weighted just means even distribution of your weight in your feet, like a horse stance, 50-50. That idea makes no sense to me, so I’m just going to ignore it.

To me, double-weighted starts to make sense when you think about that feeling you get, when you feel stuck, when you feel frozen. For instance, you are standing and someone comes over and puts their head on your shoulder and leans on you, let’s say.

Now, when they’re leaning on you and you are now crooked, you are not just supporting your weight, you’re also holding up some of their weight. So, if I don’t accommodate that, if I don’t shift my position, I don’t adjust my posture, I am now tighter, I’m straining a little bit, and I’m not as free as I was, I’m somewhat constrained.

So, in that way, I would say you are double-weighted. It’s my weight plus their weight. The state of being frozen.

It could also be just on your own, if you slip and you fall, okay, you have the physical challenge of managing this fall down to the ground, but let’s say you’re also afraid. You stiffen up, your eyes go wide, your hands pop out, and when you hit the ground, because you’re stiff and because you weren’t able to soften and go with it, you break a wrist or you hit your head, you have a bad fall.

So in that way, I would say you were double-weighted because you felt stuck or frozen, helpless, for that fall to the ground.

So this is something, this state of being double-weighted, getting heavier than you normally are, of getting stuck, can happen on your own or it can happen because of someone else’s activities against you. So let’s break it down even further.

Like I said, four different ways, more specifically, that you may add heaviness, weight to your life. And hopefully we can avoid these, but here’s the first one.

The first one is your body versus gravity. This one, we can’t escape. There’s no way you can get around it. You’re living in a body, I presume. So your weight is always being pulled down by gravity. And we try to manage that with good posture, right?

So one of our studies as martial artists is the study of stances and our alignment. If you are bent over in your life or you’re hunched over commonly, that means that some of your muscles are working harder than they need to.

You’re burning calories, extra calories. You are adding tension into your body. And that strain is limiting your freedom of movement because you’re tighter some place. And over time, certain muscles are getting weaker while others are trying to accommodate for them.

So you’re imbalanced and you’re constrained and you’re unnecessarily burdened. So we try to lighten that load by good posture. Once we start moving, it becomes even more challenging.

If you can’t balance yourself and get rid of excess tension when you’re just standing, now that you’re stepping, running, kicking, fighting, it’s only more difficult.

So example, a spinning hook kick to the head. Do you practice spinning hook kicks to the head? Well, that’s physically challenging. If you had a jump spin hook kick to the head, okay, now we’re getting somewhere.

You really have to have a great skill to figure out your alignment, your timing, your shifting, to execute that technique and land comfortably.

And this is the point of our training. As martial artists, we are in the pursuit of efficiency.

I can’t stop gravity. There will always be some tugging and some effort. That’s our single weight. Let’s call that. I’m not double-weighted yet. It’s single-weighted, just that natural alignment.

But anything that takes us off of that, if we’re tilting, leaning, we’re not practicing how to move in this world with coordination and ease, then we are now double-weighting ourselves. We’re making it even harder.

So, if you’re training well, then in most cases you should be finding comfort in how you stand, how you sit, and how you move in the world.

So that’s category number one, where you might find excess weight in your life.

The second category, instead of your body versus gravity, what about your mind?

Your mind versus beliefs and your mind versus emotions. What is your mental state at any given moment?

Let’s say something frightens you, like when you take that fall. That immediately adds tension into your body as well. Or if you’re afraid, you hear a bump in the night, and your body gets tight, okay, now you’re double-weighted that way.

In your head, if you’re afraid of something, you may also be less aware than you would have been if you were just staying calm. You start to tunnel vision. You start to add worry, like what was that? Am I going to die? Do I have what it takes to get out of this situation?

So while you’re worrying, you’re not paying attention to opportunities and possibilities. You’ve lost some of your creativity.

So it’s very likely that you will find yourself on a daily basis, on one level or another, stuck in your own body and stuck in your own thoughts. Stuck because of anger, tension, tunnel vision, self-doubts, worrying that you’re not competent at something.

Worry about anxiety, not worry about anxiety, anxiety in general. Worry that you’re going to lose your job, worry that you’re going to get sick, worry that you won’t be there for the people who love you. Tons of reasons to carry around anxiety.

Embarrassment, that you’re going to make a mistake, that you’re going to fail, that you’re not going to live up to your own expectations, let alone someone else’s expectations.

All of this stuff adds up to trouble, a clouded mind, our training should lead us to clarity. Comfort in our body, clarity in our minds.

We need to learn how to make peace with mistakes, how to make peace with our failures. We need to learn how to make peace with pain, physical pain.

If I’m injured, that’s a physical problem, but it’s also a mental problem depending on how I react to that. If my identity has now been broken. Like I’m a really good kicker. But now my leg is broken, so who am I? I’m a loser now.

We can’t let that happen. We need to train constantly for comfort in our bodies and clarity in our minds. That leads to confidence. And that’s the goal of our training, right?

We want confidence that I can move anywhere and I’m always free in my thoughts to create what I need to survive.

Third category. So far we’ve only been talking about the extra weight that we put on ourselves. But of course, particularly in self-defense, we are concerned about the weight that others are going to throw on top of us.

And the third category would be my body versus your body or someone else’s body. This is probably the heart of self-defense problems.

Someone’s got their hands on your neck. Someone is pulling your hair. Someone is punching you in the stomach. Their body is affecting your body.

Are you still comfortable when someone is choking you? Are you comfortable when someone is punching you?

If you are pulling off that spinning hook kick, even if you found a nice way to be efficient and skillful at it, even if you are clear headed when you throw it, if physically someone pushes you while you are throwing that kick or is pulling you, then you have something new to contend with. There is extra weight on you. There is a new challenge that’s come from the outside for you to execute that kick.

This is the beauty of training to fight. You have to deal with that, manage it.

So hopefully your training leads you not to just be efficient with your own movement, but to be efficient when someone is trying to oppose that movement. Training with resistance.

Someone is trying to take away your balance, and you are training yourself to get through that, to manage it, to keep my balance no matter what you do to me.

Punch, push, pull, lift, tackle, that I can maintain the comfort in my body so that I can be free to do whatever I need to do. That’s very challenging.

Fourth category. Before it was our mind against our own thoughts and our own emotions, but what about your mind versus someone else’s mind?

Someone makes a threat. Someone says, I’m going to kill you. How does that affect your mind?

If you allow someone to intimidate you, to frighten you, well, then your body is going to change, your thoughts are going to change, and usually not in a good way. You’ll be constrained. You will feel less free.

We have to guard against this. Before someone even touches you, you may already be intimidated and double-weighted just by the thought of what they might do to you.

You’re throwing that spinning hook kick again. Even if you’re very efficient hitting a bag or throwing it in the air, if someone says, hey, I want you to spar the champ over here. Here’s the heavyweight UFC champ. You have an opportunity. Go spar this guy.

Well, now as you think about throwing that spinning hook kick, you may instantly have worry now, where you didn’t have it before on the bag, that this guy is going to catch your foot or shoot when you’re kicking and take you right down or you’re going to miss. Now that kick is being affected simply because in your head you’ve added worry. You’ve allowed it to get in.

That’s in a sporting session. What about on the street? Someone jumps out of their car at a red light, storms over to your car. You get out. Not sure that was a good idea.

You get out. You’re thinking about that spinning hook kick to the head. But this guy looks tough. This guy’s got a knife. This guy’s got a buddy. Psychologically, you start shutting down perhaps. You’ve lost your clarity. Now you’re just confused. You’re scared. You’ve got doubts.

They weren’t there before. It’s the presence of this other person that put those things into you.

We’ve got to guard against that. And again, this is where training comes in. We should be training not just to be calm and confident with our own thoughts and emotions, but we need to maintain that calm, cool demeanor and our confidence even when someone else’s mental presence, their glare, their words, their mere presence starts to change how we feel. So I would call that with resistance.

We have to train not just for efficiency against resistance, but clarity against resistance.

Okay, so this is what I’m talking about when I talk about double-weightedness. Anything that’s making you carry a heavier burden than you normally do, or that you should be. Anything that takes you from your optimal state when you’re feeling great to something suboptimal where you feel limited and strained. Anything that takes you from a state of freedom and creativity and joy to a state of worry and limitations and pain.

A quick aside, when I say influences from outside of you, we’ve been using a person for that right now. A person’s body or a person’s mental state or threats. Really, it could be anything in life.

Outside of the martial arts realm, that other could be anything outside of yourself that adds weight to your life. If you’re taking a hike and lightning strikes and a tree falls and traps you under it, well, you have to deal with your body plus the body of this tree. So in that sense, you’re now double-weighted.

If that is freezing you up and you’re frozen, you feel stuck and you’re thrashing about, wasting energy, you’re double-weighted.

It could be a virus, right? Be having an illness is weakening your body, maybe changing the way you think about yourself, it’s taking you out of your groove, out of your optimal state. So technically that virus is double-weighting you if you allow it.

The list goes on and on. That’s the point. In life, you’re always fighting something. Gravity is always there. Hunger, the need for affection, all these things we have in our lives, we need money, we’re always fighting. And if you want a happy life, we need to get better, I think, through training.

We need to get better, we need to build the skills to avoid these extra weights, to unload these weights if we can. And for any weight that we can’t unload, how to carry it with some grace, with some dignity, to make the best of it, to maximize our opportunities no matter what.

Okay?

So, if we’re on the same page, again, I appreciate this inspirational concept from Tai Chi, but I do think it stops short of how bad the problem can get. Double-weighted, most of these examples that I’ve been giving, you’re not just double-weighted, you’re triple-weighted. You’re quadruple-weighted or more.

If you have a bad knee, if you tore your ACL, okay, well, one, if I want to throw a kick, well, there’s the physical challenge, I’ve got to balance that, that’s my single weight. But now there’s pain in that injury, and there’s fear from that injury, that I might hurt it again, need another surgery.

There’s also my identity that’s been broken, because I was the star of the class, I throw these kicks so great, and now I’m hobbling. So, very quickly, you’re two, three, four times heavier than you normally would be when you’re in your prime optimal state.

If you have bad posture, alright, you’re already double-weighted, you’re already making life hard on yourself, and then someone threatens you, I’m going to go over there and punch you in the face, now there’s fear, so already I’m triple-weighted, and then they actually do punch you, so now you have to deal with pain, fear of more punches, maybe you’re already falling to the ground, and you had bad posture, and you don’t move well, I can’t even keep up with how many times your weight is being added on top of you.

It doesn’t take much, and it’s very sad, really, to think about how many of us, or how often, even the best of us, walk around already double-weighted. We’re already walking around in a fight that’s two-on-one before I even see another human being.

If I feel like a loser, and I feel like a victim and helpless in this world, I’m already double-weighting myself. It’s already two-on-one, if that makes sense.

My soul has two problems now. I’ve got to move my body through this world, and I have to do it while I’m feeling like a helpless loser.

So now if another person comes into this picture and they want to hurt me, I’m already battling my own problems, my own two-on-one, and now here comes you. That’s three-on-one right off the bat.

If I have bad posture, I don’t move well, I don’t feel comfortable in my body, I also don’t like myself much, I don’t feel very competent in this world, and here comes you making threats, and you’re putting your hands on me. Four-on-one.

If you have a friend, it’s getting worse. We stack the odds sometimes so heavily against us, we cannot win. We are automatically putting ourselves in situations where it’s impossible to succeed, and that’s sad.

It’s so sad, and whether I’m talking about you sometimes, I mean, all of us are there sometimes. Or someone you love, and we all know this, people that you know who are their own worst enemies, their own worst enemies.

Think about that phrase. They’re already beating themselves up. You don’t have to do anything to hurt their feelings or make them feel lesser than or unworthy of a better life. They’re already doing it to themselves. Everything else just piles on, and then it becomes hopeless, it seems.

But hang on. Don’t turn off the video and jump off a cliff just yet.

I’ve got three humble tips that I’m going to offer here that have helped me.

Number one. Don’t take life so personally.

It’s very easy to get pulled into drama. Even on our own.

If I’m training and I hurt my wrist, tweak my wrist on the bag, I immediately feel sorry for myself. I feel like a loser.

What am I doing? I should have known better. Blah, blah, blah.

What about tomorrow? Now they’re going to think I’m terrible.

It’s amazing how quickly you can go from optimal state to crushing self-pity, self-doubt. We can’t let that happen. We need to operate from a place of objectivity.

If this calls to mind the philosophy of stoicism, so be it. Excellent. Take a big helping of stoicism.

If this brings to mind some Zen concepts, being able to see things uncolored by judgment and just see things as they are, okay, then take that approach.

But the point is to be able to transcend our judgments, transcend our emotions, transcend the drama and just float above the noise. Float above the chatter. That alone is freeing. Transcend to kind of float above it. You’re lighter.

You can’t do that if you’re down in the trenches, down in the mud, wallowing in self-pity. You can’t float down there.

So the trick here though is when you’re objective, that means you dismiss the negative aspects of your life and I would say the positive aspects of your life. I can’t allow myself to get swayed either way.

That’s the exercise. That’s pure stoicism.

No matter what you do in this world, there will be people who love you and love what you’re doing and people who hate you and hate what you’re doing. No matter what you do. I can’t let either one of those poles affect me.

Whether you love me or hate me, my focus has to be objective to just say, I just want to be my best. I just need to know what I’ve got, what I want, and can I make it happen the best way I can?

I just want to fight my best fight in this world. And to do that, I need to get the drama out of my way.

Now, granted, for this tip, when I say don’t take life so personally, that’s like saying, hey, don’t be sick. Hey you, don’t be poor, be rich. Doesn’t help. So how do you do it?

How do you get to this stoic state, this Zen mind? How do you get there?

Very simply, I’m not a doctor or a magician. I would just say very simply, take the long view of your life. Take the wide view. See the big picture.

If right now I asked you to think back to yourself when you were 20 years ago, whatever age, if you’re only 20 right now, then think back to when you were 10.

What were you worried about 20 years ago? What were you worried about? Was there a bully making your life more difficult? Were you worried about asking someone out on a date? Finding a job? Passing final exams and graduating school?

Getting into a martial arts school? Getting to the right school? Passing your next belt test? Being a black belt? Opening a school?

What were you worried about?

Take a look. You’re here. You made it. You survived. Clearly, you had the tools to get through all of that. But how much time and energy and attention did you waste with all of the worry? The worry didn’t help, I bet. The worry just takes away your energy, slows you down, and limited your actions.

There’s really no positivity behind the worry. The anxiety doesn’t get you where you want to go. It only slows you down and holds you down. So break free of that. Seek objectivity.

If you take it the other way, let’s go 20 years now into the future. 20 years from now, look back to where you are right now, today, and what is worrying you?

20 years from now, what are you still going to be worried about that you’re worried about today? Or, once again, will you see 20 years from now that you got through it, you survived, you succeeded, you did what you had to do?

Your job is to be the best person you can be right now and fight as hard as you can for what’s right for you. That’s it. If you allow worry and anxiety and doubts, get in the way and make yourself heavier, you’re not going to go as far.

So, please remember, the noise and the chatter just don’t matter.

They don’t. Just focus on what you want and focus on your next move to make it happen. That’s it.

Tip number two. Keep training. All along, I’ve been saying that training is a solution to all of this weight being piled on us. I’ve been saying it all along. We think about lifting weights. There we go.

Forget for a moment about physical metal plates on bars that you’re lifting. I’m talking about the weight of life, the four different ways that we have weight put upon us. We want to lift those weights. We want to figure out how to manage those weights better.

How do you do it? Training. To me, that’s what martial arts training is the best at.

Martial arts training gives you a chance to face fear, the weight of that fear and work through it and either manage it better or remove it. Fantastic.

It allows you to take on insecurity, ignorance, incompetence. I think it has it all. That’s why I love martial arts training.

You can purposely put yourself in situations that add weight and then you get a chance to lift it and get better at it and get stronger and more skillful and then lighter.

When you first started sparring, was it easy? No, it’s heavy. It’s dark. It can be traumatic, but you give it time. You give it effort. You keep training. And with time and effort, you develop skill.

You develop knowledge. You find comfort and confidence. And that’s the point. So keep training.

As a side note, please train with other people. If not all the time, sometimes.

Remember, of the four categories of weight, two are just you. The other two come from someone other than you. That’s a partner. So if you’re not training with a partner, well, then you’re only getting good at two of the categories for weight-bearing. A partner fills in the other half.

If you want to have the lightest journey through this world, you need to train with other people. I don’t just want to be free when I’m alone. I want to be free when I’m with somebody else, especially if they’re trying to punch me in the face. I want to feel free.

Tip number three. Keep measuring. By measuring, I mean pay attention. Pay attention to what makes you feel heavier, what makes you feel stuck or frozen, and figure out why.

What caused it? Who were you with? What were you doing? Where were you?

Every time that you sense a change in your breathing, maybe you stop breathing or you’re starting to breathe faster, what caused that?

Every time you feel a tightness in your chest or your neck or your back, what’s going on? What triggered that? Can you remove this from your environment?

What if you feel queasy, nauseous, sick to your stomach? What caused this?

There are clues here. It shouldn’t be a mystery. Something shrinks your body. Pay attention.

What just made you feel smaller in your space? What took away your size?

If you feel intimidated, you don’t feel like you can speak your mind, you don’t feel safe, you feel threatened, you feel like a loser, what just happened?

Why don’t you feel worthy of what you want in this world? There are clues here.

You will see patterns if you pay attention. You may already be able to identify those things. It may not be a mystery at all.

So then the challenge becomes, can you remove them? Can you stop them? Can you avoid them? Get rid of them.

Of course, while you’re busy measuring what makes you heavier, you should also be measuring what makes you feel lighter.

When do you feel free? When do you feel creative? When are you in the flow? When do you feel weightless?

If double-weighted is a problem, and even being single-weighted is part of life, naturally, well, anything we can do to feel weightless that lifts us up must be good, must be better for us, must give us more opportunity. So, pay attention to both sides.

What makes you feel heavy? What makes you feel light?

The fact is that we are fighting all day every day, so you should be measuring all day every day.

If something is making you heavier, change it. If something is making you feel lighter, keep doing it.

That’s really simple. Now, hang on. Before we wrap this up, I do have to warn you, in case you didn’t know, we all die. We all end up crushed under some weight, whatever that may be, an accident, an illness, a murder.

I just want you to know, the number one takeaway, if nothing else, is you’re not alone in feeling that pressure. You’re not alone in feeling the crush of life. But as martial artists, we have this goal that we can be our best under that pressure.

Under the weight, we learn how to defend ourselves and still put out our best effort to go as far as we can. Doesn’t mean we always win, but we go as far as we can with what we’ve got.

Whether that weight comes from ourselves, or from life itself, or from other people. We learn to avoid carrying extra weight. We learn to unload extra weight. And if we can unload it, we learn to carry extra weight with a little more grace and maybe even a little style.

Of course, we’re not just martial artists. We’re also good-hearted, kind, caring human beings. And as such, that carries its own goal.

I don’t just want to be my best self. I want to help others be their best self too. So if I can learn how to lighten my load, I’ll do whatever I can to help someone else lighten their load too.

And if we can do that, if all of us can do that, then not only will we have happy lives, but everyone we love will have a happy life too.

All right, thanks for letting me unload all of that. Hey, if you’re a student of Tai Chi, let me know in my way off base on my thinking about double-weightedness or does some of this make sense?

If you’re not a student of Tai Chi, let me know what you’re thinking anyway. I’m always curious. Maybe you’ve got a tip to help me lighten my load.

Until next time, smiles up my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #119: Lighten Your Load – Tai Chi’s Double-Weighted Error [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

You get a lot of advice as a martial arts student… you probably give a lot of advice, too! But is it possible that all of that good advice is actually bad advice?

In this episode, I’m examining five pieces of popular advice that might not be helping anyone. In fact, these teaching clichés might be making your life harder! Here are the five suspects—

• Relax.
• Don’t use so much muscle.
• Leave your ego at the door.
• Stop doing the same technique–try something different.
• Don’t give up.

Any of these sound familiar? 🙂

Don’t get me wrong—there are good intentions behind all of these training tips, so I’m not saying you’re a bad person for repeating them. But I am saying that there’s a right time to share these words of wisdom and a wrong time… it’s that crucial judgment that makes the difference.

To LISTEN to “Bad Advice in the Martial Arts”, here’s a link.

• Play the audio podcast below… or download to your device.
• Subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher or Google Podcasts or Spotify.

To WATCH the video version or READ the transcript, scroll down below.

If you’d like to support this show, share the link with a friend or leave a quick review over on iTunes. Thank you!

Oh—and don’t forget to sign up for free email updates so you can get new shows sent to your inbox the minute they’re released.

Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

Bad Advice in the Martial Arts

Here’s the video. If the player doesn’t work, click this direct link.

As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Howdy, Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts, back from a bit of a hiatus. First one in ten years, I don’t feel too bad about it.

Welcome to episode #117 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Yeah, since you’ve seen me last, I moved from Raleigh, North Carolina back to Los Angeles. We lived there almost two years, about a year and three quarters. And don’t get me wrong, I have no hate for the East Coast. I’m from there. All of my family is there.

On this particular trip, I met some really great new people, some great new training partners. I learned a lot. I have nothing but nice things to say about the experience. But what can I say?

I love LA. So we are back. But enough about me. Let’s talk about you.

Today, I have five pieces of bad advice that you’ve probably heard in the martial arts.

And now that I can tell you, I’ve trained from coast to coast. I am sure no matter what your school is or who your teacher is, you’ve heard these pieces of advice.

Spoiler alert. The five pieces of advice I’m going to talk about today…

• Number one, relax.
• Number two, don’t use your muscle.
• Number three, leave your ego at the door.
• Number four, stop doing your favorite technique all the time. Do something else.
• And number five, don’t give up.

Those are the five pieces of advice that I’m going to call bad today. Now, here’s what I mean.

All advice, I think, is well-meaning, well-intended. But that doesn’t mean it’s always correct.

For example, very wise words, look before you leap. Have you ever heard that? But maybe you’ve also heard, he who hesitates is lost.

Now, those two pieces of advice are opposites. They have two different ideas. So which one is good and which one’s bad?

It all depends on your particular situation and when you hear the advice, right? The advice that you get today may not be so good tomorrow and vice versa.

So the advice that I’ve already listed here, the five pieces of advice, in some contexts is probably good advice. But not always. And I want to talk today about when that is bad advice and when you shouldn’t follow it at all.

All right, makes sense. So let’s get right to it.

Number one, relax.

Now, I have already ranted about how I think this is a terrible piece of advice in a separate video. So I’ll put that link below if you want to go into the full, full discourse, you can find it there. But in case you haven’t seen it, I’ll sum it up very quickly.

When people tell you to relax, they fail to see that your tension, if you’re tight, is a symptom of a problem. It’s not the problem itself.

If you are really a concerned teacher and you see someone is tense or you feel that you are tense yourself, the question is why? Why are you tense? Why are you not relaxed? That’s what you need to figure out.

I don’t think anybody walks around purposely trying to be tense. So when your teacher comes up or if you say to a student, relax, it’s like, well, no kidding, I would like to be relaxed. Why don’t you ask me why I’m not relaxed?

For instance, do you like getting hit in the face? Maybe you start martial arts and you don’t want to get hit in the face. So of course you’re tense.

Maybe you don’t like someone putting their arm around your neck and trying to choke you out and so you tighten up, you get tense. Those are natural reactions. So telling me to relax doesn’t help.

What is good advice? Well, the solution to tension is experience. You need to get better at what you’re doing. You need to get comfortable at what is making you so tense.

So as a teacher, you should be showing your students how to relax. Don’t just tell me to relax. Show me how.

If that means something simple like take a breath, that’s a great first step. Take a breath that does help me relax a little bit unless I’m being choked, then no, it’s futile.

Generally, it’s going to be introducing a skill, giving me a tip to show me why this isn’t so bad a situation, how to make it better, how to turn it around. And then the more you practice that, the more your tension will go away, the more comfortable you’ll feel, and suddenly, you just are relaxed.

It’s not something that you pursue directly. It’s something that happens as a reward for your practice. So, get more experience, and that should solve itself.

Number two, stop using your muscle. Stop using all your strength.

Recently, I was in a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu class, and there was a big guy. He’s a white belt, head taller than I am, at least 50 to 70 pounds, bigger than I am, and cut. This is a weight lifting kind of guy.

And when we rolled, I was moving all over him. I was tying him up. I was able to get out from under.

And after we rolled, I said, you know, it’s okay for you to fight back. It’s okay for you to use what you got there. Use your muscle.

And he said, oh, well, they told me not to. I answered, who told you not to? They’re just trying to make it easier on themselves, I think. With all respect to anyone who gave him that advice, you left him with nothing.

It’s like saying, hey, listen, don’t use your muscle. And you don’t use your speed. I see you’re very fast. Don’t use that.

Hey, I see you’re very flexible. Please don’t use that. Don’t kick me in the head. I don’t want you to use your flexibility right now.

What?

Hey, you seem to have really good cardio. Could you just hold your breath sometimes so we could even this out? Because I’d prefer if you were out of breath.

Hey, I noticed that your eyesight seems to be pretty good. Do you mind just closing one eye while we work out?

You wouldn’t say those things, right, typically? So why does muscle get such a bad rap? I don’t think that’s fair.

Particularly if you look at the heights of the sport, let’s say, of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, do you see people without muscle? No, I see people who are jacked up, people who admit to using steroids.

So they have muscle, they use muscle, and oh, by the way, they also happen to have solid technique. Okay, so as a white belt, this guy came in with muscle, which is an asset. That is something we should all have, some strength.

But then they told him, okay, don’t use the strength. But he had no technique to back him up. So now you have someone who doesn’t want to use their muscle because he’s being a good student, he’s doing what he’s told. But he also has no technique, so therefore, he’s a sitting duck.

He’s getting trounced by an older, smaller man, simply because he doesn’t know what to do. Again, that’s a bad habit. I say if you have muscle, use it. Absolutely use it.

Now, any advice I’m giving you today, I’m not saying hurt your partners, be reckless, be dangerous. No, of course not. But if you have an asset, use it.

Otherwise, what’s the alternative? You’re training yourself to not use your strengths. Believe me, if you jump out at me in the middle of a parking lot with a knife, I’m with my family or alone, I’m going to use everything I have to defend myself. If I have muscle, I’m going to use every bit of it.

So it doesn’t make sense for me to not use assets. That’s a terrible habit to get into.

Hopefully, the goal would be like, okay, you’re brand new, you have your muscle, so of course you’re using it because that’s all you know. So maybe you’re 99% muscle and you’re 1% technique.

But then a month or two goes by, maybe now you’re down to 95% muscle and 5% technique. Six months to a year, maybe you brought that down, maybe you’re 70% muscle use, and you’re relying on 30% technique.

And you keep training and training until the scales tilt, and maybe you’re so good, you’re like 99% technique and you just use a very little bit of muscle just so that you can function.

Well, that’s a wonderful training journey that you just went through. You figured out how to use your assets and how to succeed without a particular asset. That’s a full training experience.

And again, I think if you’re in a good school, you’ll have that luxury to learn that. You will learn when to use your asset and when not to, you’ll find the limitations of your asset.

Hey, I went really hard that first round using all muscle, but now I am gassed out. I can’t breathe. So now what am I going to do?

Ah, now you’re forced to figure out some techniques and strategies now that your muscle has been taken away from you. That’s what good training does. It strips away your strengths at some point, strips away your assets, so you’re forced to use something else. And that’s where the training fills in.

So, don’t fall into that trap. If you’ve got muscle, go ahead, bring it in. Don’t hurt anybody, but use it until you can’t. And then you’ll be able to use it more wisely. So use it and learn to use it wisely.

Piece of advice number three, leave your ego at the door.

I get it, I get it, but this falls into the same category as not using your muscle. For me, martial arts training should be a full body, full personality experience. So if your ego has gotten you this far in life, whatever successes you’ve had up till now, bring all those tools onto the mats.

If you are a prejudicial person, you walk in saying like, well, girls can’t fight. No woman’s going to beat me. Good. Keep believing that until you run into the female who taps you out. Now, your beliefs are challenged, which is exactly what should happen in a good school.

Maybe you come in arrogant. You say, well, I’m already a black belt in that style, so this style won’t be so hard. Oh, okay. Well, keep believing that. Good. And then when you find out that the tricks that work for you in that school don’t work so well in this school, then again, you’re going to have to relearn new habits. You’re going to have to start over again.

Maybe you were raised as mommy’s special little person. And so you walk everywhere thinking, I’m better than you. I’m a superstar. And believe me, I’m part of all of these things. I’m prejudicial, arrogant, and a spoiled brat. And martial arts wiped that smirk right off my face. Good training will do that. It will wipe that smirk off your face.

Again, so whatever your beliefs are, it makes no sense to tell someone, well, don’t believe those things.

How old are you? You’ve been doing this for 18 years, you’ve been alive. Or you’ve been alive for 30 years. You’ve been alive for 50 years. And those beliefs have gotten you this far.

But now try to start as a blank slate and see what happens. You’ll have nothing. You need to learn the limitations of your beliefs. You need to learn the errors in your ways.

So, I say don’t leave your ego at the door. Bring it on to the mats. That’s where we can test it. That’s where we can challenge it. That’s where change happens. So bring it.

Number four, stop doing your favorite technique all the time. Try something else.

I think we’ve all had this experience, right? You have a partner and you already know what they’re going to do, whether you’re sparring or rolling, whatever you’re doing. It’s like they always do the same thing.

So you tell them, hey, try something else. Now to me, this falls again into the same category as telling people not to use their muscle or not to bring in their ego. Now you’re telling them, hey, stop doing your favorite technique.

This is a strategic criticism. I already know what you’re going to do. But again, this is tricky.

When you start martial arts, you probably have some insecurities. You don’t know what you’re doing. And then you’re taught some techniques and you practice those techniques. And lo and behold, one of them perhaps starts to work for you.

And once you feel something working, that insecurity is now replaced with confidence. And now that confidence that you keep repeating because it keeps working becomes your identity. You are that technique.

If I’m sparring, I’m going to kick you with that roundhouse to the face because that’s my technique. That’s who I am. That’s what I do. We’re inseparable.

Well, that’s fine. But again, you should not be clinging on to that high kick like a security blanket, right? When we were kids, we talked about security blankets. The little kid can’t go anywhere without their favorite blanket. They’ll cry if you take it away from them because that’s their security.

The world is chaotic. They found this one piece of cloth that they can hold on to, they can control, makes them feel good. And now that’s how you can become if you cling to one particular technique all the time.

Now we know at some point, you have to grow up, right? As a human being, at some point, it’s better that you learn to let go of that blanket and find your security and other attributes in your life than to have someone come finally and rip that blanket away from you when you’re 25, you’re working at a bank and someone says, what’s with the blanket? That’s enough.

You’re making it’s embarrassing that you work here. No one’s going to come and ask you for a loan. Give me that blanket. You don’t want to end up in a tug of war with your security blanket out in the real world.

The dojo is a place where you can bring in your security blanket and then learn to let it go because you replace it with other more lasting and universal attributes. So that may become another technique.

Okay, you stop doing this technique and now you learn this other technique. But again, you don’t want to be reliant on any one or series of techniques. Your goal ultimately is to just be a confident person, knowing that you’re going to do your best no matter what the situation is and what tools you have to work with. You’re not reliant on anything.

So force yourself out of that comfort zone and if you don’t do it yourself, again, I hope you’re part of a good club, a good school that forces you out of it. If you keep trying your favorite technique, there should be someone eventually who shuts it down, who takes it away from you.

And I’m, by the way, I’m only speaking from my own experience. I kept pushing a certain technique. Just recently I could think of one move and I was using it for at least six weeks straight. I kept purposely putting myself into this bad position because I knew no one could do anything once I got there.

I was just learning how to shield up really, really well until I met one guy who broke through and then I realized I was vulnerable and then I had to let that go.

So I’m just speaking from my own experience. Let go of your security blankets before someone rips it out of your hands and you stand there crying and wetting your pants. That’s too late to start learning lessons.

Don’t let that happen in the real world. Let it happen in the dojo and just be brave. You want to be a confident person, not just someone who can execute certain techniques confidently. I think that makes sense.

Last one, number five. Don’t give up.

Boy, so many posters, so many anthems about not giving up, being tough, get back in there. But not all the time. Not all the time.

I know so many people who have spoken of a martial arts experience where they went to a school, starting martial arts, tore their shoulder, popped a knee, hurt their neck, and then gave up. And I would say that was the right thing to do at that time.

Yes, you should give that up. If you keep going back to a school and you keep getting hurt, something is wrong. And it may not be you. It could be a reckless environment, the vibe there, the teacher is not supervising, the techniques themselves just aren’t for you. Not right now.

So I would absolutely tell you, yes, get out of that school. Give up on that school.

Perhaps you’re following a diet. You’re on the XYZ diet, trying to lose weight, good for you. Six months has gone by, you’re really not losing any weight, and worse, you’re starting to stress out because you’re counting the right number of macronutrients, you’re timing your meals the right way, you’re doing everything you think correctly, but it’s not working for you. Give up.

Six months has gone by with no change, and now you’re just stressed out because maybe you’re not doing it right or you should try harder. No, maybe it’s just not for you. Give it up.

Self-defense. You might say, I’m really interested in self-defense and I found this club and we do forms and we do these pad drills, but you know, we never do partner work and it’s been a couple years now and I’m starting to think that I’m not meeting my goals about feeling confident in self-defense skills. Give up. Give up that school.

Now to be very, very clear, I’m not saying give up your goal. I’m saying give up that particular plan.

If you’re going to a martial arts school where you keep getting hurt, don’t give up your goal of becoming a great martial artist and learning to defend yourself. Find a different school, but give up on that first one.

If your diet’s not helping you become healthier and it’s just stressing you out, give it up. Don’t give up on the goal of becoming fitter and healthier. Just find another way to do it.

This is tricky because I think martial artists in particular are faith-based creatures. In the beginning, again, we’re insecure. We don’t know what we’re doing. So you go out looking, you find that school or that teacher, that style that speaks to you, you feel comfortable. And I have to have faith that if I do what they are doing, what they tell me to do, that I will reach my goal.

We have to have that faith to sign up at any club, right? But sometimes we forget what the goal was and we just end up stuck in a school or in a diet, or in any type of situation, where we forgot why we started.

So you’ve got to always measure what’s happening. Are you getting the results that you intended? If you’re not getting the results that you wanted and what you are getting isn’t better than what you wanted, give it up. Give up.

There’s no shame in that. I’ve given up more things than I can count. I’d have to sit here forever just listing all the things I’ve given up, whether it was a career path, whether it was pursuing a particular talent that I thought I had.

I’ve given up certain schools, certain teachers, not with malevolence. I don’t have hate for any of them, but they just weren’t meeting my goals. They weren’t pointing me in the right direction. So I gave up.

I’m not a quitter. That’s different.

It’s okay to give up, just don’t quit. If the goal is worthy, give up, but don’t quit.

It gets confusing. I know.

All right. Well, those are the five pieces of advice. So as we wrap this up, I’ll say again, if you are feeling tense, okay, be tense.

If you are using muscle and your strength, okay, use your muscle.

If you’re an arrogant, egomaniacal, prejudicial student, okay, use it.

If you’re using techniques that keep working, great, keep working until they don’t.

And if what you’re doing, your plan is not working out, well, then give it up. Form a new one.

All advice can either be bad or good. It’s truly up to your situation and to the timing when you get it. And my big message today, just remember, sometimes doing the opposite of good advice is the secret to a happy life.

Okay, I hope you heard something today that was the right advice at the right time in your life. If not, hey, come back in two weeks or two years, listen again. Maybe then it will be the perfect advice at the perfect time.

Until next time, smiles up my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #117: Bad Advice in the Martial Arts [Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Are you a good judge or a bad judge? In the martial arts (and in life!), I’ve definitely been both. But as I get older, I’d like to think I’m getting better at passing judgement.

Whether we’re talking about fighting styles, techniques, and training methodologies or art, food, and people, how can we be sure we’re making the right decisions? Is there a way to see the world clearly and avoid making mistakes?

In this episode, I’ll share some mistakes I’ve made as well as some strategies to maximize success in your training, career, and relationships.

Don’t get me wrong—I still make mistakes! But I’ve gotten better at swallowing my ego, making corrections, and moving forward towards my goals. So, if I can get closer to being a good judge, I believe you can , too!

To LISTEN to “How to Be a Good Judge,” you can either:

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To WATCH the video version or READ the transcript, scroll down below.

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Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

How to Be a Good Judge in Martial Arts and Life

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As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello and welcome to episode #115 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better. My name is Ando here at Happy Life Martial Arts, and I am quite thankful to see you.

Today, I want to talk about judgment. They say, don’t judge a book by its cover. But is that good advice? Hmm.

In martial arts, there sure is a lot of judgment, isn’t there? That technique won’t work on the street. That style is ridiculous. That teacher is a fraud. That guy is a legend. That’s the best martial art there ever was.

We hear it all the time. I think I’d like to share a few thoughts on how I’ve navigated the world of judgment over the years, so that it might help your martial arts journey. And hopefully, maybe even your life. So let’s get started.

The reason I’m bringing up this topic is because over the Thanksgiving Day holiday, I had a chance to take some family to an art museum. My wife, my mother, and at the art museum, we came upon the Impressionism wing, and my mother is a fan of Impressionism. She was also a career art teacher, so I figured we’d be in there for a while.

As we went into the room, one of the first exhibits we saw were three Monet paintings, right next to each other. Now, I’ve seen Monet exhibits before, and I’ve got to tell you, I thought these were not his best work.

The first one was just looked like a sun and a rock, no big deal. The second one was some kind of landscape reflecting on a pond. And the third, actually, I couldn’t figure out what the heck it was. My wife thought maybe it was a horse drinking water, which would have been odd. I actually couldn’t tell what it was.

So I do know that Monet went blind towards the end of his career. So I just figured, you know, these were from that period, his blind period. And of course, because his name is on that painting, museums are happy to put these paintings up, whether they’re good or not. And these were just some of the not so good ones.

Okay, so I had my little judgment, and we moved on. Worked our way along the wall until we came about ten minutes later to the end of the hall opposite the three Monet paintings. And before we left that gallery, my mother said, hey, look back at the Monet.

I turned around, and it was as if three new paintings had been hung up. Suddenly, all three were just illuminated, as if there was sunshine coming from within each of the frames. It was striking.

The first one absolutely was like a sun setting behind a rock. The second one was like this mirrored effect of this lovely landscape on the water. And the third one now did reveal itself to be a plant in water. They were just marvelous.

Now, I’m not going to say there was greatest works, but they had changed so much. Within ten minutes, just by standing at a different place in the room, my judgment changed from these are garbage to these are masterfully done.

Now, that made me a little nervous, because how can you not think immediately, man…

…how many times in my life have I looked at something, passed judgment, and then moved on, never looking back again? How many times was I just dead wrong about my first assessment?

So the advice, in case you have to go, and you can’t make the rest of this, the big message today is take a second look. Don’t just say, I got this, and move on.

It’s a fast-paced culture, or maybe just we’ve always been fast-paced creatures. We like moving forward, we like moving fast and furiously. There’s a fear of missing out. If I don’t keep up with the pack, I’m going to fall behind.

So I just got to keep taking in new information and keep going, which means I have to judge quickly. But that doesn’t always mean I’m accurate.

How many times have you said or do you hear people say, oh yeah, been there, done that. I’ve been to Paris, been there, done that. Oh yeah, I took Aikido, been there, done that.

I know it. I got it all. I got everything I need to know.

But did you?

Did you really pass a fair judgment? Did you have the full experience? Did you take a second look?

In martial arts, I’m just as guilty as anyone of passing judgments and then maybe not wanting to look back because I got to get on to the new thing. In my style of Kung Fu, many, many times, I was shown by a teacher a “fancy” technique. And while they’re showing this technique, oh, we’re going to start on the ground and kick up and then you’re going to roll over and grab this and strike this.

And I’m thinking, there is no way, there is no conceivable scenario I would ever do this. Why would I do that technique? That’s crazy.

But then we would do a multiple attacker drill or we’d introduce a weapon or some limitation, you know, broken arm, something. And suddenly I would find a similar movement or maybe the exact movement coming out of my body. Suddenly the context had changed and that move wasn’t so fancy. It became the only thing I could do.

This happens all the time for me nowadays in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. I’d say overall Brazilian Jiu Jitsu has changed over the years and maybe in the old school version, you didn’t have to be quite as athletic to pull off all the techniques that are going on. But I think it’s gotten a lot more athletic. If you want to do all the inversions and rolling attacks, it requires a slightly more useful and agile body, I would say.

So again, when I go to class and the professor starts to show some technique, well, you grab this fancy grip and you feed it through here, then you flip over there, then you’ve got to invert and roll around to this side, and out of respect, I will practice the technique and I’ll try, but my brain is saying, no way.

But then same thing, we start to roll, get tired, my tricks aren’t working, they start stacking me up, put pressure on, and my body just turns away. That’s very similar to what was shown. And I see where the technique was born. I get it. I go, oh, that’s how that happened.

So I’m just fascinated as I’ve gotten older how no way can become okay. And I’m sure you have your own examples of that.

Of course, I’m not just talking about martial arts here, I’m talking about judgments you’ve made in all areas of your life. Let me give you an example from my life.

Do you like falafels? Growing up in Buffalo to the age of 23, I’d never had a falafel, never heard of a falafel. When I moved to Los Angeles, not only do they have falafels, I found an article when we moved there that said, the top 20 falafels in Los Angeles. It just blew my mind.

Well, what is this thing? So we drove out and I found a falafel, and I hated it. My judgment was, this is fully awful. That was my little joke. Falafels are fully awful.

A couple years went by, and the opportunity came up to try falafels again. And it was a different experience. A different kind of falafel. Different spices, different size, different texture. And I loved it. I thought, oh, now that’s pretty good.

Nowadays, I’ve eaten falafels all over the place. Now I’m fussy. I’m a connoisseur of falafels. There’s a certain coarseness that I like. There’s a certain spice blend that I like. There’s a certain texture that I like. My judgment has changed over time.

The same, of course, goes with people. How many times have you met someone that you didn’t really hit it off with at first, but over time, you start to respect their manner. You start to respect their work ethic. And you start to change your opinion of them.

And, of course, on the other hand, people that make a fantastic first impression. Boy, what a friendly guy. Boy, they were so helpful. But then over time, you find that they’re very manipulative. And they’re actually kind of toxic. You need to get away from them. This happens.

Our first judgments, our first impressions are often dead wrong.

And, of course, from a teaching standpoint, can you think back to a time when you had a teacher who was hard on you? And over time, you realized you didn’t hate them. You actually loved them for the fact that they held you to a standard and they saw more in you than maybe you saw in yourself. They were a tough love teacher.

I just think it’s amazing how many times I’ve been wrong. And the older I get, the more I find that I was wrong. And perhaps you have found the same.

So, back to don’t judge a book by its cover. Is that good advice? No, of course not. We must judge. As a matter of fact, even in the context of books, you should judge a book by its cover. That publisher and the author and the artist purposely put together that cover so that you could judge it.

Oh, that’s a cookbook. Oh, that’s a romance novel. Oh, that’s a technical book on some software program. You need to know what’s in the book based on the cover.

So, yes, judge. How did you get into martial arts in the first place? At some point, you had to judge you wanted to do martial arts as opposed to a different activity. Then you had to judge the art that you wanted to take.

Judge the school and judge the teacher. Judge your training partners. Judge your training routine.

And then, of course, outside of that, you have to judge your spouse or your partner. You’re going to judge what kind of business you go into. Judge your career path. Judge your job and your coworkers.

This is all part of life. We have to judge.

So, yes, judge a book by its cover.

But recognize that that is a first judgment. That’s a first impression. It cannot be final. As we get older, we realize the first judgment is not the final judgment.

What’s the second judgment? Well, you judge that book by its cover, you like the cover, so you bought the book. Now you have to read it.

You found a person, they seem very charming, now you get to know them. So you write them an email, you go out to dinner, you get to know them better, you spend time with them. Now we’re reading them.

All through life, you’re going to find that your impressions change as your relationship deepens. The more you know, the better able you are to pass a judgment. And often there’s a surprise. Sometimes not, but often there’s a surprise. So be open to it.

But wait, there’s more. I’m still not done. The first impression isn’t final. Taking a look back to that second impression, that second judgment, is also not final. Because something funny happens…

We get older. We gain more experience. We recognize different patterns. Our perspective changes.

So now, that book that you thought was so wise and incredible when you were 20, seems really sophomoric and kind of trite when you’re 50. Things change.

That movie that you thought was so funny when you were 30, when you’re 50, I don’t really want to watch it again. It’s not funny anymore.

When you’re younger, you might have gone into that art museum, looked at a painting and said, I like the colors or I don’t like the colors. And that was the basis of your judgment.

As you get older, you start to maybe get a little art history. You find out there’s a political meaning behind that painting or religious significance.

Or you learn more about the artist and you realize what struggles he was going through at that time in his life. And you start to see what he was trying to express or she was trying to express. And now suddenly, you’re not just looking at the painting. You’re looking at the person behind that painting. That leads to a very different judgment in most cases.

So the advice here is don’t become a prisoner to your first judgment.

Don’t become a prisoner to your first judment, second judgment, or any judgment. Because you’re changing.

In the martial arts, specifically, I can think when you’re young, maybe you’re exposed to Tai Chi. Now I’ll say right off the bat, I’m going to talk about the stereotype of Tai Chi. Some Tai Chi can be explosive and can move just as quickly, and just some of their training is slow. But let’s go with the stereotype that all Tai Chi is slow and soft.

So maybe as a youngster, young martial artist, you see some people practicing in the park and then moving in slow motion, and you think, what in the world is that? That doesn’t look like a fight. Nobody moves in slow motion. Tai Chi is stupid. Case closed. Judgment passed.

But then let’s say you’re in your late 20s, you’re in your 30s, and you get an injury, and you can’t work at that same dynamic or explosive level that you were in whatever art you’ve been in. Whatever that could be. BJJ, taekwondo, kickboxing, whatever. And suddenly that Tai Chi, you take another look at it.

Take that second look and you say, well, you know, maybe if I slow down a little bit, I can still work on my legs. Or maybe if I just slow down, I can work on my breathing and do a little body connection work here.

Maybe if I do a little visualization with the movements that I already know and just slow down, I can learn a little bit more about them. See how my alignment is changing. See how my weight is shifting. Break your techniques down a way you have never done it before.

Certainly, then, maybe as you grow older, now you’re 70 or older, and now for sure you start to see more value and like, gee, I’m glad I experimented with that Tai Chi back in my 30s because now I might even give up what I used to do in my 20s and just practice in this slower methodology. I have enough experience with the other stuff. Let me dive deeper into this methodology.

Now along that way, maybe you go back to your original art, maybe you switch arts, maybe you create a hybrid of your own. It’s all good, but the point is it changed over time because you allowed yourself to change your judgment. You took a second look, a third look. As you changed, you allowed your judgment to change.

The opposite, I warn you, because I get this email all the time, hey, I train in this such-and-such a style, hard-hitting, I’m injured, and now I’ve had to take off six months, or gee, it’s going to be a while before I can get back to it. What should I do? And you can just tell that they’ve already not considered anything outside of what they do.

I can’t do what I normally do, therefore I have to stop training. And that’s a sad situation to put yourself in. And let me say, you put yourself into it, because you didn’t allow yourself a review, a second look at all the things that you threw out and thought were worthless.

Especially when life forces you to take a second look, take that opportunity, open your mind again, and see if what was so stupid 10 years ago, or even a month ago, suddenly now is worth a try and makes sense. I think you’ll be surprised more often than not.

Of course, another famous quote about judgment comes from the Bible. In the Bible, we get the quote, Judge not, lest ye be judged. Does this mean we should not judge ever?

I don’t think so, because as I said, we have to judge which food is rotten and which food is healthy. What kind of people should I be spending my time with and which people should I not be spending my time with?

We have to judge. Judgment is a survival mechanism.

But when they say, Judge not, lest ye be judged, perhaps there’s a warning in there. The warning is, don’t go around judging other people by different standards than you judge yourself, because that’s not fair.

You can’t go around saying, well, if I make a mistake, if I do something that’s perceived as evil, or wrong, or mean-spirited, I can justify that. I have reasons for it. You don’t understand where I’m coming from.

So you want to allow yourself that margin of error, but if someone else does something mean-spirited on the surface or seemingly evil, you don’t have that same understanding. You don’t allow them to justify it. You don’t allow them a way to explain themselves. You just say, no, you’re evil.

I have excuses. You’re just evil. So I think that’s what that quote’s all about. Apply the same standard to yourself as you would apply to anyone else.

My advice on that would be to make sure that when you’re judging yourself or others, you do it with a sense of fairness. You do it with as little bias as possible.

And being in the Bible, I think it also means to judge with some kindness, some compassion in your heart, because that opens up the door to some understanding. It doesn’t mean that anything someone does is okay or that you don’t have to put some evil actions down and then maybe later come back and say, okay, what’s going on here?

Of course, self-defense means I have to judge that you’re doing something wrong and I’m going to stop you. But I don’t have to have contempt in my heart to do that. I just need to get that job done, protect myself, protect my loved ones, protect the common good. And then let’s see if there’s room for compassion here, and maybe I can understand where you’re coming from.

So, fairly and kindly and with some understanding, let me ask you, how would you say you do judge yourself? Do you feel that you judge yourself fairly and kindly? Because it’s also true you could be very harsh to yourself, very critical and unforgiving.

You might make a mistake and it absolutely crushes you. I hope not. I hope you can lighten up a little bit. Because if you’re harsh on yourself, that is a surefire way to kill your goals. You think you’re not worthy, you think you can’t do it. It will kill your dreams if you’re too harsh.

As opposed to a healthy sense of self-criticism, where you recognize where you could have done something better or differently. And you allow yourself a little sense of forgiveness. You allow yourself to make a mistake.

You make the correction, you make the correction, you encourage yourself to try better next time, and you move forward with your life. So I hope that’s how you judge yourself.

Second question would be, how do you judge others? And do you judge others the same way that you judge yourself? Do these go together?

You can absolutely be harsh on other people, which kills relationships. When you judge someone as, oh, they’re evil, I hate that person, you’ve just closed the door to ever building a relationship with them. And maybe you could have helped each other in some way.

Or maybe you closed the door on someone today, and you don’t realize that three years from now, five years from now, they’ve gone through a transformation. And if you don’t allow them that chance to express that, or to take a second look and say, are they still the same? You might be missing out.

I’m not saying that you should go around giving people who have wronged you another chance to wrong you. No, I’m all about self-defense. Protect yourself.

I’m just saying, every time you close that door, if you have the time and the space in your heart, sometimes it’s worth a second look to see if anything’s changed. Just a thought.

So I hope that you can forgive some mistakes that you make, and I hope that you can find some allowance to make allowances for other people to make mistakes. Recognize that they’re also learning, they’re also growing, and it’s not always from a place of evil. Sometimes it was just bad judgment.

You’ve made bad judgments. You’ve changed your judgments. Maybe they would have done that differently if they had another chance. Or maybe if you ran into them next week, they would have taken another path.

So we’re all out here learning and growing together, hopefully. I can definitely tell you if you try to compare Teenage Ando to 50-year-old Ando, these are two different guys. Sure, there’s some things in common, but there are some stark differences as well.

And if you judged me only by my behavior as a teenager, ooh, maybe you wouldn’t talk to me again. Maybe you wouldn’t like that guy and never give me another chance. And then, oh, you wouldn’t have been able to watch this great video. So, do the same for yourself.

Don’t hold yourself today accountable for everything you did back when you were a teenager or 20s or yesterday.

The mistakes that you made in your past were based on the information that you had at the time. You’ve got to believe that you made the best judgment you could at that time. But today is different.

So, give yourself the freedom to make a new decision and pass a new judgment. I think that’s the healthy way to go.

Overall, the piece of advice here, as we’re getting near the end, is to try and make your first judgment humble, not hardcore. When you’re judging, when you’re figuring out what you like and what you don’t like, come at it with some sense of humility, knowing that your opinion might change over time. The older we get, I think the easier that is to do.

When you’re younger, it’s easier to just come in hardcore, like, that’s garbage, that’s your diet. No, that’s wrong. Science says this, da da da.

That’s your religion? That’s wrong. I’ve got the right way.

I know. Passion makes it hard to change your position down the road. The harder you come in with that first impression, with that first judgment, the more invested you get into it, the more your identity is connected to it, the more you become a prisoner of what you’ve been preaching. And that’s no good.

That becomes an egotistical activity, instead of just living life and trying to judge things in the moment fairly and kindly.

In the world of martial arts, I’ve met people who would say, don’t weight lift. Are you into weight lifting? I know some teachers say, weight lifting–don’t do that. It’ll slow you down. It’ll make you too bulky. You’ll be tight. You should be practicing your techniques, not lifting weights.

But then let’s say that same martial artist who’s been preaching that for decades turns 55. They have an injury, and their physical therapist says, you need to lift weights. You know, we need to improve your bone density. I need more stability in this joint. This is going to benefit you a lot. You need to lift weights for your well-being.

Now, if you’ve been so hardcore against weight lifting your whole life, that remedy is going to be really hard for you to accept. Like, what? Weight lift? I can’t let my students see me weight lifting. I’ve told them for decades, don’t lift weights. What do you mean I need to lift weights?

The more hardcore you are in your beliefs and the more hardcore you are in your preaching of those beliefs, when life changes, when you change, it’s just harder to adapt. It’s harder to move forward. It’s harder to find a new way.

So don’t do that to yourself. I know even just for me, since we’re mentioning weight lifting, when I was a teenager, weight lifting? Yes! I wanted to be bigger and stronger. Absolutely.

By the time I got to my late 20s and early 30s, it was taking a lot of time. I didn’t feel comfortable eating that much, but I was still in martial arts, so I felt, well, yeah, I’ll still lift weights, but not to get bigger. It’ll just be to stay in shape and stay strong.

As I got into my 40s, I had some injuries, time is short. I figured, you know, my training time is really special. I think these weights are actually restricting me and just cause for injury. I’m just going to switch to bodyweight exercises, calisthenics, animal movements, natural movements. So no weights. Cancel the gym membership.

Now I’m in my 50s. And guess what? Just bought some new dumbbells. I just felt the need. I just felt weak and disconnected. I felt like I needed that pressure back on my skeleton to feel strong and to feel full again.

So I’ve been all over the weightlifting spectrum. Absolutely yes, to absolutely no, and a couple of times, well, a little bit in the middle. So I’m very proud of myself for never having been so hardcore that I was telling other people, yes, weights or no weights.

It’s up to you. Who are you? What do you want? What do you need? What can you handle? That’s where your judgment should come from.

Hardcore, if you’re hardcore, that’s like saying, I’ve made a judgment and it’s forever. Case closed. If you’re humble, your humility says, I’ve made a judgment for today. This case is subject to review.

Judgments may change in the future, because who am I going to be in the future? What am I going to want in the future? What do I need in the future? I don’t know. Do you?

So be careful with those judgments. So at this point, my friend, let me say, go forth and judge freely. Judge yourself, judge others, judge everything. Just remember that the decisions and the judgments that you make today may change tomorrow. That’s the way it is.

So give yourself the freedom to learn and to grow. Give yourself that freedom to change. Be fair, be kind and be forgiving. I think that is an important formula for a happy life.

Hey, you’re still here! Therefore, I judge you as being very cool. Truly, I am honored every time that our paths cross, and I look forward to it happening again.

Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #115: How to Be a Good Judge in Martial Arts and Life [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

I’m not saying that combat sports and self-defense are the same—they’re not! But there are some fundamental principles that apply to both. Here are a few I hope you’ll consider.

You can watch the video below or scroll down for the transcript. Keep fighting for a happy life!

3 Sparring Tips for Beginners in Self-Defense

Okay! Sparring. You already know you should keep your chin down, hands up, and keep moving. Those are the basics.

Now I’ve got three more tips to not only make you safer and more effective in sparring, but if you face an attacker in real-life—and you can’t run away—these should help you defend yourself, too.

Tip #1: Know Your Range, Know Their Range

When you’re hitting a bag or a partner, pay attention to how long your arm is… and your leg. You should know when someone is in your striking range. But that’s not all—you should also pay attention to your opponent’s striking range.

Whether someone is taller than you or shorter than you, look at their arm, look at their leg, and calculate the distance of the “danger zone”. Where can you get hit? Do not hang out in the danger zone unless you are attacking or ready to counter their attack.

If you want to step back a little to clear your head, catch your breath, shake out your arms, or get a plan together, that’s fine. But once you drift back into their striking range, don’t be surprised if you suddenly get punched or kicked in the head. You were basically asking for it!

If you’re dealing with an out of control sparring partner, here’s a video for you.

How to Deal With an Out of Control Sparring Partner

Tip #2: Don’t Start Over

When you touch gloves to spar, or set up at a tournament, or if some bad guy gets in your face for real, recognize that you are starting off on the most dangerous spot on the planet. Take a step back, safer. Step to the side, safer. On a plane to Poland, safer.

Still, some people throw their favorite combo, get an angle, then drift right back to where they started. Or they dodge an attack, get an angle, then walk back into the danger zone. NO!

If you get an angle, fight to keep it. Don’t put yourself right back where they want you. Make them turn and make them move to find you.

By the way—when we talk about sparring, we should also talk about taking care of your brain. I’ve got another video with my advice on hard sparring. Here’s the link. Check it out.

Click here for more on Hard Sparring.

Tip #3: Strike Your Way In, Strike Your Way Out

Look—you may have some really slick combinations, but remember, the fight’s not over when you stop throwing punches—the fight’s over when the other guy stops throwing punches.

So, don’t get caught attacking, then get popped in the face as you back up or break away, because you assumed the fight was over and you were safe. You always want a clean getaway and that means covering your exit with strikes.

Don’t go in like a lion and out like lamb. That will get you killed. Enter a lion, exit a lion.

Hey! If you made it this far, I’ve got a bonus tip for you—don’t waste time! Some people spend half of their sparring time avoiding the actual sparring.

Let’s just presume that you’re already very good at running around and staying away from your partner. Good job! Now stop that!

Believe me, if you have a living, breathing partner to practice sparring with, that’s a gift. Make the most of your sparring time by getting in there and experimenting. Figure out what’s working for you and what’s not.

All right. Know your range, don’t start over, and strike your way out. If those tips are helpful, let me know—leave a comment. And for more martial arts tips you can use on and off the mats, don’t forget to subscribe to the channel.

Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post 3 Sparring Tips for Beginners in Self-Defense appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Do you remember the first technique you learned in the martial arts? Was it a jab? A block? Maybe a breakfall?

Whatever it was, let me ask you—would you say it was also the most important technique? If not—

Don’t you think it should be?

Over the years, I’ve learned a wide range of both practical and somewhat “fancy” moves, but the fact is NONE of them will work on their own. That was a problem until I figured something out…

There’s actually a powerful technique you can include before any move to increase its chances of succeeding! I’d say it’s not only the most important lesson in the martial arts, it may be the most important lesson in living a happy life.

What is that technique? Just hit “play” and I’ll be happy to break it down for you! 🙂

To LISTEN to “The First Technique in Martial Arts,” you can either:

• Play the audio podcast below… or download to your device.
• Subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher or Google Podcasts or Spotify.

To WATCH the video version or READ the transcript, scroll down below.

If you’d like to support this show, share the link with a friend or leave a quick review over on iTunes. Thank you!

Oh—and don’t forget to sign up for free email updates so you can get new shows sent to your inbox the minute they’re released.

Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

The First Technique in Martial Arts

Here’s the video. If the player doesn’t work, click this direct link.

As always, if you’d like to keep the conversation going, feel free to leave a comment here or through my Contact Page.

TRANSCRIPT

Hi ho, Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. In a great mood today, hope you are too. Welcome to episode #113 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better. Ain’t it the truth?

Sitting here today in my cool Mantis Boxing Rash Guard. Maybe you can see the mantis there. This comes from my friend, Randy Brown.

Sifu Randy and I, as you may know, just held a four-day in-person Kung Fu training camp up in New Hampshire. And may I say, it was a success. It was fun. I think everyone learned something and no one died.

That’s the formula for a success. Fun, learning, and no deaths.

We’ll probably have another event similar to that coming up. Maybe you could join us at the next one. Get your own cool rash guard. I’d really like that.

But let me tell you about the best takeaway I got from the camp because that’s the topic today. When I showed up, I really didn’t know who was going to be there. I mean, yes, there’s a registration, but I hadn’t worked with almost any of them.

So I didn’t know what they were going to do or certainly how they were going to do it. It’s a big mystery. And that forced me to prioritize what I was going to do. I want to be prepared for anything.

So then the question becomes, well, what are the priorities? What do I need to do first so that I’m prepared to be at my best no matter what happens? In other words, what should be your first technique? What is the most important technique to start this engagement with?

I’m also curious, what was your first technique?

I’m curious because you would think that the first technique that you’re ever taught would be also the most important technique from your teacher’s point of view. So, if you can remember, I would love it if in the comments you would just let me know, what was the first thing you ever learned in a martial arts class?

Was it a jab, a block, a breakfall, an armbar? I’m just curious, what was it? And, if you have the time, do you feel it was the most important lesson that you ever learned? Where did it fall in to what you learned later?

I would suggest to you that the first technique in martial arts, the most important technique in martial arts that you should learn, is preparation.

I mean specifically, preparing to face a challenge. The technique before the technique, if you will. The technique before you move. I’m talking about optimizing your state of mind and your state of body so that you will perform at your best no matter what happens. That makes sense, right?

Here’s the problem. Let’s say you are sparring with someone. You put your hands up and right away, they grab your wrist.

Now, in that instant, what happened to you? Who are you? When you felt that wrist grab, come on, there’s a physical reaction. You feel that pressure, a little bit of impact maybe, maybe even some pain.

On the psychological side, there’s also a reaction. Maybe you are a little afraid, maybe you’re a little embarrassed, caught you off guard. Maybe you feel weak because this person really grabbed aggressively. You might even feel stuck. You could instantly feel trapped.

Let’s just recognize that in that instance, in that instant, you’ve just become suboptimal. You are not at your best. Whatever moves that you’ve learned, punches or kicks or grab escapes, even specifically this type of guard grab wrist attack, whatever you’re going to do is not going to be at your best because your mental state and your physical state have now changed.

A minute ago, maybe you were feeling great. You felt powerful, you felt unlimited, you felt comfortable in your body. And now all of a sudden, that one quick instant, that all changed.

This could happen, maybe, let’s say sparring. Have you ever had this experience? You’re feeling great. And they’re pairing up partners for sparring. Could be at a tournament, could be in your class. And they say, okay, you are going to spar that person. And you look over…

Now, that first look is what I’m talking about. Your feelings in that first look. If you look over and it’s an eight year old kid, you probably feel safe. You probably feel competent. You probably feel like you can have some fun with this.

But sometimes you look over and that first look is somebody bigger than you, stronger than you. Maybe you don’t know them and they look mean. Maybe they’re a higher rank. Maybe they have a reputation for hurting people. Maybe they’ve hurt you.

So how do you feel now? You might start off your match already feeling defeated. You may already feel like you don’t have much of a chance. You are automatically suboptimal. And now that was just in the context of a class.

Imagine you’re walking down the street and suddenly someone shoves a knife in your face. Imagine suddenly someone puts a gun in your face. Imagine suddenly three guys grab you and drag you behind a building.

I just want to be clear that whatever that first feeling that you get, whatever fills your soul, that is going to determine your capability to defend yourself, to fight.

Let’s be very clear…

No matter what style you study, no matter how long you’ve been training, no matter what kind of shape you’re in, your second technique will not work or certainly won’t work as well as it could unless you’ve mastered the first technique, which is managing your state of mind and your state of body as you are first confronting a situation.

Now this topic I actually discussed a little bit in a recent video called, The Most Important Stance. And in that video, I was kind of being cute that the most important stance was not the horse stance or a cat stance or a front stance or any stance that we really focus on that looks cool. I suggested that the most important stance was the ready stance!

In traditional martial arts, we’ve been given a gift of some type of preparatory stance before you do a form or even before you spar. You have a chance to stand at the ready. That is your time to practice putting yourself in an optimal state. To power up, to get your mind right and get your body right and, yes, your spirit right. Whatever comes after that is just an expression of the resources you just pulled together.

Your ready stance pulls your power together, kiyotsuke, and then you get ready to use it, yoi, and then you move it around. You play with it. You express it.

So in that moment, that preparatory stance, who are you? How great are you? How great do you feel? How ready are you really to face whatever’s coming next?

Even if you’re not in a traditional martial art, you still have that moment before maybe you touch gloves or you slap and knuckle up. You have that moment to get your head together before you engage. That’s one advantage, perhaps, over self-defense, where you may not, you may get sucker punched or caught off guard. But at least in training, we have this chance to develop who we are. And you should really think about that for a second.

Self-defense. Think about those words. Self-defense. Who is the self? Who are you protecting? You at your best.

We are training to develop ourselves to be the best we can. Then we’re trying to defend it so that nobody can take it away from us.

We train to be optimal human beings. And then we train to have the power to hold on to that. We don’t want to lose it on our own. And we certainly don’t want it to be taken away from us by someone else.

If you think about it, that’s what a bad guy does. That’s what makes them a bad guy. The bad guy is trying to make you forget how powerful you are.

They’re trying to minimize you. They’re trying to shrink you in your space. They’re trying to make you feel helpless. They’re trying to make you feel unworthy.

They’re trying to make you feel voiceless. Like whatever you have to say doesn’t matter. They are trying to make you less than your best. And it is my opinion that the less best you go, the more danger comes into your life. The more you’re led down that path, where you’re either giving away power or letting power be taken from you, the more danger you are going to be in.

Again, we’re here to train, to maximize our power and hold on to it, no matter what happens.

Think about some professional fighters. Now, it’s no secret that a pro fighter, that’s a hard life. And I’m sure you’ve seen enough documentaries or followed your favorite fighter to see the struggles that they have to go through sometimes, whether it’s just the losing weight or having injuries, having a bad training camp, coming into a fight, tired with jet lag, maybe there’s a family drama going on, maybe they’re having some problems with their diet, maybe they’ve got food poisoning. There are all kinds of things that a pro athlete has to deal with.

But when the event shows up, when it’s time to get in there and perform, it’s time to perform. The champions in sport find a way to be their best even under bad circumstances. Even when it seems that everything is against them, they still find a way to keep fighting and bring up their best performance. That’s what champs do and that’s what we should do.

Whether or not you’re a professional fighter or professional athlete of any kind, you get the point. Real life is the ultimate match. It’s the ultimate tournament.

You are more than a professional athlete. That’s not derogatory to say, well, you’re not a professional fighter. No, no, no. You’re bigger than that because real life is bigger than any one sporting event. That’s why martial arts is not just a sport, it’s a lifestyle. It’s a way of life.

We are preparing to be at our best in all situations, not just when the whistle blows. Yes, not just the ring, the ring of life we’re talking about here.

Okay, so if you agree with me that it’s all about the preparation, it’s about how we face challenges first before we start taking actions that matters. We’ve got to ask how. How do we get better at this?

How do we optimize ourselves and maximize our resources?

I think it starts simply by recognizing it and saying, okay, I’m going to prioritize that first feeling. I am going to prioritize my optimization that I practice feeling my best everywhere I go.

I think some of us take that for granted. You just kind of wake up in the morning and you go. You have a routine and you just start checking off the boxes. You go through your day. But maybe you didn’t make it a priority to prepare yourself for the day. That’s what we need to fix.

We want to make our psychology our number one priority. And I’m going to hit you with four Cs. For me, the four Cs to optimize my psychology, my mindset for the day.

I want to be calm. I want to be clear headed. I want to be comfortable. And I want to be confident.

How do you do that?

I believe in minimizing the drama in your life. Oh, pick your battles carefully, my friend. Pick your battles carefully. Use your energy wisely. Maximize your resources whenever possible.

Don’t get sucked into someone else’s agenda, someone else’s problems, someone else’s drama, someone else’s priority list. Make your own psychology number one.

Now, since we’re talking about sports anyway, think about some pro athletes. How do some of these champs get into that state where they can defy setbacks? You’ve seen it.

Many pro athletes before a match will put on some headphones and listen to their favorite music. Maybe some will go off into a corner and have a ritualized warm-up procedure that they go through. Maybe some wear a favorite pair of lucky socks. They set superstitions and rituals that put them in the mindset to be at their best no matter what.

I can think of a Taekwondo instructor who was the master in the school. He was the top guy. And he was always very composed, very controlled. And once in a while when he would come out and do some sparring, he was always a little reserved, conservative in his technique. And most people were respectful of that and would just match that tone.

But every once in a while, there would be some hot shot student who would forget himself and start going after the master a little recklessly, out of control. And this master had a ritual when that happened…

He would step away for a moment, just a moment. He would turn around, take a breath, and tighten his belt. And after he tightened his belt, he would turn around and he had his game face on. And then he would put his foot through your chest.

So that’s interesting, but how about you? Do you have a ritual to be at your best?

If you’re going on a job interview, when was the last time you went on a job interview? You probably had some type of ritual to get yourself in the right mindset. Maybe you went over your resume, started rehearsing answers to common questions, looked at yourself in the mirror, you put on special clothes, whatever. You went in to make the best impression possible and to perform at your best.

What about a first date? Have you been on a first date lately? I have not. But I sure remember that you want to perform at your best, show up at your best.

What about just going to class? Do you have a ritual before you go into class or while you’re putting on a uniform?

What about just getting up in the morning? Like I said, most people I think just dive into their day and they don’t take a moment to prepare themselves for the day. How do you get up?

Do you meditate or say a prayer, have a cup of coffee in the quiet, pump out 10 squats, 10 push-ups, 10 sit-ups? Do you have a ritual?

I’m not prescribing what your ritual should be. I’m just suggesting that knowing yourself so that you can develop a ritual to be your best self is a great idea. I think it’ll make your whole day better.

It may take some time to study that, to research that, to figure out who do I need to be to succeed in this art, in this class? How much time do I need to spend on conditioning versus meditating versus visualizing versus partner practice versus solo practice?

That may take some time to figure out a formula for yourself. But once you figure it out, then you can get through it more quickly.

And that’s what would lead me to another thought here, to give yourself time for state breaks, right? You have a state of mind, you have a state of body. You spend time developing what you want the character that you want, the person that you want to be, not just in your class now, but everywhere you go in life.

And sometimes you’re going to need to take little breaks to get yourself back into that character because it’s very easy to get knocked out of character, to forget the person that you want to be or to forget the person that you are because there are so many outside influences pushing in on you, expecting things from you, trying to screw you up sometimes.

That’s the nature of self-defense. That’s what bad guys are trying to do–screw you up, make you forget who you are and what you can do.

So, I encourage you to develop this ritual for yourself. Maybe it involves just taking a breath. You just are able to take a deep breath, get your power back, and now you’re back on.

Maybe you have a mantra that you develop for yourself. Something you can say when you get scared, when you get hurt, when you’re starting to feel hesitation about taking an action you know you need to take. Something you can say to yourself.

Maybe it’s a smile. I find a smile to be very, very powerful, and it has a physical effect as well, a reaction through the body.

Maybe you just clap your hands, maybe you rub your hands together, maybe you squeeze your fists. It can be something very physical. Maybe you stretch.

Maybe you just have a totem of some kind. Maybe you wear a ring, or you get a tattoo, or you always wear a special necklace. Something that reminds you who you want to be or who you are.

I think it’s really important that we have that little touchstone in behavior or attitude or thought that snaps us back to our full power. As you move through your day and you feel a dip, you feel that little slide away from your 100% optimal self, you have this technique to get it back.

This is the first technique I believe that we should have as martial artists and as human beings how to sense when your power is lessening and how to snap and get it back as fast as you can. To be aware of that first feeling of loss and be able to immediately whiplash into gain.

And don’t get me wrong, this is hard. This is really difficult. I’m a grown man in his 50s now, and it’s still shocking how quickly I can either lose power on my own or have it taken away from me. I think it’s very natural to shrink, to give up sometimes. To give in to thoughts of failure or to just not wanting to play the game anymore. Just being exhausted by trying so hard all the time.

I get it. Particularly if you compare yourself to others. Not just in person. Oh, I got to spar with this guy, he’s way younger, stronger, better. But even if you’re just watching a movie or television, you think, ah, look at this person. They’re so far ahead of me. They’re so much better than I am. What am I doing? Why do I even try anymore?

As far as self-defense goes, it could be someone just raising their voice. That could cause you to give up some power. Someone could make a direct threat to you. That could make you lose some power. Someone just by getting closer to you could make a change in your body or your mindset. That leads to danger.

I just, oh, you know what I just realized? Even the weather, even the weather, I have a window right here outside the camera and it’s a cloudy day, threatening rain. Some people would look at that and even let that take them out of their optimal state.

You wake up, you start your ritual, ah, I’ve got my green tea and I’ve stretched for 10 minutes. Everything’s great. Oh, I look out the window, there’s a cloud. What a terrible day.

No, no. Don’t be tricked, my friend. Don’t let anyone trick you into believing that you’re not powerful, and don’t trick yourself into believing that you’re not powerful.

We have to believe as martial artists and as enlightened human beings that there’s always something we can do. There’s always some way for us to fight back, to keep fighting for what’s important to us in life.

So that’s the goal. We want to skip the dip.

As you move through your day today, and you have these fluctuations of confidence and fluctuations in comfort, skip the dip.

When you feel it going down, get to your state break. Get your mindset again. Feel better in your body. Get back to your optimal self.

Why? So that we can perform at our best and get more out of life. That’s the point.

So this is my challenge to you now, my friend. It’s very simple…

Step one. The challenge is, first, identify your first feelings.

In any given moment today, just be aware of how you’re feeling. Become aware. Pick a measure.

Start with your heart rate. Someone says something unkind. You feel your heart starting to increase, adrenaline starting to flow.

Okay, just identify it. Just say, hey, I notice that this person is getting my heart going.

Check out your shoulders. That’s another way to measure how you’re feeling. Are you calm and clear and comfortable and confident? Are your shoulders starting to come up? Is your neck getting tighter?

Just identify it. Don’t judge it as good or bad. Just at least be aware of it first. Like, huh, there’s a change happening in my body.

What about your mind? Is something happening to you where suddenly you feel you should just be quiet? You don’t want to say anything. You feel voiceless.

Or do you go the other way? Is something happening right now that’s making you angry? And you feel like you have to say something. You want to shout.

I challenge you just to identify, to step back a little bit and observe yourself to see what the natural reactions are in your mind and in your body just so that you’re aware of them.

Step two will be to then control those feelings.

Because the feelings that you get may not be the ones you want. They may not lead you down the optimal path.

So, okay, somebody insults you or threatens you and you feel your heart starting to race. See if you can control that heart rate.

Can you take a breath? Can you slow down? Can you repeat a mantra? Can you squeeze your hands? Is there something you can do to bring your heart rate down?

If you feel that tension in your shoulders or tightness in your jaw, can you relax your neck for a second? Can you drop your shoulders? Can you settle your weight down? Can you feel your feet? Drop it.

Can you do it? This is the question. This is the challenge. Can you control what has come out of your body at this point naturally?

If you feel like you’re shrinking, someone has an advantage on you in some way, and they’re lording it over you, and there’s a power imbalance, can you widen your stance a little bit? Can you broaden your chest a little bit? Can you expand a little bit instead of shrink?

Very small changes that you can control will start opening a door, I think, to bigger changes. So experiment with them.

And of course, if you’re feeling like you shouldn’t say anything, you’re feeling quiet, at least say, I agree, or I disagree. If that’s all you can get out, then at least control that feeling like I shouldn’t say anything. And just say, I agree.

And if you feel like you absolutely have to say something, see if you can zip it. See if you can just let the moment pass without saying something, just for the challenge of control.

Step three. If you’ve identified that first feeling, and controlled it, now, choose your action.

Choose your second technique. That was the first technique, to prepare yourself to make a second movement, a second action. And once you do that, observe the results.

I bet that if you give yourself this power of controlling that first feeling, of putting yourself back into an optimal state, you will get better results in accordance with your goals.

If you’re just reacting and shooting from the hip, you’re going to get what you’ve always gotten, which is where you are today and who you are today. If you’re expecting more of yourself, or if you desire more of yourself and more of your future and better results, then here we are.

Start controlling that first feeling and make more optimal choices. Observe those results and start adding up your data and see which choices led to which results and which ones led to the same old results that you don’t want.

Whether you win or lose, remember you’re winning just because you’re controlling it. Your power is really that you have the choices in your behavior. If you’re just reacting, if you’re just repeating cycles that somehow got wired into you when you were a baby or a kid, then you’re not free to choose and that means you’re stuck.

We’re trying to break that mold. We’re breaking up that wiring and we’re trying to reevaluate and rewire the way we want it to be. To be the person we want to be, to build the character that we want, to be optimal.

So, win or lose, I mean, it doesn’t matter because there’s no guarantees. We all end up dead. We all suffer losses anyway. We’re just trying to make the most of what we’ve got while we’ve got the chance to do something. That’s the optimizing.

And again, it’s natural along this journey to make mistakes and to feel like you didn’t do things right and to in that way give away power because you’re starting to judge yourself like you’ve done something wrong or you’re not good enough. But that’s an illusion.

Remember, you fight back. You keep coming back to this project and get better at it. This is the technique. That’s why I’m calling it a technique.

It’s not just, hey, be a winner. Hey, be awesome. That’s not a technique. That’s just a desire.

The technique is how to change our negative thoughts into positive thoughts. That’s something we have to practice. And we need to do it faster and better than yesterday.

It’s just like a punch. When you learn how to throw a punch or a kick, you’re not very good at it at first. It takes time to develop that skill. Along the way, it starts coming to you faster and more competently. You can throw a better punch and a better kick.

This technique is the same. The technique of mastering the first feeling, the technique of putting yourself in a mind state and a body state that is optimal for the best results. This is something we have to practice.

But if right now it takes you a month to find your optimal state, that’s okay. Then it’s going to take you a couple of weeks to get back to that optimal state. That’s fine. But keep going. Make it so that you can eventually, instantly get back into that optimal state.

Look over at that sparring partner who’s reckless and dangerous. Instantly, you’re at your best. I’m going to deal with them.

Somebody pulls a knife and instantly, I have held on to my power and I’m going to do the best I can to defend myself. That is the goal.

And ultimately, if you can do that fast enough, maybe there will be no transition. Maybe we can just stay in that state all the time. Again, that’s the end goal.

For me right now, I still have fluctuations. I still feel the dips, but I am getting better at how fast I can come back to feeling great again, to being my best. I’ve gotten better at it. It’s a technique, but my goal is still that that’s just who I am. It doesn’t matter what happens.

I’m going to skip the dip. I don’t have to snap back. It’s just in me. And so that will be the challenge for you too.

So that’s what I wanted to share with you today. That’s pretty much it. Let’s recognize that we have an optimal state. So know yourself the best you can and bring it into your control. Because if you can put yourself into your optimal state, then you will be able to make optimal choices.

Those optimal choices are going to lead to optimal results. And that, my friend, will lead to an optimal, happy life.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Before you go, give yourself a moment right now for a state break. Do what you have to do to put yourself in the best state of mind and state of body that you can. And then, my friend, go forth and conquer.

Until next time, smiles up, my friend. Let that smile be your shield and your sword. Keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #113: The First Technique in Martial Arts [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

While some may think cardio kickboxing is just a dance class with puffy gloves, I say it deserves a little more respect. Let me know if you agree!

You can watch the video below or scroll down for the transcript. Keep kicking!

Is Cardio Kickboxing a Waste of Time for Self-Defense?

Howdy! Ando again from Happy Life Martial Arts. Is cardio kickboxing a waste of time?

No! Not if you’re looking for a fun way to strengthen your heart and lungs while burning a few calories. But what if you’re also looking to build self-defense skills?

Ooh. Now, you’re going to hear some different opinions. Some martial artists will tell you that if you’re not sparring or rolling against partners who are fighting back, you’re wasting your time. In fact, I just made a video claiming that you’ll never be the best martial artist you can be without hard sparring.

Click here for more on Hard Sparring.

But is that the end of the discussion? No. Here’s why—

Even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Yes, even a little! And cardio kickboxing counts as a little martial arts.

Now, when I was younger, I admit—my attitude was “all or nothing.” Either sign up for a hard-hitting self-defense program or forget the whole thing and just pray nothing bad happens to you. 

But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned that something is better than nothing.

ANYTHING is better than nothing!

So, if cardio kickboxing can train you to stand tall and put your hands up if a bad guy starts trouble with you, then I say go for it. Let me give you an example…

My mother is over 70 years old. She’s never studied any martial arts whatsoever. If she calls me and says, “Hey, #1 Child—the gym down the street just started a water aerobics class and a cardio kickboxing class. Which one should I do?”

I’d say, “Well, can you swim? Yes? Then 100% take the cardio kickboxing class.”

Will that be a waste of time? Heck no. She’ll learn how to throw some punches and kicks, maybe add some elbows and knees, and develop basic footwork patterns.

Plus, most importantly, she’ll spend some time thinking about defending herself, even if it’s just against a faceless bag, which is definitely not a waste of time.

The fact is most people don’t think about self-defense at all. Which only makes them more vulnerable.

Now, I’m not saying a cardio kickboxing class practices the most realistic or effective self-defense techniques ever developed, but even a little time spent adopting the mindset of fighting back is a big step in the right direction. At least compared to water aerobics, shuffleboard, or sitting on the couch knitting. 

Oops. Was that senior citizen stereotyping? Okay. It’s also a big step in the right direction compared to surfing, parkour, or rock climbing. Go mom!

Of course, some people might argue that cardio kickboxing builds a false sense of security. But let’s be fair—that can happen in any martial art. I’ve met some highly skilled and highly delusional people in every style I’ve ever studied.

Never forget—anybody can be killed. Which is why, no matter what you train or how long you’ve been training, if you can run from trouble, you should.

Besides, if you ask most people in a cardio kickboxing class if they’re a world champion kickboxer or an unstoppable street fighter, they’ll probably laugh and think you’re crazy for asking the question. They understand where they fall on the martial arts spectrum.

That’s the main point. There’s a wide spectrum available in the realm of martial arts training.

If you start on the rough end—bashing brains every class or slashing at each other with live blades—you might get hurt and never come back. But if you start off on the other end— practicing forms in the air, slow motion movements, or hitting pads instead of people—you might build the confidence to take another step on the path towards a more hands-on martial arts program.

So, if you’re thinking about joining a cardio kickboxing class, go for it. If you’re already in one, keep going and don’t let anyone make you feel like you’re wasting your time. You’re actually doing more than most.

Until next time, keep kicking, my friend, and keep fighting for a happy life.

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