So...

Remember that whole Kung fu instructor thing? It lasted about 3 weeks.

I don't blame my former students, or myself that much. What I do blame is the epidemic of instant gratification or success that is king over most people's mindset in America. And movies. The level of misrepresentation martial arts get in movies is exactly like a morbidly obese man sitting naked in front of a computer and telling some pedo somewhere that he's talking to a perky 15 year-old.

Imagine his disappointment when he learns the truth.

Everybody works under the assumption that they can become geniuses in 6 months if they do a couple montage training scenes or something. No, it doesn't work that way and you'll only accomplish failure if you try, so don't. Trust me.

What works is practice. Then after that, practice. I got my black belt in 2 years and what was a major reason for that? Only the fact that I trained until I couldn't feel my legs, or until I literally had no more breath to spare. Or that I really knew that I should stop when I got that sweet metallic aftertaste in the back of my throat because my mouth probably dried up from sweating too much.  The point is that I whooped my own ass into shape. My instructors and sifu were a huge part of that, but when they left and classes were over, I still practiced.

This really applies to everything, but when things get challenging, the majority of us will toss our hands up and quit. If we can't do it immediately without skipping over the vital process of being broken, then we don't want to do it. And that's really sad. Imagine what we could accomplish, how much self-esteem we would have if we allowed just a little challenge in our lives instead of passing them by.

So wasteful.

Mastery of Oneself

Human growth is achieved in any area, intelligence, career advancement, physical strength, emotional fortitude, technical, and occupational skills, when we get better at it. Development is a better word. We can develop our strengths, weaknesses, and areas where we have no skill at all. No matter how great our growth in one area becomes, eventually we reach our limit. A place where no matter how hard one studies or trains or practices, they can't seem to get better.

Martial arts is a system that puts people in direct contact with that limit, if they are willing, and equips them with the necessary tools to surpass it. Short of religion, nothing else forces a man to confront his mind, body and spirit in an effort to reach some semblance of perfection. And even on their own, martial arts cannot help one accomplish this: there has to be some form of conviction. For Bruce Lee, it was creating a philosophy to accompany his art that made it as efficient as possible, getting rid of all unnecessary movements and keeping only what is useful. For me, it's eliminating weaknesses. Becoming stronger and more in control of my abilities. The difference between me and Bruce Lee is that he developed a system to accomplish his goal, I'm still a work in progress.

Strong martial artists master themselves. The goal is never to learn to beat someone to a bloody, pride-shattered pulp, but to surpass one's own limitations and overcome obstacles. Unfortunately, not everyone makes it that far. Sometimes it's a simple matter of not knowing what's beyond the limit. It's effectively the land of the unknown. You have no way of knowing what to expect or whether or not you will actually advance. But if you're there, you might as well try.

There's a saying, "Amateurs work until they get it right. Professionals work until they can't get it wrong." When we reach our limit, we are most likely on our way to becoming a professional at the thing we are doing, or maybe we already are: what it takes to get to that point is recognition and confrontation of the weakness of your ability. There are many things that we can do right, but that doesn't mean that there aren't imperfections, or more precisely, inefficiencies in our methods.

That saying isn't just a method of practice, it's a state of mind. When you first begin learning anything, the goal is to get it right. When learning algebra the goal of practice problems is to learn to get the problems right. When studying for any test in college, the goal is always to practice until you get it right. In doing so, we learn what makes the solution right and how to reproduce a correct answer. The mentality is getting it right.

The professional's mindset is completely different. Armed with knowledge of how to do something right, they can focus on not ever getting it wrong. This level of perfection isn't always attainable, humans aren't perfect, but the road to perfecting one's skill is about making the decision to confront that which is weak or reluctant inside of you and instead of ridding yourself of it, making it stronger. Make it work for you instead of against.

TBC...