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Tag: Martial Arts Inspired

The A/B Game

Published on November 5, 2022

There’s a game I play in martial arts classes called the A/B Game.

It’s simple.

When I say “A,” students fire off a given technique as fast as they can.

When I say “B,” they stay frozen.

My goal is to mess them up by getting them to fire off the technique on “B.”

Their goal is to have such great focus that they don’t even so much as flinch on “B.”

In the early stages of the game, getting flinchers is relatively easy—some because they’re just unfocused; some because they’re too focused on being fast; and some because they need to mess up before they actually understand the game.

As the game progresses, there’s usually a handful who are hard to mess up—so, I’ll pull out one of my tricks from my bag.

Right before I call “A” or “B,” I’ll nonchalantly say… “Okay, now I want you to beat the person next to you. Don’t let them beat you…okay? Ready…”

And then quickly yell “B!” …And get a huge chunk of students to flinch. It works almost every time.

…Why?

Because instead of focusing on themselves, I got them to focus on the others. Instead of focusing on doing their best, they were distracted on being THE best and lost connection with their focused mind.

See… When we focus on beating everybody else; on racing the person next to us; on trying to be the best—we lose sight of the most important thing… focus on ourself.

P.s. I also published 46 Impactful Bruce Lee Quotes from Striking Thoughts today.

Black Belt You

Published on October 10, 2022

What does the black belt version of you look like?

For me, as a 20+ year martial arts practitioner, black belt represents something much greater than combat or performance abilities.

Black belt represents potential fought for; potential realized; potential unleashed.

It’s a firm commitment to the realization of a greater version of yourself. A version that’s disciplined; focused; confident; respectful; generous. A 2.0 version that’s built to handle to challenges presented by life.

What does your black belt version look like? Even if you never plan on stepping foot into a Dojang (although I think it’s beneficial for most everybody)—a deep visualization practice can produce a life-changing image.

Because once you see this version clearly in your mind, you can finally start to reverse engineer your way to that 2.0 you. Without it, 1.0 you is all you’ll ever know. And you can’t reverse engineer to what you don’t know.

Close your eyes and start building.

P.s. In case you missed it, you can read the best of what I posted to MoveMe Quotes last week, here.

Back To Zero

Published on September 19, 2022

Before reading this, do a body scan and progressively relax one muscle at a time starting with your forehead and ending with your toes—get your body back to zero percent unnecessary tension.

When done, how much tension would you say you released that you didn’t even realize you were holding?

Well, that tension is the equivalent of you pushing the gas in your parked car.

Multiply that over the course of an entire day—and you can imagine how much energy is being wasted.

The challenge is that tension is often the default, unconscious state—we don’t even realize we’re tensing up when we do!

Go ahead and do another body scan and see how much tension already came back.

…This is why we have to make relaxing a conscious effort.

Both for energy efficiency and bodily health. Tense muscles become brittle—and brittle is prone to injury and disease. Relaxed muscles are flexible—and flexible is healthy and resilient.

Doing a progressive relaxation body scan—regularly—is an excellent strategy.

How can we do this? Here are 3 ideas to get you started:

  1. Set a timer: every time the timer goes off, do a body scan and get back to zero.
  2. Use a trigger: every time your phone rings or buzzes, do a body scan and get back to zero.
  3. Time-block: After each meal of the day, do a body scan and get back to zero.

The goal, like any other habitual practice, is to move relaxed from conscious to unconscious so it becomes more and more our default state.

P.s. In case you missed it, here’s the best of what I posted to MoveMe Quotes last week.

Selective Tension and Relaxation

Published on September 15, 2022

In Martial Arts, one of the goals is to learn how to maximize the creation of power while minimizing the expenditure of energy.

Essentially, it’s the practice of learning how to fully press the “gas pedal” while fully releasing the “brake pedal.”

Pressing the gas and brake pedal at the same time is wildly inefficient for driving. And so is it for moving the body. Yet, this is the default when it comes to moving the body with any degree of intensity.

Both the protagonist and antagonist muscle groups tense which, in effect, slows down the attempt to speed up all at once.

…And wastes a bunch of energy in the process.

The art then becomes learning how to selectively tense certain muscles while selective relaxing others in real time. And the challenge, of course, is that there isn’t only one gas and one brake pedal—there are hundreds.

And so it is for life.

The question to consider is this: in each task that you’re trying to complete, what resistance could you simultaneously reduce?

Sometimes we focus so much on the doing that we forget about the un-doing. Because while a 10% increase in speed for “doing” is good, a 20% decrease in resistance is better.

And this isn’t a question that’s asked and answered only once—it’s an ongoing awareness.

We’ll never get this perfect—for our bodies or for life. But, progress—any progress—makes the effort undoubtedly worth it.

P.s. This became the introduction for: 23 Greg McKeown Quotes from Essentialism and How To Live Better Via Less

Be It Then Become It

Published on March 11, 2022

You don’t start acting like a black belt when you get a black belt.

It’s only after you’ve acted like a black belt long enough that you finally receive one.

The same is true for any other identity you want to embody in life.

You become it by acting like it long enough.

The “becoming” doesn’t happen first.

You Don’t Start Good—You Become Good

Published on September 25, 2021

Let me assure you that approximately none of us start “good” at anything.

Take meditating for example. Expecting to be “good” at meditating when you first start is like expecting to be “good” at Martial Arts when you come to your first class.

The point isn’t to arrive “good”—the point is to start where you are and improve.

Besides the rare few who are “born enlightened,” I’m of the opinion that all of us have busy, irrational, crazed monkey minds which make meditating exceptionally hard.

…Which is precisely why we should be spending time practicing it.

What we need to do isn’t *not* meditate because its hard. What we need to do is better manage our expectations.

Meditating isn’t about closing our eyes and being able to experience a magical ceasing of all incoming thoughts. Not a chance.

It’s about stopping the flow of incoming information and allowing what’s there to settle.

When I meditate, I spend probably less than a minute out of twenty actually free from thinking. This is an excellent day of meditation for me.

In fact, any day I practice meditating is an excellent day of meditating—because I practiced it.

Get it?

The practice is the reward. Just like in Martial Arts. What are belts but an external motivation tactic to encourage training?

The end goal (black belt) is simply a motivation tactic that’s designed to get you to practice.

So, if you want to become a “black belt” in meditation (or anything), humble yourself and start practicing like a white belt.

Drop And Give Me 20!

Published on July 20, 2021

When I was a Martial Arts student, my teachers would give the entire class push-ups for the wrong-doings of a single student.

I hated being punished for things I didn’t do that were also out of my control. It made me resent them in many cases.

So, I resolved to never do that to a class when I became a teacher (Yes, I knew I wanted to be a Martial Arts teacher long before I ever was).

Now, the motto that I have worked tirelessly to embody is praise publicly, reprimand privately.

No longer is the attention of the class pointed towards the students’ wrongdoing—now it’s pointed towards the students who are doing things right. And the students who are doing wrong get a private conversation from a more experienced instructor who can compassionately help them understand and change their behaviors.

Had I not felt that resentment and planted that seed in my mind when I was a student all those year ago, maybe I never would have felt the need to change that tradition when I was in front of a class (with misbehaving students) all those later years.

You can learn just as much from the people who do wrong by you as you can from the people who do right by you.

You just have to keep an open mind and learn how to channel your negative emotions rather than let your negative emotions become you.