Fight for a Happy Life with Sensei Ando: Martial Arts for Everyday Life

Welcome to Episode #121 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Hero Worship in the Martial Arts.”

We all need teachers and role models in the martial arts… but can following a leader become harmful at some point? Is it possible to show a teacher too much respect?

YES! If we’re not careful, our humility as a student can be transformed into hero worship. Once that happens, it becomes impossible to maximize our skills and build true confidence. And without true confidence, your ability to defend yourself is greatly diminished.

Be careful! It’s happened to me… don’t let it happen to you!

In this episode, I’ll share a couple of stories that not only showed me the dangers of constantly seeking a teacher’s approval, but also helped me figure out how to train with a balance of humility and confidence. As a result, as you may know, I created and awarded myself my own black and white belt! 🙂

Here’s to healthy training habits and learning to become your own hero!

To LISTEN to “Hero Worship,” here’s a link.

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!

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.

Welcome, my friend. Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. This is episode #121 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Today, heroes, mentors, role models, teachers, we all have them in the martial arts and beyond. But when does following a leader become harmful?

When does admiration transform into adulation? And when does adulation transform into idolization?

Can you show too much respect for a teacher? When does respect transform into hero worship?

Now, yes, I still have teachers. I still seek guidance. That’s what teachers are for.

Teachers can inspire us to get started. Teachers can encourage us to keep going. And teachers can guide us to make sure we’re heading in the directions of our goals.

That’s all good. But I find in the martial arts that oftentimes teachers are elevated into gods. They’re glorified. They’re deified.

And I know this, of course, from my own personal feelings towards some teachers, particularly early on in my martial arts career. I also know this from listening and reading many interviews with martial artists, some famous, some not.

And I also know it from different martial artists that I’ve spoken to in person. You’ll hear people make comments like, oh, I’ll never be as good as my teacher. Or they will describe their teacher in legendary terms.

The stories that you hear are just incredible, unbelievable, often. They’ll say, oh, their skills. I still don’t understand how they could do what they did. It was almost magical.

And very simply, it puts yourself, these stories, in a place of being nothing. Oh, compared to my teacher, I’m nothing.

Now to all of that, I say stop it. Stop. Respect your teachers, of course. That’s not what I’m talking about. If a teacher changed your life, then of course you’re always going to have respect for them. Even a bad teacher.

A bad teacher meaning maybe they cheated you in some way. Maybe you had a difference of opinion and it broke up the relationship. Maybe politics got in the way. There are lots of stories of people falling out with their teacher. But you still respect them. Because if they changed your life, you still carry that lesson with you.

So, this isn’t about respect only. Respect is its own category. There’s a different topic to talk about though. And that’s just knowledge and skill.

I’m asking today, can you be better than your teacher? Are you better right now than your teacher?

Does that question come off as disrespectful right off the bat? I would say no. I would say no because learning is not a competition. Your teacher is on his or her own journey. They have their own stories to tell.

You’re on your own journey. You have your own goals that may be different from your teacher’s goals.

You certainly have different histories. You certainly have different training methodologies perhaps, or the amount of time that you can put into it.

So you’re not on the same exact journey. So it’s not fair to compare them. So I ask again, are you right now better than your teacher at something? It doesn’t have to be everything. But can you find some qualities, some attribute that you have that maybe your teacher does not?

Quick example just for myself, simple. When I was younger, I practiced a lot of high kicks. So I still have a lot of knowledge and some muscle memory of high kicking. And many of my teachers were in styles that didn’t practice high kicks.

So right off the bat, I can tell you, I am better and know more about kicking high than several of my teachers. It wasn’t worth talking about at the time. And they certainly never pointed it out, because that’s not why I was there learning from them. It was not the appropriate topic to discuss, and it wasn’t a competition. So it didn’t matter, irrelevant.

But what about you?

The reason I’m asking is because in your training, if our goal is to be the best we can be and to have a happy life, to be fulfilled, to get the most out of your training and your life, we have to reveal any self-limiting beliefs. I cannot walk around always thinking that I’m not as good as someone else.

Maybe, yes, of course, if there’s someone who is a professional martial artist and they’re training full-time and they’ve been doing it for decades, and maybe you’re a hobbyist and you only train for a couple of hours on a couple of things, well then sure, there will always be a long list of skills and attributes that you can say, yeah, my teacher is better than me at a lot of these things, all of these things.

But that doesn’t mean there’s not room for you to still be great or to achieve a higher level of skill than your teacher at at least one thing, something. That’s of course up to you to figure out what that would be. But I just want you to have the possibility in your head that as you train, that you’re not always lesser than, you’re not always a weaker, watered down version of your teacher.

And the reason for that is because self-defense is rooted in confidence. How can you possibly defend yourself if you don’t believe in what you can do, if you don’t believe that you have some skill? That’s not healthy.

There is ego that we need, healthy ego that says, I can do this, I can beat that guy, I am good enough.

Quick little story, I remember training with a guy and at that point we were both senior students in a style. And at one point we were doing pretty well, we had a good flow going, we felt pretty competent, you could feel good momentum coming on.

And he broke it. He broke the momentum by saying, I don’t know, he was saying, man, you know, that was good, but can you imagine how this would never work against our teacher?

And I wasn’t quite sure what he meant, like, what are you talking about?

He said, well, you know, I mean, that’s a really good move and, you know, we did it well, but if you imagine, can you imagine trying that against our teacher? He’d kill us.

And I just remember thinking, are you crazy? How ridiculous. What a crazy thing to say.

So you’re telling me if you went home right now and your teacher, the teacher, was beating your wife or beating your child, you wouldn’t be able to overcome him. You can’t even imagine a reality where you would destroy him and take him down.

Now maybe that sounds disrespectful to create that scenario in your head, but I don’t care. This is important.

You have to believe in your head that you could take out anybody who means you harm. You have to believe that. The opposite is damaging to you.

How can you walk around thinking that right off the bat, the people that you know in your own small circle, you can’t even beat them in a life and death situation?

No. I don’t care if it’s my teacher. I don’t care if my teacher’s got a knife. I don’t care if my teacher’s swinging a sword. If they mean me harm or the people that I love harm, I can visualize taking them down and taking them out with respect.

Now my friend, when I came back with that attitude, snorted. He didn’t accept that thought at all. He’s like, you’re crazy.

And I thought, what? Call me crazy if you want to. Call me delusional. But I would rather be delusional in my training than limited, self-limiting, believing that there’s no possibility of beating someone that I know, let alone some phantom that I don’t know, some future bad guy.

How do you feel about that? Who is the martial artist that you hold in the highest esteem? Whose skills do you have the most respect for? Can you visualize a scenario where you beat them?

If this guy broke into your home, if this guy was hurting someone you love, could you take them out? I hope that you can imagine, yes. Yes you could.

So limitations are dangerous to me if you’re training for self-defense. It opens the door to cult-like thinking.

The very idea that someone is better than you and you are always going to be lesser than them, that there is no possibility ever that you will be better than they are, is the most damaging belief system I can think of as a self-defense student. We’ve got to weed that out.

If you need a leader, need a leader, not just respect a leader and say, oh, I’d like to follow this leader and see what they’re doing, learn from them, copy them in some ways until I can find my own way, that’s healthy. But if you find yourself always needing a leader, needing validation, needing them to see you and say, you’re good at this, you’ve got skill.

If you can’t stand on your own, that’s a problem.

If you need to be connected to someone higher than you at all times, someone to always refer to or defer to and say, well, oh, I’m not that good, but he’s great and I’m part of their organization, his organization, therefore I have some abilities, but only because it’s his school, not because of my own work, not because of my own practice.

That scares me. It scares me that people put on a patch or wear a logo and think that’s the source of their skill, that’s the source of their confidence, that’s what makes them feel good about themselves as opposed to wearing their own patch, their own logo, carrying their own flag.

And again, I mean no disrespect to an organization or a teacher that you’re part of, but it should be balanced. It would be fantastic if you could be proud of your teacher, proud of your school, proud of your affiliation, but equally proud of yourself, if not more so.

Because that’s what this is all about. It’s your life. I cannot put the power in someone else’s hands to make me happy, to make me proud. It’s got to be on my own terms.

We’re talking about confidence here. Where does confidence come from?

Every martial arts, I think, has that somewhere in their marketing materials that you’re going to build confidence, come to the art, do this training, and you’re going to build confidence. But where does it come from?

Do you have confidence? Real confidence.

To me, that’s an uncomfortable question, because I’ve met so many nice people, good people, hard working people, loyal people, showing up, doing work, practicing, and yet when push comes to shove, maybe literally, they don’t have confidence in what they’re doing. Or they’re waiting for someone to tell them that they should have confidence in what they’re doing.

If you wait around, if you’re not careful, and you’re waiting around to get a teacher’s approval, if you are seeking validation, if you’re waiting for a teacher to tell you that you’re good, you may be in big trouble, because you may never get those words.

You may never hear the testimony from a teacher or that senior student that you look up to that you’re doing a great job. So, don’t set yourself up for that feeling that you’re not good enough, that you didn’t work hard enough. That’s not fair.

And, furthermore, there’s an ugly fact that we need to admit. Particularly in the martial arts, you may find some teachers who don’t want you to think that you are better than they are.

They don’t want you to think or believe that you could ever be better than they are. There are many teachers in the martial arts who enjoy creating a mystique around them. They enjoy being a little mysterious.

They enjoy being a little set off from the crowd. They like being held in the regard of being like a legend or almost godlike. That status is what feeds their confidence and feeds their ego.

But that does nothing for you. This creates a paradox, by the way. I’ve always wondered about this.

I call it the humility paradox. If I say, oh, my teacher, they’re amazing. I’ll never be as good as my teacher. And if your teacher then says the same thing about their teacher, oh, I could never be as good as my teacher. My teacher was perfect, I am imperfect. That means that your art is getting weaker and more watered down every generation.

What is the point of studying that art if you can’t maintain it or improve it? Your humility is actually an insult. Because what you’re saying is either you’re a terrible student because your teacher showed you what to do and I guess you failed.

You dropped the ball. You didn’t maintain the art. But that also is an insult to your teacher because apparently, since they’re the teacher, they didn’t do a good enough job with you. They didn’t share the right stuff, their timing was off, whatever.

However, if you are worse than your teacher, that’s an insult to your teacher and it’s an insult to you. You’ve both failed. So nobody wins when you have that level of humility.

On the other hand, if you say, oh yeah, I am as good as my teacher and your teacher says I am as good as my teacher, then that art might be worth studying because you are passing down something that’s staying strong. You are a strong student and you have a strong teacher and your art is also strong.

Everybody wins with a little less humility and a little more confidence, self generated confidence.

Now backing up a second, let me tell you the big story that brought all this into my head and compelled me to share. I have a story about the mystique factor and a younger student, me, who bought into that for a while, bought into the legendary stuff. Here’s how it went.

When I started in a particular art, I wasn’t training with the top guy. I was training with a senior student of the top guy. The top guy lived out of town, which was fine.

My senior student, my teacher, my direct teacher, was highly skilled and I thought a lot of him. Now my teacher spoke in hushed tones about his teacher, the top guy. That guy was a killer. That guy was a pioneer. Nobody can touch that guy.

So of course, as a young student, respecting my own teacher, who I can see has a bunch of skills, if he’s talking like that about his teacher, the top guy, I’m sold. I’m terrified of this guy. Wow, what a legend. And I get to meet him? I’m part of his organization? I get to wear his patch?

Ooh, I’m very excited. I’m proud to be there.

Now the only time I would see the top guy would be at belt tests. On a schedule, the teacher would come around and preside over belt tests. And those first couple of times, I couldn’t wait to be in the same room with this guy, this killer. And I was always disappointed because this top guy wouldn’t say anything. Wouldn’t do anything.

He would literally just watch the test. And then as soon as it was over, take off. That was it.

Now on the one hand, it was disappointing because I’m looking for wisdom. I’m looking for information. I’m looking for a demonstration of what this is supposed to look like beyond what my teacher is showing me.

But I never got that. But it did keep feeding the mystique. Oh, he didn’t say anything this time. Oh, he didn’t show anything this time, but maybe next time. Maybe if I just hang around a little longer, maybe if I build his trust a little more, maybe if I prove myself a little more.

Now, a big excitement came up, arose, when I got my hands on a video. It was a bootleg copy of a seminar from the top guy from a couple of years ago. I couldn’t wait to get that thing in my VCR at the time. Put that tape in, I was only allowed to have it for a week.

The person who gave it to me said, look, I got to have this back. Don’t tell anybody you have this. This was like top secret stuff. You weren’t supposed to see this. Here’s this seminar tape.

I popped this thing in and I watched it several times. Always looking for the magic. What does he say? What does he do? How does he move?

And I couldn’t find anything. I was very disappointed in the tape. He did say a couple of things and he did do a couple of things. So it was valuable for that. I’d never seen him say or hear him say anything or do anything. So it was something, but it wasn’t much.

So when I gave the tape back, I was a little disappointed until I found out there was a real seminar, a new seminar coming up, and I could attend it. I was at a rank where I was allowed to attend. Oh boy, inner circle stuff.

So I go to that seminar. I can’t wait. Turns out the top guy gave the exact same seminar that I’d seen on the tape. Made the same couple of talking points, showed the exact same couple of techniques that were on the tape. Nothing new.

But it’s worse than that because there was also no special moment, an off-video moment. There was no walking around and coming over to put his hand on my elbow to say, here, not there, or to say, that’s great, or to say, that’s terrible.

There was no any personalized commentary to let me know that he could see what I was doing. In other words, no praise, no correction, no validation, no nothing. And like before, like every belt test, when the seminar was done, he was gone.

Finally, and this is years in now, a black belt test. My black belt test. Now, I’ve got to drive out of town. This is at the main school.

Drive out of town, pay the big bucks, all the excitement and preparation that you can imagine and you’ve done yourself for a black belt test. Here we go.

Get up to the test. This is the last chance. What’s going to be different? Maybe something now is going to spill forth from this fellow.

No. Black belt tests, just longer tests, lots of work.

I did my part, but once again, the legend sat there, watched, only said a word or two at the end, didn’t demonstrate anything. There was nothing extra. Same old, same old.

And when it was all over, I had done my part, right? I sweated, I gritted my teeth, I got through all the requirements. And when it was over, he was lingering for a moment, because there were plenty of other students there and senior students.

So he wasn’t able perhaps to just bolt out the back door, because he had so many people from his affiliation there. And I saw him taking a picture with someone, a photo. And I thought, what the heck, I’ve kind of had enough of all this. This might be the last time I’m here. I would at least like to get a photo with the guy, the top guy.

And so I went over, waited my turn, and I just simply said, may I take a photo, sir? He didn’t answer with words, he just gave me a quick little nod. I stepped up next to him, stood there, and here’s how this goes.

The camera flashed, and while my eye was adjusting back to the normal light, he had already turned and was gone. Literally gone in a flash.

I was standing there, no handshake, no pat on the back, no look in the eye, nothing. Gone.

And I stood there thinking, what kind of teacher is this? Bigger question. What kind of person is this?

I just paid you money. I drove up here to pay you this honor, to support this school. I’ve been loyal for years. I’m wearing your patch, not even a handshake.

But wait, there is still the biggest question coming, the point of this whole episode. The question really wasn’t, what kind of teacher was he? The biggest question was, what kind of student am I?

What kind of person am I? Why did I need this person’s approval so badly?

Why am I seeking this person’s validation? I don’t even know him.

I have had no special memories with this person. I’ve only ever heard about him or seen him from afar. I’ve literally never touched the man.

So what am I looking for here? Why do I need this affirmation?

I don’t like the answers that I’m coming up with at the time on my drive back. So now I have to take a bigger view.

Why did I sign up in the first place? Why am I interested in martial arts? Why am I paying people for tests?

Why am I seeking teachers? Why am I practicing?

Was I looking for self-defense? Yes.

Self-control? Yes.

Get in shape? Yes.

Confidence? Kind of.

The thing is, I got everything I wanted. Self-defense, self-control, getting in shape. I got all that stuff. But the confidence was not really there.

Somehow I had been either because of my own personality that I came in with, or because of the culture of that type of training, that I was led to believe that I needed someone’s approval, someone’s validation. I needed someone to tell me, good job, that’s correct, you’re doing it right.

Or in short, yes, I see you. Yikes.

What a strange another paradox here. Wearing a black belt, seeing my name on a certificate, with the words confidence on it. Integrity and confidence and strength. And yet I don’t feel like that. I feel like I’m missing something.

That’s a huge problem. And I’m thankful to that whole system to have revealed it to me. This was the opposite of self-defense.

Because again, if self-defense is rooted in confidence, this didn’t actually give me confidence. Because my confidence at that time was hinged or linked to someone else’s opinion of my work, instead of my own opinion of my own work.

And that’s my big message for you today…

I’m hoping that you can validate yourself, that you have your own system of measurements that will prove to you that you’re doing good work and that you are on the right path and that you have this possibility of being great at what you do, whether or not anyone else ever sees it or tells you.

Maybe that’s a lot to ask. I really, when I think about this topic, I can’t help but think about the Wizard of Oz and how similar the Wizard of Oz can be to some martial arts teachers.

In the Wizard of Oz, if you recall, spoiler alert, at the end, they find the wizard and the wizard gives the scarecrow a diploma to prove that he has a brain. He gives the tin man a heart, a plastic heart clock, it ticks, to prove that the tin man has a heart. He gives the lion a medal to prove that he has courage.

And of course, the punchline is that those three characters demonstrated all of those traits in the adventure to come see the wizard. They already had all those attributes. The wizard was just there to affirm it, to validate it, to say, yes, you’re right, you have these things.

Which then brings us to Dorothy. If I recall correctly, Glinda, the good witch, tells Dorothy, Oh, you want to go home? You had the power to go home all along. All you had to do is click your heels three times and say there’s no place like home.

You had the power all along. You have the power.

You don’t have to wait for anyone to give you the power, certify the power, tell you about the power. It’s already within you.

So don’t wait for a sensei, for an idol, for a hero, for a good witch, to tell you that you’re doing great work. You should know.

You should know because you are getting results from your work. You have feedback from your practice. All you need to do is be honest about it, reflect it, reflect on it, and see if you’re getting what you expected.

When you are getting good results, keep doing that stuff. When you’re not, don’t.

But end the confusion of doing work, getting some results, but not judging them until someone else comes to help you to judge them. You know whether it’s working or not, either you’re getting punched in the face or you’re not.

That’s what I love about martial arts. Either you have a cut lip or you don’t. Either you just tapped out to a choke or you didn’t.

So that’s why you need your own measurement system to know how to judge your teacher. If you only rely on your teacher’s judgments about your progress, then that means you’re also allowing them to tell you how you should feel about them.

I need to have an independent inquiry into my own results. So I know if the teacher’s guidance is on point or not.

So again, self-defense, self-reliance, self-confidence. They all go together. And I hope that sounded respectful. Because I am still respectful to even the teacher who enrobed himself with mystique and didn’t shake my hand at the black belt test. I still have respect for that teacher.

And I still believe that they were very solid in what they can do. And that they deserve their legendary status. I’m not taking anything away from that person. I still respect them.

But I’ve learned to respect myself with or without them. And that’s the point. As a matter of fact, that’s why I gave myself a belt.

Where is it? Maybe you’ve seen me wear this. This is my own black and white belt. Half black, half white. My yin yang belt. And I made this myself. Because I wanted to represent that on the one hand, the white side says, I’m still a student. I’m still seeking teachers. I’m still seeking information. I’m still learning.

But on the other hand, on the other side, there’s black, which represents, I do have some skills. I do know some things. I have not been wasting my time.

By my own measurements, I’m not that bad at a few things. I’ve got some real skill. And so when I tie this on, I think that puts me in a very balanced place. I think that’s a healthy spot to be in.

And I hope you are too. So let me wrap this up.

I hope that you are training right now with no limiting beliefs. I hope that you are training with the possibility of greatness in what you can do.

And I hope that your heroes, your teachers, I hope that they would be proud of you and tell you that they are proud of you if you ever surpass them in anything or everything.

If your teacher is not the kind of person who would say something like that, that you are better than they are, that you have achieved more than they ever could, then maybe it’s time to choose a new teacher. Maybe it’s time to choose a new hero.

Okay, I wish you happy training, my friend. Trust in the work that you’re doing, be honest about the results that you’re getting, and build confidence in what you’re learning and who you’re becoming.

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

The post #121: Hero Worship in the Martial Arts [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Welcome to Episode #120 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Use It or Lose It.”

Some people say martial arts is like riding a bike… I don’t! I say use it or lose it!

The fact is that no matter how hard you train, you can’t practice everything all the time, which means some skills will always end up being neglected. But wait—the situation is worse than you think.

Unfortunately, a lack of time is not the only reason you will see your hard-earned skills slipping away… not by a long shot!

So, consider this your wake-up call. In this episode, I’ll break down the three major reasons (and a few minor ones) our capabilities get rusty. But I’m warning you in advance—you can’t always stop the corrosion and rot.

Put simply, life is a losing game! Whoa. That sounds bleak, doesn’t it?

Don’t worry—along with the bad news, I’ve also got a four-step formula to help you hold on to your skills for as long as possible. So, don’t give up yet!

To LISTEN to “Use It or Lose It,” here’s a link.

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!

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.

Howdy, Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #120 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Happy to be back after a little bit of a break. In case you didn’t know, this is the 10th anniversary of the podcast. I’ve been doing one episode a month for the last 10 years.

So I took a little break just to feel it out and make sure I still felt like yammering on camera. As it turns out, I still love the sound of my own voice, so I’ll be keeping it going for a while.

Also during my time off, I did a little work on an online course, a new course called Martial Arts Over 50. So if you’re getting older and you either took a break from your training or you feel like you’re not getting as much out of your training as you used to, take a look at this course.

It might help as you get into your older years to get the most out of your training as possible. I’ll put a link below. But today, the topic, losing.

I’ve got a warning for you. You are losing skills every day. But do you know which ones?

You work hard, you train hard, you study hard. You may have skills at a world class level. But the fact is, you’re losing something all the time.

If you’re working on this, that means you’re not working on that. No matter how much time and energy you put into one area of your training, that means you’re neglecting a different area of your training.

It’s not always your fault. There are many different factors that go into what you’re gaining and what you’re losing. And that’s what I want to look at today. Let’s figure out how to maximize our capabilities moving forward and stop losing the skills that are the most important to us.

Now let’s start off by breaking down what I think are the three ways that we lose skill. One, life changes. Two, your body changes. And three, your focus changes.

Let’s break these down. Starting off with life. This category is mostly not your fault. Most of these factors you had no responsibility for, it’s just life.

So for instance, maybe money. Maybe you lost your job. Maybe you had to use your money for medical bills or to help out a family member or a friend and suddenly you just don’t have the money to go to class or to take those private lessons or to fly and take that seminar.

Maybe it was time. Maybe you used to have a lot more time when you were back in college or in your 20s, but now you have a family. You have a child and another child. Maybe you have to take on a second job. Time can slip away and now you have less for training.

Maybe it’s the location. Maybe you had to move for your job or to take care of a sick family member and you’re just not in the same town where your old school was. Maybe the school changed locations or the school closed down and now you’re without your training group.

Maybe your teacher passed away. Maybe your favorite training partner moved away or passed away.

All of these things are not your fault. Life happens and hopefully our training has equipped us to do the best we can in these circumstances. But no matter how you cut it, your training changes every time one of those factors is changed.

So most recently, you could probably all relate, the lockdown. I wasn’t responsible for that. But definitely that was a major change to my training routine.

Suddenly only training alone. Solo training only. No partner practice for over a year. That was unthinkable. I had never imagined something like that could happen. And yet there it was.

So in the beginning, it was shocking. And then in a way, it turned into a blessing. Because it forced me to change my perspective on how I was training. It forced me to shake up my priorities and take a good look at how I was spending my time to really figure out if I was using it the best way I could.

We can all fall into a routine that becomes a rut-teen. You’re in a rut. It could be a good rut, but often it’s a bad rut. If you haven’t updated it in several years, I think it’s a great idea to take a look at it. And the lockdown forced me to take a look at it.

I’ve always said that martial arts is really two projects. There’s time spent on developing yourself, and then there’s the time spent developing yourself with another person. Or two or three.

Self-defense is ultimately a relationship. How you manage other people, there’s two sides to that. There’s you and then there’s them and you’re together.

So the lockdown took my focus off of how to control other people and brought it back to how to control myself, my body, my thoughts, my feelings, my strategies. What can I make better? I had to ask.

What have I been neglecting? What skills am I not maximizing? What skills have I lost?

And that led to a whole new training routine. And when it was all done, when the lockdown was over, I found I was in better shape than ever. I also found that my mechanics were better.

I think I had better balance, better weight shifting, my strikes had more impact. I just felt better.

And my breathing, my coordination with my breathing and my mindset, all of it I thought had been polished to a higher degree. So I was grateful for that. But there were losses. Some things I didn’t expect.

I didn’t expect the timing in my sparring to be off because I was visualizing when I’m hitting stuff, I always visualize shadow boxing. But people are different and different people are different.

So there’s always a slightly different space-time continuum to deal with. And so getting back in the groove of reading body language and setting myself in positions where I need to be, that took a little time to sharpen back up. I didn’t expect that as much.

A big surprise was pain tolerance. I’d lost a bit of my pain tolerance. When I wasn’t getting tapped out or choked out or hit all the time.

When I came back and had partners again and felt that pressure and impact, yeah, there was a little bit of an ow factor. Like, ugh, that’s uncomfortable. So I had to catch up on that again, getting back into pain tolerance.

And very specifically, I remember being in a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu class and my backward roll for some reason, just not there for me. I had done other conditioning on the ground, but that specific, completely super small backward roll, my back had stiffened up a bit, and I just had a problem with it.

Of course, I wanted it all back. When I realized I’d lost some timing and pain tolerance and a couple of different moves, I wanted them all back. I felt they were all important.

And now I know if I ever have to train alone, if I’m forced to, or just in my own private routine, added a couple of hand-eye coordination drills, like with a ball, playing a little handball against a wall, hitting myself with a stick, poking myself with a stick, just a little bit of impact practice on my own so I don’t lose that.

And animal movements, a little extra time on the ground with a more specific visualization of being stacked up, having all that pressure on my neck, being able to roll that out. So I benefited when I found out what I’d been losing.

How about you?

During the lockdown, whether you honored that for two weeks or a year or you’re still honoring that, what have you lost? Did you notice anything? Did you get it back?

Even without a lockdown, even if you are not forced to just train alone, I think it would be valuable if you just took a minute and reflected on the importance of your school, your teacher, your training partners, and really be specific about what each of those offers you.

What do you get out of those experiences and relationships of being in a school with a teacher, with training partners? Don’t take any of those things for granted.

Whatever situation you’re in with your training right now, get as much out of that as you can while you can before life steps in and closes that school, takes away that teacher, or messes with your time and money and location and you can’t get there anymore. Just be aware of it so you can get more out of it.

Next, after life changes, your body changes. This one, mostly, you can’t do anything about either. It’s expected that your body is going to change as we grow older, but still there are some surprises that come along with that.

Since we’re aging, you’re going to find muscle mass goes down. You start losing muscle mass, no matter how strong you are.

Bone density can change. You might start losing some bone density. Your balance, you might start having some issues with that.

Your eyesight, I don’t take that for granted anymore. Energy level down, recovery time up.

These are just changes from the genetics of being human, apparently.

I’ve even noticed lately, I’m having difficulty swallowing. What the hell is that about? Maybe that’s great because it slows me down eating, but I keep getting caught. I just can’t swallow. I’m looking into it, don’t worry, but that was a surprise.

Of course, I’ve talked before about arthritis. In my late thirties, my shoulders really started bothering me. In my forties, my feet started giving me problems. Now I have to wear orthotics most of the time when I’m training.

And in my fifties, herniated discs became more of an issue. I didn’t plan on any of these things. I certainly didn’t prepare for those things in my twenties and early thirties. But yep, there it is.

To be expected, as we get older, your body changes. But let me tell you what was unexpected. I lost the bounce in my step. The spring in my step. That youthful little spring.

I figured this out crossing the street. You know when you’re crossing the street and the timer is counting down, 5, 4, and so you do a little quick jog just to get across the intersection. You bounce up onto the curb and you’re on your way.

Well, to my horror, I was with my wife a couple of times. We’d be going across the street, see the timer counting down, and I ended up doing the old man jog. I started saying, let me hurry up here.

My hands started moving, but my feet didn’t. So I was basically just still walking, but pretending like I was jogging. My feet felt like they were stuck in cement. No bounce, can’t get going.

And when I got to the curb, forget about bounding up there. No. I found myself stopping and pausing, stepping up safely, and then getting up on the curb.

Who is this guy? What is this? You’re a martial artist? What the heck happened there?

I figured it out. I realized that I used to train in the stadium near where I live. I used to do a lot of stair training. Bounding up, bounding down, jumping down. I realized, oh yeah, you don’t do the steps anymore. You’ve moved into other kinds of training.

I just didn’t do it on purpose. I just stopped going to the stadium. And then I also realized that I had broken my jump rope. I was never a big rope jumper, but I usually always have one. In the trunk of my car, particularly when I was out working out in the park during the lockdown, I was jumping rope. I had a lot of bounce in my step. It felt great.

But then eventually the rope wore out. It broke. And that was one of those things on my list, like, oh yeah, you need a new jump rope. I never got around to it. And there it was.

Without my thinking about it or planning on it, I found myself with no bounce in my step anymore. Horrific!

So this is what I’m talking about. While you’re doing one thing, you’re not doing something else. And if you really want a bounce in your step, you better keep training it. And now I do.

I do appreciate a good bounce in my step. So I’m back to bouncing. I add a little bouncing into my daily routine. And I’ve added some frog jumps. Very simple.

It’s taken about three or four months, but I’m happy to report that my body reclaimed its spring. So you can too.

Evaluate what you’ve been missing. Make a little effort to add it back. And I think you can get it back.

All right. So three. Life can happen. Your body can change. And now the one that’s more responsible, you’re more responsible for, your focus can change.

Right off the bat, I can think about high kicking. Kicking head height. When I started martial arts in my teens, in my early 20s, high kicks were very important to me. What other measure is there as a martial artist than being able to spin hook kick someone in the head?

That’s what I wanted to do. That’s what I did. I stretched, I conditioned for it, I practiced it. High kicking. No.

Once I got into my mid 20s, I started realizing, hang on, this is a skill that takes a lot of my training time. And as I get older, as I’ve seen my older teachers struggle with high kicks and complain about their backs and tight hamstrings and hip implants, I kind of made a decision like, I would rather spend this time practicing techniques that I can work into old age more easily.

I can always just pick up a stick. I can always just kind of move my hands around. So let me just focus on that stuff and forget about the high kicks. And so I set high kicks aside for quite a while.

I mean, I’d still throw them here and there, but they weren’t part of my regular training program. But then in my 40s, I think it was my 40s, I changed my mind. I suddenly thought, well, wait a minute, why am I willingly giving up mobility and the coordination, the balance that high kicks demand?

Isn’t it just good for me as a human animal, just as a someone who’s in motion a lot, to be able to lift my leg up, to have the flexibility and that mobility and the confidence to move my body in any way I want?

I wanted that range of motion back, so I said, you know what, I’m going to start throwing some high kicks again. Let me add that into my training routine. To my horror, they were gone.

It wasn’t just as easy as, okay, let me turn that switch back on, toggle on. No, I had lost that skill. Sure, there’s some muscle memory, but the memories were of younger muscles.

If 10, 15 years have gone by and you haven’t thrown many high kicks, you don’t have them anymore. I don’t believe martial arts is like riding a bike. Your body needs updates all the time. I was basically running old software on a new computer, and there were just too many bugs to let that run smoothly.

In my mind, I felt like I know how to do this, but my body did not remember it really. So the upgrade began. I needed to switch out, update, get better software, switch out the processing, whatever. I’m not a computer guy, but you know what I mean.

I needed to update the systems all across the board, and very slowly and painfully, I’ve gotten my high kicks back. Of course, I’m in my 50s now, so I’m constantly updating and getting that groove back, to get that leg up there with some kind of control and some kind of accuracy and get that done.

I don’t regret it at all, but again, it’s another example that my focus changed and I lost a big chunk of my skill.

Weapons would be another category of loss for me. In years past, I went through a stick phase, went through a knife phase, and staff has come and gone.

Long staff. When I’ve lived in a small apartment, which is most of my life, staff is just not convenient. I’ll keep it in my car, if I go to the park, like during lockdown, suddenly staff became far more a bigger part of my training program.

When I moved to North Carolina, the back of our place opened up to a big field. So again, staff. I was working with it all the time.

I’ve moved back to Los Angeles now. I’m back in a small apartment. So, staff? Difficult.

I’ve taken it out to the park. Once I moved back, it broke. I smacked it onto a tree and it broke.

I haven’t gotten another one, and very quickly it just slipped my mind. Like, oh yeah, I got to go get another staff.

What happened to the sticks and the knives? Very simply, I’m sure you’ve done this. You rearrange your training space or you move to a new place. You put some things, your equipment, into a cupboard or in a closet or they’re in a box somewhere, and then you forget you even have them.

Months go by, years go by, and suddenly you think, what happened to my knives? Where did my chucks go?

You haven’t picked them up in years. So what happened to your skill?

The good news is, clearly you’ve had more time to work on something else, so you’ve been developing, but if you really wanted that knife skill or that stick skill or that staff skill, that stuff might be gone. So out of sight, out of mind.

We’ve got to be careful about that, because time goes by so fast, and every day that you’re not doing what you want to do, you’re losing something. That’s the warning today.

All right, so is there a solution to this? What’s the solution to this? How do you stop losing the skills? Is there a way?

Well, yes, and no. The fact is, here’s the hard, cold truth. In the end, we all lose everything. We lose our lives. So let’s start there and move backwards.

In this slow crawl to the moment that you’re dead, you’re going to be losing things, like it or not, because of life, because of your genetics, your body, your focus, your dreams. Things change. Everything changes.

So what are the last things, the last skills that you want to lose? Please take a minute and answer that question for yourself. Pause the video.

What are the last skills that you want to have with you the moment before you die?

What are the most important skills to you? Is it high kicking? Would you like to be able to do a split till the day you die?

Is it your strength? Do you want to have guns? You want to be able to flex your arm and impress people in a tank top?

Do you want just a clear head and a calm soul? Do you need to add more meditation to your life? Should that become your number one training exercise?

Is it your cardio, heart and lungs? Do you think you’ll live longer if that’s your number one priority?

Do you want to maintain your explosiveness? Do you think that’s the most important?

Do you want to be an encyclopedia of forms, of every style? Make that list. The shorter the better, I would think.

As we’re all losing everything, and you know the ending of the story, you’ve got nothing. What are the last skills you want to have in your possession?

This is the formula, my friends. Start with that.

Number one, set your goals. Which skills do you want till the end?

Number two, prioritize your training to make sure that those things on your goals list are practiced first and most. If you love stick fighting and that’s your favorite thing, that should be the first thing you do, and that should take up the most of your training time.

Don’t get distracted. Focus on that.

Number three, after you set your goals and you prioritize your training routine, keep the tools that you need in sight. Like I said, out of sight, out of mind. So, if you want to keep that balance in your step, then you better have a jump rope, or you better live right next door to some stairs if you want to jump on them.

Keep them near you. Keep them in sight. Don’t put them in a closet. Don’t put them in a box. Put them right up in front.

If you want to work on that staff, put the staff right by your door. You want to lift weights, put those dumbbells right by your bed.

Put the tools that you need right in front of you so that they’re always on your mind. It could be as simple as a poster, by the way. If you’re inspired by a certain body type or a certain hero, put that poster up where you can see it all the time.

Maybe get a tattoo. If there’s some icon or some symbol that means something to you that reminds you of what you want from your training as a martial artist, put that tattoo front and center so that you can see it and keep it in your mind. Because life is busy, and you will find other things to focus on. Just an idea.

Keeping things in view, to me, also means being viewed. Being seen. So that means show up to your class.

If you’re part of a class, keep showing up. If you have a teacher, keep seeing the teacher. If you have good training partners, keep that relationship going. Show up. Be seen. Get in there.

Last part of the formula. Set your goals, prioritize your training, keep your tools in sight. Reflection. Before you train, after you train, take that moment to ask if you’re getting what you wanted. Are you meeting the goals that you set out for yourself?

I don’t think you can do enough of this. Figure out what you’re working on and why and keep that list updated.

It’s so easy to drift into an agenda that’s 20 years old, 10 years old, or someone else’s agenda. Peer pressure, what you see in a movie, what you see in a tournament. Come back to basics.

You’re going to die. What do you really want to be known for? What do you really want to have in your possession? Which skills? The clearer you are, the better. And that’s it. That’s the formula, my friend.

And don’t wait for old age. Don’t wait to shock yourself with what you’ve lost to start this process. Do it right now.

I don’t care if you’re 15 years old. I don’t care if you’re 25 years old. Go through this exercise right now.

The clearer you are, the earlier, the earlier you can be clear, the better for your future training. If your focus changes over the years, so be it. But get clear now.

Remember this–life is a losing game.

I don’t care who you are or how hard you train. In the end, the Grim Reaper always wins. He will take everything from you.

So, our job is to fight, fight, to hold on to what we want as long as we can, to not let that stuff go until the very last second. It’s your choice if you want to let something go or just suck it up when something is stripped away from you without your choice.

Either way, when these things happen, when you have to let something go or something is taken from you, we must be strong enough to make peace with that. If you can make peace with what’s lost, that gives you more time and attention on what you still have.

And focusing on what you have and being grateful for it is absolutely the secret to a happy life.

Okay, you’ve been warned. Time is short in getting shorter. Which is why I’m so grateful that we could spend some of that time together.

If you’d like to spend a little more time together, either training online or taking a class here in Los Angeles, let me know. Training together is something I plan to do until the Grim Reaper says otherwise.

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

The post #120: Use It or Lose It [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Welcome to Episode #119 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Lighten Your Load – Tai Chi’s Double-Weighted Error.”

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

Welcome to Episode #118 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “How to Get More from Your Martial Arts Practice.”

You train hard… but are you getting everything you can out of your martial arts practice? Probably not!

Don’t worry—in this episode, I share three practice tips that will pay you back with BIG results. At least they did for me!

No, they’re not magic. No, they’re not quick ‘n’ easy. But if you’ve ever felt stuck in a rut, these might just be what you need to hear… and do!

Especially if you’ve ever felt like QUITTING martial arts completely, this episode is for you!

Before you walk away from all that time and effort you’ve invested in training, give these three tips a try. Heck, try even one!

Yes, I believe even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better, but sometimes if you give just a little bit more, you can get a LOT more in return!

To LISTEN to “How to Get More from Your Martial Arts Practice, here’s a link.

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!

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.

Hello, hello. Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #118 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

And I really believe that, you know, what I just said there. A little martial arts makes life a whole lot better. At least that’s how it’s worked for me so far.

And that’s why I’m shocked, shocked at how many people have not gotten that message. How is it possible?

Martial arts is so mainstream now. People see it everywhere. They know it’s a safe activity, relatively speaking. And they must know that it does so much to transform your life in a positive way, which is why I am shocked.

Don’t tell me, well, there are millions of people participating in martial arts. Yeah, but there are billions of people on the planet. Why isn’t everyone signed up for a self-defense course or doing at least a six-month investment somewhere in some type of training? Answer me that.

Anyway, you know what’s more shocking? More shocking than the number of people who don’t look into martial arts at all is the number of people who start martial arts and then quit. That blows my mind.

What? You did the hardest part. You walked through the door. You signed up someplace. You started and then you stopped.

Now, I’m not talking about, well, I couldn’t afford classes or I got a bad knee. Life happens. I get that. But there’s always a way to keep pushing forward a little bit to make some improvements, even if you’re just training on your own, especially in this day and age with the video.

So what’s with all the quitting?

If you had a business opportunity and every time you put in $1, you got $2 out, would you ever stop investing? No, either would I.

So that’s where I get confused because for me, every investment I make in the martial arts definitely pays me back. Well, at least two-fold, five-fold, ten-fold. I have to make up a number there. But I feel it gives me more than I put into it.

Hence, even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

So if you are in a rut right now in your training, or if you are not training at all, or if you feel bored by your training, or you are thinking about quitting your training, that’s what this episode is for.

Today I want to give you three quick tips on how to get more out of your training so that hopefully you don’t quit. Because I do believe if you are training well, you should be getting a lot of benefits out of it.

Now I’m not talking about making this a career, being a professional fighter or a professional teacher. That’s not what I mean. I mean in your mindset.

Stop thinking of yourself as a part timer and start thinking of yourself as a full timer. You’re always a martial artist. Make that part of who you are.

I get it. In the beginning, martial arts may just be an activity, something that you try. And it’s interchangeable. It could be a yoga class you went to try or a swimming group or softball team. You just wanted to do something and you tried martial arts.

But if you stay in that part time interchangeable, it’s just another activity, something to do mindset, well then it will get changed out. Eventually, you’ll get bored with it. Eventually, it’s not something that excites you anymore because you never really committed to the idea that I’m all in. I’m a full time professional martial artist.

So we have to make that shift. Make the shift that it’s not just something you do, it’s who you are.

I think of it a little bit like Superman. Bear with me, old school Superman. If you’re a part timer, at least the way I was when I started, I would have my normal life in my normal clothes and then you get to go to class. And when you go to class, you take off your clothes and then you put on your uniform. And there was a little mini transformation there.

You put on that uniform and you start to transform into the person, maybe, that you want to be. I feel stronger, bolder, I’m getting tougher, I’m working.

But then class is over and you put on your normal clothes, you go back to your normal life, and that class just kind of becomes a memory. You don’t necessarily take it with you.

Now, old school Superman is a little different. Old school Superman always had his Superman uniform on underneath his Clark Kent clothes.

Meaning he was always Superman, but he would play different roles and he would put on a different suit to cover that up sometimes. But make no mistake, he’s always Superman. He’s always on the hunt for when can I be of help? When can I be of service? When can I be a hero?

So we should be the same way. A part time martial artist is someone who only feels great when they’re in class wearing their uniform and then goes back to an ordinary life where they don’t feel as wonderful.

But a full time martial artist, a pro, you’re always a martial artist. And when you feel great in class, you take that outside into the world, you still feel great.

When you feel like you’ve got some courage or some toughness, you bring that into the rest of your life because you’re a full time martial artist.

So that would be my challenge to you. Make this mental shift. Don’t be an amateur martial artist. Just start thinking like a professional martial artist. Once you make that shift, meaning that you stop focusing on your martial arts style and start focusing on your lifestyle.

Do you see that little switch there? It’s not the style of martial arts that you do. It’s your style of living that matters. Once you do that, you have that attitude, everything changes.

The way you eat is going to change because there is no on day, off day, I’m going to go to class later, so I’m going to eat a little bit healthier, so I don’t feel sluggish. No, every day you feel like I want to be at my best, so I’m going to eat pretty clean here, I’m going to be healthy.

The way you sleep, you’re not going to say, well, I worked out hard yesterday, so I’ll give myself a little extra sleep, but then tonight I’ll stay up late. No, I want to be at my best all the time, so I want to get to bed, recover, be ready for the next adventure the next day.

And I’ll tell you, even my wardrobe changed, meaning that I used to have a separate part of my dresser that was just for workout clothes. I wasn’t going to class. I was going to go workout in the park or in the garage or whatever. I would have some old t-shirts, old pants, tattered, stained, ripped up, old, because I figured, well, I don’t want to wreck my good clothes.

But then at some point, when I made that shift, that’s exactly the time, when I went from part time to full time in my mind, I said, why am I treating my practice time with so little respect? Why am I wearing clothes that I don’t want anyone to see me in? I wouldn’t wear these clothes anywhere else into the world.

So now I have this separation in my head between, oh, there’s the training version of me, and then there’s my real me back out in the real world. I wanted to break down that barrier.

And once I made that attitude shift, I threw out all the tattered clothes and realized that I wasn’t paying enough respect to the full time martial artist that I want to be, that I am. And yeah, so I got some workout clothes, nicer clothes to work out in.

And that makes me feel a little bit prouder, might seem superficial, but it gets me into the, it keeps me in the mindset of being at my best.

Caught that. It doesn’t change it, it keeps it going.

So that as great as I feel out during my day, I feel just as great training, then I get boosted by my training, I slip right back into the world. So I highly recommend overall, go full time in your head, go pro and see if that has a trickle down effect on everything you do.

This is very important. If you are a full time professional martial artist, and you are now, right? Did you already flip the switch?

You can’t just rely on class time to reap benefits. That’s not the only place where you should be investing yourself, or pushing your limits, challenging yourself, because just do the math. That’s such a small part of your life.

Let’s say you go to class three times a week, and let’s say each of those classes is an hour and a half long. Okay, so what’s that? I’m not a math guy. Is that four and a half hours? Four and a half hours of training time. That’s not much. That’s almost nothing compared to how many hours there are in a week.

So why do you think there’s some magical carryover that four and a half hours of training, that’s if you’re training three times a week for an hour and a half, is going to influence everything else in your life? The scales are off. It’s very little training.

Yes, I believe even a little makes your life better, but I want you to get more, because if you’re thinking about quitting, it means you’re not getting enough. That’s what we’re talking about.

So I need you to start finding more ways to get more out of your class time and then more out of your out of class time. And you know me, I’m going to tell you that the whole world is your dojo.

Everywhere you go is a classroom. Everyone you meet is a teacher. Everything that happens to you is a lesson.

Once you take that bigger view of things, you’ll understand what I’m talking about. You’re always improving. You’re always learning. You can always be getting better.

So, okay, but specifically, in class, even if you decide to ignore everything else I’m saying, at least get more out of your actual class time.

Don’t be the person, if you set up a bag and you’re taking turns with someone else, you’re number three in the line, you’re going through, don’t be the person who goes up, hits the bag, and then strolls back to the end of the line, and then waits for your next turn, and then you hit the bag, and then you stroll back, and you don’t do anything.

What are you doing? That will be one example of time that you can fill with extra practice.

When it’s your turn to hit the bag, you hit the bag, then you shuffle back to the end of the line, you practice that combo in your head until you get to the bag. There’s no reason why you still can’t be practicing.

Or don’t be that person who fills class time with small talk about movies and social events. I’m not saying don’t make friends and don’t be friendly, but if you’re going to rely on your class time as your main time for improvement, you need to be on it because you’re a professional martial artist and you came into that class for a very specific reason.

Or at least by now, I hope you have specific goals for yourself. So get after it. Do a little extra practice. Don’t wait for your teacher to come over and tell you to do that. That’s a mistake.

Now, outside of class, of course, I still want more. So absolutely, I would keep a journal. Keep some type of diary, some type of notebook. I’ve recommended this before, and I’m saying it again, because that’s such an easy thing to do.

Before you drive home after class, or first thing you think of in the morning, or after a practice session, anytime something occurs to you, you see something on video, a crime being committed, and someone fighting, and you have a thought about it, journal it. Write it down.

That’s another way to learn. It’s another way to enforce your beliefs. So it’s just a great idea to kind of keep this little running diary. And even if you have nothing to say, go back. Flip through where you’ve been in your life.

Go back through some of your old thoughts. See if they still ring true. See if you have new ideas. You are in development. So keep a record of that development.

I think it’s very encouraging when you may feel a little blue or feel a little unmotivated. It’s great to go back and say, Wow, I used to think that or whoa, I’ve come so far from this note. I’m a big fan of keeping the journal.

I would also recommend in this idea of assigning yourself homework, don’t wait for a teacher to give you a goal. Yeah, you’re a part of a school perhaps, and so they have a curriculum and maybe there’s testing requirements. And if you’re a good student, you follow those.

But don’t rely on those. You should always have a small project that you are working on, on your own. You have to take some responsibility for your development. You are your own teacher.

If you think your class is unchallenging, that’s not the class’s fault. You should be adding challenges to your own practice to make it more challenging. Whatever value you’re getting from the class, great, get that. But that’s not the end of it. That doesn’t define your entire martial arts journey. It’s still up to you to figure out what do you want to get better at?

What do you need to get better at? And write that down. And for me, I think the smaller and more specific goal you can craft for yourself, the better.

If you just say, I want to get better at sparring, I don’t know what that means. How?

I’m talking about very small goals that you can put in that journal or make a separate notebook for just for goals. Things that you can measure and check off when you’ve achieved it.

If you think, you know what, from now on, I’m just going to pay attention and make sure my wrist is a little straighter. Perfect. That’s a very small thing that you can fix.

I’m going to work on that alignment between my knee and my ankle so I don’t keep getting into these wonky positions with my stances and footwork. Wonderful. There are so many things you can do.

I won’t go on with a hundred of them, but think about it. The smaller the better, what is something you can give yourself as a homework assignment that you can measure and monitor and check off and say, I did that.

The reason you want to do that is because that gives you that little boost of happy hormones where you feel, I did that. I accomplished something. I’m getting better. There’s proof that I got better.

That’s the addiction, I think, that keeps me going because I’ve figured out how to give myself assignments that I can achieve, that I feel great about that. I can celebrate that. And then I’m excited to get to the next one. That becomes my drug of choice, improvement.

So give yourself homework. Don’t wait for someone else to do it for you. That’s kindergarten first grade thinking. You’re a professional. You’re a full time martial artist. It’s who you are, which means you are your own teacher. So give yourself homework.

Tip number three, how to get more out of your martial arts training. This one might sound a little odd, but stay with me.

So afterglow meaning that great feeling you have when you work out.

Have you ever finished a great workout, finished a great class, been proud of yourself, and felt, boy, I wish I could feel like this all the time. This is great. This is what I signed up for. I love this feeling right now.

I’m in my body. I feel centered. I feel balanced. I feel like I know who I am. I like who I am. I like who I’m becoming. Boy, this feels great. That little buzz, that glow.

Well, what happens after, though? After the workout.

When I was younger and I still compartmentalized my training life over here and my other life over there, I was constantly going up and down that satisfaction scale or that glow.

I would work out, feel great, feel like, yes, this is wonderful. I got everything I want, wanted out of this training. And then you take a shower, you change your clothes, go back to your job, back to your relationships, back to your business, whatever.

And your neck starts getting stiffer and your legs are cooling down now. And you forgot what you were working on earlier. And now there’s other stress coming in. You’re starting to not feel as good about yourself and life happens. And your training is nowhere to be found.

And the longer you go, maybe you had this great workout, you peaked optimal state, feeling great. And then maybe you haven’t trained for a day. You’ve just been free falling.

And maybe two days have gone by and you haven’t really worked out. Now you’re feeling bad about yourself. All that feeling in your body and balance and blah, blah, blah. It’s all gone. It’s just, pew, evaporating.

We don’t want that to happen. As full time martial artists, the goal, and this is it, this is what self defense is all about as far as I’m concerned, is first defining our optimal state. Figuring out the exercises, the styles, the whatever you need to do, the workouts to get you into that state where you feel almost invincible at your best.

First figure out what that is. What’s your baseline? What does it take to get you to feel your best? Once you’ve gotten that feeling, now the challenge is to hold on to it.

When life comes after you now, how can you maintain it as long as possible? Don’t get me wrong, life is tricky. So you’re going to take some hits, you’re going to take some falls, but how deep do you go? How deep is that dive off of your optimal platform? And how quickly can you regain it and come back?

That, to me, is what self-defense is all about. You might feel great about yourself and someone slaps you in the face, and if that completely changes you, that’s a problem.

If someone insults you, betrays you, rips you off, and that immediately puts you into a worse version of yourself, they’re winning.

Self-defense means no, I’m going to defend myself, my best self. So to do that, measure how great you feel when you are at your best.

Then second, pay attention to what takes that feeling away. Where are you when you don’t feel great? Who are you with when you don’t feel great? What are you doing when you don’t feel great? And all of your confidence is being chipped away, all of your joy is being chipped away.

What’s happening? Because those are the things you need to change. Get away from those people, move out of that place, change what you’re doing.

Sometimes you can’t, sometimes you’re stuck with this relationship, you’re stuck with this location, or at least for now you are. Okay, so then what can we do? That’s where to me micro workouts come in.

If we presume that you feel great when you have a full workout, it’s time to yourself, time with your partner, boom, boom, and you’re in that zone, you’re feeling good. You’re getting the benefits that you hoped for out of martial arts.

Now, as a full-time martial artist, you leave that workout, something starts to chip away at your happiness. That’s the time to have a micro workout, something that gets you back into that state as quickly as possible.

Maybe it’s 10 squats. I don’t know what it’s going to be for you. Maybe it’s a minute of shadow boxing. Maybe it’s a breathing exercise. Maybe it’s a mantra.

But you have to start experimenting once you realize that your glow is fading to find these little ways to perk it back up, to brighten it back up. And it’s up to you to do that.

No one can tell you how to do that. I wish I could. I could say, hey, all you got to do is say, hokum pokum and you’re done. You’re going to feel great.

No. If that does work, by the way, feel free to try hokum pokum. I don’t know. Probably not.

But the idea is to keep your momentum going. You train hard. You challenge yourself. You reach that high. You’re proud of yourself.

You start to dip. Nope, micro workout. You pull it back up.

You start to dip. Life is hard. Oh, you pull it back up. And you’re just trying to stay up there as long as you can.

And I believe what happens is all that hard work that you’re doing, instead of always trying to come out of the valley and come back up to the peak, the less you dip and then they add on more work, the higher you start to go. So your peak starts to rise. And that’s ultimately what we want.

I don’t want to just gain an optimal state and then just hope to maintain it. I want to keep gaining. That’s idealistic, so be it. I want to keep gaining.

So the only way to do that is to hold on to what you’ve got. You got to take ground, hold that ground, and then move forward. We can’t keep getting pushed back to where we started.

Just as an aside, I’ll tell you, my favorite afterglow test is in the middle of the night. You ever wake up to use the bathroom or get a quick drink of water, and sometimes I’ve trained whatever I did during the day, and I wake up, and I can’t make a fist, and my back hurts, and I just feel wonky, and I bump into the wall.

I have no awareness of anything. And that to me is a big clue that whatever you did during the day, here you are in this night state, and something is not carrying through. My goal is to have the best parts of me carry through all the time as a full-time martial artist, even when I’m sleeping.

And yes, I sleep in clothes. I don’t even sleep in sleepwear. I always want to be at my best, ready for presentation and go.

Or sometimes, when I train, I wake up in the middle of the night and I feel in my body. I feel balanced. I feel I know my place in the universe. I have no problem getting into the bathroom and back. I don’t bump into anything.

It’s a very strange experience to have one great night, one bad night. But it makes me think like, well, what did I do today? Why am I so out of it sometimes and so in it other times?

So, take the wake up challenge. See where your mind is at. What state are you in when you wake up in the middle of the night? It might be a big clue.

All right. I hope that helps. That was three tips. Those were three tips to help you get more out of your training. I really hope that if you’re bored or you feel like you’re in a rut, you feel like you’re stuck, that you’ll heed my words.

Don’t quit. Not yet. Try a couple of these things. Try one of them even. Because martial arts, I still believe, is a great investment.

That dollar in will give you $10 out if you just keep believing in it. It just takes a little work. It’s not magic. So, don’t give up on this. Put a little more in, and I bet you get a whole lot more out.

Okay, hope that helps. I really do believe if more good people are training in the martial arts, the better this world’s gonna be.

So, go pro, give yourself homework, and measure your afterglow. That’s the formula for a successful happy life.

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

The post #118: How to Get More from Your Martial Arts Practice [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Welcome to Episode #117 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Bad Advice in the Martial Arts.”

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—

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.

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!

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.

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.

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…

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.

Welcome to Episode #116 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “You Got This.”

Confidence is a tricky commodity. If you have too much—trouble. If you have too little—trouble!

Especially in the martial arts, place too much faith in your skills, you might wind up dead. But place NO faith in your skills, you might also wind up dead!

With those high stakes in mind, let’s discuss the effort to find the right balance between confidence and humility. Along the way, we’ll look at the Dunning-Kruger effect, belt tests, self-defense demos, and a few tips to get more out of your training.

(For all you Boy Scouts out there, there’s also a shout out for the Totin’ Chip award!)

To gain a more accurate measure of your knowledge and skills, you can LISTEN to “You Got This” here:

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!

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.

Howdy, Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #116 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Today, I wanna talk about confidence. We all want to say, I got this…

Do you know how to do that? I got it.

Can you do that? I got it.

But sometimes that’s just not true!

On the other hand, sometimes you might think you can’t do something. You think you don’t know enough when you actually do.

Now, this problem of having either too much confidence or not enough confidence can hold you back not just in martial arts, but in every part of your life.

If you can’t get an honest assessment, if you don’t have a clear picture of where you stand with your knowledge and your skills, then how can you set appropriate goals for yourself?

How do you know which teachers to seek out? Which information that you need? Which questions to ask? What to practice?

We have to have a clear picture of where we stand. So let’s see if we can talk about this a little bit and maybe we can help straighten out our next steps in life.

Now, to start, I’d like to back up a little bit to when I was a lad. Back to when I was a Boy Scout. Yes, I was a Boy Scout.

Now, in the Boy Scouts, they have an award called the Totin’ Chip Award. And it’s not so much like a ribbon. It’s a badge. But at the time, it was just a card, a card that you could either put in your pocket or into a wallet.

I didn’t have a wallet back then, so I had to earn my leather working merit badge by creating a wallet. Then I had something to put my Totin’ Chip card into. Very clever.

Anyway, the Totin’ Chip award is given when you can demonstrate proper safety handling of an ax, a hatchet, a saw, and a knife. So anything with a blade, you have to show that you know how to handle them. They’re not toys, they’re tools.

And one of the coolest rules that I remember from that training was, and by the way, it strikes me now that having a bunch of kids in the woods with maybe one adult supervisor for a weekend running around chopping things up and setting fires was a wonderful time. I hope they still do that.

But one of the rules that I remember the most was when you wanted to hand someone else a blade, let’s say an ax, if I was going to hand you an ax, one I’d make sure the blade was not facing either one of us, I would offer you the handle and I would say, got it?

And you would reach out, extend and hold on to that handle and then you would say, got it. And then and only then would I let go and let you have it.

So this was a process to make sure there was no gray area. I wasn’t just handing it out into space, presuming you had it and then I let it go too early. And if I’m trying to receive it, I’m not just saying, yeah, yeah, and just holding it, then I didn’t really have it. Now it falls, cuts off one of our toes or cleaves my shin.

It’s a good safety guideline. I believe nowadays they’ve changed the verbal cueing. I think nowadays you offer it to someone and they say, thank you, and then you can say, you’re welcome.

I believe they’ve updated the words, but the idea is the same. Trust, but verify. That is the safest course.

I’m going to trust that you’re going to receive this, and I’m going to trust that you’re giving this to me. On both sides, we’re going to verify it with some verbal cueing.

I think that’s a really good example of how you can take some of the vagueness out of any exchange. If I’m a student or a teacher, I want to make sure that the information going back and forth is clearly received.

As a teacher, let’s say I’m in class, and I’m teaching you how to throw a punch, and I say, okay, put your chin down, set your shoulder this way, put your thumb here, turn this way, breathe that way. Got it?

And as a student, you say, got it. Now, do you really? Probably not.

No, I just listed off maybe, let’s say, five tips to throw a decent punch. When the student then says, yeah, I got it, what are they talking about?

Can they throw the punch all of a sudden? They know how to throw the punch? No.

We have to first of all realize that the transmission of knowledge is broken up into two pieces. There’s the actual information, the idea, the concept, the concept, and then there’s the actual skill, the doing, the performing, the executing of that knowledge.

So right off the bat, if you are giving someone something, information-wise, say, hey, can you throw this punch? Yep, I got it. You as a teacher have to know they don’t have the skill, they’ve just got the knowledge.

But really, they don’t even have that knowledge yet because most tips have to be felt and experienced to truly understand the words that they just received. There are levels to the knowledge.

That’s why I think keeping a notebook is so important because when you have a notebook, you can write down things that you don’t fully understand yet. You have a surface level understanding from where you are today. But five years from now, you’ll go back, read that same information and you’ll have a deeper insight, same words, deeper experience of what those words actually meant.

So the point is, your knowledge and understanding is relative to where you are in life at that moment. So when you say, you got it, on the one hand, you’re talking about the knowledge. I understand what you’re saying.

But what about your skill level now? What can you execute? Because that’s a separate question.

If a teacher says, you have it, you got it, and you say, yeah, I got it. Maybe the next good question would be, can you do it? Because that at least lets us know we’re talking about two different things, understanding and being able to perform it, capability.

When it comes to the skill, and you’ve just learned it, of course, you don’t know how to do it. Not to the specifications that your teacher just said. It’s going to take time, repetition, it takes effort, it’s going to take attention, some more corrections, work, sweat. That’s how you build the skill.

So again, it’s relative. Your skill level is relative to the amount of work you’ve been doing. And it’s endless. There’s always another level that you can get better, which is why if you say, I got it when it comes to skill, can you throw that punch? Yeah, I got it. You’re not exactly accurate, because there’s always another level you can make it better. There’s always a deeper level of understanding.

When you compare martial arts, let’s say you take boxing and Choy Li Fut. Now, on paper, one art, boxing, might look very simple. There’s a small number of strikes that are allowed, small number of guards, positions, limited number of footwork drills you’ll probably do.

Choy Li Fut has got hundreds of forms, weapons, the kicks. There’s just a much longer list of movements that you would have to know. But it doesn’t matter whether it’s a simple art, I would say like boxing, or it’s a more complex art like Choy Li Fut. Either way, there are levels, there are nuances. You can always make something better.

I’m not slighting boxing when I say it’s simpler. It’s just as complex as any other skill, because you can go on and on forever, practicing and learning and increasing your timing and your spatial awareness and combination cleverness. It’s unlimited.

And of course, the same goes whether you’re a chef. Just because you graduated culinary school doesn’t mean you don’t learn anything more about cooking, right?

Whether you’re a surgeon. Hey, I don’t want a surgeon who stopped looking at other research papers or studying other techniques once they got out of medical school. I want someone who’s up to date, who’s paying attention to everything else that’s going on. Making his skills better or her skills.

And certainly as a parent, as a friend, we can always be looking at how we handle people, how we deal with people to make our relationships better. Right? Right.

Now, I get it. It’s a human quirk. We all want to say, I got it. So I don’t have to keep working. I don’t want to feel like I don’t know anything. So once I do know anything, something, I want to jump on that and feel fully confident and then maybe have some relief that I’m not an ignoramus anymore. A little is a lot more than nothing. Even a little.

So if you had never studied martial arts, you don’t know anything about martial arts. Even that first month of training in whatever style you do, that jump in knowledge and experience is huge because you’re comparing it to nothing. One day of class is more than nothing.

And if you’ve had anxiety about not knowing anything about martial arts and now you’ve got a month of classes under your belt, wow, you think you really know something. And that’s okay. It gets you in the right direction.

You’ve got some confidence, but the mistake, of course, will be to think that you’re not going to learn anything more if you stay two months or ten years or fifty years.

Now, you can see this human quirk in kids easily. They don’t know how much knowledge there is out there or how much experience is in front of them. So they’ll very quickly think they know everything, particularly when I’ve worked with kids in the martial arts, when it’s coming near time for a belt test, and they’ll say, Oh, can I test for my new belt? And I’ll say, OK, well, let’s see the moves that you’re required to know.

And they can’t do them at all. They’re no good. And they still think they’re OK. They’re the one who asked in the first place, Can I test for a new belt?

I’m like, Well, let’s see the moves. Is that the right move? No, it’s not the right move. You’re doing it wrong. So here, let me show, let me help you. Here, try it again. Better. Okay, you’re getting there. Okay, there. Now, that was a good one. And then they still think, Okay, so now can I test?

They’re confused, thinking that, Oh, now that they have a clearer piece of knowledge, that means they also have the skill. Whereas, I, an older person and the teacher, I’m thinking, No, no, I need you to now take that knowledge, go turn it into a skill that becomes a habit, so that if I put you in a pressurized situation, like a belt test, or God forbid, a real life situation, that skill would be there.

But the kids, they don’t get that. Unfortunately, many adults don’t get that. It’s the same thing.

Many adults, certainly in the martial arts, walk around with an attitude of, been there, done that. Yeah, I did that style. Yeah, I already earned that belt. As if it’s it, that’s it. And there’s nothing more for them to learn, which is crazy, right?

This is a word I’ve been using lately. They have talk-nique, but not technique. They can talk a really good game.

When I’ve worked with teachers in the past, and even some high-ranking people, people who’ve owned schools, and they’re up on the wall, they’ve got all kinds of diplomas and certificates, but they’re just not that good, in my opinion.

Okay, granted, it’s my time on camera, so that’s what I’m saying.

I look at it and I think, that’s not the level of skill that you are demonstrating that I would expect when I look at all of those certificates and pictures of you on the wall. There’s a disconnect here.

Your talk-nique is very strong, but your technique doesn’t seem so.

And that would be even if they’ve had a school, maybe for decades, and I’ll watch them teach, and I just don’t think their teaching style is very good. They seem to be kind of self-absorbed, they don’t really have a good system in place, they’re not giving good feedback, they’re not paying attention.

And yet, they would say that they’re a professional teacher, they are a professional martial artist, they’re really great at both of those things. And I’m looking at it like, no, there’s a disconnect here.

And again, the problem here is that some people see learning as a checkbox. Oh, you got your high school diploma, check. You graduated college, check. You got your black belt, check. And that diploma, that certificate, that award, that new belt is seen as a period or an exclamation point.

But it’s not.

It’s just dot dot dot… an ellipsis. It’s to be continued. You are engaging in a process, a practice, and it never ends. There is no end to it. If you’re a true student, it never ends.

So, when people come on so strong, like, yeah, I got that, yeah, I know what I’m doing. Be careful with that. If you’re the one talking like that, don’t let your technique outdo your technique. Be careful.

And again, I’m a human being, so I have the same flaw, quirk. I’ve been doing martial arts for 30 years, over 30 years. So don’t you think I want to say, I got this, I know what I’m doing. I don’t say that.

I’m very careful about that because on either side, you’re probably wrong. If you think you know everything, you’re wrong. If you think you know nothing, you’re wrong.

I think there’s that great Bruce Lee quote. Someone asks, hey, are you a great martial artist? And he says something like, if I tell you that I’m great, you’ll think I’m bragging. If I tell you I don’t do anything, I’m no good, then you’ll know I’m lying.

We have to try to find that balance in the middle. And this, of course, brings up what you’ve probably heard of already, the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Now, I’m not a psychologist, so I can’t speak to the solidity of their research methods or how their studies have been criticized by current psychology, but as a popular term, the Dunning-Kruger effect is basically the idea that most people overestimate their level of competence.

People who don’t know much think they know more than they do. And on the flip side, the people who are truly skilled and who are truly competent usually feel insecure about it and feel that everyone else knows as much as they do or more, and they feel that they’re not that good at things.

So it’s this odd, again, the human character.

Either way, you can end up in trouble with that kind of thinking on either extreme.

So of course, I’m curious about how you assess yourself. Where do you need knowledge? Where do you need more skill? Where do you need information? Where do you need practice?

As much as you can, I think it’s helpful to reflect on your level so you know where you are. And I would encourage you to find a balance. Find the balance between confidence and humility.

Yes, you should have confidence in the experiences that you’ve already had in the past. But at the same time, you should have the humility to know that you haven’t experienced everything. You haven’t seen everything.

So there is an unlimited amount of new that can come to you. You are still capable of learning. I’m not saying it’s easy, but I think that’s where you want to be. I think that’s where you don’t get into trouble.

The minute that you think this dichotomy between confidence and humility doesn’t exist, that you either think you’re a loser, you don’t know anything, or you think you’re the greatest in the world and you can’t learn anything more, that’s when you’re going to get into trouble. And maybe not just for you, but for the people around you.

For example, have you ever seen a self-defense demonstration online or in person that just wasn’t very good? Now again, I don’t want to come off judgy, but I have some experience that leads me to believe when I see other people sometimes executing a technique or a demonstration, I think that could be done better.

Particularly when they play metal music while they’re demonstrating, or they’ve got a cocky grin on their face, or they’re laughing while they do it and they say it’s easy.

Here’s a choke defense. It’s easy. Do this, do that.

Now to me, that doesn’t, that hurts people to see something done poorly. And the problem is here that the demonstrator thinks they have it.

If you said, oh, do you know how to get out of a choke? Oh yeah, I got it. In fact, I’m so confident I’m going to show it.

Okay, so you’ve got maybe someone who doesn’t know that much leading. They’re the one putting themselves in the spotlight to say, look at me, I’ll show you how this is done. And you’re looking at it thinking, man, it looks to me like a strong wind could knock you down. That’s trouble.

On the other hand, there can be someone who’s got lots of experience and has spent a good deal of time studying and practicing and experimenting, and they have something good to offer, but they don’t want to deal with criticism, they don’t feel they’re that good, they see everyone else doing the flashy videos, and they don’t think they’re good enough for that.

So they hide, and they help no one. So this is the dilemma.

If you don’t have the balance right between what you know and what you don’t know, you could be hurting people or helping no one.

Another example, let’s say as a student, as you’re trying to learn, maybe you walk into a school, you run into another martial artist, and they say, oh, do you know how to do an armbar, this new kind of cool armbar? Now if your ego or your just miscalculations of your own skill lead you to say, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I got that, I can do an armbar, I know how to do that. That’s it, you just closed the door.

Now this other person who is just going to probably show you something has no reason to pursue you anymore, like, oh, okay, great, you know how to do an armbar, we both know.

Whereas if you’re a little more humble and they say, hey, you want to see how to do an armbar? And you say, sure, I’d love to see how you do an armbar. Now the door is open, they can excitedly share what they have, and you as a student have access to new information, perhaps, and it only takes that subtle little change of how they maybe grip something or say something that really makes an impact on how you do it for the rest of your life. It’s worth it to try.

It’s that idea maybe of Socratic irony, Socrates, the philosopher, the idea that you go in to an argument playing dumb. Don’t come in thinking that you know everything or letting people see that you know everything. You come in saying, I don’t know, what are you talking about? What is it that we’re arguing about? You let the other person share what they’ve got and then you know better what angle to argue and then you know better who you’re dealing with.

So that might be a little more aggressive, but I think just as a student to learn, you want to leave that door open. And by having the humility to say, I don’t know, I’d like to see how you do it, then you’ve got a chance to learn something.

One more example, belt tests, particularly traditional styles, Karate, Taekwondo. When you have a belt test and you have to know certain number of forms or memorized combinations, maybe vocabulary and history, maybe you have to demonstrate a board break, you can do some sparring, you can have a long list of requirements.

And as a teacher, they come to you and they say, well, your test is, your due date is coming up, you got it, you know all the material, how do you feel? You could be, again, trouble. You could say, oh yeah, I got it, no problem. Which borders on cocky, like, oh yeah, you think you got it.

But the truth is, maybe your form is not that good. Maybe you try to break that extra stack of boards and you smash your hand. I’ve seen all of these things happen and fallen victim to it myself, victim of my own ego.

And I can say that on that end of the spectrum, when you think, yeah, I got this, no problem, that can really shatter you. That can be ego, identity, shattering. Because you went in with all this hubris and confidence, and then you made a mistake in your form.

And it’s not just a mistake for you. It’s a crack in your identity. Because you said, I have this. I am perfect. I know everything. And then in front of everybody, you don’t.

I’ve fractured my wrist trying to break boards that I shouldn’t be breaking. It’s embarrassing, but it’s a great lesson, right?

On the other hand, if your teacher says, okay, well, I’ve seen you working hard over here, you’re ready for the test? And you think, oh, no way. I don’t want to take a chance of making a mistake. I know I’m not perfect. I keep getting hit when I’m sparring. I’m afraid of breaking those boards. You’re just full of anxiety.

You have not been building confidence in your work. And if you’re not forced to test, you probably would never test. You’d just be a white belt for the rest of your life. That’s also a problem. Now, you’re missing out on the sense of achievement that you could have had. Now you’re missing out on getting to the next level and learning new information that builds on the current information that you’re making better.

So again, the problem here is not having a solid, clear assessment of where you stand in your knowledge base and in your skill sets.

We want ultimately to have balance between confidence and humility. When someone says to you, I’ll give you my formula, when someone says to you, you got it? I think there’s a yes and a no. Anytime there’s a challenge to what I can do, there’s a yes and a no.

You got it? I might say, yes, I am better than I was, but no, I’m not as good as I could be. Feel the balance there? Giving myself credit for what I’ve done, but leaving the door open for improvement.

You can say, yes, I’ve improved, but no, I’m not done improving. That’s fair. That seems balanced.

Yes, I’m on the right track, but no, I haven’t gotten where I want to go yet. Nice, balanced. You feel that?

It’s a lot better than saying, oh, no, no, I’m not ready, or saying, yeah, I got this. Better.

You can say, yes, I’ve got some of this. You could even say, yes, I’ve got a lot of this, but no, I don’t have all of it yet. Oh, nice answer. Practice saying that one.

Yes, I’ve got some of this, but not all of it. It’s never wrong to say that.

Yes, I’ve got as much as I can understand and do today, but no, not as much as I will have tomorrow.

Nice. Yes, but I’m still learning. Yes, I have something, but I am still learning more. You get the idea. Practice this feeling of balance.

I always want you to be proud of the work and the research that you’ve done in the past, but at the same time, I want you to be hopeful and excited about the future. Because there is no limit to how much you can learn. There is no limit to how many fields you can find success in.

Got it?

Okay, I hope that ramble will lead you to reflect on what you really know and what you can really do. Then I hope you’ll be able to set some appropriate goals to take the next steps towards a happy life.

Until next time, keep reflecting, my friend, and keep fighting for a happy life.

The post #116: You Got This! Confidence in the Martial Arts [Video + Podcast] appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Welcome to Episode #115 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “How to Be a Good Judge.”

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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Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

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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.

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.

Welcome to Episode #114 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Driving Without Brakes.”

I’ve done some stupid things in my life… but driving without brakes may be the stupidest!

Of course, I didn’t plan on putting myself (and everybody on the road around me!) in danger, but it also wasn’t a big surprise. Nope! I’m ashamed to admit that I had ignored the warning signs for months before experiencing the terrifying consequences.

I hope that by sharing this embarrassing story of bad decisions and misguided priorities, you can avoid creating unnecessary terror in your life.

This incident truly scared me straight and changed my life for the better… I hope it might change you a little, too.

To LISTEN to “Driving Without Brakes,” you can either:

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!

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.

Howdy, Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to episode #114 of Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

I will apologize up front, in case you hear any construction noise, we’ve got some work going on next door. They’ve got radio blasting, hammering, sawing, yelling.

So, let this be the first message of the day. You can’t always wait for perfect conditions to do things. Do the best you can with what you’ve got. And this is what I’ve got today.

What else do I have today? Well, not just that message. I’ve got a story for you. This is a terrible story. And by terrible, I mean full of terror. My own personal terror.

You probably won’t care. But this is a story that was a real horror for me. And it’s also very embarrassing because it was completely my own fault. But it did happen over 30 years ago. So I am prepared to forgive myself, especially if sharing this horrific story can in some way help you avoid a similar mistake.

So let me hit you with this story. Prepare. And then I’ve got three quick lessons that I drew from it. And maybe one of them will make sense to you, too. All right, ready?

I was 16 years old. This is 16 year old Ando. Had just gotten my driver’s license. Didn’t have a car.

I was holding out, saving up for some type of sporty coupe. But that plan never worked out. Instead, a kindly neighbor had an old Buick station wagon that she no longer required. And I picked it up for I think $600.

That was my first car. Dark blue, red leather-ish interior. And like most older cars, there were some tricks to operating it.

It had a window that you had to kind of jimmy a little bit to get to work. And yes, it was an old-fashioned window, not an electric window.

There was some smoke coming out of the tailpipe and the carburetor was tricky. It had some type of the butterfly valve on top where you had to use a twist tie once the car got running in the cold weather, you have to go out and tie it open.

So there were some tricks to keeping it moving, but I didn’t care. It was my car. This was freedom. This was my chariot of independence.

So there I was, a young driver, and I got a couple years out of that thing, at least a year and a half, two years, but I had no money. So I wasn’t one of those kinds of people who could soup up the car or trick it out in any kind of way.

I had no money and, of course, no mechanical knowledge. That’s the other big part of that. And no friends who had any mechanical knowledge. So anything that was wrong with that car stayed wrong or got worse. In most cases got worse, which brings us to this horrific story.

One day, I hit the brakes and heard a squeak. And as I learned, that might be an early sign that your brakes are starting to go. You might need to replace those. But I had more important things to do and they were still working, so I didn’t think too much about it.

But as time went on, and this is one of those things that you don’t really notice right away because it’s so gradual, but at some point I noticed that I was really having to press the pedal deeper than I used to. Instead of just touching the brakes, you would have to get it half an inch, maybe then to an inch, an inch and a half. You had to press more and more.

Until eventually, and here we’re getting into the embarrassing part, I had to press that pedal all the way to the floor. Not only did I have to press it all the way to the floor, I found myself having to turn in my seat, jam my heel down into it and use the back of my chair to kind of add extra leverage to really depress that pedal and pin it to the floor to get any kind of breaking reaction out of it.

Now again, I’m going to just claim that I was young, poor and stupid. That’s what makes this so embarrassing. I just thought I could get by. It seemed like I had more important things to do.

I was able to drive. I was functioning. I actually developed a whole technique where I didn’t really use the brakes that much.

Instead of speeding off to destinations, I would just take my time and if I looked up ahead and I saw that there was some braking going on, I would just start coasting. And I always gave myself a big cushion of space around the car, which is good defensive driving anyway. And I found that I could just kind of stay in this bubble and time myself to get from place to place.

So it’s crazy how you can adapt to things you shouldn’t have to adapt to. I shouldn’t even have had to develop that skill. And it didn’t last that long because ultimately, here’s what happened.

Heading to Taekwondo class. I think it was like a seven o’clock class across town. I’m driving myself to class because I’m a big boy.

I head out and this is all happening within a block or two of my house. I head out and the first turn I need to make is a left into a two-lane road. One lane coming, one lane going.

So I time it, there’s a space, I roll out into traffic, I’m heading towards an intersection. Up ahead, I see the light turn red, there’s five or six cars because it’s basically, I mean, it’s a seven o’clock class, so there’s a lot of traffic on the road. This is basically rush hour.

I need to stop. I turn in my chair, I jam my heel down to the ground, I start pressing… and on this day, no reaction whatsoever from the car. No braking response. I am rolling unhindered.

Calculating very quickly, I realize I’m going to smash into the back of those cars. There was not enough room to coast, there was not enough time to wait for that light to turn green. This was bad. So I swerve into the oncoming lane.

First miracle. I didn’t hit anybody, didn’t run into anything. I get into the oncoming lane, but I can’t stay there for long because now there’s cars making their right hand turns up there and whatever they’re doing, left hand turns.

So I get right past the residential portion and there’s a gas station on the corner. I get out of the incoming lane and I make it to the edge of the parking lot of the gas station. I roll into the gas station, still going full speed.

Second miracle. There is an opening to get through the parking lot around the gas pumps to get to the far side of the gas station. So I’m thinking, great, I can just kind of let this slow down.

And as I round the corner of the gas station on the far edge, I see an air pump, right? And behind it is a high curb, maybe like six inches high. Behind that, there’s a big row of like seven or eight foot high hedges, green hedges.

So I just set course for that curb and figure if I can just hit the curb, boom, just get ready for that jolt. You’re going to come to a sudden stop here, but you will stop.

Nope! I hit that curb, ba-boom, and roll right over the curb and right through the hedges.

Miracle three. I didn’t know what was behind those hedges, but fortunately, there was no one there. Could have been kids playing, could have been… who knows, right? I mean, it’s horrible.

What I end up seeing as I break through the hedges is a front lawn, a driveway, a front lawn, a driveway. There’s a whole block of houses, houses on my left, street on a right. And I just start rolling. And I make it about three or four front lawns before I start slowing down.

And I realize, well, you can either stop on someone’s front lawn, which seemed like a bad choice, or you can just jam that wheel, get up one of these driveways, and at least get into a backyard on a driveway.

That’s what I did. I yanked the wheel, went down a driveway, ended up in someone’s backyard, and I figured out finally, threw it into park, and the car stopped.

Now, why didn’t I use the emergency brake, you might ask. Never occurred to me. Never once did that occur to me. I never used the emergency brake, so it just wasn’t in my thinking. I never used it, so I wouldn’t even know where it was.

Anyway, there I was, sitting in the driveway. I realized how many miracles I had just experienced, how lucky I had just gotten, and how ridiculous my decision-making had been up to this point. What a fool I was.

And as I caught my breath, I realized, okay, the next step’s here. You’re not going to make it to class tonight, my friend.

I pulled out a scrap of paper out of the glove compartment, left my phone number and a note for the homeowner, walked home — talk about a walk of shame — walked home, and then contacted a salvage yard.

I walked back, met the guy that night, and he gave me 50 bucks for the car. I was shocked. Maybe that’s a mini-miracle.

I just remember his flatbed truck, him towing up that car, and him driving off into the night. I never saw the car again. Goodbye, my chariot of independence.

So that’s the story. And boy, I learned a lot from that. I really did. And I’ll try to sum up very quickly three important things that I still think about. I still think about that brake story.

I don’t know why it took so long to share it on the podcast. Probably because I’m embarrassed by it. But here we go.

Look down the road to really get a full view of where you’re going in life.

When I was young, I thought so many things were just not that big of a deal, whether it was brushing your teeth or fixing a headlight or squeaky brakes. There were so many things that just seemed too small to worry about. I had more important things to do, whether it was school or training or my hobbies at the time, everything was more important.

But as you grow older, you realize no problem starts big, really. Everything starts small. There are little warning signs, little flags, and as you get wiser, you start to notice those things and you pay attention to them. And if you’re smart, you deal with them. You nip them in the bud.

If you don’t brush your teeth for one night, okay, if that becomes your habit, down the road, if you take a look, you’re probably going to have to spend a lot of money and go through a lot of pain to fix those problems.

I have a video, maybe you’ve seen, called Why I Quit Taekwondo, and no, it wasn’t because I lost my car. Taekwondo changed my life, so I’m not bashing Taekwondo. So, if you’re in Taekwondo, stay there, I hope you’re getting what you want out of it.

But at the time, I was doing fine, I felt great, but this was my late teens into my early 20s, so it wasn’t that hard for me to bounce around, throw high kicks, stay flexible, stay athletic enough to participate. But eventually I started to really ponder, would I be able to participate in my 40s, 50s, 60s?

Could I see myself as an old man doing the conditioning to participate in an art like this? Would I want my self-defense strategy to rely on that kind of conditioning and those kinds of tactics?

I ultimately decided, no, I think it’s time to shift into a different art where I could invest my time and my energy so that I could do things even into my 60s, 70s or 80s. I wanted an art that I could grow old with and I just did not believe, right or wrong, you may have a different opinion, I just didn’t believe Taekwondo was the art for that.

So that was one example of looking ahead and I think it saved me a lot of pain and disappointment. And now that’s become my life habit. I try as much as I can.

If my headlight is out, I will go get that serviced right away. Even doing dishes, I used to always think everything was more important than doing dishes, and then it starts to smell, you get mold or people visit and it’s embarrassing.

So now as soon as I use a dish, I wash it right away. I do not let dishes linger anymore. And of course, this applies to everything you do.

Self-defense, same thing, when a flag pops up, you should deal with it right away. If someone is crossing your boundaries, if someone is disrespecting you, if someone breaks your trust, the earlier that you speak up for yourself, the earlier that you set a boundary or move away from them, the safer you’re going to be.

So in self-defense, the earlier you act, the better.

Saving money, the earlier you start saving, the better. Your good health, the earlier you start practicing good habits, food, sleep, stress, the healthier you’re going to be.

So that’s lesson number one. Take the long view. Look down the road and see if what you’re doing today, if all the little flags and warning signals that are going off around you really are something you can ignore? Or if you look down the road, do you see them getting worse and worse and putting you in danger?

Let’s say you’re sitting at an intersection. The light turns green. When I started driving, that green light was like you were racing cars. Go! As fast as you can. Hit the gas. Go!

And it didn’t matter if the next light had already turned red or if there was a bunch of traffic. It was just fun to hit that gas. Go!

And then, okay, you’d have to stop and slam on the brakes. That’s probably why my brakes wore down. I was used to a very herky-jerky style of driving.

Stop! Go! Stop!

And it wasn’t until I was forced to change my habits to start slowing down a little bit and just kind of finding the flow in the traffic where I didn’t have to be so herky-jerky. Of course, that saves gas. It’s not as hard on the car. It’s not as stressful. You can just stay in that sweet spot and just move along. And I think that’s a far more mature way to drive.

It’s also true that you could end up at a green light and start daydreaming or looking at your phone or staring at the person next to you and thinking about their life. And you suddenly, beep, beep, beep, you’ve been sitting too long.

You weren’t paying attention. You’re not going to get where you want to go. Now you’re running late. Now you’re interrupting the flow.

Either way, these are not good habits to take off like a rabbit or to just sit there and lose your focus. And that’s the same also in anything you do in life.

You might jump into a project, I know, I’m going to start this business. And you jump in, you invest a lot of money, you just, you go so fast and you end up burning out, making a huge mistake, not setting things up properly and the whole thing crashes and you lose.

On the other hand, you might have a great idea for a business, but you’re terrified that it’s going to fail. So you don’t even start. You don’t even try. And that also gets you nowhere.

So we have to start trying to find that flow in our lives where we can keep moving, keep learning, keep improving without courting the risks of crashing or just sitting still.

And of course, this applies to your training, right? In your sparring or in your wrestling, if you’re aggressive, aggressive, go, go, go all the time, well, you could walk right into a KO. People see you coming and say, whoa, boom, walk right into a punch, walk, dive right into a leg triangle.

But on the other hand, if you’re always blocking and passive and backing away, well, you can also get knocked out. You can’t block forever. At some point, you got to find the balance between aggression and passivity, between waiting and attacking. You find that sweet spot.

In your training in general, there’s the risk of overtraining, but there’s also a risk of undertraining. If you train too hard, that can hurt your body. If you train too little, that’ll hurt your skills. You won’t be very good.

So again, you have to find that balance. Find the sweet spot. This is really important. So that’s tip number two. Find your flow.

Find your timing on whatever projects you’re working on, whatever is important to you, so that you can keep your forward momentum going, that you can keep flowing, so you’re not always starting and stopping or just quitting.

The key here is to not worry about other people. Don’t worry about falling behind your buddies. Don’t worry about getting ahead of everybody you know either.

Run your race. Set your pace. You know I love rhyming. So I say again, run your race, set your pace.

Ask for money if you need it. Ask for information if you need it. Ask for more time if you need it. Ask for help if you need it.

You’ve got to invest in yourself. And one of the greatest investments you can make is just to ask questions. Put yourself in a situation where you are the student. It’s okay to do that.

When I was younger, I didn’t like that. I thought it made me look stupid and made me look weak to ask for anything from anybody. But that’s completely wrong. That is completely foolish.

With what’s worse, feeling stupid for asking a question or feeling stupid because you just crashed your car through a row of hedges and watched your car get taken away on a flat bed truck. Yeah, that was stupid.

So please, don’t wait till you end up in jail to learn this lesson. Don’t wait until you lose everything you’ve got. Don’t wait until you crash your car. Don’t wait till all of your teeth have to be replaced. Don’t wait until you find out you’re terrible at what you do. Don’t become a person who’s just bitter and angry and makes excuses.

Get what you need. Money, information, time, help. Get it. Ask for it. Please don’t be afraid.

Life is short. Get on it.

Let me tell you, I have spent thousands of dollars, I’m not kidding. I’ve never added it up formally, but I can tell you for sure, thousands of dollars on private lessons, on classes, of course.

I’ve also asked thousands of questions. I’m putting out the bills and I’m putting out the question marks. I have not been afraid to put on a white belt.

Sure, you know, you have the anxiety of starting over or trying a new art or being the new guy, but ultimately I haven’t stopped putting on white belts over and over again and be the new person.

So take the class, sign up for the course, pay for the private lesson, email that contact, approach that mentor, do what you have to do to get what you need.

You don’t have to suffer alone. You don’t have to be afraid alone. You don’t have to just live your life quietly alone. That choice usually leads you down a darker and darker path. And I think you’ll find that your life only gets worse, not happier.

Make no mistake, the better you are at being you, the better able you’ll be to help everybody else. So invest in yourself.

Ask for what you need, work for what you need, and be the person you should be.

Was that already lesson number three? That didn’t take long at all, right?

So let me wrap this up…

I really, truly hope that by sharing this horrible story, this embarrassing story, that it will spare you from making any similar mistake. You are probably wiser than I am, but there’s also probably some part of your life that you could apply one of these ideas to, and I hope you do.

The big plan here is to keep setting goals, okay? And you don’t have to jump into them right away and blow all your resources. Don’t jump in blindly. Take your time.

Look down the road. Pace yourself. Find your flow so that you can keep moving, keep learning, keep improving. And when you need to ask for help along the way, ask for help.

If, on that journey towards your goals, you need to pump the brakes, or you even need to come to a stop sometimes, that’s okay. That’s okay. That’s part of driving. That’s part of life. But I do believe that the more you practice finding your flow, listening to your own timing, whether you’re driving or you’re living, you won’t need the brakes as often.

You’ll be able to stay in that safety cushion. You know who you are. You know what you’re doing. You’re not concerned about anybody else. You’re just focused on your goal and you found your flow to get there. If you do that, I think you’ll just keep rolling along and get closer and closer to a happy life.

Okay, I hope sharing my story will help you avoid crashing through the hedges in your life. Hey, if you’ve got an example of something that started off small in your life and grew into something horrific, feel free to leave it in the comments. I’d love to hear about it. I’m just happy that you survived to tell the tale.

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

The post #114: Driving Without Brakes – A Warning for Martial Arts and Life appeared first on Sensei Ando.

Welcome to Episode #113 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “The First Technique in Martial Arts.”

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:

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Thanks for listening! Keep fighting for a happy life!

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.

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 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?

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.

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.

Welcome to Episode #112 of the Fight for a Happy Life podcast, “Lessons From Being Choked Out.”

When I started training in the martial arts, I practiced a long list of moves to escape from chokes. No air, no problem… right?

WRONG!

It turned out that there’s a big difference between a “practice choke” and a REAL strangulation. Thankfully, I found out before someone tried to really kill me!

Thanks to teachers like Carl Cestari and “Judo Gene” LeBell, I had the chance to feel how effective (and terrifying!) being choked out can be. Those experiences also taught me a few good life lessons, which I’d like to share with you.

Before you listen to the podcast, you might also want to check out my video, How to Survive a Choke. It might come in handy!

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Howdy, my friend! Ando here from Happy Life Martial Arts. Welcome to Fight for a Happy Life, the show that believes even a little martial arts makes life a whole lot better.

Sad news in the martial arts world. As you’ve probably already heard, the legend, Judo Gene LeBell, has passed away at the age of 89. Now, there are so many stories about Judo Gene LeBell, and I’m going to add another one to the library today.

Judo Gene was, of course, a pioneer in cross training in the martial arts. He made a name for himself in the sports world, the entertainment world, and of course, the teaching world.

It seems that Judo Gene worked with everybody who’s anybody, and it’s just an incredible legacy that he has left behind, the influence that he has had on the martial arts world. But more than that, what I was probably most impressed by was the fact that he always carried himself with a sense of humor.

Martial arts is a serious topic, self-defense is a serious topic, but he found a way to make it very human and to balance out that energy that can sometimes run away to being too aggressive or frightening. And he made it very human. At least that was my take on it.

As it happens, I was lucky enough to meet him one time. Just once, but once might have been enough because he choked me out. I’m going to tell you that story and the lessons that I took away from it in one moment, but first let me back up and give you my quick history on chokes in general.

Now, forgive me, when I say chokes, we’re really talking more properly, probably about strangulations, but common usage, I’m saying chokes, so let’s not get too technical about it at the moment.

Now, my first formal schooling was in Taekwondo, and in our Taekwondo program, we did practice choke defenses. So you know, two hands on a throat, arm around your neck. But I would say even though we were practicing choke defenses, I was never really choked.

So you’d get a little squeeze, you’d say, oh okay, Yeah, I get it. But to me, I didn’t have a lot of extra respect for choking as opposed to a wrist grab or a collar grab or any other kind of grab. It just seemed like, Okay, well here’s what you do for a choke, just like any other attack. I just do this, I do that.

Now, of course, that’s a bit of a problem, a bit of a blind spot to not take chokes more seriously. And my attitude changed forever when I went to a seminar with Carl Cestari. Now, I don’t know if you know about Carl Cestari, but he was a highly trained martial artist. He was more of a pioneer in the combatives field.

He popularized or brought back to life a lot of the teachings from World War II, the work of people like Fairbairn and Applegate, and so he came in with a really practical, tough-edged type of training.

Now, I was still a young Taekwondo belt at the time and I didn’t know what I was looking at here. I just knew this guy’s tough.

And at one point during the seminar, he was in a mount position on the ground and he put a choke on a guy. And to my ignorant eyes, I thought, well, the guy’s hands are both free, his legs are both free. We’ve done choke defenses. Surely that guy can get out of there.

And so I asked that question. Yes, my friend, I asked that foolish question. And I, with respect, I said, Gee, you got that choke, but why can’t he just get out of that? And Sensei Carl said, Oh, come here. And I lay down on the ground.

He got into the mount. He basically prepared his hands and he said, tell me when you’re ready and then you could do whatever you want. As soon as you feel the choke, you do whatever you want. And I said, okay. Go!

And I kid you not, what happened was, I think I’ve told this story before, my arms not only did not click into some automatic choke defense, my body actually extended! To my horror, my arms shot out and my legs shot out because he put that choke on and it felt more like a punch to the throat than a choke.

So I would say that was the first time I was ever really choked. It was terrifying. I immediately had respect for chokes and put them in a different class than a wrist grab or a collar grab. Chokes are terrifying when applied fully and properly and with bad intent.

All right, so I’m a little slow on that, but I figured it out. Now, back to my Taekwondo class. Our class was held in a school. They shared the rent with a Judo program and I was friendly with a couple of the guys in the Judo program. At one point they saw us working on choke defenses and one of the black belts offered, Would you like me to choke you out?

That’s right. That’s the kind of things that happen in a Judo school. It was just very normal. It was like he was getting a cup of coffee. He said, Would you like me to choke you out? And my knee-jerk response was no, because I was still living in terror from Carl Cestari’s choke.

I just thought, Oh my God, I don’t want that again. But more than the terror of being choked out, I didn’t really trust this guy. Nice guy, but I’d never seen him choke anybody else out. I had not been choked out fully when Sensei Carl put that choke on me.

I had tunnel vision and I saw stars and I was that close to going out, but he let it go. I presume he knows what he’s doing and he let me go just before I blacked out. I didn’t mention that detail, but that’s why it was so terrifying, because I was pretty much gone.

So when this guy said, I’m gonna complete it, seal the deal, I said no– no I don’t, because I don’t know what’s gonna happen to me and I certainly don’t trust you.

Now that was a decision that I regretted for years. Even though I was still learning other self-defense styles and still working through choke defenses, I always had that nagging voice in my head saying, you should have gotten choked out, you should have taken that opportunity, you should have said yes. Now you don’t know.

So I don’t know the full extent of what this choking experience is like, or strangulation. So that went on for years until, ta-da, here we go…

I went to a martial arts event in Las Vegas and Judo Gene had a station at a booth at the event. I think he was selling his book, maybe he had some DVDs. I didn’t buy those, but I did get the book– here it is. Gene LeBell’s Grappling World, The Encyclopedia of Finishing Holds.

The deal was, I’m a little foggy on this part, but you stood in line, and then you could buy this book, and it might have been, you get a patch if you let him choke you out. So two different deals– you can either just come up and buy the book or if you wanted the book and a patch, well, then he would choke you out to earn the patch, to say I was choked out by Gene LeBell.

Now, you’ll see inside, he was a kind enough fellow to sign the book. He put, “To Ando, the best of all worlds. Your friend, Gene LeBell.” And can you see there he actually drew a picture of himself. So, sense of humor, big heart, doesn’t know me from Adam and he took the time to do that. One of my treasured possessions.

Okay, so now, to get the choke, you had to get in line, and by the way, I can’t imagine how many people Judo Gene must have choked out in his lifetime, because just there at this event, there were, I don’t know, 20 or 30 people in line. It was a multiple day event, so just from that place alone, he must have choked out a hundred people, I’m guessing. So I can’t even imagine how many people he put to sleep.

But I got into line. The friends that I was with wanted no part of this. Not only weren’t they going to join me, they were trying with all of their power to dissuade me from doing this. Like, what are you crazy? Don’t get choked out! That’s not healthy! It’s dangerous! You can’t do that!

But I knew who Judo Gene LeBell was and I knew that if I was gonna get choked out by anybody, that’s the guy who should do it. I trusted his experience, his legend. That’s the guy I wanted to be choked out by. So I ignored my friends and we’re moving up in line and I’m standing strong.

Now there’s a guy ahead of me in line. Just a little aside here– this guy, I’m wearing normal clothes, but this guy came with an image. He’s wearing an all-black gi and a black belt, okay. And he’s got his girlfriend with him. They’re a really good-looking couple. I hate them already.

They’re super young, fit, good-looking couple, but this guy’s got a bit of an attitude. This guy’s pretty cocky. It’s the way he’s holding himself and kind of moving around and talking about stuff. He’s pretty cocky.

Now I don’t know where I picked it up, but somewhere along my journey in martial arts, I’d picked up the idea that if Judo Gene LeBell is choking you, if you give him attitude, then he’ll drop you on the floor. He’ll choke you out and then drop you on the floor. If you are respectful and kind, then he will lay you down on the floor and be good to you in your unconscious state.

So I already knew going in, and I would have anyway, treat him with respect, treat him with honor. And I did. But the guy in front of me, like I said, he had a little bit of attitude with him.

So I can’t speak for a Judo Gene. I’m not saying anything bad happened here, but here’s what happened. My friends are all still watching in horror, like, please don’t do this, don’t do this. And I keep saying, it’s totally safe, it’s not a big deal. It takes six to eight seconds. It’s just a drop in oxygen here. I’ll be right back, no big deal.

This guy ahead of me though, stands up, Judo Gene gets behind himand puts the rear naked choke on him. Guy goes out. Gene puts him on the floor. And when he awoke, Gene goes back to the table because he’s signing autographs and doing his bit.

My memory is that it was his wife and one of his senior students who would collect the person from the floor, get them back to being sensible, and then escort them away. So I do believe that was Judo Gene’s wife who was there.

Now, as this guy wakes up, he freaks out. He’s just panicking. He’s like, what’s going on? I mean, like bad acting in a bad movie. He didn’t take it well.

And Judo Gene’s wife, who must have seen this a million times, said, Are you all right, honey? She’s very calm about it. Are you all right, honey? And he’s like, No, I’m not all right! Flipping out.

I’m pretty sure that his girlfriend left him that day. I’m pretty sure, because the show that he put on just was very embarrassing. So that’s on him.

But back to me– far more important. My friends were now doubly terrified, because not only did they have their preconceived notions of what would happen when you get choked out, they just saw this tough guy freaking out from being choked out. So a little extra pressure on me to keep my cool.

All right, so it’s my turn. I go up. I say something very respectful, like this is an honor. Thank you for doing this. How crazy is this, right? This guy makes a living choking people out. But I’m there. I’m all about it.

So presumably, he senses that I am respectful because he didn’t slam me on the ground. But sure enough, he puts the puts his arm around my neck. He says, Are you ready? I say, Yes, sir. And my last thought, because the pressure came on pretty fast, a little bit slower than Carl Cestari did it, but here it came…

And my last thought was, Gee, that’s tighter than I thought. That was my last thought. Gee, this is a lot tighter than I thought it would be.

Okay, now we pause because that’s what happened to me. I don’t know exactly how long I was out. I’m sure it wasn’t long. But when I woke up, it was a very surreal experience. It was like being reborn, I guess.

The only thing I can think of is that song, Comfortably Numb, from Pink Floyd. The distant ship smoke on the horizon. Because when my eyes opened, of course I was on the rug and looking up at the ceiling and there were some of my friends’ faces hovering above me.

I swear to you, I didn’t know my name. I didn’t know where I was. I didn’t know who these people were. There was a moment or two there where I was just completely zoned out. And then slowly the memory like, Oh, I know where I am. Oh, I know what just happened.

Oh, and it was very calming. It was very peaceful. It was like just like a reboot of the whole system. And I just found myself full of joy, full of warmth. I was very thankful for the experience. It wasn’t terrifying at all, the reawakening.

So I was very thankful to Judo Gene for that memory. For that safe passage into the world of being choked out. After the fact, of course, I eventually got into a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu school. And I have fought many, many chokes since then. I’ve gotten back to that point of the tunnel vision, and the stars, and not being able to swallow for a couple of days. I’ve been that guy. But never been choked all the way out.

So Judo Gene is still my benchmark for chokes. Now the lessons that I took away from that event.

Number one, if you’re in martial arts, whether you’re a student or a teacher, respect the attack.

I don’t care what you’re practicing. If it is wrist grabs, or punches or kicks, or you’re working with knives and sticks, whatever it is that you’re doing, please never ever forget that these are movements designed to hurt, maim, and kill people. Justified or not, that’s what’s going on.

This is one of the reasons why– I’m not telling school owners how to run their business– but when I had the opportunity to be one of the guys throwing a birthday party in a martial arts school, and you see other people using samurai swords to cut cakes, that’s not me. I absolutely am against that. I don’t like the intermingling of weapons and humor. Not like that.

I said before, Judo Gene always had a sense of humor about himself, his own character. Or you could trash talk between students and other teachers. Okay. But to me, it always seemed very distasteful to take a sword, a killing weapon– this is not for harvesting bananas, this thing is not for churning butter, this thing was made to cut people apart, kill them– and to use it to cut a child’s birthday cake.

Call me a killjoy, say I’m a stick in the mud. It just seems wildly inappropriate. I also don’t use guns to put peanut butter on bread. I don’t think that’s cool, but you do what you want. I’m not going to stop you. I’m just saying that’s how I feel.

So number one, respect weapons, respect barehanded weapons. You’re in martial arts, it’s martial, that’s warfare. Please always respect what you’re doing.

Even if you’re not choking each other out and really hurting each other, even if you’re doing light contact sparring, don’t be giggling about some joke you heard. Don’t talk about movies and TV. Honor the fact that what you’re doing is rehearsing, killing, or being killed. It’s just very important.

Number two, second lesson, Judo Gene inspired me to become a person of trust.

Someone that you could trust, someone who could inspire trust in others. Like I said, I had an opportunity from a nice guy who was a Judo black belt years before to choke me out. But there was something missing that I just didn’t trust him to do it.

Judo Gene, for whatever reason, even though I had never met him before, but in learning about his history, knowing about his history, seeing him that day, getting the vibe of what was going on, and seeing how he was choking other people out, I trusted him.

Maybe that’s irrational. We’re irrational beings sometimes. But it still gave me the idea that it would be so cool to live a life that would allow others to trust me with something as precious as their life, let alone telling me a secret, telling me something that’s bothering them.

Whatever it is, it would be so great if I could go around to anyone and say, May I choke you out? And have them say, Oh yeah, sure. Let me put my coffee down. Sure, go ahead. I trust you.

It’s an interesting way to measure your character. If you’re going around offering to choke out people and they say, Absolutely not, never, not in a million years, you might want to look at how you’re treating people.

Be a person who can choke others out. Be like Judo Gene.

Lesson number three is to make peace with death. Accept that death may just be a new beginning.

This is a theme I’ve talked about before, so I won’t belabor this. Specifically in episode #24. It was called Facing Death. I talk more about this in depth.

But let’s not forget, again, it’s martial arts. You are practicing, in a quality class, you are not forgetting that you are practicing death in its extreme form. I’m either trying to prevent you from killing me or I’m in a situation where it would be justifiable to take your life.

Of course, we trained hopefully so that we have so much control that we have options. So maybe even if it is justifiable to take a life, you don’t have to. Maybe you choose just to damage their body so they can’t fight you anymore. Maybe you find a way to get away from them. Maybe you find a way even to befriend them at some point in your life.

We want that range of options, I think, if we’re fully functioning human beings. But at its core, we’re still talking about worst case scenarios.

So you have this chance in your martial arts training to practice facing death, which is the ultimate failure, the ultimate loss. How do you handle that? How do you face it?

When I was choked out by Judo Gene, I woke up in a state of joy, of warmth, of happiness. I had a really nice day after that. The guy ahead of me did not. He was tense, he was upset, he was flustered, his identity was shaken. He did not face that death well. And again, I can’t speak for him, maybe he was just having a bad day.

But for you, give yourself these opportunities when you’re training. When you lose, that’s a chance to practice dealing with loss. When you fail, that’s your chance to practice facing failure.

How do you handle it? Can you, do you get angry about it? Do you feel shame or do you see it as a learning experience? Can you even face failure with a smile because you know you have another chance.

Obviously, death is death. Perhaps there is another beginning after death. But if you do wake up on this plane of existence, you got another shot. Waking up is, Wow, I have another shot to get things right, to make things better.

So, treat every loss and every failure as a rebirth.

Yes, don’t get me wrong. Sometimes that can sound a little too idealistic. Can you make everything better? Is life just this never-ending series of improvement if you keep a positive attitude?

No, no, I don’t think so. We’re all different, right? Genetically, some of us are going to be predisposed to shutting down under stress more than other people. Then we have environmental concerns, where you’re raised, how you’re raised, who your role models were early on.

Don’t get me wrong. We all come into this world in that first 10 years or so with wildly different makeups. However, whatever your makeup is, I do believe that you can change. You can make it better. You can improve whatever your station is.

I know that only because I changed mine. I’m not perfect. I wasn’t born perfect. But I know that before martial arts training, I definitely had a hotter temper. I was far less patient with people. I was far more critical of myself. I did feel shame more if I lost or wasn’t number one. I was far more competitive for the wrong reasons, for unhealthy reasons.

I did take everything personally. A red light is personal. That insult is personal. You really meant that. A bad grade on a test, that teacher’s out to get me. More paranoid.

But martial arts really reset me because failure is part of that process. Losing is part of that process. Getting hit is part of the process. Getting choked is part of the process. Tapping out is part of the process. That’s not something to run away from. That’s something to embrace. Because if you can accept all of the losses, then you will grow.

And that’s my goal. And I presume it’s yours.

So please go into your training at class with your partners. Never with an unhealthy competitive spirit. You’re there to improve yourself and you improve yourself every time. You can look at that loss, look at that failure, and smile because you know you have another chance to make it right.

Even training on your own. Yes, you could do pushups until you conk out. You could try to hold a horse stance as long as you can and get to that point where you, eventually, your muscles fail and you collapse to the floor.

Okay, those are physical examples, but let me repeat one little lesson from Episode 24. I would also encourage you on your own to think negative.

What? Aren’t you Mr. Positivity? Well, sometimes.

But it’s also valuable to think negative. I mean specifically spending time with your scariest thoughts and meditating on your nightmares. That’s something I said in another episode. Spend time with your scariest thoughts and meditate on your nightmares.

So, yes, should you visualize winning? You bet. That will make your techniques better. Should you also visualize losing? Yes, because that will make your learning better. If you go around denying that anytime you lost was a fluke– Oh, I wasn’t trying, he got lucky– you didn’t learn something.

So practice losing when it’s not real, like anything else. Like a kata–how am I going to respond when I lose next time? How am I going to respond when I fail next time? How am I going to face it?

I mean literally, if you’re going to visualize getting out of a choke successfully, also spend a moment imagining what would happen if you didn’t get out of that choke. How would your friends feel? How would your family feel? Maybe that’ll remind you what you were fighting for in the first place.

How would the world be different if you’re not here? Spend time visualizing being knocked out. Visualize being jumped on by four or five guys and you can’t win. You just accept the beat down. You’re going to have to heal now.

Visualize being shot. Imagine being stabbed. And let those emotions come up. Let those feelings come up and reflect on them. You will learn so much about yourself by seeing how you respond to failure. Probably more than what you learn from when things are going great, when you’re winning, when everything worked out.

So that’s my advice. Think negative. And that is what I’m going to put under my Judo Gene LeBell chapter in my martial arts teaching handbook. He helped me learn that. By being choked out and going to the extreme of losing consciousness and being able to wake up again and keep going, a better person, a more knowledgeable person, yeah, I’ll always be thankful for that.

Now, am I telling you that you should go get someone to choke you out? I’m not here to recommend anything of that nature. Your journey is your journey. You may be able to intuit information better than I can.

You may have already had close calls in other areas of your life where you don’t specifically need that. I’m just saying that that choke helped me learn about myself and learn about the world.

So, that’s the big lesson that I wanted to leave you with today. Again, a bow to Judo Gene wherever he is today. Let’s not forget that losing is the path to winning. That failing is the path to succeeding. And if you can find that balance between thinking positive and thinking negative, you’ll be the best prepared to lead a happy life.

Okay, time to practice. I hope you’re looking forward to your next death, and I hope you’re really looking forward to your next rebirth.

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

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