I have been a student of martial arts most of my life. For nearly two decades I have had the privilege of being an instructor of martial arts. Over those many years of training and teaching, I have witnessed amazing changes in the lives of others as well as within myself. I am perpetually intrigued and continually strive to keep learning.
Once while watching a submission grappling tournament, another instructor and I were noticing a very talented young man in the competition. He did very well in all of his matches, but displayed bad attitude before, during, and after his matches. As a matter of fact, during his matches it looked almost as if he were purposely trying to inflict injury on his opponents.
The other instructor and I discussed this talented young man and talked about how it was a shame that he displayed such weak character. Then the other instructor said something to me that has stuck with me since. “He is simply immature as a martial artist.”
Sometimes just a few words can have paramount meaning.
As we go through life, there are many things that help develop our character. Our parents, siblings, school teachers, and friends teach us early in life. Later, our employers, co-workers, peers, and government guide us along. Life’s events such as relationships, births, deaths, successes, and failures help continue to shape us. These are the things that mature us as human beings…just being people.
As in life, we mature as martial artists. We start off knowing nothing of the physical, mental, or spiritual application of martial arts. We move into an adolescence stage where we think we know much more than we actually do. After much experience, we mature as martial artists and realize that we will never know it all.
Another friend once described the four levels of consciousness to me. He said, “There is unconscious unconsciousness, conscious unconsciousness, conscious consciousness, and unconscious consciousness.”
Again, just a few words, but paramount in meaning.
We are at first unaware that we are unaware. This is the stage before a person begins martial arts training.
As we begin to train, we are humbled in learning that we are not magically able to apply martial arts and that it will require many hours of hard work to develop these skills. We have to swallow our own ego and admit that we make mistakes.
Next, we begin to become more efficient in our application of skills. We know that it takes work to improve, but we now also know that the work pays off.
Finally, we reach a level to where application of skills can be done as a muscle memory action. We no longer have the think and plan out each move. The techniques simply flow though us. We are humble and no longer are our motives ego driven.
Each of these levels of consciousness has also come with many failures. It is the failures that teach us humility. Loosing keeps us humble. Overcoming the failures and losses is what helps us grow and mature as martial artists.
Since the beginnings, martial artists have sought out worthy opponents to test their skills against. The test is not of whether one can beat the other, but rather to discover one’s own physical, mental and spiritual weaknesses. Once those weaknesses have been exposed, the martial artist can focus energies to overcoming and correcting those errors.
As in life, physical maturity in martial arts comes much sooner than mental. Even black belts can be immature as martial artists. The literal translation for “shodan” is “beginning degree”. This is to indicate that the person is mature in the physical application of technique, but the path to martial arts enlightenment has just begun. Statistically, only 1 in 100 students will ever make it to shodan rank. Even less make it farther than that.
In life, we learn from our mistakes, and if we’re paying attention, from the mistakes of others. In martial arts, we do the same. Learning helps us to grow. Growth means that we are maturing. This continues throughout our lives. In our entire lives, we will never learn all there is to learn in martial arts, but we will continue to mature as martial artists.
No comments:
Post a Comment