How do you motivate yourself to go to class or train when there are so many reasons not to. Whether you are thinking to yourself; I'm tired, I don't feel good, I had a bad day, I forgot a change of clothes, I am not mentally up to it today, I am busy, I would rather be shopping, I am sore from last class, I don't feel like driving to class, I don't want to go out in the rain or any other reason that can prevent you from training, there is one question that will remind you of the importance of pushing yourself to train.
That question is "On the street, would an attacker care that [insert excuse here]?" The answer to this question is no. An attacker does not care that you are tired or did not stretch yet or are in your dress clothes or that you wear glasses or any other reason that you can think of. I am not saying that we do not need an occasional break from training. My students know that I believe we all need short breaks during our lifetime of training but there are times where there is a decision on whether or not to train when it is time to leave for class (instead of staying on the couch) on a given night. Those are the nights that you need to ask yourself the one question.
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2 comments:
Sifu,
excellent recommendation.
I have a similar one - "Why do I study martial art?"
of course, you can answer stuff like "cuz it's cool. or "i want to be like jackie chan", but that is a surface motivation. Surface motivations get you practice for a year and drop out. There's something more. Maybe you were bullied as a kid. Maybe something happened to your pet dog. I dunno, DEEP stuff.
I took a long time to give the honest answer to this one. I won't share but I can tell you that my ego didn't like the answer. However, truth is always empowering and it had changed my life.
That's a good question that I believe all martial artists ask during their career. In fact, I even know one instructor that asked all his students write a 2 page essay on it...which gives me an idea for you :)
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