Part of what motivates me as an athlete and as an instructor is that I know what I know, and I also know what I don’t know.  Seeking out the things I don’t know is a big part of my search for personal development in martial arts.  It is much easier to remain humble when I visit other schools and get put in my place by their beginners and intermediate students.  The “thrill” of being near the bottom of the class in these other environments helps me stay focused on where I am going in my own career.

Many people become complacent in their particular realm or area of expertise and stagnate due to a lack of learning and an excess of teaching.  This complacency tends to soften the mind and body.  To maintain his edge, a martial artists must have a heightened sense of others and a breadth of perception which can only be reached through continuous study.  Only when we train out of our comfort zone do we acquire a deeper understanding of our own skills.

Training hard is not always fun, but there is always something new to learn about myself.  Most of the time I learn that whatever I though I knew was not quite right.  After so many years of having the same experience, I have finally figured out that practicing martial arts is not about getting things right, it is about making them better.  Working out will  never be dull for me because I know that, no matter how much I get wrong, I can improve if I keep training.

My love of training not only stems from experience, but also from a internal restlessness – a unquenchable desire to refine my skills.  Each time I practice, I learn.  Each time I learn, I know what needs more work.  When I set out to work on it (practice again) I learn more, and then I want to do more work.  This process has been repeating throughout my entire life, and although at times my body feels as if it has nothing left to work with and my mind cannot quiet down, I can keep going because I know that there is nothing else I would rather do.

Sometimes I think that I must have lost my mind in the search for skill, but perhaps it was my mind that was in the way the whole time?  Maybe I never lost it, but I began to understand when it was helping me excel and when it was dragging me down.  This struggle to coordinate the workings of the mind and body is what makes the martial arts so beautiful.  I love training because it is my way, it is my life.