How martial artists deal with mistakes and how they apply that to their lives.

Mistakes are the portal to discovery – James Joyce 

Ever make a mistake before?  Of course.   

Learn anything from it?  Maybe.   

Waste the opportunity?  Yup. 

… 

Sparring one time, I watched my partner start to retreat and taking full advantage of the situation, I advanced on him.  The moment I started to move forward, he hit me with a wicked punch.  I still remember every detail of that exact moment.  I laugh at it because it was so obvious that he knew full well what he was doing, how I going to react and how he going to take advantage of all of that. 

I’ve used that exact same set up that he used on me, on other people about a million times since.  I learned from it. 

I had a friend hit me with the same submission in Jiu-Jitsu for nearly a month straight before I recognized it.  I wasted a lot of opportunities to learn that month. 

… 

When we’re training, we’re often trying new things.  Katas, techniques, timings, rhythms and patterns initially often feel awkward and foreign to us.  We try them and look like we barely have control of our own bodies. 

Fortunately, we’re in a safe, training environment and can afford to make mistakes.  As we work on new things, we begin to learn the subtleties of whatever it is that we’re trying to learn.  As we practice, we become more adept. 

… 

Our days are like that too.  We make mistakes but often get so upset about the mistake that we forget to learn something from them.  We see a mistake as a statement of our competency and take it as a strike against our ego.  

Our ego gets in the way of our ability to learn.  When we miss the learning experience, we waste our time. 

This week, as you go through the week, take some time when you make a mistake to really try and figure out the lesson that you’re being taught and instead of wasting the opportunity, learn from it. 

To your success,

Michael