The Biggest Fight Of Your LifeFiled Under: Instruction, Uncategorized
It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.
- Siddhartha Buddha
Your biggest roadblock as a fighter is you. Laziness, assumption, arrogance, fear … all of these are personal battles for you to win. Even if you don’t ever beat the heavy-weight champion, when you have mastered yourself you have lived a full life.
The wise Chinese strategist stated,
Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories.
- Sun Tzu
Getting to know our enemy – our competition – is pretty straight forward. We watch videos of their fights, learn who they train with, what gym they work out of, etc. We put the pieces together to get a pretty good idea of who they are. Also, if you’re serious about your craft you get to know your opponent on a deep level when you fight.
In a way, you learn a great deal about yourself from an intense confrontation. However, as “enlightened” mixed martial artist, you should think of your character as a fighter being revealed during a match rather than discovering it as you compete. You should already know that you’re hardcore – you’ve trained well, shored up the weaknesses in your game, polished your strengths. The higher the level you train and compete at, the less you should have surprises on your end.
Those who gain mastery of martial techniques are good fighters. Those who master the inner game in addition to the physical are great fighters. It takes discipline of body, mind and spirit. I won’t lie. It’s a tough fight. But even if you do hold the title belt, if you haven’t conquered yourself all the victory isn’t enough. It’s a hollow success covered with puffed pride.
Know thyself.
For a man to conquer himself is the first and noblest of all victories.
The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself; to be conquered by yourself is of all things most shameful and vile.
- Plato
Other posts you may enjoy:
Tags: Philosophy
- Permalink
- BartB
- 18 Sep 2008 8:43 PM
- Comments (0)