MONDAY MINDSET: CHANGE REQUIRES CHANGE WEEK OF 7/22/24 Change requires change. Obvious statement there, of course. If we want things to be different, then things will need to be different. Yet this seemingly simple idea is incredibly difficult to implement into our lives and habits. As a martial arts coach, I am constantly inspecting, […]
MONDAY MINDSET: SEEING PROGRESS WEEK OF 7/8/24 I often field e-mails from students (at the academy, and abroad – we have a decent social media reach here) – about their frustrations with their progress, or perceived lack thereof. Beginners, or those with the “Beginner’s Mindset,” have trouble seeing progress, as if it’s some opaque, […]
MONDAY MINDSET: TWO IS ONE AND ONE IS NONE WEEK OF 7/1/24 “Two is one, and one is none.” Commercial airlines have multiple engines but only need one to fly. Skydivers pack two parachutes. Automobiles have two sets of brakes (standard and emergency). The list goes on and on. In any critical system, there […]
MONDAY MINDSET: FEEL DEEPLY, ACT DEEPLY WEEK OF 6/24/24 Feel Deeply, Act Deeply. That first half–feeling deeply–that is something we can all say we experience. Sometimes it just hits you like a tidal wave, a deep feeling of motivation or interest or affection. Whatever it is, it hits you hard. And sometimes, we define ourselves […]
MONDAY MINDSET: THE ILLUSION OF STAGNATION WEEK OF 6/17/24 There comes a time in your training career where it feels like you are just not progressing at all. And if it hasn’t happened to you yet, it will. We have to remember that “progress” is a relative term. Unlike in weightlifting, us martial artists […]
MONDAY MINDSET: CHANNELS OF EXPRESSION WEEK OF 6/10/24 This week’s article is not a prescriptive (i.e., do X to get Y results) one. But rather just an observation and conceptual approach that I’ve taken to life, and how my martial arts training fits into a larger, holistic method of living. I am by no […]
MONDAY MINDSET: YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT WEEK OF 6.3.24 “You are what you eat.” Pretty much everyone has heard that phrase a number of times throughout their life, and it’s pretty straight forward: your body uses the food you eat to repair and rebuild your body. If you eat junk, you become junk. […]
MONDAY MINDSET: WHAT IS YOUR WHY? WEEK OF 5/27/24 Today marks the annual Memorial Day celebration, often associated with BBQ’s, sunshine, and getting stuck in traffic on the way to/from the shore. Of course, the purpose of Memorial Day has nothing really to do with any of that; it’s a day to remember the […]
MONDAY MINDSET: WHAT WE DO IN THE DARK WILL BE BROUGHT INTO THE LIGHT WEEK OF 5/20/24 What we do in the dark, will always be brought into the light. If you could boil down the lessons I’ve learned from my competitive fight career into an easily digestible nugget, this would be it. Fighting […]
MONDAY MINDSET: YOU DON’T NEED A SEATBELT… WEEK OF 5.13.24 …Until you do. As combat sports athletes, we walk a razor’s edge each day as we balance intensity and productivity with risk mitigation. Gloves, shinpads, floor mats, pads, rules, etiquette, no bare feet off the mats (wink wink)– these are all active filters that […]
MONDAY MINDSET: THE SHADOW WEEK OF MAY 6TH 2024 Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow –T. S. Eliot Although Eliot likely did not write his famous poem, The Hollow Men, about the difficulty of sticking to a health and fitness regimen, this excerpt from “The […]
MONDAY MINDSET: THE KEYSTONE WEEK OF 4.29.24 Coaches, Athletes, and Keystones– There should exist a natural tension between the athlete, who desires to grow, mature, and overcome boundaries, and the coach, who works to contain the athlete inside of a structured training protocol. People generally shy away from conflict or from disagreement, as if […]
MONDAY MINDSET: INSIDE OF US ARE TWO CHIHUAHUAS WEEK OF 4/22/24 Inside of us are two Chihuahuas. You’ve all heard the “ancient wisdom”: inside of us are two wolves. One wolf good, one wolf bad. Which one grows? The one you feed. Blah blah blah. To distance myself from this kind of TikTok brand […]
MONDAY MINDSET: DIALING IN WEEK OF 4.15.24 We’ve all heard the old expression, “practice makes perfect.” This really couldn’t be farther from the truth. We should really think of it more along the lines of “perfect practice, with perfect consistency and appropriate intensity, makes perfect.” There’s a lot to unpack there! When we step […]
MONDAY MINDSET: FEAR IS A COMPASS WEEK OF 04.08.24 Fear is a compass. Well, not always. We don’t necessarily want to run into a pack of hungry, wild wolves. But when pursuing our passions, we often find that fear will not let us freely move forward. Often this is fear of failure, fear of […]
MONDAY MINDSET: THE WARRIOR PATH WEEK OF 4.01.24 Pop-culture often makes a big deal of “The Warrior Path,” making it seem that the apprentice fighter must walk over coals, survive in the wilderness with just their wits, defeat hordes of faceless enemies, and stand on poles for days. And while extreme challenges will confront […]
MONDAY MINDSET: ESCAPE VELOCITY WEEK OF 3.25.24 In Rocket Science, there’s a concept called “escape velocity” – essentially this is the minimum speed at which an object needs to be traveling in order to escape the gravitational pull of another object. Practically speaking, if a rocket doesn’t achieve escape velocity, it won’t make it […]
MONDAY MINDSET: GIVE EXCUSES AN INCH, AND THEY’LL TAKE A MILE 03.18.24 Excuses are powerful. They are often appropriate–some of us have injuries, or restraints on our time or finances, that prohibit us from pursuing our goals. But these excuses often overstep their boundaries and trick us into thinking they absolve us of other […]
MONDAY MINDSET: WHAT IS STYLE 03.11.24 STYLE. Some people have it, some people don’t.. but everybody wants it. It’s an elusive thing. What, exactly, is style? Well, style is always defined in relation to some sort of system or instutition–“he’s got great fashion style,” “she has an awesome fighting style,” “his musical style is wonderful.” […]
MONDAY MINDSET: GIVE YOURSELF A PAT ON THE BACK 03.04.24 Seriously! Give yourself a pat on the back from time to time. We start our journeys as wide eyed beginners, wholly focused mostly on whether we can, or cannot, actually do something. That is the beginner’s burning question: “can I do this?” As we grow […]
MONDAY MINDSET: TOUGHNESS 02.26.24 We often confuse the ideas of “toughness” and “dominance.” We see the big, scary bully, with giant muscles and fists the size of cinder blocks, and we think to ourselves: “that guy looks tough.” What we really mean is, that guy looks dominant. Dominance doesn’t require toughness. I guarantee […]
MONDAY MINDSET: OWN YOUR MISTAKES 02/19/24 Own your mistakes. After all, you made them, right? Here’s the thing–most people have it twisted. In our hyper-connected world, we are privy to the “success” of other people. At least, a cultivated image of success that they often present on social media and other outlets. It can […]
MONDAY MINDSET: TEAMWORK MAKES THE DREAM WORK Joining and participating in a martial arts program is kind of a weird thing, right? I mean on one hand you are a paying customer — you have a right to take whatever you want, within reason, and define your own boundaries and level of participation. For […]
MONDAY MINDSET: YOU CAN ONLY FILL AN EMPTY CUP Quick one this week; I want to a little of my own, personal process with you. Bowing in and out of class can have many different meanings. In some ways, it’s to show deference to the instructor. In others, it’s to humble ourselves. Mostly, all of […]
MONDAY MINDSET 01.29.24 MAKING UP YOUR MIND DOESN’T MAKE ANYTHING We’ve all been there. It’s late at night. Small crumbs litter our chest, the smoking gun of a bag of potato chips gone missing in an instant. The feeling of “rock bottom,” of needing to make some change for the better. (We’ve all […]
MONDAY MINDSET: INACTION IS ACTION We often delay making difficult choices in order to look back and absolve ourselves of not taking the proper action. “See?” We’ll say, “I just wasn’t able to get myself together in time — but I would have totally completed that difficult task if I had been ready.” And we […]
MONDAY MINDSET: FOCUS FORWARD Quick one for you this week. Sometimes when I’m writing these, I find myself asking the big question: “why?” Why write these monday mindset articles when 99% of this stuff is just obvious? I’m not breaking any new ground here. Just simply pointing out the simple, basic, and obvious things that […]