The true benefit of training

[terryl965]

What does each of you beleive to be the core benefits of all your training? How has the core only made your life easier? I mean there are several benefits to all of ours training endurance fitness and cardio Self defense, but we all have that core element that means so much more than the others. Mine is the ability to be able to find inner peace withen myself. That has been my core since the early nineties.

 

[exile]

Good question, Terry.

This is going to be a little hard to explain, I think. But for me, training is a way of learning to solve certain kinds of problems elegantly, even if the actions expressing those solutions aren't at all elegant, pretty or even very nice. Just as skiing and ski-racing used to be for me (a chance to apply technical ingenuity to solve problems of changing terrain, snow texture, slope steepness and gate placement in real time), MA is a way to solve the problem posed by an attacker who wants to hurt me and who gives me an opening—grabs my wrist, arm or shirt, tries to tackle me, or tries to verbally intimidate me into not defending myself. It's a problem that I need to solve fairly rapidly, in a way which maximizes my chances. If I can find the solution—incapacitate my assailant with minimum risk to myself (i.e., in the shortest number of steps)—then I've done a good job of solving the problem.

And I think the payoff is the same kind of satisfaction that I get from solving a math or logic problem, or skiing a very tight run through the gates, or balancing the letter shapes and the spacing between the letters and words in a calligraphy project—the pleasure of finding a simple but unexpected way to achieve a certain goal that seems very difficult to achieve when it's first presented, but which you can overcome neatly if you're thinking quickly and sharply enough...

 

[Kacey]

What does each of you beleive to be the core benefits of all your training? How has the core only made your life easier?

Training is a time when I can set aside the concerns of my life and concentrate on something else - in fact, training (especially in class, but also on my own) requires that I set aside the concerns of the day and concentrate on what I'm doing - or I'll make some grievous mistake and hurt myself (or worse) another person. Having set aside the things that concern me, I can then deal with them later, because I have spent time thinking about something else, instead of obsessing over my concerns - and that gives me the mental distance I need to set aside the emotional parts of my concerns and think more objectively about how to deal with the actual situation.

 

[newGuy12]

Haha! I was watching a video today that showed an interview with Kim, Sang H. He mentioned something about the struggles of daily life can be more scary than the possibility of being assaulted physically by someone (because for MOST of us, that does not happen often).

It was something, because I have had those thoughts myself. I understand what he said! Now, inner peace? No. But, I believe practice helps me in this way: If I chose to take some action, well, once I commence, I tend to see it through.

One way or the other, succeed or fail, I tend to get my licks in there, I give it a very good try, not halfway. Hehe --> I have been called obsessive compulsive, but, that is another story.

That is how practice translates to daily life for me, as far as I can tell. You do not kick "halfway". No. You either KICK or you DO NOT KICK during practice (I am not counting feinting or stopping short and changing during some free-sparring).

When you go on the line together with the other students, you KICK, or you DO NOT KICK.

In life, then, (to me, I speak only for my own feelings), you either DO or you DO NOT DO. There is not try! Hahaha!

I think its about FOCUS, for me. That, and I have the feeling that I have such a treasure with this practice that I am very contented with my life. It gives me great satisfaction.




Regards,

Robert

 

[HelloKitty]

I really need my training. Besides the obvious health benefits, it clears my mind and gives me the calm to see more clearly the daily living, to achieve goals, to stand up when it's necessary... ^_^* uh! I could tell you more a looot of time! LOL

 

[IcemanSK]

Training is a time when I can set aside the concerns of my life and concentrate on something else - in fact, training (especially in class, but also on my own) requires that I set aside the concerns of the day and concentrate on what I'm doing - or I'll make some grievous mistake and hurt myself (or worse) another person. Having set aside the things that concern me, I can then deal with them later, because I have spent time thinking about something else, instead of obsessing over my concerns - and that gives me the mental distance I need to set aside the emotional parts of my concerns and think more objectively about how to deal with the actual situation.

You articulated what I could not.:asian: