You Suck At Martial Arts

[gucia6]

good training is like a powerful drug; you'll want to train, you'll miss being away from training, you'll long to get back into action.

this sounds so much like me... I feel sick and regretful whenever I have to miss training, for whatever reason... flu, injury, work, just the wrong day...

Great post, thanks.

I'm really glad I ran a Google search that merely said, "sucking at martial arts". This post has been so helpful. I've been training for 5 months now. I'm 33 years old and this is the first time in my life I have chosen to stay with something when I didn't think I was any good at it. I think, sad as it is to say, I'm dealing with the feelings that come along with that for the first time, too - intense discouragement, fear of imminent failure, worry that it's pointless because I can't see how I'll ever get better.

I actually have gotten better. I can see that. But because it seems like other students are getting better much faster, I doubt that my progress is meaningful. However, the other students all have some background in either martial arts or some kind of physical activity - I don't. I'm learning every scrap of this for the first time, and sometimes my brain just can't process it all - all the different techniques, keeping the punches & kicks straight, teaching my body how to move - that has to take time, too. I was starting to realize that I need to suck with abandon - just go for it. It can't possibly be worse to suck boldly than it is to suck with fear.

Hey Sarah, great job. Keep it up.
I am late starter myself, began my adventure with MA at 34, but for me it was more the ability to stay around people than progress itself. I still suck and am so slow in "getting it", sometimes I even fail at what I already "know".


Once my instructor was explaining me the technique that I suck at big time, showing me how it should be done. Then he asked me if I see the difference. My answer was "Of course, the colour of belt". This left him speechless for a moment, and then he agreed that I just need to keep on practicing to master it.

 

[KenpoMaster805]

I just asked you this on another thread, but it fits this one too...do you read the posts you respond to? Or do you only read the titles?

I read and i respond to the title

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

I read and i respond to the title

Then you miss the purpose of the thread. For instance, this one is the exact opposite of what the title implies.

 

[JR 137]

I just asked you this on another thread, but it fits this one too...do you read the posts you respond to? Or do you only read the titles?

I figured his response would be “if you don’t want to suck, take American Kenpo.”

 

[Dirty Dog]

I read and i respond to the title

You really should consider reading more than just the title.

 

[Headhunter]

I read and i respond to the title

To quote a wise man....


"D'oh"

 

[DasTim]

I sometimes speak with discouraged newer students. They believe they lack natural talent, or that they are not coming along fast enough, or that they are just not 'getting it'. They feel that they are not progressing in martial arts and that they are not going to progress. Some of them are thinking about quitting. I am sure some do quit, without telling anyone. This is most unfortunate.

This is what I tell them...

In my experience, if you look around the dojo at the high-ranked students who appear to perform their exercises and kata effortlessly and well, with speed, precision, and power, what you do not see is the work that went into those capabilities. What you do not see is that when they started, as white belts, they lacked that ability, and in fact, many of them were about as uncoordinated, inflexible, and out-of-shape as it was possible to be. When you see a statue, you do not see the block of granite it was carved out of.

It has also been my observation that many of the most naturally-talented martial artists I have seen have quit before very long. I never understood why, perhaps they didn't feel challenged, or perhaps they were just bored, but they didn't stick around. When someone walks through the door and within days they are executing beautiful kicks and nice solid punches, I sigh and wonder how long it will be before they are gone. I wish it was not the case, but this seems to be what happens quite often.

I have seen one and only one secret to martial arts success, and that is to keep training. Train until it becomes a habit, and then keep training. There is no goal, no end-date, no moment in time when you will not have to train anymore. But don't be discouraged; good training is like a powerful drug; you'll want to train, you'll miss being away from training, you'll long to get back into action. And this is a very good thing.

So you suck at martial arts? You have no natural talent? Your balance is pathetic, you have no breath control, you are stiff and uncoordinated? That's terrific!

Go ahead and suck. I suck too. Everybody sucks. The question is not whether or not we all suck, the question is what we suck at and how badly we suck.

So you see a lot of students wearing black belts and they don't seem to suck. Trust me, they suck too. You just don't see all their mistakes, because your eye is not accustomed to looking for the details where they reveal their suckitude to their instructors.

What matters here is that we accept that we suck. It's OK to suck. Be awful, be useless, embrace it!

But keep one goal. As we train, we try to suck a little bit less each day. Not huge strides, small gains. It will sneak up on you, you will not notice it. Or you may notice tiny little differences one day and go "Hmmm, I used to not be able to do that..."

So we all suck and it's OK to suck and we're going to keep sucking.

Just suck a bit less each day.

Keep training. There is no one in the dojo who thinks you are the worst they have ever seen, because THEY were you a few short years ago. They have the benefit of hindsight which you do not yet.

But if you keep training, one day some new student will look at you in admiration and ask you how you got to be so good, or they'll come to you and sadly confess that they don't think they are 'getting it' and want to quit, and you will have to tell them the same thing I tell you now. You will tell them that when you started, you were not very good at it, and they won't quite believe you.

Yes, you suck. Keep training, suck less.

And we've all got your back. We all support you. We all sucked just as bad if not worse than you. And we just kept training. All you see when you look at the dojo floor is people who sucked but kept training.

Do that, all will be well.

Way back I fell in love with the martial arts and decided to take up Hapkido. I went on average 4 times a week, sometimes 5, and signed up for every special workshop. After a year I was still a white belt. People would join and after 3 or 4 months were asked to test for their yellow belts, I saw this happen over and over but I was never asked to test for my yellow. Some of the folks who started with me even got their green belt. So at the end of the year I concluded I must truly suck at martial arts and I gave it up. Might have been easier if the only two belts were white and black, then I could have deluded myself that I could actually learn this.

Sadly I still love the idea of studying martial arts, but since I obviously have no aptitude for it, there is no point in taking it up again only to be reminded of how bad I am at it. If one can't even develop the basic competency to test for yellow after 200 sessions, what is the point of continuing!

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Way back I fell in love with the martial arts and decided to take up Hapkido. I went on average 4 times a week, sometimes 5, and signed up for every special workshop. After a year I was still a white belt. People would join and after 3 or 4 months were asked to test for their yellow belts, I saw this happen over and over but I was never asked to test for my yellow. Some of the folks who started with me even got their green belt. So at the end of the year I concluded I must truly suck at martial arts and I gave it up. Might have been easier if the only two belts were white and black, then I could have deluded myself that I could actually learn this.

Sadly I still love the idea of studying martial arts, but since I obviously have no aptitude for it, there is no point in taking it up again only to be reminded of how bad I am at it. If one can't even develop the basic competency to test for yellow after 200 sessions, what is the point of continuing!

I'm sorry to hear you quit. I obviously don't know why you weren't promoted, but I'd like to suggest belts aren't the only, or best, reasons for training. Did you ever ask why you weren't being promoted or what you'd need to do to be promoted?

 

[Buka]

Way back I fell in love with the martial arts and decided to take up Hapkido. I went on average 4 times a week, sometimes 5, and signed up for every special workshop. After a year I was still a white belt. People would join and after 3 or 4 months were asked to test for their yellow belts, I saw this happen over and over but I was never asked to test for my yellow. Some of the folks who started with me even got their green belt. So at the end of the year I concluded I must truly suck at martial arts and I gave it up. Might have been easier if the only two belts were white and black, then I could have deluded myself that I could actually learn this.

Sadly I still love the idea of studying martial arts, but since I obviously have no aptitude for it, there is no point in taking it up again only to be reminded of how bad I am at it. If one can't even develop the basic competency to test for yellow after 200 sessions, what is the point of continuing!

Welcome to MartialTalk, DasTim.

You might be reading this wrong. Maybe you have no aptitude for that particular school, but might very well have the opposite experience somewhere else. Martial Arts school are as different from each other as restaurants are different from each other.

Did you enjoy training at the Hapkido place? If you did, please don't quit because of fashionable accoutrements to the costume worn. (I probably had more fun writing that sentence than I should have)

 

[drop bear]

Way back I fell in love with the martial arts and decided to take up Hapkido. I went on average 4 times a week, sometimes 5, and signed up for every special workshop. After a year I was still a white belt. People would join and after 3 or 4 months were asked to test for their yellow belts, I saw this happen over and over but I was never asked to test for my yellow. Some of the folks who started with me even got their green belt. So at the end of the year I concluded I must truly suck at martial arts and I gave it up. Might have been easier if the only two belts were white and black, then I could have deluded myself that I could actually learn this.

Sadly I still love the idea of studying martial arts, but since I obviously have no aptitude for it, there is no point in taking it up again only to be reminded of how bad I am at it. If one can't even develop the basic competency to test for yellow after 200 sessions, what is the point of continuing!

Do MMA.

 

[Alan0354]

Way back I fell in love with the martial arts and decided to take up Hapkido. I went on average 4 times a week, sometimes 5, and signed up for every special workshop. After a year I was still a white belt. People would join and after 3 or 4 months were asked to test for their yellow belts, I saw this happen over and over but I was never asked to test for my yellow. Some of the folks who started with me even got their green belt. So at the end of the year I concluded I must truly suck at martial arts and I gave it up. Might have been easier if the only two belts were white and black, then I could have deluded myself that I could actually learn this.

Sadly I still love the idea of studying martial arts, but since I obviously have no aptitude for it, there is no point in taking it up again only to be reminded of how bad I am at it. If one can't even develop the basic competency to test for yellow after 200 sessions, what is the point of continuing!

People move at different paste, some people might improve slow at the beginning, but all of a sudden speed up.

I was one of those. I was slow for the first two years. I skip belt testing on my own. When tested for even blue belt, I was not doing well. When the teacher gave me the belt, he was saying "good job", but I knew he was just comforting me. But right after that, Something clicked, of cause I skip the next belt test. But when I tested for my red belt, I was doing pretty good. Let's put it this way, the opponent flew back and landed on his back from my kick during sparring. When I received my belt, my teacher had a stern look and said to the fact "ok, work harder"!!! I was happy, he meant that, not a pity talk. So don't be too hard on yourself. Happened to me. I had a mental block, and all of a sudden, I saw passed it. Before, I practice hard, but like one kick at a time. I started to put in combinations, things started flowing.

I am NOT an expert, I only had a few years. But this is my experience. I have no idea about Hapkido, I would not know where to start to talk to you about that.

Of cause, Hapkido might not be your cup of tea. Always can try other stuffs. MMA would be my first choice.

 

[drop bear]

Do MMA.

Oh. And it is the system. Not the individual.

 

[Darren]

I sometimes speak with discouraged newer students. They believe they lack natural talent, or that they are not coming along fast enough, or that they are just not 'getting it'. They feel that they are not progressing in martial arts and that they are not going to progress. Some of them are thinking about quitting. I am sure some do quit, without telling anyone. This is most unfortunate.

This is what I tell them...

In my experience, if you look around the dojo at the high-ranked students who appear to perform their exercises and kata effortlessly and well, with speed, precision, and power, what you do not see is the work that went into those capabilities. What you do not see is that when they started, as white belts, they lacked that ability, and in fact, many of them were about as uncoordinated, inflexible, and out-of-shape as it was possible to be. When you see a statue, you do not see the block of granite it was carved out of.

It has also been my observation that many of the most naturally-talented martial artists I have seen have quit before very long. I never understood why, perhaps they didn't feel challenged, or perhaps they were just bored, but they didn't stick around. When someone walks through the door and within days they are executing beautiful kicks and nice solid punches, I sigh and wonder how long it will be before they are gone. I wish it was not the case, but this seems to be what happens quite often.

I have seen one and only one secret to martial arts success, and that is to keep training. Train until it becomes a habit, and then keep training. There is no goal, no end-date, no moment in time when you will not have to train anymore. But don't be discouraged; good training is like a powerful drug; you'll want to train, you'll miss being away from training, you'll long to get back into action. And this is a very good thing.

So you suck at martial arts? You have no natural talent? Your balance is pathetic, you have no breath control, you are stiff and uncoordinated? That's terrific!

Go ahead and suck. I suck too. Everybody sucks. The question is not whether or not we all suck, the question is what we suck at and how badly we suck.

So you see a lot of students wearing black belts and they don't seem to suck. Trust me, they suck too. You just don't see all their mistakes, because your eye is not accustomed to looking for the details where they reveal their suckitude to their instructors.

What matters here is that we accept that we suck. It's OK to suck. Be awful, be useless, embrace it!

But keep one goal. As we train, we try to suck a little bit less each day. Not huge strides, small gains. It will sneak up on you, you will not notice it. Or you may notice tiny little differences one day and go "Hmmm, I used to not be able to do that..."

So we all suck and it's OK to suck and we're going to keep sucking.

Just suck a bit less each day.

Keep training. There is no one in the dojo who thinks you are the worst they have ever seen, because THEY were you a few short years ago. They have the benefit of hindsight which you do not yet.

But if you keep training, one day some new student will look at you in admiration and ask you how you got to be so good, or they'll come to you and sadly confess that they don't think they are 'getting it' and want to quit, and you will have to tell them the same thing I tell you now. You will tell them that when you started, you were not very good at it, and they won't quite believe you.

Yes, you suck. Keep training, suck less.

And we've all got your back. We all support you. We all sucked just as bad if not worse than you. And we just kept training. All you see when you look at the dojo floor is people who sucked but kept training.

Do that, all will be well.

I don’t like this!!! I love this!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[vic]

The same can be said for just about any activity - chess, soccer, piano, painting, knitting, etc.

 

[Oily Dragon]

Oh. And it is the system. Not the individual.

It's both.

Obvious, dude. Superposition.

 

[Gyakuto]

I think martial arts are probably the most difficult skills to acquire. They involve mind, body and spirit in unique and substantial proportions. As a consequence the drop-out rate is high and before that happens, the drop-outee will not be poor. What was the question…?

 

[Jimmythebull]

I think martial arts are probably the most difficult skills to acquire. They involve mind, body and spirit in unique and substantial proportions. As a consequence the drop-out rate is high and before that happens, the drop-outee will not be poor. What was the question…?

Probably because most beginners are only interested in physical skills, self defense.

What was the question…?

You really are pike

 

[Darren]

I was told I could never ever do martial arts!! I had no natural abilities except good eye hand coordination, in the 7th grade I tried out for track took me 5 minutes to run 1/4 mile(never could run without falling) I have a lot of minor disabilities there are things that my past and present instructors did not want me to do because of my balance but I got better in time when first starting in the arts I would fall all over the place, remember sparring once even after being in for about two years I threw a round house kick and fell what on my face(how are you floor!) fell right on top of my classmate once! People often believe I am drunk or on something because of my mild cerebral palsy and bad equilibrium till they get to know me. Just don’t ever ever give up never!!

 

[Steve]

I think martial arts are probably the most difficult skills to acquire.

You think so? I don't think it's any harder than any other complex skill set.

Personally, I think the undue focus in some arts on non-physical skills is what gums up the works. There is a natural progression of development in any complex skill set, and when you try to do things out of order it stunts the process.

 

[Oily Dragon]

You think so? I don't think it's any harder than any other complex skill set.

Personally, I think the undue focus in some arts on non-physical skills is what gums up the works. There is a natural progression of development in any complex skill set, and when you try to do things out of order it stunts the process.

I don't even think they're that complex, martial arts.

"Skill set". Like, how useful is a martial artist, anyway. Pretty useless, if you ask me.

Fixing a plumbing fixture, now there's a complex skill set. I'm trying to replace a soap dispenser right now, which seems impossible because the flange is stuck to the sink. I might need to cut...that's a skill set.