I am sitting at home, watching the halfpipe event in the Winter Olympics.
One of the athletes goes down the slope, knowing he has to put on an excellent display in order to get a podium position. He drops into the pipe. He speeds up towards the other end, catapults high into the air, and performs a fancy, tricky and impressive move. As he lands, he loses his balance and crashes face-first into the snow.
He gets up, visibly disappointed, finishes his run and stands at the finish line, on the grandest stage in the world, in tears.
And here I am at home, watching this with a big smile on my face.
Why?
Not because I’m a mean, cold-hearted bastard (at least I don’t think so).
The Olympic athletes represent the pinnacle of human athletic endeavour. They have spent their lives getting to this moment. They have spent the last few years training hard and with diligence to secure their spot in the team.
And it all disappears in a flash; one misstep, one tiny shift of body weight; one minuscule twitch of muscle fibre at the point where physics and snow and human collide.
And now they have to spend another 4 years going through the same arduous process to hopefully get to the same point, and hopefully correct that one mistake.
Why am I harping on about this? Why am I smiling?
Only 3
Because these amazing human beings understand what many martial artists know from their training. They feel this as intensely as human beings are capable of feeling anything:
We don’t always get what we want, even if we worked hard for it.
They know that not everyone gets a medal, and the podium has room for only 3 people. Not 4. Not 5. Not everyone who gosh darn it gave it a really good go. Not everyone who participated in the games.
Only 3.
At the pinnacle of sports, there’s no reward for coming close. In fact, in most professional sports this is the case.
In the age of ‘everyone gets a medal’, some people fail to see the connection between this and smaller things.
It is unfortunate that many martial arts exacerbate this already unhealthy behaviour.
In the martial arts, this has translated to ‘everyone gets a stripe’ or ‘everyone gets a belt’.
In other words, participation, rather than effort and result, are rewarded.
I have heard parents talk of the Olympics and how sad it is when someone loses and in the next sentence, literally, ask why their little boy or girl did not get promoted. After all, they’ve been coming to all the classes!
Most martial artists will be familiar with loss, defeat, and disappointment.
Maybe you lost a fight or competition that you trained hard for. Maybe you didn’t get the result you wanted in a grading, or even not get graded at all. Perhaps you are not progressing despite putting in the hours. Or maybe you got injured just before a big event that you’ve been training for.
I’ve experienced all of these examples and many more. And I’m sure that any martial artist reading this will nod in agreement.
These are things that we experience on a regular basis in training. And some of the great traits that are developed through this are discipline, perseverance, and humility. We learn that merit is earned through hard work, and that failure is a great teacher. It teaches us to value those things that are important to us when times are hard. The experience tells what we need to do in order to grow, if we only deny our ego of dictating our response. It helps us learn and meet certain important needs (more on this here).
We learn to respond, rather than react (more on this at another time).
Time and Money
If you’ve read any of my previous articles (especially this and this) you may think I am entirely opposed to the idea of rank as it relates to attendance and payment. This is not true! Here’s why:
- Rank promotion based on attendance – Attending a set number of classes may be tied to the opportunity to test for rank. It shows commitment to the goal, to a certain degree. But it should not be tied to the result. This is especially common in kids’ martial arts. You don’t get promoted just for rocking up for work. You don’t graduate from university just for coming to class. You don’t keep a relationship healthy just by being there; almost everything in life is awarded to you through effort. Rocking up is just a given for you to be able to put the effort in.
- Rank promotion based on payment – If the instructors and grading panel invest their own time to take you through this process, and incur expenses in doing so, then they should be compensated for that time, and no mistake. But that should never be tied to the result of the test. That connection needs to be understood. It is fair to pay experienced individuals for their time in helping you. You pay your doctor for them to tell you how to get better, but it’s up to you to take your medication. You pay your accountant to get your tax affairs in order, but they don’t pay your taxes in your place (wouldn’t that be sweet!). You pay a lawyer to represent you in court, regardless of whether you win a case or not!
I wonder if the widespread epidemic of ‘pay to play’ apps is tied to this attitude. Most people play games on their devices. Many of those games are free, but require payment in order to unlock bonuses that allow you to progress further or gain an advantage. In other words, everyone gets to play, but those who pay get to win.
I remember an example of someone who did not get the result they wanted in a grading. Their reaction (not response) was shocking; they threw away their certificate and badmouthed the classmates who graded higher than them. They went as far as insulting the instructors, and even coming back and challenging some of the instructors to fight them. This person, who was still a white belt, wanted to be awarded the rank of junior instructor after only having trained for 6 months.
And why not? After all, in their previous school, they were awarded rank based on attendance and paying the grading fee.
That is an extreme example, for sure. But it demonstrates the problem well.
We Are What We Regularly Do
In the context of self defence, which is my main focus in training, this behaviour can be incredibly detrimental.
One of the first and hardest hurdles to overcome in a real altercation is to accept what is happening and to act appropriately and decisively. If we are used to things going our way, are not regularly challenged or generally allowed to believe that ‘this will never happen to me’, our chances of survival drop drastically. Being able to accept what is, as opposed to what we want, is a key trait in doing this. And being forced to deal with failure and disappointment is a powerful tool for accepting that which is real. You can read more about these incredibly important concepts here and here.
Lemon Chiffon
So, back to the Olympics.
Would we still watch the Olympics if everyone got a medal, and got to stand on the podium together at the end? Would we sit through the national anthem of participants 1 through to 50?
If you answer yes, then I call your bluff. For one thing, we would run out of colours for the medals. ‘And at 31st place, the lemon chiffon medal goes to…’, which may be followed by midnight-blue, emerald-green and fuchsia-pink for spots 32-34.
And no sane person would sit through 50 national anthems in a row voluntarily.
Seriously though – we simply won’t be interested. And the same goes for any other artistic or athletic venture. Why should martial arts be any different?
So why am I smiling when I see Olympians failing?
It’s not because I’m happy to see them fail.
I’m smiling because I am happy to see human beings fully invest themselves into something with the knowledge and acceptance that nothing is guaranteed. It’s because they choose to go through the path of hard work and dedication, without the promise of any reward other than the experience and their own growth.
It’s because I see the attitude of Budo, the Warrior Way, outside of martial arts, and that gives me hope.
Stay tuned, stay safe.
Osu/Oss
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- Don’t be That Person! Thoughts on Giving Feedback in Class - January 30, 2019
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