It was 1998 and I had recently turned eighteen years old, and we had a major national election happening. I hadn’t planned on voting as I just didn’t know much about politics at all. Only vague discussions at school and random information on the nightly news or radio. However, the day of the election, my father came home and said, “get in the car, we’re going to go vote”.

I didn’t question my father, I just jumped in and off we went. In the car I asked him the inevitable question, “who do I vote for?” He said he couldn’t tell me who to vote for, that’s up to me. But he laid out the platforms of the two major parties and some brief information on the presidential candidates. I still wasn’t sure who to vote for. I ask him who he was voting for. I never forgot his response to me.

He responded by stating, “there’s five things you never ask someone.” First, never ask someone about their politics or who they voted for. Second, never ask about someone’s religion or beliefs. Third, never ask how much money someone makes. Fourth, never ask a woman her age. Fifth and most important, as he turns and looks at me for a moment after parking at the polling place, never ask a woman if she’s pregnant. The look on my father’s face suggested he may have learned that last one the hard way.

While occasional conversations about all of those five topics may come up from time to time, I’ve made a point to follow those five rules. Upon telling this story to some friends about the conversation I had with my father all those years ago, I wondered to myself. Can I come up with five rules to follow in our martial arts training? Would I need more than five, less that five? Let’s find out!

I thought back on the differences between students who have struggled and those who excelled. While it’s easy to state that those who are physically talented and quick learners are the ones to excel, that’s not always the case. Many times, those are the students I’ve struggled with the most. I’ll come back to this towards the end of this blog. First, lets dive into those rules!

Trust. The first step to learning virtually anything is to trust that the person teaching you is teaching you correctly. Much of that trust is on the instructor to provide an environment to build that trust. However, I’ve had students in the past that want to second guess everything I teach and ask the “but what if” question at every turn. This just stalls out class and learning. There’s always going to be a “what if”. It’s like a child asking “why” after every answer you give. Trust the instructor will guide you through the “what ifs’ down the road. There is no “what if” if you don’t focus perfecting the technique at hand first.

Trust also must be there between training partners. Every school has that overzealous student that goes too hard and potentially hurts their training partners. This is a trust killer. Actively protect your partner and communicate with them what you need from them. The Martial arts are a hands-on practice. Without a good training partner, there’s no progressing.

Along with trust comes loyalty. The more trust that is built the more loyalty there will be. Both between you and the instructor and you and your training partners. Trust and loyalty aren’t given, they’re earned through constant proper action.

Proper Repetition. Repetition is the only way to engrain the techniques taught in class. I’ve discussed the neurological response of how the body and brain learn a technique through closed and open-looped programs in a previous blog post, Batteries May Be Included But Loyalty Isn’t ( https://www.bourellemartialarts.com/batteries-may-be-included-but-loyalty-isnt/ ).

Out of brevity, I won’t re-write that motor function process here. Essentially, it takes physically attempting a technique thousands of times over with a neurological trial and error process to engrain a movement to a point where no thought is given for the action to happen. Think of typing on a keyboard. Did it happen the first day you started to learn how to type? Of course not. It took thousands of nt bsnr ud Fsb to type my name is Dan correctly. Learning self-defense is no different.

Most understand that consistent repetition is the backbone to learn a new technique, combo, form, etc. However, one must apply active adjustments to the technique in order to improve it. I find this often the case with my youth students. They may run through their form or self-defense techniques a number of times each day, but they do so with the end in mind. What I mean by that is they just want to get through the techniques. Not actively try and fix those techniques.

This is the worst way to train as the student ends up engraining incorrect techniques. This makes it ten times harder to correct. I’ll see students quickly flail their arms and legs out as fast as they can to get to the end of their material just to say they’ve gone through it all. Repetition isn’t the key to success in learning your techniques. Proper repetition is the key.

Consistency. Consistency and proper repetition go hand in hand with perfecting technique. Skill deteriorates over time, and one must stay consistent with their training to keep their technique sharp. One of the biggest issues I see students have is consistency making it to class. The students that progress the fastest and condition the best technique are those that I see in class multiple times a week.

Understandably, life happens. Illness, family issues, overtime at work, etc. It’s inevitable that classes will be missed from time to time or a week or two will need to be taken off. But please don’t let this be an excuse for not staying consistent. Practice at home. That could be physically training in a room of your home or in the yard or even out in a park. Physically unable? Reading through material sheets or watching videos or even just taking time to sit with your eyes closed and mentally run through material can all help until you can get back into class!

Depth. Every technique in martial arts (all martial arts styles) has depth far beyond what most casual practitioners see. Even a simple punch has a massive amount of detail to it. A beginner will throw a punch with much of their focus being on the arm and proper fist formation. An intermediate student will begin focusing on their feet and legs to generate more power and stability.

An advanced student will begin to focus on vital points on the target and timing to make the punch more effective and efficient. That’s just the process and depth of a punch getting to the black belt level. That depth continues through every black belt rank. I challenge every martial arts practitioner to take just one technique, or combo, and dig deeper.

I tell my students to consistently go back to old material and make adjustments to find new o apply an old technique. You may find that a punch in your form/kata can be used as an arm grab breakaway to set up the next move in the form rather than being used as a punch!

Acceptance. Last, but not least, is acceptance. One of the biggest things holding students back, in my opinion, is accepting that you may not be good at something. Or you may not have an answer. Or may not be as athletic or as strong as you thought you were. There are two times where this lack of acceptance hits hardest. When a student first begins their training and after they’ve become a black belt.

I firmly believe that the reason many adults don’t begin training in martial arts is a fear that they will look bad or learn they don’t have the skill set they think they do. Most people are pretty bad at martial arts when they first start. Same goes for any sport or profession you haven’t done before. That’s kind of the point. Just accept you won’t be good at it but will get better.

Oddly enough, black belts struggle with the acceptance for much the same reason. A fear they will look bad in front of lower ranks. This perception of “black belts are perfect” is ridiculous. This is where I begin to see egos develop. Hiding of weaknesses and only displaying strengths. Then when a weakness is exposed, an excuse covers it up. Black belts are far from perfect. Hiding weaknesses and developing egos hold not only that student back but may hold back other students looking up to that black belt with the assumption they will never be good enough to be a black belt.

As mentioned near the top of this blog, some of the students who have struggled the most to gain rank under me are those who are physically talented or have had previous martial arts experience. Some of these students are so confident in their skills that they simply won’t listen to my critiques or assume I’m wrong and continue to do it their way. Or they don’t want to display their weaknesses and only practice the stuff they are good at to maintain the ego. It has held back far too many talented students who could have been fantastic martial artists.

It would be easy for me to just let them slide and go up in rank so I could have that talented demo team member or model student that always looks good in videos and photos. But I never let it happen. I give out black belts to students who listen and learn. Not someone who just wants another notch on their belt. I’m very confident in what I teach. When I get push back, and I’ve politely explained the reason it’s important, and they still don’t do it, they clearly aren’t interested in learning or improving.

The ego can destroy one’s journey through martial arts. I’ll take a room full of physically awkward and uncoordinated students who listen, trust me, and work hard, over a room full of talented ego driven students who have no interest in learning anything new and hide their weaknesses. Drop the ego and accept that none of us are perfect. Some of us have just failed more than others, and that’s how we reached our current ranks.

There are my five rules to be successful in martial arts! Do you have any to add to the list that you felt helped you in your training? Post them in the comments, I’d love to hear them!