Sir Winston Churchill may not have been a Black Belt; may never have been a combat athlete, he may not of ever been in the military, but he sure did understand the "Warrior Spirit".
What is the Warrior Spirit. How do you develop it. Where does it come from.
I had a student a year or so ago. He was an executive in his early forties who had earned a Black Belt in another Japanese martial art years before he began training with me.
He had a Bachelor's and MBA from a prestigious school and he worked for a Fortune 500 company. You could say that he was pretty knowledgeable and successful guy.
Coming from the martial arts background that he did, and being a bit of an intellectual as well as wealthy, you could say that he was a challenge to instruct at times because he had difficulty with "Emptying his Cup".
He was good at his katas. As a matter of fact, they were his favorite. He understood all the technical aspects of what I was attempting to teach him, yet he always wanted to explain it back to me and then show me how much he understood.
This was no problem for me unless we were talking about sparring or combat.
You see, this guy had a challenge with getting in there and mixing it up. He wanted to be a good martial artist, but the reality of the situation was his body language and facial expressions would give away that he didn't get it; there wasn't any "Warrior Spirit."
During one class, we were working sparring drills back and forth and quite frankly, he was hanging back, not getting in there with Intensity and Intent...and he was getting pummeled.
I could tell by the look on his face that he wasn't very happy.
I pulled him off to the side and said, "Bob, you are a good martial artist. You have years of experience, a Black Belt in another style, your well educated and you're successful. What is the reason that you get cornered or tested in sparring and you just give up and coast."
He didn't have an answer for me. He just told me that he wasn't into sparring and that he liked the art side of things and didn't like the contact.
I told him, "Look, I know you want to be the best Black Belt you can be with me, and it's my job to get you there, so let me be blunt; you aren't going to get your Black Belt here unless you can show that Warrior Spirit.
That means if you're getting pummeled, you're tired, your jaw hurts and you want to quit, you fight your way out anyway. You don't just sit there and take it. No matter what, you go down swinging."
He said he understood and he went back on the deck. I told him that we were going to have a little match to see where his sparring abilities were at.
I put him in with a partner who was equal to his rank but younger, faster...and way more aggressive. I told his partner, "Don't hurt him, but don't let up until I say or he backs you off of him."
The match began and sure enough, in seconds the younger guy had him in the corner and was whupping on him. I was yelling from the corner, "C'mon, you can do it. Don't take that from this guy. Move your head...counter."
And then it happened.
Bob got clocked with a an uppercut/hook combo and I literally saw his face change...his jaw set...and a look in his eyes that I had never seen from him before.
Before I could even say anything, he fired an uppercut/hook/cross combination that rocked his partner back on his heels, and right when his partner backed off and straightened up...
Bob hit him with a front kick that literally rocketed his partner across the deck and onto his back, where he landed right in front of me with a look on his face that said something like, "What the h@#$ just happened."
I called for the break and rushed over to Bob where I gave him a huge hug. I looked him in the eye and said, "Bob, that was the Warrior Spirit. You did it. You didn't back off, you didn't cover, you didn't fold...you came out firing and you knocked that guy on his can. Way to go."
His training partner and the rest of the students that were watching all rushed him, giving him high fives, hugs and handshakes.
Bob later came up to me in private with tears in his eyes and a grin on his face. He told me that never in all of his years of training had he ever felt such an incredible surge of confidence and calmness.
Bob had just broken through an important level and learned an invaluable principle.
You don't quit. You don't just sit there and take your lumps. You don't cry and whine.
You stand up for yourself, set your jaw, get what it is that you want in your mind...
And Finish Well.
Best,
William Huff
P.S. The Shaolin Monks of China knew a thing or two about the Warrior Spirit and finishing well. Get over to http://www.shaolinsecrets.com right now and see how you can get your hands on Volume I of the ten volumes of the written recorded history of the Shaolin Temple, which includes history, training techniques, principles of combat and much, much more.
P.P.S. - Come on, Finish Well. Don't read this far and then not go to http://www.shaolinsecrets.com. No one who reads this far is a quitter, so get over there now.