its missing one of the most important aspect in martial art training. I used to think that it was just a cool thing to do and didn’t really understand the importance or the link to learning self defence! All of the top martial artists that I admired did it, now that I know a lot more people that are successful in business, they all preach about it too. There must be something in it, then why is it not something that everyone does?
The biggest excuse that I hear is that “they just can’t do it as they can’t shut off their thoughts”
A lot of people don’t understand how to do it so they’ve never tried and then there’s the ones that think its airy fairy and just for tree huggers!
The thing with meditation is that is so simple, I believe that that is one of the problems why so many people can’t see how they can benefit from getting a meditation practice in. Because it is so simple, people think that they are not doing it right!
Then there are also so many different forms of meditation, there is also thousands of different books on the topic. It can be pretty confusing, or is it?
I will make it easy for you, sit somewhere, make sure you are comfortable and ideally keep your back straight and your head upright. Bring awareness to your breathing, when you realise that you have forgotten about your breathing, come back to it. That’s it in a nutshell really, yes you will come away thinking that you didn’t do very well and couldn’t focus on your breadth as thoughts kept cropping up but guess what, that is meditation. Like all things in life, it does get easier but you won’t become enlightened overnight. There is a reason that its called a practice. I don’t know if I have ever met anyone that is enlightened but what it teaches you, amongst other things is to let go of our high expectations that so many of us have. It is about being in the moment and that brief time when you first begin and you are focused on your breadth and not running away with your thoughts, you are in the present moment!
After you have got used to the above and have got into a routine, then by all means look into other ways of meditation but don’t overcomplicate things. It really is that simple, the hardest part is disciplining yourself to put it in your daily lives.
I am not going to all list the benefits that you will get from meditation as I’m not google and you can search that yourself. The purpose of this blog is to argue that martial art schools should have meditation as part of their syllabus.
For a start, having the right mindset for training in the MA’s is crucial. I have bulleted my reasons why I think this:
- In a street confrontation, you have to know how to control you internal dialogue as well as override the fight, freeze and flight automatic response that happens.
- It helps student to become better students and focus better.
- A lot of students have come to us because of low confidence, anxiety, depression and a load of other conditions which meditation can help with.
- It helps gain new perspectives over stressful situations.
- It increases self-awareness which in martial arts is a crucial component that we need.
- It helps to bring in patience and tolerance, other key components that a martial artist needs.
- It can help people break bad habits as it brings more awareness to triggers that aid addictions.
- It can help with forming new relationships and connections as it brings an inner peace and a deeper meaning to life.
- It improves memory.
- You become more in tune with your body.
- It helps with being in tune with your emotions.
- You learn to breathe better, a valuable aid in martial arts.
- It helps with energy levels.
- It helps to install discipline into lives.
- Kids love it as they feel like proper ninja’s.
These are just some benefits that will help you grow your school and have amazing students.
