In our experience and as discussed in my last blog on perseverance, the majority of people who quit martial arts training do so at two key points; within the first few months and shortly after becoming a black belt. There are many reasons people quit. The novelty of training may have worn off and they may be struggling with the commitment required to progress. They may have become frustrated with themselves and believe they are not good enough. Or they may be struggling with injury or illness. For newly promoted black belts, they may feel that they have achieved their goal and don’t want to make the commitment to several more years of training to progress to the next level.
There are a myriad of reasons for quitting. However, the way people quit is similar. They will often tell their instructor by text or email after they have made the decision to leave. Some just stop training without even telling their instructor. Others will say they are taking a break, but in our experience few will ever return to training. While students may quit in different ways and for differing reasons, one thing is consistent. They rarely talk to their instructor about the difficulties they are experiencing before they make the decision to quit. At some point during your martial art career you are likely to feel like giving up. So what should you do if you feeling like quitting?
Martial arts training is not easy. It is difficult and you are likely to feel like quitting at times. I am interested to hear about your experiences. Have you ever felt like quitting and if so, what did you do about it? Please leave a comment. JKN Jane Hurst First degree black belt and school owner Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero Copyright © 2018. Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero. All Rights Reserved.
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During my childhood I played the piano. It was my passion and I put in thousands of hours of practice until I was about 20 years old. Needless to say I got pretty good at it. Even after a 20 year break from music, I could still play the piano well. The key was not only lots of time spent practising, but also making sure that the practice I did was of good quality.
Martial arts is no different to learning a musical instrument. To become good at it you need to practice a lot. As a general rule of thumb, you need to put in about 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill. For most of us who do martial arts recreationally, we will never achieve this level of practice. Even if we train for 5 hours a week for 50 weeks of the year, it will take 40 years to reach 10,000 hours. While mastery may not be achievable for most of us, any practice will make us better. However, in my experience many people who train in martial arts either do not practice at all, other than during class time, or do not know how to practice well. It is not simply a case of repeating something over and over again, mindlessly. Practice must be deliberate, mindful, and structured to be effective. Here are some of the practice traps people fall into. 1. Unstructured practice: Most people practice without a plan. They just go through their material in sequence, practicing everything once or twice. While any practice is probably better than no practice at all, the benefits of this type of practice are limited. The time that most of us can devote to practising is relatively short, so we must plan for how we are going to use that time most effectively, to ensure everything is practised properly. 2. Only practising what you are good at: It is common to focus on the things we are good at as this makes practising more enjoyable. However, we will improve more by practising those elements that are the hardest. This means we must break down our practice into components to ensure we devote practice time to the hard stuff, even though this might be difficult or less fun to do. 3. Always starting at the beginning: Most people practice by starting at the beginning. For example, when practising forms in Kuk Sool Won™ (patterns in Taekwondo or kata in Karate), most people will practice the entire form from start to finish. This approach makes you good at the material at the beginning and the easier components of the form. A better approach is to break the form down into segments and practice those. This ensures you practice and get better at all elements, including the harder parts. 4. Not being mindful: Many people just go through the motions when they are practising without thought or awareness. Practice must be deliberate and mindful to be effective. This means we need to really think about what we are doing. By being aware while we are practising, we can pick up and correct any mistakes we are making, refine our skills, and develop a deeper connection with and understanding of the material we are learning. There is a saying that practice makes perfect. It doesn’t. Practice makes us better. It increases our physical skills, as well as our knowledge and understanding. Effective practice is not something that simply happens. We need to consciously develop good habits. This requires effort, thought and self-discipline. However, the rewards from disciplined practice are significant. You will get better, more quickly, and develop a deeper understanding of your martial art. In my next blog I will focus on the third of the three P's; perseverance and martial arts. JKN Jane Hurst First degree black belt and school owner Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero Copyright © 2018. Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero. All Rights Reserved. 
As a white belt, I was often frustrated with all of the things I couldn’t do well. My balance was terrible, I couldn’t remember the moves, and I was constantly annoyed by the physical limitations of my 45 year old body. However, no one at my school expected me to have great kicks, or to remember everything easily, or to have great balance. In fact, they would have been surprised if I had. But I put huge pressure on myself and would easily become despondent. Martial arts brought me face to face with my nemesis, patience, and I didn’t like it. As a black belt, instructor and school owner, I now find myself helping students with similar challenges with patience. Everyone’s challenge is different, but here are four of the common ones. 1. Unrealistic expectations: Martial arts training is neither easy nor is not meant to be. In many ways, white belt is the hardest level of training in martial arts. You have never done it before so why would you be good at it? It would be like expecting to be good at playing the piano within a few weeks or months. We know it takes years of patient practice to become good at playing a musical instrument, so why would martial arts training be any different? Managing our expectations to ensure they are realistic is a key part of developing patience. 2. Physical limitations: A fortunate few are blessed with athletic prowess. For most of us though, we have physical limitations which affect our ability as martial artists. I have two herniated discs in my neck and I am not very flexible. I am also middle-aged. All of these limit my martial arts training in some way. It is easy to become frustrated with physical limitations and either push your body too hard (risking injury) or give up. The patient option is to accept your physical limitations, minimise their impact, and work to your strengths. For example, I don’t do falling techniques as they hurt my neck. I also accept that I can’t kick very high, but I do gently work to improve my flexibility. By being patient with our bodies, we can gain many benefits from martial arts training without hurting ourselves or becoming despondent. 3. Challenges with memory: Many people struggle with their memories. This can be particularly challenging in a martial art like ours (Kuk Sool Won™), where there is a lot of material to learn and remember. It can feel very daunting in the early stages of learning a martial art, particularly as you are also trying to remember new ways of moving and using your body. Developing your memory is like any other skill. You need to work at it. At first, your memory won’t be great, but over time it will improve. If you get stressed and frustrated though, it will make your memory worse. By being patient with your memory, you will enjoy the process of learning a great deal more and by being more relaxed, your memory is likely to improve. Even if it doesn’t, you will still benefit from your training. 4. Competitive nature: I am a competitive person by nature. I want to be good at what I do and I am always looking to push myself to be better. It is common for our students to be competitive with themselves. This provides a high degree of motivation to train and to improve, which can be a good thing. However, it can also lead to frustration and injury. As well, it is easy to miss the joy of training and learning. Patience involves being in the moment and enjoying the process of training for its own sake, rather than as a process to enable the achievement of a goal. Patience is something that must be practiced and developed. It comes naturally to very few of us. By becoming more patient, we learn to accept our limitations and show ourselves more kindness. This is an important part of martial arts training, which will have flow on benefits to many other aspects of your life. In my next blog I will talk about the second of the three Ps, practice, and how this is relevant to martial arts training. JKN Jane Hurst First degree black belt and school owner Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero Copyright © 2018. Kuk Sool Won™ of Onewhero. All Rights Reserved |
Caroline and Jane Hurst
Caroline is a 5th degree black belt and Jane is a 2nd degree black belt in the traditional Korean martial art of Kuk Sool Won™ . They run 2 Kuk Sool Won™ martial arts schools in New Zealand. Archives
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