I think one of the most frustrating things and interesting things about practicing martial arts is that are always new challenges. Having acquired a skill in one area does not always seem to seamlessly transfer to another area of practice. There always seem to be something put before you that is difficult to get right. Lately, my list of things I need to work on, things that don’t seem to come natural continues to grow, rather than shrink.

My teacher’s advice for this tends to be this: Pick one thing and work on that. Often training that one thing will automatically raise other skills along with it.  Now I do not think he means practice this one thing to the exclusion of all else.  But he does mean to pick one thing and really focus on it.  This is good advice. I need to take it to heart more but sometimes it is difficult to narrow it down to that one most important thing but I have decided and now need the discipline to stick with it.

And so, as I find with virtually everything in my martial arts training, I can take this idea of picking out one thing and really working on it into my life. What one thing in my everyday life needs the most improvement? If I work on that, will other things naturally improve along with it? I think that one is for certain.

Better get busy.

1. I sometimes will change into my uniform or at least a part of it like the pants to try to put me in the frame of mind simiar to when I am at class. It’s sort of like taking off your fuzzy slippers and bathrobe and putting on something decent to sit down and work from home.
2. I do laundry or clean the bathroom. Practicing quickly starts to look better and better.
3. I put on a little ”Kung Fu Fighting.”  Well no…not really. In fact, I really can’t stand that song but figured you’d be expecting that one and didn’t want to disappoint.
4. I make a deal with myself just to get my warm ups done. Once I’ve finished, that usually is enough to get things going even on low energy days to get some additional practice time in.
5. If I really am not up for practicing physically (injured, really sore, sick whatever) I use some of the time I would have spent physically practicing on doing some extra mental side like meditating or visualizing. In fact, visualizing yourself going through a form or something that you find difficult and picturing yourself doing it well can be quite helpful. Scientific studies show that going through these “mental gymnastics” actually cause the same muscles to fire as if you were actually doing the activity.

Basically, on those days when you are just not in the mood are the days where you also get practice some self discipline by doing it anyway. Easier said then done but if you wanted easy - well this aint’ it.

What do you do when you know you should practice but just aren’t in the mood?