In this episode of Martial Art of Self, we discuss personal commitment and investment for self. I share my observations on when I started questioning my purpose with martial arts when I kept doing the same exercises over and over. I could not figure out why I was doing what I was doing. I started having lots of doubts about my relationship with martial arts.

Martial arts, like so many other tools, can be used as an aid to support the best of you in this life. It is possible to create a better version of yourself through the system and principles of martial arts.

I share with you how I decided for myself the type of words I applied in my training, the exercises I used when I went into resistance, and what I had to do to re-invest in myself.

Music by Fidelis Spies

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Martial Art of Self podcast, a podcast about bringing the essence of martial arts back to self.

[00:00:12] Hi everyone, this is Aldin and in today’s episode we are going to talk about the point– the question “What are you committed to and what are you invested into?”

[00:00:27] During one of my recent training sessions last week I have been often facing resistance when it comes to training, to going to class to train, to going into training, performing my training, doing the exercises, doing the same movements, trying new movements – generally just a resistance towards moving myself in the physical body to do something physical out of self-motivation, out of self-directive principle, out of being self-initiated – you know not waiting for an emotion or a feeling to trigger the motive or trigger the motivation for me to physically get up and do my training based on a feeling- / emotional-based reward that I seek or desire or want to– want to attain or reach, if you will.

[00:01:31] But, a resistance when it comes to– when there is a lack, when there is none of such emotions or feelings that usually– that– that would act as motives or as motivational points for me to do the training. And, so I was– I was doing my exercises, you know applying myself, assisting and supporting myself through the resistance and sticking to my breathing, sticking to my breath, and sticking to the basic principle of making sure that I direct myself and I decide for myself if I’m going to train or not.

[00:02:11] So, that did assist to a very great degree and always does in terms of making sure I do do my training, I do tend to my training and I do go and– and perform my exercises and do not skip. But, during– in the middle of doing my exercises, in the middle of my training what I saw is– I started to question, I started to doubt myself. Like “Why am I doing this?”, “Why am I doing the same exercises or very similar exercises and exercising in general every single day, every single time?”. “What is the point?”.

[00:02:57] “What is the purpose?”. “Why am I putting myself through– through these mental, emotional and physical challenges like resistance, not feeling up to it, having to be creative and come up with new methods and applications to get myself just through that resistance, through that not wanting to train, not wanting to do the exercises, the feeling of tiredness, the feeling of just feeling unmotivated and so on and so forth?”.

[00:03:28] So, I was there observing within myself these internal processes of doubting myself, and asking myself the question in– in– in this nature of self-defeat of “But why am I doing this?”, “What is the purpose?”, “What is the point of all of this?”, “Why am I going through all these challenges day in and day out?”, “What– what do I get out of it?”.

[00:03:54] And, what I realized there is that I had not yet a complete and– and solid and sound reason and point as to ‘why’ I am doing what I’m doing.

[00:04:13] I had not yet defined clearly for myself ‘what’ – The ‘What’ I am committed to and the ‘what’ I am investing myself and all my resources of myself – namely time, and effort or energy, if you will, into.

[00:04:34] So, what I– what I did then is that– the answer– I looked at myself for the answer to that, in– in realizing and recognizing the need to define the ‘Why’, to define the points of first of all realizing: Okay, I am lacking commitment and I’m lacking investment into myself. I am lacking commitment and lacking investment into this exercise, into not really knowing clearly the ‘why’ I’m doing this. What is the motivational point?

[00:05:13] So, what I came up for me is I looked at it in self-honesty, being honest with myself, being true to myself, and I– I– I answered myself with that the exercise, the training that I’m doing, the training that I’m going through, the mental, physical, emotional challenges that I put myself through through going through such trainings every single day, and– and in general just having to day in, daily, repetitively apply myself and live certain words to just get myself through these resistances that come in forms of thoughts, of emotions, of feelings, of physical experiences, mental experiences, tiredness for example, or feeling angry, feeling depressed and so on.

[00:06:10] So, I decided for myself that I do the exercises, I do the training because I am committed to myself. I am committing myself to myself. I am invested into myself. I am investing myself into myself. I’m committing and I’m investing my effort, my energy, my time of doing these exercises because I’m committed and I’m investing and I’m committing into self-change. I’m committing, I’m investing into self-understanding. I’m committing, I’m investing into self-actualization. I am committing and I am investing into self- development.

[00:06:59] I am committing and I’m investing into self-transcendence. I am committing, I am investing into self-potential, self– bringing the best out of me that I can at any given moment of any given time. I’m committing and I’m investing myself into self-creation and the process of self-creation and the understanding, the knowing as I have proven to myself throughout the years of training, especially the last year – that doing the martial arts, being part of the martial arts, and having martial arts and the training involved in and be part of me on a daily basis – is so supportive, is so assistive into my processes of understanding myself, of understanding the person, the being – ‘who I am’, and how I function – understanding my mind, why I react to certain things a certain way.

[00:07:56] Understanding and getting to know more of the physical, my physical body and how it functions. How can I learn– learning and understanding more of how can I use my human physical body in equilibrium– in equality, in oneness with myself, my being to move myself, to do things, to perform actions, to be more physical, to create myself, to live– to live life instead of thinking about life; to live life instead of conceptualizing life, and being just intellectual about life? But actually living life, feeling it in the hands, moving on its soil, grasping it, breathing it in and breathing it out, and feeling it as it fills me. How can I use and how can I feel myself as the physical body that I’m within, that I’m as?

[00:08:58] And understanding and knowing that through the martial arts process, through the training I am– because it is very, very physical, I am in fact working with the physical there on, I would say, a deep level in– in terms of that I’m actually faced with many physical points that come up as– as– as a form of resistance or challenge to be more physical, to keep going as the physical and live as the physical.

[00:09:31] And, with those challenges equal the opportunity thus is here to understand those challenges, and understand and develop the skill, the power, if you will, as myself, of “How can I use my human physical body to assist and support me to keep going and living as the physical instead of giving in into the resistances – into the physical, mental, and emotional challenges that present itself in any given moment of life?” And, as I apply this and learn this through for example the martial arts training, and moving myself to do do my martial arts training – I’m able to apply the same skills, the same powers that I developed there in terms of– in terms of developing that skill, that power of: How can I use my human physical body to assist and support me through any physical, mental and emotional challenges and I can apply those to any other part of my life, to anything else that is part of my life – any relationship that is part of my life, such as work, school, education, relationships, friendships, my hobbies, martial arts, etc. Anything.

[00:10:57] Because, these powers I have realized– these skills, if you will – if– if you don’t want to call it ‘powers’ – are universal in the context that they are applicable to any other situation, because you learn from one– from one, or through one process – let’s see martial arts – but the essence of what you develop as that skill-set – for example discipline, and how to use discipline and be disciplined and what it means to live discipline and what it means and how it means to– How can you use your physical human body to assist, to support you to– to live that discipline and exert that discipline, and bring that discipline through within yourself, and apply it, and not waver – but stand at it as that ultimate, as that absolute discipline within myself, and apply it in any given situation that it is needed and called for.

[00:11:57] And thus– thus I have– I have decided for myself that this is the answer to my question of “Why am I doing this every single day?”, “Why am I putting myself up to these emotional, to these mental, to these physical challenges?”, “Why am I not just resting?”, “Why am I not just sitting on the couch binge watching TV shows one after the other, playing games, listening to music, browsing YouTube, Facebook – just not doing anything that’s really required physical effort, such as exercise for example?”.

[00:12:31] And the answer thus to myself is that because I’m committing myself, my time, my effort, my mental and my physical energy, if you will, into myself, into the processes of self-understanding, self-change, self-development, self-actualization, self-transcendence, bringing out the self-potential that I see is– is here, is available if I but live it. And, ultimately the process of self-creation – creating me and learning what it means to live. And, living life, living myself instead of conceptualizing life, instead of conceptualizing myself within my mind only.

[00:13:16] So, thus this– I’ve realized for myself being a very important question to ask yourself and to answer honestly for yourself of “How can I use my martial arts — how can I use what I’m doing and what can it do for me?”. “What can I learn from it?”, “What can I use it for to aid in, to support, to assist in bringing out the best in me, of me in creating and developing, and understanding myself, and actualizing myself as a human being, as a being – to a better version of myself continuously?”, “How can I use the martial arts that I’m loving, that I am– that I am enjoying, that I’m doing, or have been doing, or would you like to start doing – how can I do that?”, “How can I use it so that the martial art, that the practice is not only external but becomes equally an assistance, a support of the internal, the self-actualization of the being, of the self, the self-creation process, and the living of the self through the human physical body, living life instead of conceptualizing life only?”.

[00:14:38] And, everyone’s answer will be different based on what you honestly commit and invest yourself into.

[00:14:47] I find that committing myself and investing myself into myself is the ultimate I can do for myself. Because, what higher form of commitment and investment but to yourself – being invested to you, being invested and committed to yourself, to your self-development as a being to understand yourself, to actualize yourself, to understand your fears, to find solutions to your fears, to release your anger, to understand your sadness, your depression, your spite, your judgment tendencies, and transcendence them and actualize yourself through this process into a self-creation product, if you will, where you are a better version of yourself, continuously improved, and actually living instead of just thinking and feeling emotionally about life or about something.

[00:15:50] All right, we’re going to go up to here for this episode. Thank you very much.

[00:15:57] Thank you for listening to the Martial Art of Self podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, then please subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. You can also follow this podcast on Twitter and Instagram. For more information about the Martial Art of Self, please visit martialartofself.com