This week has been another full week of training. At times it comes as a bit of blessing that I’ve got a positive outlet like Muay Thai as part of my life as not only does it help me develop my skills, set goals and all the other good stuff attached, I’ve found it’s a great stress reliever too. A kind of therapy at points and gives me a lot more clarity and focus about other situations in my life.

Training this week has left me with a good feeling and that martial glow that always come as a gift for time well spent in the gym. It’s not always easy to bring what you develop in training into the rest of your life but it’s something I’m getting better at doing. I started off the week taking a lot of time listening to some great pod casts by Geoff Thompson on presence and being ‘in the now’.

Being present and focused is something I think is important for training and fighting so I found the video ‘Who am I?’ pretty good and I’d say it’s worth a watch. You can find it here and some other videos are available too. Don Heatrick has also written some good blogs on what he calls ‘flow state’ and Muay Thai and that really for me is where the desire to start learning more and trying to develop this side of things began for me. It’s an ongoing process but I can see how important it is when it comes to competing and even in the gym. I guess you need to learn how not to think.

Wai Kru / Ram Muay my first fight October 2010 ‘Pure Thai’ 

I’ve found at points that when I’m fighting I find myself very much in the now or the present moment (call it what you will but it’s the most important time. Really it’s the only time that exists.) and instead of thinking I keep myself focused and I develop a tunnel vision mentality. All that matters and all that I am focusing on is that person in front of me. Everyone else seems almost in the next room. People say you don’t hear anything when your fighting (at least other than your corner) and it’s true in a lot of respects. At least it is for me anyway.

Any type of self doubt, any voice desperately trying to tell me what technique to use next is simply put to one side so I can deal with what is happening in the here and now. So I can focus on winning. I guess when you’ve put in the work in order to achieve that then anything becomes possible and every single second that passes is an opportunity to turn a bad situation to your favour or ideally keep pressing your advantage. I’ve learnt that even two seconds hesitation is enough to cause you big problems if you don’t learn how to cope under pressure and make sure you keep the pressure on them.

And of course the best place to develop those skills is of course in the gym. It’s where I practice my drills and work my techniques and get what I need hard wired into the sub concious ready for the next time I step up. It’s the place where I feed my good wolf.

Right now I’m focusing on improving technique, as well as stepping the gear up a little as I am aiming to fight again in October. Suffice to say training is going well, and I’m sure I’ll be as razor sharp as I can be before then. I’m keen to shake the small film of rust off and finish off this year on another good note. I fought last in May and it already feels like a lifetime ago.

I’m going to keep working on presence and focus in training.( Believe it or not it’s something you can do walking down the street, putting the kettle on or anything else. You just have to give what ever your doing your complete undivided attention. Then see what happens..Switch off the internal dialogue using two simple methods ‘hear I am and there is the voice’  or ‘I wonder what my next thought is going to be.’)

I really think it’s going to benefit me. It’s something I want to bring into the rest of my life and I hope at some point I can follow up on this blog and let you know how me, myself and I are getting along.

And of course next week, just like the week before I’m back at the gym feeding my good wolf. He always stays hungry. Have a good week train hard and I’ll see you on that road.

“Just learn to be. In the motion of combat there is in life only now. The past is an illusion the future has not happened yet.The truest moment in combat is the ever flowing now.” – Bruce Lee ‘The Tao of Jeet Kune Do’