Keep The Change.

I was running home from school one day, yes running. I would pretty much run home from school every day because I had a newspaper delivery route that I had to get done. In selling some of my newspaper deliveries I promised some customers their newspaper would be delivered by a certain time. I wasn't going to disappoint so I would run home ... rain, sleet, and snow.

Occasionally, I would ride my bike to and from school, when I had a bike. There was a problem of thievery in the neighborhood that I lived in at this particular time. It took me like five or six weeks to save up for a bike so after having three bikes stolen, I pretty much gave up on buying anymore. I was sick of supplying the neighborhood punks with new bikes. I was stuck making the 1.4 mile trek home from school every day on foot.

Well one day in my mad dash to get home I happened to be the first person to go down this particular trail where this small gang of bullies would hang out. Apparently, what these punks were doing was waiting for the first person to go down the trail and then they would beat them up every day. This day was my day to get beat up.

I was embarrassed. I was angry. I was hurt. And I immediately thought to myself,” I need to learn some of that Bruce Lee crap so I can beat up three guys at the same time!”

I didn’t like feeling embarrassed and helpless. I wanted to make a change. If I was ever in that situation again I wanted to be able to defend myself. I came to martial arts.

The majority of people who come to martial arts do not come for the sole purpose of becoming a better fighter, as I did. However, we all came to martial arts for the sole purpose of becoming better. Better physically. Better mentally. Better emotionally.

In our quest to become better we need to change. Improving yourself and changing yourself go hand in hand. They are not separable. To excel at whatever it is we put our time, energy, and effort into we must be able to handle change effectively.

Street art from one of my favorite artists, Banksy

I’ve experienced many personal and professional changes throughout my life. Since we are in the business of change here at CNY MMA I figured I would share some tips I have used to help me successfully deal with changes in my life. Maybe these 5 tips will help you as well.

1) View change as an opportunity to learn. Welcome change into your life. Resisting change leads to maintenance of the status quo. The status quo is the archenemy of improvement.

2) Have a long term vision and goal. Change can cause temporary short term pain. Focusing on the pain or discomfort that change brings only prolongs the discomfort. Focusing on your goals makes pain and discomfort just a small part of the process.

3) Stretch your ability to change in little ways everyday. Trade an hour of watching TV for an hour of reading everyday. Go somewhere without using a GPS. Use a traffic jam to meditate.

4) Ask yourself how this change will allow you to grow. What is the improvement coming from your changes? What benefits are there to handling this change effectively?

5) Trust yourself. Sometimes in life we screw things up so bad that we may lose trust in our own ability to change and improve. Learn from your mistakes in the past and they won’t be your mistakes in the future. You are capable of amazing things but you have to stick with it and trust yourself.

The more screwed up and out of control your life is, your body is, or your mental state is, means that change is going to be all the more difficult and challenging. Be prepared to show strength and determination. You can handle and learn from everything that comes your way in life. I learned this from martial arts.

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