WHAT ARE YOU REALLY TRAINING?

 By Phillip Starr

We regularly engage in all sorts of exercises and routines that involvr stretching, toughening, and strengthening many different parts of our bodies. It's not unusual for many of these exercises to be more than a little uncomfortable; our muscles scream, we pour sweat, and grit our teeth as we force ourselves to move ever forward. But, for the most part, what is it that we’re really training?

Our minds.

A well-known martial arts adage tells us, “Your mind will give up a thousand times before your body does.” And it’s true. When our muscles begin to fatigue and ache, our minds scream, “Stop! Stop!” But we must push ourselves forward, ignoring its pleas.

And when we’re about to attempt something we’ve not done before, isn’t it the mind that tells us, “Don’t even try to do this. You’ll fail!” If we listen to it and believe it, failure is guaranteed.

So we must discipline the mind; train it to be our servant rather than acting as our master. I believe this is, for the most part, what our training is all about…much more so than training our bodies.

At the advanced stages of training (which, by the way, goes on for the rest of your life), training the mind takes on a whole new level of meaning.