Martial Arts Training: What is Real Discipline?
What is REAL Discipline?
Hello Martial Arts Family! ICYMI, we recently had a promotion ceremony and there were some outstanding essays presented on the topic of REAL DISCIPLINE. Here are a few entries to inspire you – more to be added! Thank you to all of our students who agreed to allow us to publish their noble thoughts and inspiring words.
REAL DISCIPLINE is showing up and working hard, even if you don’t want to, because it will eventually pay off down the road. In other words, anyone can go to an exceptionally strenuous class, but going to the next one, and the next one, and showing consistency is REAL Discipline. Further, discipline is being cheerful, and inspiring others to do the same, as well as doing their best. However, we sometimes hold these imperative pillars of our martial arts as something really demanding, or even impossible. But true discipline is those small acts just as much as those big ones: maybe today, I’m going to do some pushups, or study more, or practice a few minutes, in essence, getting 1 percent better every day at whatever objective you want to achieve. It is with these ways that real discipline is displayed, opening up the immense rewards it gives.
By: Emmett B., age 15, September 2024
True Discipline is the ability to deny or set aside an immediate desire, whether it be good or bad, in order to pursue instead what is best for yourself, your loved ones, and your community. It is the introspection required to determine if what you want is what you truly need to excel and those supposed “needs” that are, in fact, wants.
I speak abstractly here, so I will try now to speak more plainly. Sometimes, we want to give up—whether in work, school, our martial arts practice, or our personal lives—when we instead need to challenge ourselves. Other times, we want to push ourselves, but what we actually need is to rest and reflect. Discipline in this sense has three aspects: 1) the ability to discern what is best for us, 2) the resolve to pursue that need, and 3) the transformation of that will into action.
Discipline is not easy, but it is always meant to drive us towards betterment of ourselves and others, not only here at the dojhang, but in every aspect of our lives. It is what allows us to both be and become the Best of the Best.
By: Ms. Andie, Adult Instructor, September 2024
Discipline is hard work, consistency, and determination. Discipline is hard work because without working hard, you aren’t going to get anywhere. This applies both in martial arts and just life in general. Discipline is consistency, showing up every single day, even if you don’t want to, or if it’s easier to just stay home and relax. Even with hard work, without consistency, it is very hard to make progress and move forward. Discipline is determination because when you combine hard work and consistency, you get progress. When you combine hard work, consistency, and determination, you can surpass your original limit and go to places that you may not have even thought possible. The combination of hard work, consistency, and determination is “REAL” Discipline. By: Jr. Instructor Adrien S, age 14, September 2024
Real Discipline is the ability to stick with your goals no matter how difficult it gets. It means choosing long term growth over short term comfort. Unlike motivation, discipline is steady and reliable. It lets you stay focused, achieve your goals, and live a fulfilling life.
By: Rocky R, age 13, September 2024
What is REAL Discipline?
Throughout my life, the word “discipline” has had several very different meanings. When I was a kid, the word “discipline” sent shivers down my spine! It meant “getting in trouble” or “punishment” for doing something wrong. As a young adult, the word “discipline” meant not doing what I want, or being “limited” and restricted. When I thought of the word, it conjured up images in my mind of being locked in jail, in chains, unable to break free. More recently, I’ve started to think of freedom and what it means to REALLY be FREE – free to live the life of my dreams, free to be happy even when times are tough, free to be kind even when the world may not be, free from letting negativity get under my skin.
What I’ve come to realize is REAL Discipline makes Freedom possible. Discipline is the structure, the boundaries, the ground rules we set for ourselves that lead us on the path to Freedom. Discipline keeps me in shape (no eating all the cookies in the cookie jar!). Discipline allows us to have a nice home (no spending all our savings on all the cookies in the world!). Discipline makes it possible for me to offer kindness to someone (could be in the form of a cookie?!) who is being mean. Discipline makes it possible for me to walk away from an unnecessary battle. Ultimately, discipline allows me to be Free to me Me!
By: Kendra J, NinjaMom, age 38, September 2024
I have watched real discipline at work over the past twelve years I have been a parent and student here at the Dojhang. I recall a student who started around the same time as my daughter High Rank Bu SabomNim Christie (1 level before 4th Dan Black Belt). He could not sit still and would talk incessantly at whomever was sitting to his right, to his left, behind and in front of him. He was distracted and was a distraction. I witnessed real discipline—the discipline of our Dojhang—transform him into a stellar student who stood straighter at attention than any other student, and who ended up taking private lessons and learning skills no one else was learning at his age.
I have seen adult students start their practice tentatively and diffidently, getting down on themselves for not remembering a particular technique, or for not getting a punch to go straight or a kick to go higher. But then I have watched the fruits of real discipline emerge, and have shared in the joy of their discovering improved abilities, new skills, new boundaries, and new aspects of themselves.
I have seen so many students go through all different forms of transformation, all coming about because of real discipline, which starts when a student begins to discover something within themselves and about themselves through their sustained and intentional efforts at martial arts, guided through these discoveries by the Supreme Grandmaster, Master Wilson, the masters and instructors. Real discipline is an act of introspection; and through that looking within, we compose new expectations and responsibilities for ourselves and then live into and up to those new criteria.
Real discipline does not involve efforts borne out of being punished or through self-admonishment. Real discipline is knowing about and loving yourself enough to realize that you can do it—you can stand still at attention without fidgeting; you can remember that technique you have just about given up on; you can break through any number of boards held in front of you. Real discipline is a path you have cleared for yourself to be your best self.
By: 3rdDan Instructor Eric E., September 2024
Other Essay Snippets
Featured Essays: How to Conquer Yourself
What is Promotion? Essay Response from a Martial Arts Student
Essays: The Best ways to Improve Myself through Martial Arts Study
