Intensity is Required (for Better or Worse)

When you’re learning to fight, ideas and hypotheticals only get you so far. This is especially true, if you’re looking for rigorous answers to tough questions like, “Would this technique work in a violent situation?”

I find that in my jiu jitsu practice that there is a great deal of importance on technique work and drilling. Ultimately, the supreme learning, however, comes with a requisite amount of real flesh and blood resistance. It needs to be a fight to truly problem solve, engrain rigorous fighting solutions, and adapt. 

This is how I learned weightlifting. 

I’m not sure I’d recommend it for everyone, but the principle is still the same. Learning to power snatch for the first time, I had all the common faults. I was pulling on the bar, my order of operations was poor, and I was slow. There was also just 115 pounds on the bar and I could afford to make all of those mistakes and still successfully secure the weight overhead, albeit in poor form.

That’s when my training partner asked me to put 185 lbs on the bar. His logic? The only way I’d make the lift is if I understood the technique. Alas, problem solved!

Ideas are good, but an environment that demands your understanding is better. 

When it comes to physical learning, it is both safe and important to approach the edges of your ability to engrain what you’re studying. Using light weights until you find “mastery” is a myth.

Mastery requires resistance. Step to it.