“How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight?”

– Tyler Durden in Fight Club

Ok, so technically I didn’t pay to get beat up. I hoped to win.

But I lost my first match.

Tied the second. That’s improvement.

Walked away with two black eyes.

Believe it or not, I conducted a mediation a couple of days later. I like to keep things real.

Some context

I’ve been training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) a couple of years now.

Although I’ve always been physically active, I’ve not been particularly interested in competitions since high school. And high school was a long time ago.

When I started BJJ, just training was enough of a challenge. I loved it. I enjoyed it. But nowhere in my imagination did I consider myself a martial arts competitor.

However, a few weekends ago, I entered my first BJJ competition. In a previous article, called How To Master The Game of Mental Leadership, I described how I prepared for this.

I definitely did prepare. I was in great physical shape. I knew as much technique as I was going to.

While I felt nervous about all the unknowns of competition, I was ready to go.

Reality vs Expectations

As it turns out, I was completely unprepared for the intensity of the match. And how that would impact me.

Yes, experienced competitors all told me this would be the case. But I had no context with which to imagine the experience.

Without going through the “blow by blow” let’s just say I thought I put up a good fight – but made some simple errors that cost me the match.

Losing in martial arts is not fun. It’s a lot less fun than losing in most other sports. For reasons you might imagine.

As I mentioned, I tied in my second match. But by the time clock ran out and the judges called it – I was so tired I didn’t care about the results. I just wanted to be done.

So…why?

I wasn’t really fighting my physical opponent. I was fighting myself.

Fear is the single most powerful inhibitor of success, change, growth, healthy relationships and almost everything good in life.

Even if you have any of the above, fear can and will rob you of your ability to enjoy it. It may rob you of it altogether.

Fear is what drives anger. Fear is what drives perfectionism. Fear is what drives inaction or overreaction.

It shapes judgmental thinking. It limits how your brain functions. It negatively impacts your health.

At any meaningful place that I’ve been held back in life – it’s been due to fear.

I suspect that’s true for most of my readers as well.

So…here’s why I paid to get beat up:

• To confront fear: A long time ago I saw the negative power of fear in my life. But I wasn’t able to recognize all the ways it expressed itself.

I’ve learned that it’s important to regularly find and confront fears. It isn’t something I can just do once. Just like I can’t just work out once or eat a salad once.

My biggest challenge was the head game. It’s what all the experienced competitors talk about:

The tunnel vision, the way it felt like I was slowing down but they were moving fast, knowing I knew the move or the counter to a situation – but not remembering what it was.

All of that was due to the stress, the intensity of the match.

Courage isn’t a static state. It’s a mindset that needs to be maintained and cultivated.

• To get to the next level: Experienced competitors all told me that nothing improved their ability in BJJ like competing. Now I understand what they meant.

The main element is this: Being completely and entirely tested drives the greatest opportunity for growth.

It creates the highest contrast between what you think you know and what you do know. What you think you can do and what you can actually do. How you think you’ll react and your actual reactions.

It’s harder to get to the next level if you haven’t been laid bare regarding the level you are truly at right now.

I want to grow in my ability in the sport. I also want to grow as a person. Avoiding the crucible is avoiding growth.

Even though this was BJJ – it was still me. I can use this event to grow me – which translates into how I lead, how I partner with my wife, how I parent my children and anything else I do in life.

• To change my perspective on priorities: It didn’t matter how much I trained or how closely I listened to more experienced people – the only way to get an accurate perspective was to go through it myself.

That immediately changed how I approached training when I came back to the gym a few days later. Now, I had a much clearer perspective on what I needed to focus on and what didn’t really matter.

In stark black and white, it was clear what worked and what didn’t work. It was clear how I responded and what I needed to focus on.

I couldn’t know, no one could know, what I needed to work on until I had been through that experience.

It’s difficult to see clearly until you’ve been in experiences that force your priorities into high contrast.

That’s true in any context.

• Conditioning myself for when it really matters: I’m in business for myself. So is my wife. As every entrepreneur knows, success as an entrepreneur has everything to do with not letting yourself get beat by the mental game.

I’m firmly convinced that most businesses that fail, do so not because of a poor plan or concept. They fail because the mental game took the owner out.

Most major errors in larger organizations come about when leaders are afraid.

• • Afraid to confront poor choices or toxic behaviors.
  • Afraid to speak up.
  • Afraid to take risks.
  • Afraid to change.
  • Afraid to address conflict.
  • Afraid to be wrong.
  • Afraid that others will find out that you don’t know everything.
  • Afraid to ask for help.

Facing the competition, for me, was about conditioning myself when facing fear.

It was a way to prepare myself to keep pushing ahead, to think more clearly regardless of the circumstance.

No, you don’t have to join a Fight Club

In the big picture (and even in the small picture) BJJ isn’t that important. My status as a competitor isn’t either. You aren’t going to find me headlining a UFC pay-per-view match any time soon. Or any time at all.

However, the opportunity for personal growth that the tournament presented to me has been more profound than I anticipated.

But these opportunities exist throughout our lives:

I have these opportunities at work as well – to really put myself out there and risk real success or failure.

This is true in my marriage – really pushing into conversations that perhaps we’ve avoided. Taking risks with what I’m willing to share with my wife.

Being a parent presents many opportunities, especially if you really lean into it. It’s about love and investment with no guarantee of the results.

What’s next?

What’s next for you? What is an area of fear that holds you back? What is one way that you can actively confront and grapple with that fear – so that you control it and not the other way around?

For me, I’m continuing with my “personal development cross-training.” I recently signed up for a strong man competition this summer. The Scottish Highland Games.

This event apparently attracts a number of local and even world record holders. I have no chance of winning. But at least they won’t be smashing and choking me.

I’ve never even attempted most of the events before. Let alone have any skill in them. I don’t expect to win. But competing in a strongman event sounded like a good challenge.

The scariest thing might be dropping the caber on myself. Or a windy day my first time out wearing a skirt.

To be perfectly honest, though, I don’t want to look ridiculous. Even though that will be unavoidable. But I’ve let not wanting to look ridiculous stop me from too many things.

So, it is another opportunity for me to challenge myself. Because of that, I believe wearing a skirt and throwing rocks and big sticks are part of my becoming a better leader and a better man.

It’s not about the activity. It’s about embracing the challenge.

What’s next for you? What will you no longer allow to hold you back?

Take good care,

Christian

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