DO WELL - DON'T DWELL!

Most of us find ourselves very attracted to ‘grace under pressure’. In combat, we experience and see this phenomenon all the time – it is a thing of real beauty. One of the things that underpins it is the idea of ‘being in the moment’ – as mentioned in my last post. People who do very, very well, are usually in the moment most of the time. They are 100% actively and fully engaged in what is happening ‘right now’ as opposed to dwelling, for even a micro-second, on what just happened.
I like to say “DO WELL – DON’T DWELL!”
Top athletes regularly exhibit tremendous grace under tremendous pressure; in fact, I think it is one of the main characteristics that sets the truly remarkable apart from the rest. Such people hold a ‘moving mindset’ – one that is highly flexible and adaptable, even though ‘pointed’ at a certain goal. This ‘flexible focus’ is something that I feel we all should aspire to – both on and off the mat. The ‘flexible focus’ mindset is a high level concept that has been spoken about before. ‘Rat’s head-Ox’s neck’ is how Miyamoto Musashi (author of the classic ‘The Book of Five Rings) put it. The ‘rat’s head’ being a metaphor for ‘flexible thinking’ and the ‘ox’s neck’ being about ‘intent’ or ‘focus’.
The perfect idea is that we embody both types of thinking simultaneously. If we are all about ‘intent’, we tend to overlook other, even better possibilities; on the other hand, of we are all about ‘jumping’ from one thing to another, we tend to lack focus and not get anything done. The idea is that we have both sets of software running in our heads at the same time; I call this ‘flexible focus’. Go after your goal but be prepared to capitalize on other possibilities along the way. Maintain a ‘forward moving mindset’ – you’ll do well, of you don’t dwell!
Train hard – train smart,
JBW