Okay I love martial arts, its what I think about all day. For about the last four or five years I've been doing martial arts(only the last five months have been formal). I am dead sure that It is what I want to do for the rest of my life. One problem I have is Laziness. Not laziness as sloppy technique or anything like that, just laziness as to training on my own/when no one is around. What I mean is when I'm in class, or with friends that want to train, I train my heart out. But when I'm alone I always seem to lazy to train. I was wondering what advice anyone would give to help me not be so lazy?
No one can give you the discipline to do that. If you force yourself to do it, it will eventually become a part of your day, like showering hopefully is You need to set aside a certain time for it. If you are busy all day, then get up a half an hour earlier and do it first thing. I've been practicing my kicks slowly, when I first wake up cold and tired, to develop the ability to kick anytime, without stretching. Its working. It sucks though.
Is it necessarily an issue of laziness? Are you perhaps fatigued from everything else going on during the day? Is it maybe that you need other people around in order to keep you focused on what you're doing? To me it sounds like you're being too tough on yourself and coming to a conclusion to a situation without an entire understanding of what the situation is. That being said, Find exactly what it is that you want to focus your at home training on. Is it forms, basics, point sparring techniques/combos, physical endurance, etc etc. Then write yourself out a schedule/routine that you can follow. Also find music that keeps you motivated and put it on while you train. See if you can find someone (preferably someone you train with) who would be interested in training with you outside of class. Most important IMO is keep your goals in mind, know what you want to achieve and from that you may find motivation to not be 'lazy'. Good luck!
I never though of it that way. One thing though, I never train with those in my class outside of class, all my friends do other styles of martial arts, and we all have a basic understanding of everything we teach each other, just practice what we learned in our classes, or spar. Thank you for the advice.
I read somewhere that it takes two weeks of doing something regularly before it becomes habit. Maybe try setting aside two weeks to challenge yourself: get out and train as much as you can for those two weeks...make it your sole focus. Then after those two weeks, look back and see how you feel. I bet you'll be more motivated to keep training than you were before.
Omicron, you are spot on. It is called entrainment. You can become entrained to a certain rhythm in 7 to 21 days. http://www.martialartsplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=93777&highlight=entrainment If for example your young child cannot sleep, trying to put him/her to bed early for one night will not work. You have to do it for 7 to 21 days for the child to become entrained to that pattern. I see no reason why that cannot work for training also. So Zerodauto if you set aside the same hour or two each evening for the two week period suggested you should be well on the road to what you want.
I agree with KennedySensei, if you find it difficult to motivate yourself to train at home then it is incredibly important to have a routine written down so you know exactly what it is you're doing on each day. That way you don't have to waste time thinking about what to do and you can't use it as an excuse to train later when you've thought about what you're going to do.
Don't worry about it too much anyways. There are three phases of effective fight training: Building technical skills Installing the skills in a reactionary framework Using the installed skills in a free environment The only phase of fight training you can do on your own is building the technical skills. If you don't have a heavy bag you can't even do that. Of course, if you want to learn how to do forms and stuff like that I won't knock you. It's not going to help with your fighting. Personally, it's the only thing I'm interested in.
Get yourself a theme song when you start working out on your own, ideally have a sort of mix tape of songs, ideally a couple of playlists so you can mix it up, that lasts for roughly as long as you want to train for. Maybe get ten or twelve songs that fire you up and go for it for that duration. I used to use it for meditation and something else I do sometimes, to use to make sure I reached a target time.
Becoming a habit isn't the end of the matter though, you still have to have the self discipline to maintain the habit, for example I'm 'entrained' to wake up at 5:30, but that doesn't mean I always want to do it or that I wont avoid doing it whenever I possibly can.
One step in front of the other until it's normal for you. Then you feel something is missing if you don't
Training is also something you don't want to force. If you have to force yourself to train, you may eventually get to the point where it is no longer a joy but a hassle that you have to make time and reserve energy for.
Thanks for all the advice everyone. Like everyone's been saying I just need to make a routine, because when I want to train when I'm alone I never know what I want to do, so I do a little of everything then just stop. When others are with me I find it's easier to train because everyone has some idea of what they want to work on. So I plan to write down a routine and begin to stick to it as much as I can.
Make a goal, stick to it, I am very lazy when I want to be. If I think or say to myself I will train for 2 hours tommorow, I might wake up not feeling too good and spend 4 hours online playing games. Sometimes making a routine plan, does it for me. I speak to myself in the mirror before bed and when I wake up. "You look great today, oh yeah the ladies love you, you're going to have a fantastic sleep, when you wake up you will do this, at 10am you will TRAIN!!!" Etc. It works for me. If I have a plan I stick to it. After a while a good routine, I feel werid if I don't train. I feel like I have pent up energy. Good music, that gets me in the mood to train, feeling happy, doing something for a while that makes me happy.
I wish I could tell you I'd worked this problem out, but it's just as much of an issue for me. Not just in martial arts- when I was younger, I had the same problem practising the 'cello. I really honestly meant to do it, but when the time came I couldn't persuade myself to do it. I'd put it off until there was no time left. Of course, once I actually started doing something I didn't want to stop. Routine doesn't seem to help that much- I can stick to a routine religiously for about 2 to 3 weeks, then it falls to pieces.
