Martial Arts Transcending Personal Challenges

By Robert Van Valkenburgh

Kogen Dojo

. http://kogendojo.com/

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Martial Arts Transcending Personal Challenges

Our modern era has people more virtually connected to one another than ever before. With the swipe of a finger, one can instantly chat with someone else on the other side of the world or find long-lost relatives or friends through social media or a search engine. However, even with this global connectivity, something is missing in the lives of many.

Depression and suicide are on the rise, mass shootings are becoming normalized, political conflict is the ubiquitous norm, and many people lack deep, meaningful human contact and a sense of purpose.

While it is in no way a cure-all, there are many who have found martial art training, with the right group, to be an effective means of finding and developing a valuable sense of human connectedness and belonging, as well as a sense of meaning or value.

At the right martial art school, one is likely to find a group of people training for the betterment of each other and the group, a common purpose that helps to create a common bond amongst practitioners. Furthermore, this bond is fortified through the constant overcoming of the physical, mental, and emotional challenges that martial arts themselves create.

People who go through difficulties together, who solve problems together, and who push each other to achieve goals that seemed just moments before to be unachievable, become stronger, more confident, and more capable.

These resultant characteristics lead to a more fulfilling and contented life wherein one begins to see life's challenges not as insurmountable difficulties to be tolerated and survived, but as another exercise in overcoming and personal growth. In this way, the martial art practice provides real life lessons that can and are made manifest off the mats, outside the academy.

The lessons learned in martial art training provide a framework for transcending personal challenges, a way to know, through measurable and repeatable experience, that no problem is too great to overcome. In this way, martial art practice can become a source of strength and hope for individuals who struggle with lacking an intrinsic ability to face and rise above life's struggles.

Furthermore, the human connections made and developed through this type of practice are real, deep, and meaningful in a way that many people today are missing in their lives. By training together, struggling together, and overcoming challenges together, a community of unlikely friends is formed, like a second, or in some cases a first, family.