Ringo“Once you‘ve taken a few punches and realize you‘re not made of glass, you don’t feel alive unless you‘re pushing yourself as far as you can go.” Green Street Hooligans.
The best thing that can happen in your life is to take a ass whooping. Ain’t nothing gonna grow you like getting stomped a time or two. Winning fights is great, feeds your pride and feels amazing. Losing fights closely is a great way to improve your game, to pick apart your weaknesses and work on them. But a beating? A match that leaves you feeling like you can’t walk without pain for days that’s the one that shows you the truth. Wipes away all the bullshit and reveals your core. And if deep down you’re made of fire and grit, it forges a diamond hard toughness that comes from nothing else.
When it comes to steel fighting, there are few defining moments most fighters go through. There is this sense that it’s insanely dangerous a lot people get before there first fight. And then you get out there and you realize that the armor works. Most shots you barely feel like anything and you start to get this idea that its nothing. Then…Then, you meet mister halbred. Few people forget their first BIG hit. The one that made them drop, no choice, body shut down, with a loud “NOPE.” Mine I remember slowly sitting down and trying to tell my legs not to like “Stand up, this isn;t what you’re supposed to do legs. Stand up.” I distinctly remember like 10 seconds of that. In reality Al Caron tapped me in the back of the had and I slumped like a scarecrow falling off its post.
I haven’t fought a “true” empty hand fight in my life so I don’t know how the expereince reflects there but I assume it is similar to the first time you get punched in the nose. The sudden blinding pain, and often, the uncontrolled tear reaction on first few times. However after…you’re fine. Its temporary, a little scary in the moment, and floods adrenaline, but after…after it’s nothing. Maybe a little sore, maybe a little shaky, but pretty chill for alot of us. That, to me, is step one in being a Fighter as person, as opposed to a person who fights.
Step two though. OOOO, step two is when you realize that first hit wasn’t shit. See you learned. You did some work, got tougher, and now you can take that axe, take that punch. But that just means another one is coming. So you take that too. And then another. And another. In a fist fight, I think that’s the moment you realize you’re overmatched, and you’re just gonna keep getting lit up, best you can do is try to land a few and hope you get lucky. In steel, it’s the moment you realize your team ain’t coming to rescue you…and you have to make a decision. Do I take this knee? Do I bend? Or I submit or do I force them to break me?
There’s alot that can be said about the strategic reasons for both. But in the moment, you probably aren’t thinking long term. Real talk, if you say you took that knee because you were thinking ahead, I’ll nod, but I won’t believe you. I read it as you quit, you said nah, no more. And that’s aight, not a thing to be shamed of. I’ve ducked out a number of beating in my time cause FUCK THAT.
But sometimes, too much is on the line. And what that too much is, is inevitably pride. Pride telling you, fuck this, don’t you dare back down. You will pull this out or they will put you the fuck down. And that moment, when you decide, nah I’m taking this beating. That’s when you find out what’s up. Cause afterwards, you have two choices, you can smile, cause you just fought a war and survived. Or you can cringe cause fuck did hurt.
Either way, you come back again, you a” FIGHTER” now. Taking that beating and coming back, willing to do it again, thats means this shit is soul deep. Those moments, where the armor stops really doing much and you feel every shot, and stay in it, that teaches you what you have in you and where your limits are. Usually that means next time you can go further. Usually you grow from this. But not always.
It’s not true that what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger. I cut your leg off, you probably gonna squat less. Everytime you get knocked out, its that much easier to knock you out. And sometimes, the shit that happens fucks your brain up and makes it harder to go back to the the thing that fucked it up. Ass kickings, even in friendly consenting sports, can do that.
Usually, at least in my experience, its the opposite. Alot of my growth as a fighter came from ass beatings. And honestly as a person too. As a kid I was an annoying Cunt of a person. All the bad habbits I have now, constantly arguing, needing to be right, teasing and pushing limits/boundaries, etc, and none of self awareness or empathy. I fixed alot of that and gained alot of humility after catching a few beatings in scouts and round the nieghborhood. I mean it didn’t teach me empathy but did carve out the space for me to learn it. Not sure you can teach empathy via fist….I also learned pride and grit in those fights. How to never give up and keep standing the fuck up. Took me another 15 years to learn that I could apply that to things other than spite, but hey never claimed to be a fast learner.
In Steel I learned alot of my “techniques” just by taking beatings enough to start learning how to avoid them. Gave me more time on me feet to try things. And as I got good and gained the belief that I would always be able to outwill my opponent if it came down to that type of battle, I acquired the confidence that is so crucial to winning fights. Swagging on dudes can win you the fight before the first blow lands.
I was talking to my metamour Jason the other day about our fight experience. He told me a story of when he was in an Amature MMA fight against a dude who just kept landing shots, putting hands on him and a few rounds in had bloodied him up bad. Jason, of course, thought this was great, and in a moment of down time, I forget if between rounds of just in a sizing up period, looked up through the blood and smiled at the guy. Jason knew he was in a war and loved it. He wanted to be there. The other guy, all of sudden didn’t. He got shook and the rest of the fight got his ass beat.
That level of DGAF comes from taking a beating or two and learning to love it. To accept and embrace it. To relax and just bear down and take it. Bite that pillow and learn to enjoy the ride, I always say.
I also say fighting is a science, and the ring is your lab, and each match is an experiment. You’re hypothesis, My time training has made me a better fighter than my opponent. An ass kicking is a solid result, in the way a close win or loss is not. To keep the metaphor going, it’s statistically significant, and that’s the type of result you want! That’s how you learn.
The humility, the recognition of how far you have to travel, the reminder of your mortality and fallibility and fragility, that comes with an ass beating is as important as the teaching of how fucking tough you actually are. Nothing breaks plateaus, stale thought, like really having your failing shoved in your face while a boot is shoved up your ass. Everytime I’ve taken a hard beating in this sport, I’ve turned around and everything has changed. I feel sharper, clearer, tougher, stronger. It’s like fights slow down 10% every time.
Perhaps I’m just lucky to speak the language of violence fairly fluently for someone who learned it secondary. I was not raised in this shit, but it just makes sense to me. Every time I land a blow, every bruise I receive, imparts more meaning than 1000 pictures or 100,000 words. Every bleeding battle builds a better model of the world for me and so those wars, where it feels like your body was dragged through hell, they are like a direct download of 10 gigabet speed information.
Anyway this one wandered a bit and I should edit it, but I kinda like the roughness, so I’ll sign off now and go post it. See yall in the lists, and go get your ass kicked.