It is a known fact that top athletes undergo lots of stress – physical and mental. Those that endures excels and those that can’t never reach the top – regardless of how ‘promising’ they look initially.
Stress is required for changes. However, an athlete that is overly stressed will burn out, physically and mentally. ‘What is appropriate’ is less than a science and requires close monitoring and care. I have seen lots of athletes whose career ends much earlier than necessary because of pressure. When training is no longer enjoyable, when the body is in constant pain and when the right type of support is not there, an athlete will never reach his/her full potential despite natural talents. It is well documented that during a teenager’s fast growth period, it is necessary to scale back the level of competition and stick with training on the fundamentals until the body and mind stabilizes. However, how many coaches / parents can take a step back when you see early signs of talents and successes?
Don’t get me wrong, ‘not pushing’ will never get you anywhere either. However, pushing too hard too soon or at the inappropriate time can definitely end a promising career. Just like push hands, there are times when ‘letting go a bit’ is actually more effective.
In the old communist countries, “toughness” is used as a filtering system. It makes business sense when programs are all paid for by the government – they need to measure from an efficiency of dollar spent perspective. However, as an individual, you either make it or you don’t – those programs were never intended to be for self-improvements. It is more like work where you are expected to produce results. In that world, sport is a destination – not a means to enhance life.
The challenge with teaching internal style is that we believe the ability to relax through skills is the foundation of good techniques. If you always count on just your physique, you will not be able to learn the essence of each technique. However, relaxing is counter-intuitive to everything we do – everyone wants to squeeze their muscles to make a punch more powerful or faster.
Looking at things around us, you can see lots of live examples where work effort is not equivalent to smart effort and may not be effective nor efficient towards a given goal. However, don’t ever be fooled in thinking that muscles do not help – you just need the right muscles at the right time. Therefore, I disagree with those instructors that take ‘relaxation’ to its extreme and disregard physical conditioning altogether.
There are instructors that figure that if you are not under stress, you cannot get better and they can get pretty nasty and ‘in-your-face’. This really depends on the person as well as timing. As an example, a person that is already beat up from work do not need to be yelled at during their off-hours. Or a person who is sick needs rest to heal up. Inappropriate use of stress becomes a filtering system and used to eliminate those that cannot survive – only those that survive matters. That works for seal training but that is not appropriate for the majority of people looking to strengthen their body and mind in their spare time.
Through the years of teaching LHBF in many different ways to different age groups as well as individuals with different goals, I know that every person’s goal and stress tolerance is different. Furthermore, it changes over time. The only way to work is for the instructor and participant to have good honest communication to set the appropriate target and goals.
Exercise
Stress and pressure can be self generated. Do you understand what I mean? Explain and give examples. How can you avoid that?
Are the classes giving you enough challenges? If not, what challenges would you like more of? Please elaborate.