On Pain

Rarely discussed, Pain is an important part of long term training. The word itself covers a very wide range of events from a prick of your finger on a nettle or a stubbed toe to life ending injury and everything in between.

Pain is our body sending us a message, one that we are still alive (liberally borrowed from the Destroyer series of Murphy and Sapir) and need to find a way to resolve that event.

Pain instructs us that we have done something wrong and we need to listen to our pain to learn from our error.

Pain being struck during Kotekitae drills limb striking and torso striking), Pain from sparing, Pain from exertion and lactic acid buildup in your muscles, Pain from falls and other impact events. Building for accommodation to pain, to not let it be observed. Watching for pain reaction to learn where to attack. Pain from body illnesses.

When you step away from life threatening or serious body injury pain, you discover something interesting. You experience pain, as from a toothache, but you can’t remember the pain, you only remember that you had pain such and such a time. Training then to transcend the ‘owie’ because it will pass and move through it to keep executing.

Pain may be a reason to quit training, or it may be a place to move beyond feeling pain to keep training working harder.