You try something new. You fail. You give up.

You tell yourself some story about why you failed, why it's pointless.

Maybe it's because you don't have the time. Or you're not smart enough. Or good enough.

Or maybe you weren't taught the right way. The teacher didn't care. Or worse, they didn't actually know how to teach the topic.

There are plenty of self-deprecating and/or external things to blame. Some of them are probably true. But nothing worth having is easy, and nothing in life is because of just one thing.

Let's start here:

Your ego is getting in your way. And ego is the enemy.

This isn't just a cute phrase in Stoic circles. It's a reminder that we must take action, and that the first thing we must change is ourselves.

The first paradox of learning is that we want to learn, but refuse to accept that we're beginners.

We want to learn
We find someone to learn from
We start learning from them
We see growth
We see progress stall
We become frustrated
We try harder
We become disillusioned
We blame
We quit

This is true for your 'failed' attempts at:

- Dieting
- Exercise
- Languages
- Skill development
- Professional development
- Personal development

I know it's true because I have failed attempting each one of these more times than I like to admit.

Especially online in a world of 'curated perfection'.1

'Failed attempt' is a clue as to what's going on here. How can you fail at attempting something?

The whole purpose of an attempt isn't to succeed. It's to do, and then observe the results. You may not be strictly following the Scientific Method, but you are there to learn from your mistakes.

By definition, every 'attempt' is successful as long as it happens. The results don't define the success or failure of the attempt.

So if my attempts aren't failures in and of themselves, why didn't I reach my goal?

It wasn't my fault I would tell myself. I made excuses. I made excuses because they helped protect my ego.

This is a lack of accountability in action, and that makes me (and you) uncomfortable. We don't want to believe it's our fault. It challenges our worldview.

At least, it does until you stop believing success means you're a good person and failure means you're a bad person.

With that idea out of the way I was ready to learn.

There is a concept I kept hearing through different martial arts called 'Beginner Mind.'

It exists across cultures and time. It is a reminder, an admonition, to check your ego at the door.

Beginners know nothing. The best beginners accept this with humility (not self-deprecation). They are receptive to instruction and correction. They follow the Master's lead because they aren't telling themselves that they know a better way.

Ego is what leads us to believe that we know better than the Master. How could a beginner logically believe this? They are the Master because they have put in the work. That's why we have sought them out. To learn what we do not know.

I stopped second guessing what I was being taught and started actually learning.

I didn't tell the instructor how what he taught was like something I already knew. I focused on what he was teaching me. On how it differed from anything I already knew. On how different it felt, and how it could help me achieve the aims of the practice being taught.

I had to accept that the context was different from anything I had done before, and the it was the subtly in the application which made it better suited to this context.

Consider arm binds.

Arms are vulnerable in certain places, and that doesn't change between cultures. That's just anatomy.

But the way you exploit those vulnerabilities changes depending on context.

Medieval treatises like Il Fior di Battaglia are teaching how to damage an opponent who is wearing the armour of the day. Aikido on the other hand teaches how to exploit the same body mechanics but also focuses on not injuring the opponent.

The context, and the intention is different, so the application must also be different.

These differences can be subtle. This subtlety was lost on me when I trained with my ego. When I removed my ego, I understood the subtleties, and how I could apply the same principle to different situations.

I became a better student, and better martial artist, and a better instructor.

When we approach each lesson as a beginner would, with our 'Beginner Mind' in place, we are better able to learn.

Learning something new can be scary. We're scared of failure, so we focus on the wrong things. This fear comes from our ego.

The only failure is in failing to allow yourself to learn.

Acknowledge that you are learning, and learning requires you to make mistakes. Attempts are successful as soon as they are attempted, regardless of outcome.

Don't be afraid to remind yourself of this. Say it out loud if you need to. Choose to adopt your Beginner Mind, and enjoy the process of learning.

Achievement comes later. So worry about it later.

BUT

What if you're following the wrong process?

What if you're following the wrong person?

I'll discuss those questions later. For now, learning to confront ourselves, how we stand in our own way, is the first step.

I write about learning, leadership, and niche business through the lens of Historical Martial Arts.

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This was phrase my fellow Horse Archers repeated to themselves as we trained in those early years.

It was our mantra, our reminder.

It was meaningful. It spoke to us on many levels.

We’re also a bunch of nerds, so:

Years later, I was fascinated to read about the the same concept being taught by Kyudo Master Kenzo Awa.

I’ve been rereading Zen In The Art Of Archery by Eugen Herrigel. 1

Herrigel was a German Philosophy professor who studied Kyudo as a way to understand Zen Buddhism while he taught at the University of Tokyo for six years in the 1920s.

Master Kenzo, one of the greatest archers of the twentieth century, spoke often of this concept:

"Don't think of what you have to do, don't consider how to carry it out! The shot will only go smoothly when it takes the archer himself by surprise."

Master Kenzo Awa

As soon as an archer tried to concentrate on the process of loosing the arrow, his presence, his ego, interfered with his ability to do so.

This Arrow Only (TAO) was also our subtle nod to the philosophy of Tao. In Chinese, Tao is often translated as "the Way,” as in, the The Way of achieving something.

This Arrow Only was the only way we would achieve the results we sought. It reminded us that Ego Is The Enemy, which is a common refrain among modern Stoics.2

As my fellow Horse Archers and I trained, we would spend hours in front of a target shooting handfuls of arrows.

Any thoughts, any emotional reaction we had to our previous shot would negatively impact the current shot. It didn't matter if it was positive or negative. It was a distraction.

If I felt pride at a bullseye and hoped to repeat the success, I failed. If I felt discouraged or any sense of shame at a missed shot, I would fail again.

Any thought of future arrows would ruin the current shot as well. It didn’t matter what thought entered my mind. Thinking about how many points I needed, whether

• to reach a goal

• to compete with myself in order to reach a personal best

• to compete with the others, even in friendly ways.

It didn’t matter. Any of these would ruin the current shot.

My fellow Horse Archers and I spoke of this often, and we agreed.

It was our mindfulness, our absolute presence, which allowed each arrow hit home.

Even if the term 'Mindfulness' was becoming a fashionable cliché at the time (circa 2020), it didn't change the truth of the matter.

This Arrow was the Only one that could exist in our minds.

No wonder this concept of mindfulness, of presence, of removing all distraction and ego, is central to warrior philosophies across time and space.

“This Arrow Only” helped me, helped us all, find the true stillness in a Warrior’s heart. It bound us together, like the sinew holding feathers to the arrow.

In front of the target, bow in hand, we were all equal. And equally at the mercy of our distracted minds.

I’m still searching for my stillness as I train.

I write about life, leadership, and niche business through the lens of Historical Martial Arts.

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Be honest with yourself: you’re not a professional whose life and livelihood depends on one specific skill.

I can’t think of a single person in Historical Fencing that shouldn’t be training their off-hand. That includes the few professionals who actually make their living doing it.

In fact, they usually train their off-hand more than most because they need to as comfortable teaching left-handed fencers as they are right-handed fencers.

You need to balance your body. For health, for strength, for coordination, and to decrease the damage of aging.

I’m guilty of this too.

Even when I was training consistently I would focus too much on my dominant sword arm.

I found plenty of excuses. I’m tired. I don’t have enough time to train both arms equally. I’m already good enough with my off-hand to teach left handers the basics. I need to focus on building my skills for my next lesson with an instructor better than me.

Here’s the truth: It feels good to focus on my dominant sword arm because I see my skills return faster after time away, and I see faster ROI when learning new skills.

But that’s just me stroking my ego. And ego is the enemy.

Even when I was ‘focusing’ on my off-hand training, it would be less than 20% of my personal training time.

That’s not going to help much. Yeah, I could teach beginners left-handed as needed, but deep down I knew I wasn’t teaching them as well as I was teaching right-handed fencers.

I avoided thinking about this too closely. Most people probably wouldn’t care, but for me that was living against my values. I wanted to be the type of instructor who knew their craft so well, inside and out, forwards and back, that I could switch hands flawlessly.

I even encouraged new students to train with both arms! Especially in beginner classes with a one-handed weapon, new students’ arms get tired. It was the perfect opportunity to encourage fencing with both hands: just switch when your arm gets tired.

I knew the benefits. I told students about them. It’s good for muscle development, coordination, and for learning the material. Things that are often easier, more intuitive, with our dominant hands take more conscious thought to do with our non-dominant hand. You literally have to focus harder on the task. That’s mindfulness in action.

For those that were skeptical, here was the coup de grace: if you don’t train both arms, you’ll never be able to fight with two swords! ⚔️

Depending on the student, and what kind of motivation I thought would work best for them I’d phrase it like this:

“I will not let you fence your peers until I believe you have control of your weapon. So if you ever want to fight with a sword in each hand, you better start working on that off-hand coordination now.”

Fast-forward to today, February 2025, and I’ve been away from sword training for the better part of nine months. But I’m back.

Now is the time to start training both hands equally. It’s something I’ve wanted to do as a fencer and as an instructor. It’s time to put my money where my mouth is.

Plus, I’m not getting any younger.

Focusing on flexibility, mobility, and body movement has given me the greatest ROI of any training I’ve done in the past 5 years. I’ve spent a lot of the last decade learning how to rehab a body damaged by repetitive strain injuries during my military service. I’ve finally found things that are working for me. The kind of things I wish I had been taught twenty years ago.

It’s part of why I teach youth classes.

Restarting my training now and focusing on my off-hand as much as my dominant hand will also allow my left side to develop at a better pace to match my right.

This time I’ve got a plan.

I’m doing this by making minor adjustments to my solo training time at first.

1. Warmups focus on symmetry and balance in my movements to strengthen joints. Especially shoulders.

2. Drill both hands. I’ll start with my non-dominant hand first to not cut it short when I’m tired.

3. Review video of drills to self-critique. Do not shy away from the clumsiness of my left-handed fencing. That means I need to do more, not less.

4. Do daily tasks with my non-dominant hand. Drinking water, using a fork, brushing my teeth.

This focusing the brain on coordination, creating new neural pathways. This translates to my strength work, so I can focus on the strength part more.

Both my brain and body will age better. I turn thirty-nine this year. According to my kids that’s pretty old. And to be honest, I notice it too. Training takes more effort. Recovery takes more time. And parts of my body that I was able to ignore in my 20s are making their displeasure known when I get out of bed every morning.

I write about life, leadership, and niche business through the lens of Historical Martial Arts.

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It’s how the brain works. It’s how the brain processes knowledge and experiences. It’s how the brain reinforces learning through intermittent recall.

It’s also about habit.

This is something I’ve struggled with most of my life: habit building, motivation, neurodivergence. It is something I have been fascinated with and researched far beyond the point of over-intellectualization.

It is something that is learned by doing, not by thinking.

Eugen Herrigel pointed out the same concept when explaining how he came to understand Zen Buddhism in his book *Zen in the Art of Archery.*

Zen, as a concept, cannot be understood solely through academic study and intellectualization. It can only be understood, *truly understood*, through practice.

It turns out that habit is a lot like physics.

Consider inertia:

An object at rest will remain at rest, unless acted on by a force.

An object in motion will remain in motion, unless acted on by a force.

An object in space will continue floating along forever. But we don’t live in space. We live here on the ground.

A ball rolling on the ground will come to a stop because friction is the force that slowly acts against its continued motion.

Friction is an interesting concept. It is strongest when an object is not moving. It takes more effort to get the ball moving than it does to keep the ball moving.

So, it is hard to start learning something; to start a habit. It is less hard to keep moving forward.

This is a key part of learning that I have overlooked for far too long.

I was looking at it from the wrong perspective.

Showing up everyday to train isn’t just about practicing a skill 10,000 times to attain mastery. It is as much about keeping that inertia going, that forward momentum.

This is the key to continued motivation, and accelerated learning. It also happens to fit nicely with what we know of brain capacity and intermittent repetition as necessary for skill development.

It’s almost like Masters of the Art (regardless of which art) knew something about mastery.

Imagine that.

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Unsurprisingly, the Japanese codified this training into distinct martial arts, the descendants of which still thrive around the world.

Karate is perhaps the best known, and saw incredible growth in the postwar period as American soldiers spent time in Okinawa.

I’m trying to find better resources explaining this, but this is what I’ve learned so far:

The Eighteen Martial Arts of the Samurai

• archery (kyudo/kyujutsu)

• barbed personnel abilities (mojiri) 

• slinging a linked sickle (kusarigamajutsu) 

• throwing daggers (shurikenjutsu) 

• Kendo/kenjutsu (fencing/swordsmanship) 

• firearms proficiency (teppo) 

• cavalrymanship (bajutsu) 

• spitting needles (fukumibarijutsu) 

• polearm abilities (naginata jutsu) 

• rope abilities (torite) 

• abilities with a short sword (tanto) 

• spies (ninjutsu) 

• personnel abilities (bojutsu) 

• proficiency with a spear (sojutsu) 

• scuba diving (suieiijutsu) 

• drawing a sword (iaijutsu) 

• abilities with a truncheon (jitte)  (judo/jujutsu) yawara

Right away I see that some of the Japanese names for these arts are their modern equivalent. And also, while scouting was undoubtedly a samurai skill, I don’t think ‘spies (ninjutsu)’ is accurate. My understanding is that ninjutsu was only taught to members of a specific clan, and Samurai abhorred the idea of clandestine assassins.

Much to learn, but this is a starting point.

Onwards.