Looking Bad

“Show me a guy who’s afraid to look bad, and I’ll show you a guy you can beat every time.”

– Lou Brock

This could be the person who isn’t willing to make the effort. It may be the person with too much ego. Either case the results aren’t good.

How many times have you heard someone say “I can’t do that.” Probably too many to count, right? Maybe you’ve even said it a few times. I’m sure that I have along the way. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It might just be a statement of fact, such as letting others know that you don’t have the knowledge or the skill to perform the specific task. All too often, though, it comes being afraid of looking bad when trying to figure how to make something work (i.e. fail).

The martial arts gets lost in the Hollywood presentation of what it is – all flash, no principles. In most cases, the martial arts techniques are just a means to an end as the antagonist travels through the plot. This leaves the development of courage to real martial arts schools. This means the work that doesn’t include medals and trophies. It takes a good bit of work to get past the embarrassment of failing in front of people. Whether in private or in public failure happens, so people NEED to accept that failure is part of learning and growing, so they also NEED to have the courage to continue when they do fail.

The thought of public performance is one of the biggest fears that people have. The stress of being challenged in public to do something that can make you look bad takes courage to overcome. A bunch of heckling from peers doesn’t help, though, either. Until looking bad has no bearing on whether or not you do something, you will always be at a disadvantage.