A Case for Martial Arts: 5 Benefits You Can Get from Practicing Right Now
Ithink I made it clear in my article “Bouncing Back: Three Lessons I Learned from Miyamoto Musashi” that martial arts has transformed my way of thinking.
I’ve come to see things for their pragmatic value, skills to be mastered, and to persevere in the face of difficulty. It’s not that beauty and relaxation are dead to me — these lessons are just a way of holding myself accountable when it comes down to brass tacks.
Of course, like any other well-intentioned human on the planet, I want others to know about the benefits they can get from something like this. Hopefully by the end of this, you’ll feel that picking up a martial art is worth your time.
So here’s what you’ve been waiting for.
1. It’s a good physical outlet.
Martial arts are some of the best ways to get rid of all the frustration bottling up inside of us. In a culture that still worships at the altar of the 5 day work week, 9–5 schedule with the hopes of retiring at the age of 62 (which is starting to seem like an ambitious goal nowadays), it’s anathema for that kind of life.
And maybe quitting your job isn’t an option for you. A lot of people want to hustle endlessly because they’re workaholics at heart. Maybe you just love your work too much, but you can’t escape the unending scrutiny of your boss or the ceaseless office drama and it’s killing your passion. Or you need to pick up the extra hours to support your family in a time of crisis. Whatever the reason, why not make time for something that’ll help you get those frustrations out?
It’s better than blowing up on someone you care about. A loved one, friend, or god forbid, a coworker that then takes it to the boss and says that you’ve got a few screws loose.
Martial arts offer a serious antidote to stress management problems. Whether it’s a combative art like Karate that allows you to take out frustration on a punching bag, or the meditative, relaxed nature of Tai Chi, you’ll feel the relief of the time you put into it. It’s a long-term strategy to keep on going without falling to shambles.
It also helps as a way to gather functional fitness. While taking up a martial art doesn’t guarantee rippling muscles and the cardio of a triathlete, it does provide fitness in other ways. Muscular endurance from repeated practice, improved balance to hold stances and perform specific motions, and typically, the development of good eating habits.
That last one requires a little bit of extra discipline on your part, so a word to the wise: make sure your diet is conducive to your martial art.
2. It improves and maintains your mental health.
As someone who puts in 3 days a week for Karate and Iaido, these arts has had massive returns for the time spent on them.
It’s become more than a physical outlet for me, or just an idea of something that seems fun. My mental health was in the dredges before I started these practices. I was a classic example of failure to launch in a lot of ways, mainly professionally.
It killed me inside, every day.
I wanted to write for video games one day, then the next day I would be so cynical about the game industry that I convinced myself it wasn’t worth it, and I was better off doing what I was doing now (which was nothing). Then I’d flip-flop like this on a million other things. Essentially, I had become neurotic, paranoid, and inconsolable about all my interests.
Starting my martial arts journey wrangled in that overgrown-child part of my brain. I started to take my writing seriously. I pumped out applications like a madman, making a goal to apply to at least 2–3 different jobs a day (with tailored resumes for each).
But even with every rejection letter, my mental stability was finally able to put up with it. I no longer sank into defeat when an opportunity didn’t work out. I got right back into it and kept trying.
Martial arts helped me develop the “Inner Citadel” that Stoic philosopher and Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius talks about in his Meditations. If I was feeling despondent, rejected, and compromised by the outside world, I was able to retreat to my Inner Citadel, and reassess the situation, like a general on the field of battle after a retreat.
That’s because martial arts provide focus. It gives us a structured way of living for our own benefit, and sometimes, the benefit of others.
3. You get to learn about another culture.
It’s not like when you walk into the dojo you’re stepping into a 100% authentic version of 16th century Japan. There’s all sorts of nuances from the 21st century attached to it: the iMac in the office that manages class memberships, the convenience of modern plumbing in the locker room, and the coffee station with old, stale Folgers patiently waiting to be used.
It’s more like a looking-glass into another culture. It can even be as basic as the language used to describe moves, weapons, schools, and the names of its practitioners and founders. Your martial art may be completely divorced from its point of origin, but it still provides a cookie-crumb trail to the source.
That’s because no self-respecting martial arts school will deny its heritage. The people practicing there will make it clear that their lineage is prestigious in some way.
And so, you get the opportunity to learn. You get to see the reasons for the development of the practice. You can partake in alternate holidays, see foreign masters that come by and perform in seminars, or even take trips to the motherland of these arts.
I am not saying that you’ll become competent and knowledgeable about Japanese, Chinese, Brazilian, or any world culture based on what you learn in a dojo. It’s one face of the culture it comes from, and cultures adopt many different faces for different situations, and their values change with time.
But you get the opportunity to expand that knowledge, and for many, it’s far more gratifying to learn it for the sake of a martial art than as a Gen-Ed in university or a mandatory work meeting.
4. You get to connect with like-minded people.
I’m all about openly seeking people you might disagree with, but sometimes you need some agreeable people to help you recalibrate.
Everyone might be there for different reasons, but you’re all there to improve, have fun, and take something valuable away from the practice. Your focus will mainly be on improving your skill at the art, but you’ll likely find opportunities to connect with others on common ground. The martial art, for one. Work life, family, and hometown problems all can be relevant topics.
You’ll start to find out that your nextdoor neighbors or even coworkers were kicking butt in Karate this whole time, and you simply never knew until you started putting on the Gi and earning your Obi stripes.
Of course, this is very dependent on the atmosphere of the place you practice at. Some places are much more rigid with how their attendees socialize, others are very lax and will let it devolve to social hour. Try to find a balance, and enjoy what you can learn from other people through the kinship a martial art fosters.
It lets you reclaim your humanity after your busy week full of trials and tribulations. It doesn’t matter that your check engine light came on, that you got home an hour later than usual because of an accident on the highway. None of it matters, because in that place, you belong and thrive. You relax. Productively. You are reminded that humans are social creatures, and get to embrace it.
5. You develop mastery over all your skills.
Your martial arts practice doesn’t only teach you to master the snap-kick or the Zanshin of the cutting sword, nor the 42-strikes with a Bo staff. It teaches you how to focus.
One thing that is regrettable about schooling is that they rarely teach you how to study, focus, or learn. It seems ridiculous to propose that people need to be taught this, but be honest with yourself: how many people do you know that have trouble focusing? How many people constantly procrastinate on things that you know are important, but they just don’t seem to care? Or they can’t seem to take in new information and let it stick?
Or maybe you’re dealing with those problems yourself.
Regardless, martial arts offer you a way to fix that. Because you will be repeatedly practicing, you’ll get in the rhythm of hard work. Even more importantly, you’ll be disconnecting your mind from all the other problems in the world, because you have to.
Seriously. Try to perform a roundhouse kick while you’re stuck thinking about how your friend pissed you off with his passive-aggressive text messages. Or your in-laws and their subtle disdain for your existence. Maybe your neighbor’s dog keeps crapping on your lawn.
Whatever it is, it stops mattering to you when you’re in the zone. When you have that Zanshin.
And that’s the key to mastering something. You need to be able to sacrifice the overthinking mind. My Iaido instructor constantly warns us about the “diseases of the mind,” the little things that try to sneak in when you’re practicing, and ruin your focus, your Zanshin.
It’s why my phone is always in my duffel bag at practice. I stop paying attention to the constant flux of the world’s problems. It pays mental dividends to disconnect.
You’ll be able to take that focus and move it to the other things that matter in your life. Your work, your family, your health. You start to put aside the things that you previously used as excuses and begin living that life you always wanted to live. It stops being a dream that you’re succeeding, because every day you’re improving in some way when you finally learn how to focus and master what you’re good at.
Miyamoto Musashi, in his Book of Five Rings put it pretty clearly:
“Never stray from the Way.”
