Square One

I think it is time to go back to judo practice.  I haven't practiced consistently in years, and the past decade has been about me practicing a few times, starting out good, then losing, then despairing, and then quitting.  After a few months of inactivity, I go back to judo and the cycle repeats again. 

Judo is not easy to do.  It is not just jacket wrestling.  It involves a whole change of lifestyle not just an hour or two or three per week.  Your whole life has to revolve around judo or you won't succeed.  In your teens, twenties, and thirties, you can work or go to school and train judo in the evenings and weekends.  But as you get past 35, your body slows down, you accumulate injuries, life throws you children and relationships and other obligations, and you just lose interest as you realize it's all been done before.

I am 41 years old.  For today's standards, that is old but not too old.  And I look way younger than my age.  I still look like someone in his prime.  But I am older and slower than most young athletes.

I want to incorporate a judo workout into my lifestyle.  Once or twice per week is good.  I need to start doing conditioning or it won't work.  That includes pushups, stretches, and cardio.  Diet is the main thing in fitness but it is not the only thing.  Just eating chicken and brown rice every night is not a recipe for fitness.  It's not that simple.

As I age, I learn to be less ambitious.  I don't want to work.  I don't want to make more and spend more.  I want to be less ambitious and more fulfilled.  I can do music, judo, home cooking, and date lower socio-economic women and not need a boatload of money.  More money does not mean more happiness.  Jesus called this, 'the Vanity of Riches'.

So one thing I must do is re-incorporate judo into my daily and weekly life.  It is not enough to play guitar, cook your own food, and masturbate to porno every day.  That is not a real life.  Judo is the one thing I gave to society and it is too late to start something new. 

Every young man must learn that life is not a free for all or orgy.  You must do service before you get to the fun part.  Business before pleasure.  My job literally is to grapple down policemen and pin them.  You may work at Starbucks.  To each his own.  Judo is not just physical education or Olympic combat sport.  It is a lifestyle.  It is also a theory, that the soft overcome the hard.

So besides music and home cooking, I should learn I must do what I must do.  Judo is the only thing I really succeeded at, and abandoning it in midlife is a mistake.  As long as I have two arms, two legs, and one head, I can play judo.  I can also crosstrain Aikido.  Judo and Aikido go together.  The clinch and weapons grappling.  This is not boxing or wrestling, which is just sparring and competition.  Judo is a competitive martial art with a philosophy and guiding principle.

So I am back to square one.  I did not waste my life.  I had fun, accomplished great things, and met some interesting characters.  I am not even old.  Someone in his early 40s who is still fit is still young.  The point of all this is to start something in youth, do a little bit every day, and never quit on yourself.  Don't just vegitate eating pizza and getting lapdances.  That is not a life.  Do something and be somebody.

Peace.