5 things i would tell myself before my first fight

If I were to go back in time before my first fight. I think I would cringe at at many of the decisions I made. There are so many times where I laugh at how seriously I took things. On the subject on taking things too seriously, here are 5 things I would go back and tell myself before my first fight.

Just chill the fuck out.

I remember when my coach sent me a message about who I was matched with, the club they were from, their age, experience, etc. The first thing I did was search him on Facebook, and I couldn't even think straight. It all felt real now; it kicked in—fear, anxiety. Every night, I would think about whether he was going to be bigger, hit harder, be fitter and stronger, and I tried to compare myself to this imaginary person I had made up.

Now, currently in my 7th fight, I have no idea who I’m fighting. Sometimes I forget I even have a matchup and don't even know the gym he’s from. Nothing has changed with my training; all I focus on now are the faults in my own game. I've found that my confidence grew by changing my mindset away from figuring out what their game would be and making sure I game-plan against that. If they were a kicker, I was going to be a better kicker. If they were a heavy clincher, I would work on my clinching to be better. Don’t get me wrong, there's something about working on particular strengths and weaknesses in your own game.

Contrary to my previous mindset, now I just focus on the adjustments my coach wants me to make and do that in camp. It’s time to stop worrying about my opponent's strengths and be prepared for any situation thrown at me. I found my confidence started to shine before fights with the thought of “let’s see if they can keep up with me and my strengths.”

At the end of the day, you really just need to chill out; it's that simple. You are a fighter now—there's no way out of it. Be a fighter and take on new challenges as they come. Be ready to fight a giant.

If I could go back and see myself training for my first fight, I would give him a big slap on the back of the head and tell him to have fun because tougher challenges lie ahead.

If you’re asking yourself how to just chill the fuck out, it’s simple: you either do or you don’t. Take it day by day and dive headfirst into the passion you’ve taken on.

You are tougher than you think.

When I got out of the ring, I remember walking away thinking, "Damn, that went quick." I trained so hard, got beat up in training, and spent many late nights overthinking. I was so worried that this guy would have some superhuman strength and knock me out if I got touched. My God did I overthink this, now I spend late nights wondering why I wasted so much sleep worrying.

I think I had a sore ankle from kicking afterward (which I injured in camp as well). I took a couple of hits, but they honestly just felt like sparring out there—three rounds of hard sparring, and then you go home.

If I could go back in time and talk to myself, I would say, “You have three sparring rounds to not look like a total idiot. FYI, as soon as the bell rings, you’ll forget that people are watching and you can barely hear your corner. All that last-minute planning of the amazing combo you were going to land clean won’t happen. You’ll go to your basic instincts and do what you practiced in training without thinking, so train smart and don’t practice dumb shit.”

Just do it.

There is no other way, except the way. Fighting is a commitment and taking damage to the brain is not something to mess around with. Surround yourself with good training partners, intelligent people, and mostly, people who want the best for you. If you have this and they believe in you, all that is left is you. No half decisions, you do or you don’t. No bullshit hype around it, make your choice and if that’s to go for it, then put your head down and just do it.

Believe in your training to do the work for you.

Many Sport Psychologists will talk about the term “flow state” in competition or training. Do you ever remember a time in school where your mind just decided to be quiet for a moment and focus for a straight hour and then when the class finished you feel like you were in a trance? This was a very rare occurrence for me, I struggled very much with staying focused in school. There was one class that I will never forget.

Our teacher asked us to write an article about any subject for an English project. At the time, I was obsessed with 90s rock so I decided to write an article about the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Before the class had finished, I had finished the whole assignment. Writing my 1500 word article and handing it up to my teacher, I remember seeing her face drop to the floor. Here was me handing my assignment before anyone had even gotten started. Usually it would take me months to sit down and get it done, hence the jaw hitting the ground harder than David Goggins throwing a medicine ball on the ground and telling me to “stay hard”.

The truth was that I had no idea what I was going to write about. I just started writing, I already had so much background knowledge of the band that I just kept on writing and editing without stopping for an hour. There was still a bit of editing and grammar that I could have done better but honestly if you asked me any question about the bands history, timeline, members, ages, colour of their hair and how old Anthony Keidis was when he used to skate to school on LSD. I could tell you before you could even finish your sentence.

I believe this Flow state can transfer in anything in life, especially sport. When you train constantly on the fundamentals and do it under the pressure of sparring, I can promise you that you will feel a certain degree of flow state, when you get into the ring. Everything will come natural and you will perform very similarly to how you train.

Losing isn’t as bad as you may think.

It’s as simple as the heading, failure is so important in our life and if we avoid it, then we will never really achieve anything meaningful. Especially as an amateur fighter, one of the big keys to success for a professional career is to compete regularly. Who cares if you lost a fight, imagine how you will feel when you get back in the gym and work for the next one and imagine the feeling you will have if you win your next one. Imagine the feeling and relief you will have knowing that you did the right thing by sticking it out and performing better in the gym and learning from your mistakes. Imagine the feeling you will get when the other members of your club who are too scared to fight, look at you and how you deal with loss, which will encourage them to fight. Now tell me what’s so bad about losing?