I’ve been thinking about writing daily blog posts for a while now, and I’ve kept putting off—not because of the writing part, but because I wanted to have the perfect setup, and this blog didn’t quite feel like that. This is where I write for my newsletter that I send out . . . well, far too infrequently, come to think of it. But I couldn’t send out daily newsletters—that would be too much! So this remained, in my mind, a place to say occasional significant, important things.
But that’s all changed! In fact I will be posting here daily for a while, or at least that’s my intention, though I’ll only be sending occasional posts (like this one) out to the list.
Don’t worry though—This isn’t just about my personal writing journey; I’m gonna bring it back around to fencing in a second.
See, one of the challenges faced by many fencers I work with is hesitating when they should attack. They’ll be in the bout, not quite sure what to do, and get stuck. Or worse—they’ll have a great plan, but worry that it’s not going to work out the way they want, that it’s not the right timing, or they’ll make a mistake in execution.
I understand that fear—I’ve been there, and ya know what, sometimes it’s right. You’ll mess up the timing, miss the action, or make some other mistake and lose the touch.
When that happens, it feels like even trying was a mistake.
But the reality is, ya gotta try. You’ve gotta give it your best shot to ever know if it even could work—and often, the first few times it won’t just because it’s new, and you’re pushing yourself. But that doesn’t make it a failure, that just means you’re getting the experience you need to succeed in the future.
A great example of success with this is a client I’ve been working with for a few months, a Y12 epee fencer who’s been struggling with committing to his fleches in competition. He knows it’s important, but hasn’t been able to bring himself to just go for it—until last weekend.
Last weekend he competed in the Cobra Challenge in two events, and, using the breathing techniques we’ve been practicing, trusting in the process like we’ve been talking about, he did some beautiful fleches with full commitment—and because of that, achieved some of his best results in both Y12 and Y14.
Of course I’m always happy when my fencers get good results, but what I’m really proud of is the way he let go of his fear of losing and just went for it.
In closing I’ll just say . . . if there’s something you’re hesitating to start because you’re afraid it might go badly, maybe take a minute and think about it. Would it really be so terrible if you ‘failed’? Might you learn something even so? Hit reply and let me know your thoughts!