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Essay 89: The most vital piece of successful training

Training doesn’t just happen. You must make it happen.
Put it on the schedule. Go to bed at a decent hour. Wake up. Get ready and get on the mat at the appointed time.

Training requires commitment, discipline, follow through, grit and… clean clothes.

You can’t wait until you feel like it. You can’t do only what you like.
Sure it’s fun to fine tune what you’re good at but you gotta work those weak areas too; fill in the gaps.
You can’t just do what you want to do. You gotta do what you gotta do.

Once you’ve set it up, once you’ve gotten up, once you’ve shown up, you still need a vital piece that is not up to you: you still need a training partner.

Someone willing to show up too.
Someone willing to get up.
Someone willing to set up training, accommodate your schedule, brave traffic.

Someone you trust.
Someone you know has your best interest in mind, just as you have his/hers.
Someone who knows how to take it easy and when to bring it up a notch.
Someone who doesn’t baby you but won’t crush you either.

If you’ve got that someone, you’re golden.

Photo of Sarah Badat Richardson, Burton Richardson, and Shaun Hara
My 2 favorite training partners Burton (top) and Shaun (bottom)

I’m lucky. I’ve got two awesome training partners.
My husband, Burton Richardson and one of our staff instructors Shaun Hara.

Both of them have invested so much time, energy and plain good will in putting my improvement on their own agenda. They genuinely want to help me. They motivate me. They keep me going. Because they show up, always, I can’t let the lazy inside of me win. I can’t let them down. They are the very best part of my training.

There are days when I would rather stay in bed but I don’t. So long as these two awesome training partners are willing to put up with me…

…I’ll be there.


Thanks to the dedication of these two, I earned a second stripe on my Brown Belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for the street today.
Thank you for reading. 

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