The Eisenhower's Matrix is a great tool for time management, used by successful businesspeople around the world.

The beauty of the matrix is that it can be expanded to many other applications. 
I'd like to share one of my favortie ones. It's a great tool for helping you understand what kind of threat you might be dealing with, and how the situation might develop. 

There are many wonderful lessons to learn from the martial arts. Not just about how to move your body through space, but rather about who you are, who you can be and how to interact with others.

But is there one style that teaches this better than others?

I recall the following experience from the time I was studying music at university;
I was experimenting, before class, with a particular effects pedal for my guitar that I absolutely loved. The lecturer walked in 5 minutes late, while I was still playing around. He didn’t say ‘hi’ or ‘good morning’. What he did say was “yeah, cause that’s the sound we all want… turn that shit off and let’s do something useful. Start with this tune – 1, 2, 3, 4…”

In one short sentence, he managed to embarrass me in front of the class, mock my creativity and hurt my confidence. He moved on to the tune instantaneously and thereby eliminated any chance I had to reply or comment.
The rest of that rehearsal was torture. This was over ten years ago, and it still stings when I think about it! So why bring it up now?

If you’ve been around self-defence for a little while, you would have heard the term OODA loop. It stands for 'Observe, Orient, Decide, Act', and refers to how our brain makes decisions.

I have written about my interpretation of this here.

I refer to it as the 3P’s. I refer to it in this way not because I’m trying to be different or innovate, but simply because it’s easier for me to remember…

This concept is incredibly important to principle-based learning and problem solving, whether that’s in self-defence or in the ring.

Martial arts are a form of self-expression, so let's compare them to the one tool for self expression that we all share as human beings - speech.

We don't all speak the same, and every language sounds differently. When we speak a sentence, we put emphasis on particular words. We may speak slowly or quickly, and change our rhythm and pace. We use pauses to give meaning to certain words, and to allow the listener to process what we are saying. We change our pitch, tone and inflection to convey feeling and meaning. Where we stand (close, far, in front, on an angle, etc.) and how we use particular body language has a massive impact on the message we send when we communicate.

To me, sparring is the physical manifestation of the same principles. It is when we stop practising putting words together, and actually converse freely. It's when we improvise. So how do you learn to make great speeches when sparring?

Yiddish is a fantastically wise and funny language. It has the accumulated wisdom of about a 1,000 years’ worth of Jewish grandmothers’ wisdom, expressed in sharp, funny, cheeky and witty proverbs. One such saying is:

‘Di oigen zollen nit zen, volten di hent nit genumen’ - ‘If the eyes didn’t see, the hands wouldn’t take’.

Jewish grandmothers obviously know a lot about self protection… How so, you ask?

The following is a true story, one that happened to a good friend.

He is, as we say in Australia, a Unit. With a capital ‘U’. He is mid-thirties, around 6’0 and 95kgs, with hardly any body fat. In addition to being very fit and strong, he also had a military career spanning close to two decades and has been involved in self-defence and the martial arts for most of that time. He has been in situation where he had to put those skills to the test, and has done so successfully. Simply put, he is not a dude you want to mess with.

His career often involves travel. During one of his moves to another part of the country, he sought another Krav Maga school to keep up his training (and sanity – those of you who train regularly know what I’m talking about). He trained there for the better part of 6 months, and then went for his first grading. Despite surviving all of the scenarios and dropping one opponent after the other, he failed his test and was told he needs to stay on as a white belt. The reason was that his technique was different to what the school teaches. Apparently, his blocking technique was not effective… despite all evidence to the contrary.

Was the school right to fail him for not learning their way of doing things, or was it their oversight for failing someone who has demonstrated to have clear self-defence capabilities?

You have finished warming up and have put all of your protective gear on. You’ve spent the last 5 minutes mentally preparing yourself for what’s about to happen. ‘It’s all good’, you tell yourself. ‘I am the star here. Everyone is here to make me look good and I’m going to kick butt’. You feel sharp. You feel ready. You feel excited.

The bell goes, and within seconds your partner hits with you with a hard, clean shot.

Things go downhill fast from there. Your adrenaline takes over. Your combinations don’t seem to have an effect, you can’t seem to land any clean shots and you start getting frustrated.

The next round, though with a different partner, feels much the same.

Has this ever happened to you? If the answer is 'yes', then read on.

Sparring.

For some, this word brings excitement, anticipation and fun.
For others, it brings fear, trepidation and that familiar feeling of an empty pit in the bottom of your stomach and a dry mouth.

Both are normal, and we all get some days of one and some days of the other, depending on our experience, how we feel on the day, who we are sparring with, etc.

I’d like to invite you to think of the aggregate, or the overall theme of how you feel about sparring. Which one of the above two responses seems more prominent - anticipation or fear?

Previous I discussed two points that relate to being a good training partner in the dojo. You can read about it here. Those two points related to what to do and what you need in order to do it. I also wrote quite a bit about some of the many funny, weird and wonderful faces you will meet at the dojo. You can read about them here.

I’d like to recap the example I used in the previous article, as it conveys a pretty strong message message:

The instructor just finished demonstrating a particular drill, and asks you to find a partner. Everyone in class is quickly paired up while you are still looking around trying to find someone who is on their own, and quickly notice gazes being averted when you try to make eye contact. You eventually manage to corner someone and now have a partner!

Or

The instructor just finished demonstrating a particular drill, and asks you to find a partner. Before you get a chance to look around, 3 people approach you. They are all smiling and when you pair up with the nearest one, the other two smile and say ‘how about next round?’

Which one happens to you more often?