Black Belts Don't Come Cheaply. These Are The True Keys To Mastery.

"Only one who devotes himself to a cause with his whole strength and soul can be a true master." - Albert Einstein

These days, you can easily find metaphors in self-help magazines and blogs urging you to get a black belt mindset. You can also browse LinkedIn and find people proudly touting metaphorical black belts in various professional accomplishments.

As a 10+ years practitioner of Shudokan Karate, I've become dissatisfied with some of the cheap ways that the term black belt is often thrown around. Too many people take mastery lightly.

In martial arts and in life, I've realized that success is more about true mastery than some sort of hack or shortcut.

In this article are the keys to true mastery. I have used them in my own life to achieve extraordinary results in martial arts and many other fields.

Immerse yourself.

Do not take these lightly.

True success requires work.

Ganbatte

"Do or do not. There is no try." - Yoda

There is a phrase in my dojo:

Ganbatte.

This roughly translates into Japanese as hold on and never give up.

Mistakes were tolerated in the dojo. Those are part of learning. However, a half-hearted effort was not. A bad attitude and you're dismissed from the mat immediately.

When you truly care, you give it your all. You truly decide what you want. You aren't waffling about which direction you'll go because you know what you want.

Get crystal clear on your goals, and then hold on to the vision. Be willing to do what it takes. Endure. That's really how you achieve in a nutshell.

Total mastery is difficult. Very few achieve the rank of black belt in my school.

Hold on and never give up. It's simpler to say than to practice.

Complete Mastery Comes From Complete Commitment

"Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness." - William Hutchinson Murray

As students progress through the ranks, there becomes a tipping point where the students begin to become intermediate-advanced.

At this point, Sensei always had a similar speech:

"You are now at the point in your Karate journey where you need to make a decision. Up until now you could pretty much do what you were told, pass the tests, and keep progressing. But now, you have a choice to make. You need to decide if you're just here for fun or if you're committed to achieving the rank of black belt. If you aren't, that's not a problem, and you can continue training. Just know that at this point I need to know which of you are committed so we can make sure to give you the resources to get you there."

I chose to become a black belt.

It was one of the best decisions ever, yet it required a lot of sacrifice. It required that I close off a lot of alternate paths.

In your life, you have decisions coming up daily, staring you in the face.

It's difficult to say no to the hundreds of other priorities that could potentially take up your time.

It's difficult to say yes to the original commitment you made when you fail, slip backward, or don't know where to go.

Yet I've found that success comes from singularity. What you pursue is less important than the obligation that you pursue it with 100% commitment.

When you put skin in the game, you're not simply wishful thinking disguised under the name goal. You commit to the outcome, create a real plan with specific deliverables and outcomes, and stay accountable to somebody else as you execute.

Success Must Become Automatic

I was warned often that in your black belt test, you are moving and performing the entire time. There is no time for thinking or contemplation. You show up and perform.

If you want to succeed, you need to unconsciously breathe and live the moves required to become better. They have to be reflexive, automatic, and perfect.

Exercise. Time with your family. The routines of your day. Journaling. These things must become simple and automatic in your life by daily repetition if you want to unlock higher levels of clarity and power.

IT

To paraphrase my Sensei, "At some point, you find what I like to call IT. You don't know what IT is until you've found it, but it's what separates the black belts from everybody else."

Successful people operate on a very different gear than most people.

Once you've found that gear it's a lot easier to perform. It's like unlocking a new transmission in your car and having totally new capabilities.

Successful people have pursued growth for so long and traveled so far that when they're surrounded with average people, it's like visiting a time capsule.

Growing up in Karate, and trying so hard to achieve the black belt goal, my mom, already a black belt, would ask me multiple times a week:

"Have you found IT yet?"

A worthy question to ask yourself. A powerful why will give you the drive to perform at an unusually higher capacity.

Become A Polymath

In some styles of martial arts, you're taught to focus predominately on fighting or the physical aspect. Not so in mine. Everything from breathing exercises, meditation, emotional health, principles of mastery, and more were learned as I did karate.

To be successful, you can't simply major in one thing and ignore all other skills and abilities. You must be in tune and well-balanced across all areas of your life.

Choose to be a polymath: someone very skilled in multiple things.

Honor, Respect, And Relationships

"Most people are in a state of competition rather than collaboration.

Collaboration is a much higher level principle than competition.

Competition is focused on the self. It's also very low-level thinking because what you can do on your own is very limited.

People who are competing are grinding. They're more focused on winning than creating real solutions.

However, when your thinking becomes expanded, you realize you could do so much more with other people. Collaboration creates unique connections working by yourself never could." - Benjamin Hardy

In my karate class, it was never just a transaction.

It was family.

You were there to build relationships. To submit and to learn from mentors. You were there to learn and to grow.

Have honor.

Be respectful.

When you're truly focused on how you can help and serve other people, then you unlock the secrets to the greatest growth.

When two people are givers, they create something spectacular between them. They aren't in a constant tug-of-war. They're focused on creativity and collaboration.

To better your network, start thinking about what things you give to others. Not as a transaction, but to be helpful.

Failure Is Merely A Crucible To Improve You

"Anything is possible if you pay the price." - Benjamin Hardy

Probably more than half the people in my style fail their first black belt test, myself included.

This is not an easy or light test. People almost never take it unless they're confident that they can pass it. And yet still many people fail.

When I failed the first time, I took a grand total of 2-3 days to feel sorry for myself and what went wrong. However, I couldn't stay past-focused when I still wanted to achieve something in the future.

The next test was 4 months away.

I stepped up my game.

It was only because of the pain of that failure that I was able to make more progress in martial arts during those 4 months than at any other point in my life.

Your failures are simply the crucible through which you manufacture something even better. Always remember the purpose of a crucible is to refine and to purify.

Let It Go

There's a concept a mentor of mine teaches frequently:

Expect everything, and attach to nothing.

What this means is that you plan for and expect success to come, but you aren't crushed by failure should it be the outcome.

You simply view it as feedback and a new learning opportunity. You are emotionally removed from the outcome and instead attach your emotions to your lifelong and long-term growth as an individual.

When success comes, you celebrate it and grow it into even more success. When failure comes, you simply let it go and re-focus your efforts.

When you aren't attached, you allow yourself more growth. You allow flexibility and creativity.

You can't invest emotional energy in negative outcomes, events, and circumstances if you wish to succeed.

Singularity Of Focus

In martial arts, focus is expected. When your partner gets ready to do an exercise with you, you will literally get punched in the face unless you respond quickly.

When you're under pressure in this manner, you cannot be distracted by anything else. You have only the option to think about how you're going to dodge or block that punch.

Most people lack true focus. It keeps them back from true success.

Engineer your environment such that you're forced to focus on the task at hand. Clean your desk. Remove distractions.

A tool I now use frequently in my creative work is to work for 35 or 55 minutes in chunks with zero distractions and then take a break. To become a true master of focus, I recommend Deep Work by Cal Newport.

The Goal Isn't What You Think It Is

There is a story we tell frequently in our dojo about a samurai who needed a new sword. Two blacksmiths accepted the challenge. The younger blacksmith's sword sliced every leaf sent down the river in half. The older blacksmith's sword was so sharp it split the current itself, causing each leaf to veer away before touching the blade.

The moral was that you must be so sharp that you repel enemies instead of needing to fight them.

As martial artists, our goal in the dojo is always not to fight.

Likewise, in your life, your current goal probably isn't what you think it is. There's probably a higher objective, a higher reason, and a higher way that you need to tap into.

Spend time thinking hard about if your ladder is leaned against the right wall. This will help you get unstuck.

Master What You Love

To achieve mastery, you need to learn to love it.

I love karate. I love the energy and the fulfillment it brings me. However, it's not for everyone.

Commit to something you want to spend large amounts of time, money, and emotional energy becoming your best at. Dan Sullivan teaches to focus on a concept for 20-30 years that you're constantly excited to master and learn more about.

Become the best at what brings joy to you. In such mastery, you'll find you've become a better person.

"It's not what you have. It's who you become." - Jim Rohn

What Does It Mean?

"There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs." - Zig Ziglar

Some dojos really operate like gyms, but with fancy uniforms. There is no focus on the philosophy or the principle behind true mastery.

I always laugh when I hear about people who got their black belt at the age of 7 after 10 months of training. I always ask myself: what does it mean to you?

Arguably more important than what you achieve is what your goals mean to you. You'll often find that successful people have a far deeper why than most people.

Higher and holier reasons are more likely to drag you out of bed in the morning than your own ego.

My black belt means a lot more to me than it means to most people. It represents true mastery of a craft. It means 100% commitment.

Nothing worthwhile in my life or yours ever came because it was easy. Any overnight success came because of years previous of diligent, focused effort.

There are no hacks to success.

Are you willing to take the stairs?

Readings To Go Deeper

• The Road Less Stupid by Keith J Cunningham
• Willpower Doesn't Work by Benjamin Hardy
• Essentialism by Greg McKeown
• Deep Work by Cal Newport
• Triggers by Marshall Goldsmith
• Finish First by Scott Hamilton
• Mastery by George Leonard
• This article by Richie Norton