Training in martial arts has great physical and mental benefits and provides an opportunity for emotional self-growth. As anyone who practices being mindful will tell you, that being aware of your thoughts, emotions, and physical and mental state can help relieve stress, lower blood pressure, reduce chronic pain, ease anxiety and depression, provide self-healing, and decrease aggressive behaviors. Martial arts give people the skills needed to manage their adrenaline and control their fight or flight responses.
Over the years of my training, I’ve added meditations and affirmations to my martial arts discipline. In turn, it provided an added mental boost of self-love and confidence that propelled me into wanting to become the best version of myself.
The meditations helped me learn how to control my breathing and become an observer of my behaviors, thoughts, and feelings. This allowed me to see my behaviors and how they affect others – which is necessary when you’re in training to be a human weapon. It’s imperative to understand that knowing martial arts does not give you automatic rights to look for a fight – it’s essential to know when to fight vs. when to walk away.
An affirmation is an expression that embodies the practice of positive self-thinking, talk, and love. Affirmations like “I am unapologetically my beautiful self” and “I fight for me” were and still are personal to me in my mental health and self-love journey. These affirmations help me further combat my struggles with mental health.
By combining martial arts, meditations, and affirmations, an individual can grow beyond the limitations others have set for them and beyond the confines of their imagination.
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