It's only failure if you quit

[Bible_Belt]

Last Saturday night, I lost my third mma fight to become 0-3. The fight was in my hometown with most of my friends there, and they saw me lose to an 18 year old opponent. It was not fun.

I have 1,001 excuses, many of them very good ones. I worked as a promoter for the event. I laid out 800 seats the night before the event and sold a ticket for each one, taking probably a thousand phone calls in the weeks before, up to the time we began. I was getting my gloves taped backstage, and ushers were coming back into the warmup room to try to get me to come resolve arguments over seating. I was tired and in no mood to fight. I don't think very many mma fighters have ever tried to promote at the same time. Now I can see why. These are great excuses. And yet acting upon them is still the wrong choice.

I wanted to quit martial arts altogether for about a day. But training for over two years to retire 0-3 as a fighter is the only way to make failure a certainty. Quitting is an essential part of failure.

I don't handle failure very well. I grew up as a big fish in a small pond, and always naively thought that I would immediately be good at everything without much effort. Real competition does not work that way.

Here are the videos. Everyone I talk to says I looked good, but it still hurts to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YedgBTqYQuI

He takes me down right away, then I almost triangle choke him. As he pulls backward, I reverse the position and hold him in side control. He gets his guard back, tries a triangle that I block, and then the little fvcker almost broke my arm with an arm bar. That is when I do the funky somersault escape. I made that up...then and there. My arm still hurts a little.

I land some good jabs from standup, and then unfortunately try a takedown that gets squashed. He holds onto a guillotine even after I stand up and then slam him to the mat. I should never have tapped out to that. That is the first time I have ever tapped out in a match; it is a sickening feeling to have quit like that.

I also found his video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6JSHAelIsU

Notice my comment. I am also proud of being able to keep myself composed until we got out of the cage. Someone told me 'good fight' as I went into the locker room...and I flipped out on them, screamed at them at them that it wasn't. I still have no idea who I yelled at. I stomped out and just went home in raving a55hole mode.

But anger quickly turns to depression...a bunch of excuses and self-pity are not going to ever do me any good. I went back to train on Monday. It is was not easy to walk back inside and see a lot of people I feel that I let down. A lot of people wanted to see me win; they all feel bad for me, and I hate that. But I go and face them, laugh it off, and go on with life.

A large part of my life and self-identity is martial arts. I enjoy being the guy with a law degree who should not be a cage fighter...just not the losing part. If I were to quit it all, I would lose a large part of myself. Lately in training, I practice escaping from chokes a lot. I will get better.

I made a video still of the 1/3 of 1 second where I looked good:
http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x252/dotheopposite/jab.jpg

That is my facebook default pic now. I am going to try and focus on the positive. Negativity only leads me toward quitting, and quitting is the only true failure. No matter how bad you feel; It's only failure if you quit.

 

[MeteorMash]

Good fight man. You kept going to the end.

You didn't look bad at all, just remember to keep your hands up! lol
I'm in the same boat, I lost my first MMA fight, and had a million excuses. While yours are good ones, I still believe that excuses are no good. It is what it is and now you can't change that. Excuses to me are just attempts to protect our ego. We try to make ourselves seem better because we are ashamed of losing. But in reality it only makes us look worse.

I think the real strength in people comes from when they can except defeat and still hold their head high and keep on going. This is not easy at all, but it separates the winners from the losers like you said. In truth there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with losing. Nothing at all. Losing is part of the game and in the end only makes you better if you don't give up. In fact, if someone is good enough to beat you (even if you slipped) congratulate them for their victory, don't make excuses

My instructor told us something yesterday that I agree with to the max. The real fight, the REAL one, is not in the cage, but in training. The true fight is busting your butt for hours a day on the matt learning new things and conditioning your body. Nothing can trump that. You only spend a few minutes in the cage which is nothing compared to hours of training. You show up in the cage to show off what you've learned and have fun with it. Don't take it so seriously. Just relax, enjoy, and know that you are a trained fighter and can handle yours. Win or lose, who cares?

I'm sure you probably know this stuff already lol but like you said, never give up.

I'm preparing for my second fight in a few weeks. I can wait!!

I'm gonna bash his face in

 

[lakeshore]

Wait a minute. Why are you on this site?

You're a MMA fighter, you should have NO problems getting chicks!

 

[Tiguere]

Wait a minute. Why are you on this site?

You're a MMA fighter, you should have NO problems getting chicks!

Tell me about it. Win ot lose MMA fighters get pvssy after every fight.

 

[Bible_Belt]

I joined sosuave after my divorce to re-learn how to date. I've been living with the same woman for the past two years, so I don't need help getting girls, at least not this minute. Like all of us, I have needed help before. I think I keep posting here because I am in part talking to myself, reminding myself of the things I need to re-reinforce.

You are right about women liking mma fighters, though. On the one hand, no one should take up martial arts for the sake of women, that is absurd, but on the other hand it cannot be denied that they like it. I could probably screw a dozen women every time we have a fight; I often have them asking me to come to their house to sell them tickets. From being on this site, I understand the subtlety of the manner in which women indicate interest. When a woman finds out that I fight, it is a very similar reaction to when they hear I have a law degree, only in that one it is more like vegas jackpot dollar signs in their eyes. When I girl finds out that I fight, her demeanor will change immediately. She'll smile, her eyes will get a little wider, she'll ooh and ahh when she talks...these are all IOI that I read about on here.

btw, it's all well and good to have things that women like, both tangible and non. But one thing that I have learned in life after finally getting to the point that I had something after starting from nothing is that I still only want to be around the same people who were around me when I had nothing. Now that I can get women to like me because I have shiny stuff or do exciting things, I don't have any interest in those women. That is the trap of any sort of wealth; you have to be able to pick out the people who only like you for that wealth. I noticed that after law school, all of a sudden a lot of my overweight and dorky classmates who had never gotten a date suddenly all seemed to be marrying beautiful women. Screw that.

And thank you for the insights, MeteorMash. Martial arts is indeed more about doing battle with one's self than it is about fighting anyone else.

On the positive side, as a co-promoter, the event was a tremendous success. We got a great story on the local news:
http://www.kfvs12.com/global/catego...default&clipId=4576418&flvUri=&partnerclipid=

ironically you must first watch an ad for a lawyer

 

[lakeshore]

Dude, you're a mma fighter AND have a law degree?!? Thats like chick jackpot! Haha, but you seem like a humble guy.

 

[SoldMySoul]

The things we learn about posters on here!!! I am quite impressed you even get out in the ring!! You appear to be in good shape too. Fighting the young bucks is tough too man. They say when you get older you start losing your nerve and I believe that to be somewhat true.

When I was 35 y/o I was in the best shape of my life, but after an on the job injury in 2008, I have never been the same and have not picked up a weight since. I can really only do cardio since I was injured again last year.

Kudos to you for getting out there and I say keep at it while training. You have my respect man!!!

 

[thecurtainfalls]

Bible Belt is also here to dole out useful and good advice to other posters, something that is in rare supply here.

Not a bad fight man, you almost gained the momentum right before the guillotine, too bad the takedown didn't quite work right. That kid looked like he had a pretty strong center of gravity. Honestly, I prefer boxing to MMA because I can't stand all that grappling ****, but of course I understand the skill behind it.

Definitely don't give up. I liked the parallels you drew between your fight and what we learn here on SoSuave... including making the still photo of your jab the default image. Focus on the positives and never quit. Your 0-3 record as a fighter is a ****load better than my 0-0. Taken broadly, the same idea can be applied to pickup.

 

[SexxiKing777]

Who was stronger? You or that Assh0le?

I dont know if it makes much difference, but it's usually the stronger guys that win fights

you seem pretty small. try bulking up and then see how your game improves

it worked for me. Haven't lost a fight since

 

[LovelyLady]

Very inspiring post, Biblebelt. Thank you. It reminded me of this poem:

Dont Quit!

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
when the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but do not quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Dont give up though the pace seems slow
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than,
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victors cup,
And he learned too late when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit
Its when things seem worst that you must not quit.

-Anonymous

 

[spesmilitis]

agree 100%

 

[PokerStar]

hey bro,

at least you are doing something that you love to do, win, lose are draw.

Sure you lose battles but the war will always rage on!

cant wait to see the vid of your next win.

 

[Bible_Belt]

Thank you to everyone for all of the words of encouragement.

Things are going well for me in promoting fights, even if I am 0-3 fighting in them. I was hoping to have some pics of the fight back by now, but I did at least find a few of one of our ring girls of one of her modeling gigs: http://www.spire-mag.com/model_contest/round1/alexandra_shadowens.htm

mma is fun because of the people I get to meet

 

[Trader]

To the OP:

Obviously being an MMA fighter requires ridiculous amounts of courage, so girls will definitely be in to you

It's great to see you have dedication to MMA, yes losing sucks but in the end, compare yourself only to yourself. Did you get better these past few months? You probably did, so you are a winner in that sense.

Whether or not you want to keep on competing, that's up to you, but it's clear that your passion is related to fighting, be it in the ring, or promoting it.

 

[synergy1]

I hope my story inspires you a little:

A number of years ago a bunch of my 'friends' decided to kick me off their street/floor hockey squad. They said I sucked more or less to my face. By fortune, a few of my other friends let me on their team composed mostly of refs. We started off the season by losing our first 3 games - some of them badly. I still remember a semi-close game where I had the puck along the boards and blind passed it to the guy streaking down the center who went in and scored. As the top scorer for the team, I felt personally responsible that I basically threw away a chance to come back thus before playoffs we had 0 wins and three losses going into the playoffs.

We decided to change some stuff up, and shuffle people around. Long story short, we won our first playoff game 18-0, won the next game by about the same margin, and completely tooled on the team in the championship game. The kids on the other squad were getting desperate and dirty, but we would keep buring goals while their sorry asses were on the ground trying feverishly to stop the onslaught.

I want to echo others comments and say you got a lot going for you. you got your **** together, are clearly a pretty smart dude, and do MMA. I don't know how bad 0-3 is, but I know that your first win will come and it will be awesome. Quitting seems so easy at times, especially when there seems to be no way out, but if you love it as much as you do, than quitting isn't an option. You know it, I know it, and the board knows it. I look forward to hearing about that big W after some intense training and dedication!

good luck man.

 

[dj0014]

Hey Bible_Belt,

Can you look up some bios of famous fighters like Mouhamed Ali, Mike Tyson etc. also check for some of the best ones in MMA.
Learn from them and show to yourself that you can achieve that.

a friend of mine went to Thailand to practice.

Don't beat yourself and get up and do something.
The easiest thing to do is beat yourself. Don't do this.
Check some of Jean Claude's films
Watch "Rudy" as well.

Good Luck
Dj014

 

[Bible_Belt]

thanks again.

I finally got the pictures back. They are posted to my photobucket account:
http://s186.photobucket.com/albums/x252/dotheopposite/

I had another fight event last weekend, not fighting myself, but working on the promotions side. It was a huge success. My last opponent was there, fighting again, and of course he is my new buddy, just like the other two guys I fought. It would be very easy to be a d!ckhead to him, taking my frustrations at myself out on him, but that is another lesson about losing that has occurred to me lately. It is easy to resent the success of others, but that is just another excuse. Doing that does not get me anywhere.

I found out he had trained for two years, same as me, which makes me feel a little better about losing. His opponent last weekend had only trained for a month and a half. I did get to talk to that guy before the fight, and told him to keep it on his feet. He actually made it to the second round before losing to an arm bar, and got in a lot of good punches. So my opponent from last month is now 2-0, but his face was pretty messed up after his fight. He has earned his success.