One of the great inventions of film and television that allows for the action to happen is the one-punch knockout. MacGyver’s trying to get out of the sinking ship, and he punches the guard, and the guard just goes to sleep for a solid half hour. MacGyver doesn’t want to kill him (it’s not that kind of show), so he just knocks him out. But most knockouts aren’t like that. You go away for a second and then you’re right back.
There was a lot of that in my training. I guess the way I came to justify it is the way most people who fight justify it: Fighting is really, really rewarding. I truly enjoyed it. I got feelings from fighting that were bigger than those I had experienced in almost any other realm of my life. It made me feel awake in a way that I had never been awake. Those kinds of big emotions and big experiences may come with a heavy price tag.
MMA is really bad for you, but it’s also good for you in many ways. So that’s how I justified it. I felt like I was taking manageable risks in exchange for big rewards. When I eventually quit, I didn’t quit because I said, “Okay, that’s enough. The book project is over. I can go do something else.” And I didn’t quit because I was worried about my brain. I quit because the rest of my body gave out.
It was a very sad thing, sort of like the end of a romance. I left it very reluctantly, and I left it knowing that I’d never get it back, that I was just too old for it in this phase of my life. The phase of running with young men was over, and it wasn’t coming back.
Harris’s response hits a bit close to home:
Harris: I certainly can relate to this experience from the grappling side. I haven’t yet admitted to myself that I’m not training in BJJ, but I’ve gotten several lingering injuries, and the gaps in my training are getting longer and longer as I wait to recover.
Gottschall: That’s the bummer with grappling, Sam. You don’t hurt your brain, but you hurt everything else. Almost all my significant injuries came from grappling.
When you spar in boxing, the only thing that gets hurt is your brain. Everything else feels pretty good. But if you spar in grappling — wrestling and jiu-jitsu — it’s like one-on-one tackle football. There’s opportunity for mayhem that’s not present in a very controlled boxing match.
I was going to comment on the “bully repellent” cauliflower-ear post earlier, about that physical mark separating rugby union forwards from backs, and how a winger can spot a front-rower by those ears and know not to biff with those fellas.
This post rings true for footy, too. As you get older, you know the game better than ever, but your body doesn’t recover the same way, even on field, during a game. Over the years you learn how to make and take big hits, but getting through the grinding work of scrum time, ruck, and maul just takes a heavier toll, to the point you have to give it up. Sure, you can lay a guy out with a crash tackle, but 30 or 40 tackles, with all your niggling knocks and injuries, for 80 minutes?
All my footy injuries — minus two particularly bad concussions — happened at the bottom of a ruck or in a collapsed maul or scrum, never in devastating tackles. One of those concussions happened whilst I was making a tackle! Cost me nine stitches under my left eye, too. Scar looks good but…
Having trained in both MMA and Rugby Union (karate, muay thai, boxing; no. 8, openside flanker, respectively), I’d say the sports carry many similarities in terms of physicality and mentality. Sure the martial arts are nominally individual pursuits, to a degree, but you won’t learn much doing it solo. Both teach masculine wisdom and discipline, plus the self-respect gained from testing yourself against other men. It’s a beautiful thing.
A common piece of wisdom where I grew up: if you’re still playing footy when your son starts — about age 5, making you early 30′s, generally — you deserve everything you get. Applies to sparing too, really.
What kind of skill-based competition is not rewarding?
The only times in my life I’ve ever felt like I was truly alive were either fights, school tests or closely contested games.
Same kind of neurology involved, no doubt.
Also, I don’t get the primitive martial arts obsession. Hand to hand fighting is nice, and good for pub brawls, but if it ever truly breaks down one is undoubtedly going to fervently wish he had spent all that time trying to become a decent competitive shooter. A light machinegun can repel or seriously hurt a mob, whereas empty hands, not so much.
That is his point though. Young men want to win “duels” for status. They’re not especially concerned about self-defense.
Now, for self-defense, you still need to recognize that you always have your own body, so you can always fall back on unarmed skills — which traditionally focused on getting the other guy’s weapon away from him. Next, you almost always have your sidearm — pistol for a cop or CCW permit-holder, folding knife for most blue-collar guys, sword for aristocrats in a feudal society. Rarely would you carry a long arm without planning on heading into trouble. The best weapon is the one you have with you.
Well, carrying a two-pound pistol and another pound of magazines is no biggie.
The only problem is doing that in summer, the time of the year with most violence.