Whether you practice Aikido or any other discipline, here are some little tips to get the most out of what you do.

Defend your time

Be honest: who hasn’t told you, at least once in your life: “You should take some time for yourself”? Your reaction was probably to think: “Yes, sure… With work, study, family, expenses, mortgage, Where can I find the time for myself?”

If you feel like your time is packed with so many activities and responsibilities, the good news is that you can get out of this routine. Start from the scratch: 2 hours dedicated for you per week. You will see that organizing your days according to this space will change the perspective and improve the quality of your time.

Dissatisfaction is an ally

If you feel that something is missing at the end of every day; if you perceive that you would like something different, something “more”, that kind of “more” that you cannot describe, do not be frightened. Dissatisfaction is the main stimulus that allows you to make big positive changes.

The good news is that dissatisfaction is a powerful ally, not an enemy. Together with that pinch of difficulty that you can meet in your personal path of practice, this ally of yours can make you a person who is looking to improve in the small and big things of everyday life. It is the spring that makes you stand up, the spark of curiosity, the key to knowing, accepting and overcoming limits in a creative way.

Smile

As soon as we turn on the smartphone, we are overwhelmed with news and information that doesn’t make us want to smile. Precisely for this reason, knowing how to give someone our smile is something great and necessary. It is also contagious and there is no vaccine that can fight it.

Smiling is martial, because if done with respect and sensitivity, it disarms. It makes the practice environment cleaner, facilitates ties, creates the conditions for couple and group work to be truly serious and profitable.

Communicate

It is well known that speaking represents only 7% of communication. Communicating means wanting to share something with someone. In a practice that presupposes the sharing of a physical space and an interaction with contact, it is important not only to be able to listen (what the teacher says, what our practice partner does with us and on us). It is essential to learn to be clear. It is essential to have something to “say”. Maybe an emotion. Or a feeling. Or a need. It will not be immediate and it will be difficult for a while. You will tend to talk during practice. Then you will see that there are things that the mouth cannot say in the same way the body does during a workout.

Then you will let the word be the tool to interest you in your fellow practitioners by talking with them. Small seeds sown frequently generate lifelong friendships and new relationships to blossom.

Finalize and start over

The logic of continuous improvement is that of a spiral staircase. A path that seems to be circular. Which apparently always leads you through the same points. But it is a path that takes you high, if you stay on it.

Your best today is the starting point for tomorrow. There will be ups and downs. Apparent moments of bending and stopping. Allow yourself the luxury of evaluating your route over distance. True courage is looking yourself in the mirror every morning and starting from there.

Fight your own battle, not others’

There are situations that deserve your attention and energy. Others simply don’t. Carving out a space for yourself helps you to outline with ever greater clarity those areas and responsibilities that depend on you and that really require your engagement. You are the variable of your equation. If you eliminate yourself to solve other equations, the problem is not solved, it becomes more and more tangled. Being a point of reference for others is possible to the extent that you work to consolidate your personal balance.

Start with the bodywork

A human being is more than a body. But starting with small gestures of attention for our bodywork works miracles even at less physical levels. Small progressions, not major revolutions, in the fields where we feel the greatest need. Nutrition, training, sleep, hygiene, look… so on and on. Starting with small gestures of improvement, from those 15 minutes of work-out and stretching in the morning before leaving our home, builds the foundation of a new person.

Have a good trip to discover the best version of you!

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