Sports Psychology: Zen in the Martial Arts Essay

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The Zen section that is to be analyzed in this Sports Psychology analysis involves a very discouraged player who needs help. The player is involved in Kumite or rather a sport is known as sparring. He met the man by the name of Parker in one of the gyms who was later to be his rescuer in the game (Joe, 1982). Mr. Parker was to bring a hero out of him. Mr. Parker is seen to apply one of the most important sport psychology analysis skills very effectively. This particular skill is the critic whereby Mr. Parker watches the player perform in one of his Dojo (Joe, 1982). Later he calls him in his office for a piece of advice. Mr. Parker uses symbolism to drive his point home. Through the drawing of a line, he can teach the player that only through working on his weaknesses can he be able to overcome his challenges. This means that in any situation, the winners are not the issue but the losers. This is because it is very evident that working on improving one’s strengths rather than trying to pass the opponent’s line is what matters. This does not mean that by improving skills and knowledge a person is automatically bound to win.

It may indeed take a long time like in the case of the player who after months of training and improving his skills did not win the match with the same opponent. Nevertheless, the player applied the same tactics in his tennis training and after a while, he improved drastically. The lesson to be learned is that the process of improvement is gradual and not instantaneous. This is shown by the fact that the player had to play more than once to recognize the signs of improvement in his skills. In addition, there is a lesson that there can never be improved without hard work and some great inputs which are represented by the length of the line drawn by Mr. Parker.

The moral of the story is that in whatever endeavor a person decides to undertake, he/she must focus on improving his/her strength rather than on winning against the opponent. The storyline that leads to a conclusion is the effort which the player put in after the advice he received as well as the winning expectations he has in every match he attempts. The conclusion is that what matters is not winning but being able to improve from the previous attempt.

The application of the section to sports is that practice makes perfect and that critics are very important. The player could not see his mistakes while on the mat but after Mr. Parker sat him down and took him through the analysis session he was able to discover his mistakes and eventually improved (Joe, 1982). In addition to that, in any game, the player must never play a defensive game since it only leads to frustrations. In life, the section can be used to educate people about patience and perseverance. This is because after practicing and perfecting ourselves there is still no guarantee of winning or emerging the best. As we try to improve ourselves and our skills, even our very own competitors are doing the same. This means that the next time we meet our competitors they are still likely to perform much better than us. However, it is obvious that great improvement will be evident and will later translate into winning.

Reference

Joe, H. (1982). Zen in the Martial Arts. New York: Bantam Press.

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IvyPanda. 2022. "Sports Psychology: Zen in the Martial Arts." March 16, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/sports-psychology-zen-in-the-martial-arts/.

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