Confidence founded on solid, strong training. Think of how you feel when you spar someone you know in your heart you're better than. Maybe the new guy in class or a little brother. Your confidence exudes and you fight in a much better mental state. Now, think of how you feel when you fight someone you think is better than you and you're going to get your butt kicked. Do you think you fight just as good? Or maybe do you think you're as collected?
The calmest person in a gunfight is usually the one who will win. because he can keep himself in condition yellow or maybe red, and avoid going into black, into the fight or flight, he will control his breathing, his trigger control, his shots, and ultimately the fight.
Same goes in hand to hand. Aggression is important, but aggression isn't always just being the more angry guy. Letting anger get a hold of you could actually work against you. The phrase anger blinds is true. the last thing you want to become in a fight is a growling, grunting, angry beast that mauls and claws like an animal. Now, that may win some fights. But, you don't want to throw all your training out the window just to resort to your hindbrain's gross response.
You DO want to attack with intent, with purpose. You should be training this way. Far too often I hear and see guys training that say things like, well in a real fight I would hit this hard....blah...blah...blah. I say when you hit your punching bag, hit it 100%. As hard as you can. Try and kill it. I like the BOB bag for that. I can see the face and the body better and hit it hard, thinking this guy wants to hurt me. I won't let him.
An anecdotal story (many moons ago) in a training environment on break in front of my classmates while waiting for the instructors to return. I let into a BOB bag. Releasing some pent up frustration at a certain instructor and because I wanted to do something other than what was being taught. I ended up on top of the bag pounding the face into the mat. When I stood the bag back up, water leaked from his shorts. I thought, I just made BOB pee his pants. The class got a laugh out it, and I had to think of a quick way to hide the water before break was over.
You might not think about it, but there is a chance the guy you'll fight will pee his pants. I have had three guys I've fought actually pee their pants, and one guy defecate himself. It's because they went into condition black and went into fight or flight. Stress related heart rate jumped over 175bpm, the hindbrain took over, blood pooled from limbs, loss of bowel control and bladder control (unnecessary functions in fight or flight), the body dropped in a crouched stance, sometimes tunnel vision (side step to move out of his visual range), audio exclusion (inability to hear verbal commands), among others.
The point is if you can maintain mental control over yourself, odds are you will maintain physical control over your opponent. Let your training shine. Let it do it's business. You sit back and make command decisions about what it does.
When I taught martial arts I used to tell my students train to forget. Train it so well it's like walking. No one thinks about the mechanics of walking, but we can all do it naturally, almost like breathing. Train so that's how you fight.
I might have strayed off topic a bit, but I got carried away. I apologize if I hijacked this thread. I think it all relates to the topic of most powerful tool anyways.
WA
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