V. K. Madhav Mohan

1. Never Quit: The Warrior Ethos

Karate teaches and instils the Warrior Ethos in a serious student and practitioner. Briefly, this means living with courage, honour, discipline and loyalty at all times not for oneself but for one’s family, community and country. It is actually living the Samurai Code which enables acceptance of death as inevitable and therefore jettisoning any fear associated with dying. According to Musashi Miyamoto, “today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is victory over lesser men.”; and “the battle is not against the world but against quitting on yourself”. Further, according to Yamamoto Tsunetomo^[4], “the Way of the Samurai is found in death.” The underlying meaning of the teachings is that once we accept death as inevitable, we achieve freedom from fear. When we internalise this lesson, we overcome any tendency to give up the fight, no matter how adverse the situation. This insight, if translated into a mindset, makes us impossible to defeat!

Practical Examples of the Never Quit Mindset

Practical examples of this mindset are:

• Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic Expedition^[5]: during which his ship Endurance was nearly destroyed by ice; despite the odds, he led his men across the frozen frontiers of the Antarctic without loss of life. His motto: “Through endurance we conquer.”
• Michael Jordan^[6]: arguably the greatest ever basketball player who says, “I’ve missed 6 more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” His mindset is one of unyielding persistence despite repeated failures which, in fact, is the hallmark of all champions.

The Never Quit mindset is beautifully summarized by the Japanese proverb: Fall seven times, rise eight.

2. Discipline Delivers Victory

Training is not an option; its mandatory; it is first a daily struggle, then a habit and then a way of life! After a while, the daily training regime will lift you out of mediocrity quietly and without fanfare. Soon you’ll be head and shoulders above everyone else in your competence, strength and stamina in every area of life.

In my book Three Word Truths^[7], I dwell in detail about the importance of practice and consistency. The following excerpts from my book Three Word Truths describe the 7 context and benefits of discipline in training.

• Practice Builds Confidence:
  Mastery requires practice – lots of it! That’s a no brainer. But doing the hard grind has some effects that are not easily apparent. Practice essentially means repetition: doing something over and over again until you can attain accuracy and speed. At first speed is elusive and so is getting it right. Doing even the basics is extremely frustrating, boring and indeed painful, mentally and physically. Your body and mind need to be trained to become capable of doing the technique perfectly. That’s why every basic training program is made up of drills. Suppose you’re taking a maths course; after the concept and technique has been described you move on to applying it to solve problems. Each problem is in effect a drill. The more problems you solve the better is your understanding of the concept and technique; and the better is your ability to solve problems. Drills create strength and stamina both of which are mandatory for speed and accuracy of technique. As you practice more and more, you develop your capabilities along many dimensions. You develop, as sports coaches describe it, muscle memory. Every part of you is tuned to do the technique fast and flawlessly. At the same time, the number of hours of practice have built your self-confidence too. As you become better and better during practice, you also become more certain that you can become very good at whatever you’re attempting. As your speed and accuracy improve, your progress is visible to you and that builds your self-assurance. You now know that you can do it! That is the confidence that enables you to take risks innovate and improvise in any given situation.
• Consistency Creates Mastery: Each of us wants to excel at something! No matter what it is maybe just polishing our shoes or maybe making a cup of tea…or washing vessels in the kitchen sink …not to mention rising to the top of our profession there’s something so totally satisfying about a job done to the very limits of our capability! Actually, this has a lot more to do than mere satisfaction. When we excel, we build our self-image, self-esteem and self-confidence. These three aspects, internal to our mental makeup, are crucial to our sense of well-being. They combine in a synergistic manner to make us strong, resilient and unshaken as we navigate the turbulent sea of life. So, it’s vitally important to excel! How do we master a particular skill, domain of knowledge or indeed a way of life? Mastery is elusive and hard! It has to be fought for and won, inch by inch, second by second, minute by minute, day by day, week by week, month by month for years and years! There’s simply no magic wand which you can wave and say “abracadabra – let me be the master of my life”. We have to put our nose to the grindstone and work on whatever we’re trying to master! Practice, repetition and discipline, every single day! On the road to mastery there are no shortcuts…just daily practice, without missing even a single session…for long periods of time consistently. In fact, consistency in practice should define you. You can vary the routine or the type of practice to keep it interesting. But the consistent discipline of doing what it takes on a daily basis is what delivers mastery. There’s no other way. If you want big results, small and consistent steps every single day will deliver them in time. You have to embrace patience and determination to travel this road!
  

  The following examples illustrate the results of discipline:

  • Miyamoto Musashi^[3]Won 60 duels and was never defeated because he believed that, “You can only fight the way you practice.”
  • Lord SriKrishna: taught us in the Bhagavad Gita^[8](Chapter 6, Verse 5) that we can master the self and define our destiny with discipline: “Let a man lift himself by his own self alone… for the self alone is his friend and his enemy.”
  • Marcus Aurelius^[9]stressed that that daily discipline enables you to be calm in the middle of stress and chaos: “If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it”
  • Samurai Training (Kenjutsu & Zen): Samurai practiced repetitive kata (forms) daily until they became instinctive. This discipline ensured pinpoint accuracy in life-or-death combat
  • Militaries: train continuously with intense discipline because “the more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war” as emphasised by General Norman Schwarzkopf.
  • ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation): Success with Chandrayaan 3 in 2023 resulted from decades of scientific discipline (trial, error, fix, improve, test).
  • Kobe Bryant: legendary basketball player who was famous for his “Mamba Mentality,” which led him to train at 4 am for years and years; his success was the result of this discipline

  So, on the road to excellence, there’s no room for procrastination or sloth. Discipline is the steel frame on which the building of excellence is built. It means practice with consistency irrespective of moods, desires, temptations, alternatives and time shortages. That is why my Sensei insisted on the practice basic combinations or Kata a hundred times every day, day in day out, without fail! This kind of discipline is bound to create an almost superhuman capability to deliver flawless performance which guarantees results. As Sun Tzu^[10]said in The Art of War, “Every battle is won before it is fought” because victory is earned through preparation, readiness and intelligence.

3. Breath Control Is The Key

The body no doubt has to be conditioned, trained and strengthened continuously. However, unless the mind is clear, focused and balanced, the body cannot produce effective and explosive action. Breath is the crucial link between the mind and the body. By oxygenating the blood vessels, the breath provides nourishment and energy to the body and calms the mind

As Lord Krishna teaches us, “samatvam yoga uchyate”. Yoga is all about balance and equipoise. One must sway neither one way or another; neither to too much action nor to too little action. We have to calibrate our response to every situation with just the right mix of aggression, defence and inaction. This kind of calm response can only happen if the mind is uncluttered, unhurried and unaffected. Breath control is the key to such a calm response. If the breath is controlled the mind is controlled and the body follows. If the breath is not controlled, the mind panics and the body goes into overdrive with stress generated hormones and a runaway heart rate. Situational awareness, tactical acumen, strategic considerations, communication and target prioritisation all fall apart when the mind is hyper agitated.

Yoga practitioners lay the greatest stress on Pranayama as the way to control the mind is through breath. The Hatha Yoga Pradipika ^[11]teaches that “when the breath wanders, the mind is unsteady. But when the breath is calmed, the mind too will be still.” When breath is mastered, so too is the mind mastered. Patanjali’s states in his Yoga Sutras that “Prāṇāyāma removes the veil of ignorance and makes the mind fit for concentration” (Yoga Sūtra 2.52–53). The essence of Sage Patanjali’s teaching is that breath control stills the mind by reducing restlessness, removing obstacles like ignorance, agitation and distractions. It prepares the mind for meditation — making it steady, luminous, and clear.

Insights From Modern Science

The benefits of mastering breath are very well established by modern science. Slow and deep breathing switches on the body’s parasympathetic nervous system and produces the relaxation response. It reduces the heart rate and blood pressure and mitigates the generation of stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. This is what Sage Patañjali^[12]referred to as the veil of ignorance!

Regulating the breath generates alpha brain waves which in turn spark relaxation and creativity. It also activates the prefrontal cortex of the brain and thereby improves focus and decision-making which are so critical in the battlefield and in fight or flight situations. And, this is what Sage Patanjali alluded to when he stressed that breath control makes the mind “fit for concentration”.

Furthermore, awareness and management of breath reduce activity in the brain’s fear and stress centre, the amygdala. It also increases protection against panic, anxiety and emotional imbalance. Again, this is what Lord SriKrishna teaches when He says that yoga is Samatva or balance. Furthermore, breath control increases oxygenation and carbon dioxide tolerance which in turn improve cellular efficiency. It also improves Heart Rate Variability (HRV) which is a biomarker for resistance to stress and an indicator for adaptability.

This is why every modern combat-ready soldier and warrior is always taught and drilled in breath control. Special Forces train continuously to master Box Breathing or Count Breathing. They are also taught mindfulness to combat future anxiety, depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Even public speakers and CEOs today are reaping the benefits of practicing breath control.

Miyamoto Musashi insists that “Breath control is the way to keep calm.” Similarly, in Samurai & Kyudo (Archery), the archer exhales slowly as the arrow is released, uniting breath with release. Breath control ensures pinpoint accuracy and prevents hesitation or panic in combat.
All this is precisely why Karate focuses so much on breathing katas. For example, training to master Sanchin Kata is considered one of the most important and crucial practices. Apart from teaching the practitioner to generate power from the hips and ground while rooted in the stance, the Kata lays stress on deep breathing from the abdomen. Loud exhalations are a hallmark of the Kata. This kind of breathing is called Ibuki Breathing. It directs and regulates the flow of energy while building focus and cushioning the body during hard contact. The “three battles”, implicit in the name Sanchin^[13], signify physical strength, mental focus, and spiritual willpower all uniting to create zanshin (remaining sharply aware) in combat.

The synergistic combination of these insights and practices create an unbreakable character and force that imbue you with a charisma and aura that are not just ephemeral but real! They combine in forging an unbeatable warrior who can conquer any adversity or challenge in life or work. From these powerful force multipliers can be internalized in the dojo but applied with devastating effect in diverse scenarios, from battlefields to boardrooms. That has been my personal experience throughout my personal and professional journey!