This is one of the things I hear most often when answering questions about class.
I think many people look at this the wrong way. I'm sure many other holistic practices get this all the time, finding balance, offering an outlet for the days frustrations, escapism etc.
Truthfully it's not as complicated as that.
How does adding another commitment to your life relieve stress?
How does following another's instructions alleviate tension?
Time constraints, mental taxation and physical exhaustion?
Not to mention the parameters of pseudo-foreign culture rituals...
Engaging in any physical activity and in my experience especially Karate only ADDS stress; so what I try to explain is by confronting ourselves daily we are serving to increase our resistance to stress.
By challenging the body you are encouraging it to grow.
By pushing the near limitless limits of your mind you are programming it to succeed.
By placing your self under extra stress, met with a determined attitude to overcome, you exceed the expectations you may have placed on your self.
Your body requires more energy caused by new demands so it does something amazing; it tells you to take in more fuel. Suddenly you have the energy adequate for your life, suddenly you have the mental capacity to meet the days requirements. You've evolved (in a sense).
So does Karate relieve stress, no, Karate is stress but intentional.
Karate increases your resistance to stress, and through it you find a way to overcome it.
TRAIN KARATE.
Does Karate help eliminate stress?
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Yes, emphatically and absolutely, it provides the body and mind the tools to reduce and on occasion eliminate stress. It is not about adding a commitment to relieve stress when the commitment is made voluntarily; it is not about following someone else’s instructions as if under duress - look at one as in voluntarily committed oneself; it has nothing to do with any form of time restraints especially when self imposed and as to mental taxation then why voluntarily commit to the endevor and as to physical exhaustion that is also about self-imposed limits we voluntarily put on ourselves. Remember, you sought out, decided and then voluntarily committed yourself to the study, practice and applications of karate.
Engaging in a physical activity adds a kind of stress that is considered “Good Stress” in the medical community. Stress is like yin-yang, a fundamental sub-principle of philosophy in martial arts and karate where the stresses of every day life have both good and bad where we try to limit and mitigate the bad while embracing the good.
Stress is that effect that is as intricate part of living and being human where participation in certain types of physical activity or in this instance, karate, provides us a positive stress that contributes to lower blood pressure, stress coping skills like diaphragmatic breathing, another sub-principle of physiokinetics, the ability to relax, etc. all medically proven to mitigate and reduce “BAD” stress.
It is not a matter of exposing ourselves to stress to create the ability to resist it but rather a way to achieve more good stress that by its very nature counter’s the bad stresses life has to offer naturally and in accordance with nature and the Universe itself.
Granted, it is a form of stress, good stress and that type of stress is good and a viluntarily intended model you participate in but it does not increase resistance but rather trades off in a yin-yang form good for bad stress and that is good.
You cannot overcome stress, that would require you not live life and life is full of stresses both good and bad and almost all of the bad is dependent on the individual themselves while mind-set and mind-state govern whether mental stresses are good or bad and that provides a lead into stress is not just good or bad but it has variations such as, “Environmental stresses; psychological stresses; physical stresses; social stresses,” and so on but regardless of the variations to good and bad stress karate, like all physical and mental models of similar nature simply provide you the tools to deflect the bad stresses into good stresses of which good stress benefits the mind, body and most of all our spirits.
Bibliography:
Jones, Matt. “Karate for Stress!” http://mattjoneskarate.blogspot.com/2016/01/karate-for-stress.html dtd Saturday, January 23, 2016.
Bibliography (Click the link)
Thank you for taking the time to comment! Some great information.
DeleteThanks for the inspiration.
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