On February 3, I turned 39. To celebrate, I did 39 minutes of “Shark Tank” at Freeport Martial Arts, my jiu-jitsu academy. Shark Tank, for those who do not know, is a training exercise where one person–me in this case–spars with a never-ending stream of “sharks” for a set amount of time.
I had six students in class that day, most weighing over 200 pounds. Each student sparred with me for one minute and then got five minutes of rest; I sparred for all 39 minutes.
To say I was exhausted at the end is an understatement.
For context, a title fight in the UFC is five five-minute rounds with a one-minute break between rounds, totaling 29 minutes. My birthday Shark Tank exercise was 10 minutes longer, and I got no breaks. Still, my conditioning is laughable compared to that of a professional MMA fighter. Their opponents are far more skilled and athletic than my students, too.
After what felt like the halfway point, I looked at the clock. I had not even reached 10 minutes.
Twenty minutes into the exercise, one of my students mercifully suggested a one-minute break.
“Nah, he’s fine,” replied another student.
The training exercise continued.
At 25 minutes, I gave up on the idea of offense and focused on defense, also known as survival. The clock ticked up slowly as we approached the 39-minute mark. I saw a light at the end of the tunnel, and it was not, as a college professor once said, “an oncoming train.”
Following my birthday Shark Tank exercise, my students sparred with each other. “I’m exhausted,” one student said after a few five-minute rounds. I smiled to myself, thinking, “You’re tired?!”
Of course, I gave my student shit for saying that. They are more than 15 years younger than me and had sparred a collective 20 minutes spread over an hour that day. Plus, I completed the exercise with a mild shoulder injury to my AC joint, which was probably foolish. They were fine.
I learned some valuable lessons that night and wanted to share them with you.
Never look at the clock
The clock is a torture device. Looking at it will only make things worse.
For one, you will focus on the clock, not on the opponent, which distracts you from what really matters: surviving. It was when I looked at the clock and distracted myself from survival that I got caught in submission holds and tapped out.
Second, time speeds up and slows down in our mind at the most inopportune times. When in a state of duress, time goes agonizingly slow. Focusing on the task at hand, not the time at hand, is how you will avoid the mental and emotional drain of the clock.
Third, looking at the clock does you no good. Aside from telling you how much longer you need to survive, the clock offers you no value. It is a dungeon master evilly smirking at you, knowing you are close to your breaking point. Focus your energy on your opponent instead.
Conserve your energy
No one can go all-out for 39 minutes. Conserving your energy is the only way to ensure you get to the end.
Conservation of energy applies not only to jiu-jitsu but also to life. You cannot work 80-hour weeks every week or pull all-nighters and expect to sustain performance over time. To do so is an exercise in futility.
Part of energy conservation is knowing when to exert energy and when to rest. Another part is observing when and how you spend and recover energy, recognizing what is effective and ineffective, and making adjustments to optimize for performance.
Presence of mind is the key to conservation of energy. The more present you are, the more you will recognize whether and when you need to stop and go, remembering that sometimes the most productive thing you can do is rest.
Survival is about mindset
Shark Tank is a physical exercise, of course. Sparring with six people for 39 minutes is indeed a physical activity. But the real value of Shark Tank comes from the mental and emotional side of the exercise.
Survival is about mindset. Winning in a game of survival depends on your ability to remain calm, adaptable, and resilient. Losing your composure, becoming rigid in thought and action, and letting your spirit break are the roads to defeat.
It helps to remember that others have done this before you and survived, even thrived. You can do it, too.
You are tougher than you think
Completing 39 minutes of Shark Tank showed me that I am tougher than I thought.
While a round of Shark Tank is nothing compared to the intensity of an MMA fight or the brutality of a street fight, it is a formidable training exercise designed to push you to your limit physically, mentally, and emotionally. It is an exercise that reveals yourself to you.
Like any test that pushes you to your limit, you walk away with a better understanding of yourself and the world around you. You know where you stand in the world.
We owe it to ourselves to face new challenges beyond what we perceive our current limits to be. You might find that we are completely wrong about ourselves and must update our mental model of who, what, and why we are.
“I am tougher than I thought” is an empowering thought. Realizing I could survive a 39-minute onslaught like that deepened my confidence, calmed my spirit, and gave me a better sense of who, what, and why I am.
The same applies to you. Challenges are a means of revealing your best self to you. Your best self is already there. You simply need to bring it out, dust it off, and use it.
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