Right before my daughter was born I returned to the martial arts.\u00a0 I\u2019d have a child to protect, after all, and I wanted to be able to do so.\u00a0 My first belt test had me rattled.\u00a0 I hadn\u2019t been tested physically for more than fifteen years.\u00a0 I\u2019d become increasingly bookish and sedentary since my teen years.\u00a0 So I did what I do well, I read the manual over and over.\u00a0 I studied.\u00a0 I took notes.\u00a0 I took notes and practiced and studied\u2026 and studied some more.<\/p>\n
Even though there would be no written component, I studied for my belt test the same way I\u2019d study for a history or science exam\u2014read, memorize, recite, repeat.<\/p>\n
Moments before the test began I ran through everything in my head.\u00a0 Moments after I\u2019d bowed in and the test had started, I forgot everything.\u00a0 And I do mean everything<\/em>\u2014basic kicks, basic strikes, basic techniques.\u00a0 At one point, I even blanked on my instructor\u2019s name<\/em>.\u00a0 My brain simply emptied of everything except anxiety and fear. I was not present.\u00a0 I was thinking about being present, thinking about kicking, thinking about blocking.\u00a0 Or, in this case, trying to think about doing those things.\u00a0 I was locked in my head, everywhere in time except where I needed to be, which was in the moment.<\/p>\n Below, four authors talk about being mindful, practicing hard, and about always delivering your best.\u00a0 This is all basic advice that I\u2019d heard some version of at the time of my first Kenpo test.\u00a0 I\u2019d heard it, but I hadn\u2019t listened<\/em>.\u00a0 Instead I\u2019d worried, studied, and been too scared to deliver my best for fear that it wouldn\u2019t be good enough.\u00a0 Classic test anxiety.<\/p>\n \u201cMartial arts is a fantastic foundation for being a writer,\u201d said novelist Jon F. Merz. \u201cThe discipline involved is directly transferable to the writing life. You have to keep pushing forward all the time, even on the days when you don’t feel like it. The bruises that you collect–whether they come from the dojo or the publishing industry–toughen you up. And that’s good. The writers I respect–like the martial artists I respect–are those who keep striving every single day to be better than they were yesterday.\u201d<\/p>\n I agree with Merz, wholeheartedly.\u00a0 With each belt test I improved\u2014improved my technique and my ability to be in the moment.\u00a0 By my fourth test, I actually started disappearing into the increasingly complex techniques and katas.\u00a0 And now, for me, the challenge is to apply what I learned in the dojo to what I do in front of the keyboard.\u00a0<\/p>\n Bruce Cordell, James Grady, Jon F. Merz, and Jenn Reese are all martial artists and successful writers.\u00a0 Bruce Cordell<\/a> is a game designer and novelist.\u00a0 He is the author of the recent Abolethic Sovereignty trilogy and the forthcoming Sword of the Gods<\/em>.\u00a0 James Grady<\/a> is a novelist and screenwriter.\u00a0 His novels include the thriller Six Days of the Condor<\/em> and the recent Mad Dogs<\/em>.\u00a0 Jon F. Merz<\/a> is a freelance writer and action-adventure novelist.\u00a0 He writes the Lawson Vampire Series, Jake Thunder Adventures, and contributes to the Rogue Angle series under the housename Alex Archer.\u00a0 Jenn Reese<\/a> is the author of Jade Tiger<\/em> and Tales of the Chinese Zodiac<\/em>.\u00a0 Her Above World middle grade adventure series is due out next year.<\/p>\n And now, here\u2019s what the masters have to say\u2026<\/p>\n *<\/strong><\/p>\n What has the study and practice of<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>martial arts<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>taught you about writing in general and<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>fiction writing<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>in particular?<\/strong><\/p>\n *<\/strong><\/p>\n James Grady:<\/strong>\u00a0 What\u2019s ironic about this question is that it goes to the heart of a long work I\u2019ve been sketching out about the essential sameness of martial arts and writing.\u00a0 I don\u2019t want to reveal my epiphanies here (in part because I\u2019m still working them through), but think of the importance of architecture, timing, clarity, directness and nailing the point in writing then playing out in some martial arts situation.\u00a0 All those things influence the martial arts event and outcome.\u00a0 Thus, the more mindful and practiced one is in those elements \u2013 stances, punch timing, seeing the whole opponent, going for the best neutralizing\/destroying technique \u2013 the more likely one is to walk away whole from a martial arts encounter.\u00a0<\/p>\n And if you add into that matrix the element that what you\u2019re writing about no more exists than does the opponent in a kata<\/em> or the Taiji form, and even fuller marriage of martial arts and fiction writing appears.<\/p>\n Jenn Reese:<\/strong>\u00a0 White Belt Mentality. \u00a0I\u2019m not particularly athletic, and when I started martial arts, it was with no expectation of competency or talent. I felt open to learning everything, without expectation of success or previous bias\u2026\u00a0 This was not at all how I\u2019d ever approached my writing. I\u2019d been putting sentences together my whole life \u2013 we all have \u2013 so when I began writing fiction, I expected to be decent at it immediately<\/em>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s just words, right?<\/strong><\/p>\n So, so wrong. Martial arts helped me to get back to basics with my writing, to understand that it\u2019s an art and craft — just like martial arts \u2013 that requires focus, practice, and an open mind. You don\u2019t start good, you earn it. Bruce Cordell:<\/strong>\u00a0 I took up martial arts as a lark. But as I learned more and more, I realized that the training had a concrete, real-world value for me as a writer: practicing martial arts could give me the tools to write better fight scenes in fantasy fiction. Especially fight scenes involving hand-to-hand fighters, since my greatest focus has been Muay Thai and jujutsu. That said, it’s easy to go overboard when trying to replicate a real world technique in fiction–luckily my editor knows to watch for danger signs. She knows to avoid so much detailed fight “choreography” that the reader’s eyes threaten to glaze over.<\/p>\n Jon F. Merz:<\/strong>\u00a0 Martial arts has informed most of my life and due to the rigorous nature of the training, it’s taught me to see my goals through to the end and to never give up. Traditional publishing is a tough business. In many ways, there are distinct similarities to the pursuit of excellence in combative training. It’s not enough to simply throw something out there that’s, for lack of a better term, half-assed. The maxim I always follow in my martial arts study is I train how I would fight. That means that if I’m serious about being able to hold my own if the situation calls for it, then I have to work my butt off to ensure I have the skill to back that up. Likewise, with writing and fiction in particular, you have to work your butt off to make sure you’re delivering the best story you can to readers.<\/p>\n *<\/p>\n Jeremy L. C. Jones <\/em><\/a>is a freelance writer, editor, and teacher.\u00a0\u00a0He is the staff Interviewer for <\/em>Clarkesworld Magazine<\/em><\/a> and a frequent contributor to <\/em>Kobold Quarterly<\/em><\/a>.\u00a0 He teaches at <\/em>Wofford College<\/em><\/a> and <\/em>Montessori Academy<\/em><\/a> in Spartanburg, SC.\u00a0 He is also the director of <\/em>Shared Worlds<\/em><\/a>, a creative writing and world-building camp for teenagers that he and <\/em>Jeff VanderMeer <\/em><\/a>designed in 2006.<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Right before my daughter was born I returned to the martial arts.\u00a0 I\u2019d have a child to protect, after all, and I wanted to be able to do so.\u00a0 My first belt test had me rattled.\u00a0 I hadn\u2019t been tested physically for more than fifteen years.\u00a0 I\u2019d become increasingly bookish and sedentary since my teen years.\u00a0 So I did what I do well, I read the manual over and over.\u00a0 I studied.\u00a0 I took notes.\u00a0 I took notes and practiced and studied\u2026 and studied some more. Even though there would be no written component, I studied for my belt test the same way I\u2019d study for a history or science exam\u2014read, memorize, recite, repeat. Moments before the test began I ran through everything in my head.\u00a0 Moments after I\u2019d bowed in and the test had started, I forgot everything.\u00a0 And I do mean everything\u2014basic kicks, basic strikes, basic techniques.\u00a0 At […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1252"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1258,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions\/1258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booklifenow.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nIn theory, I should\u2019ve known everything in my muscles.\u00a0 I should\u2019ve been able to simply do what I needed to do.\u00a0 Instead, during the test, I thought about what I needed to do and was rewarded with a terrifying blankness.<\/p>\n
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n