Live today so you can be proud tomorrow

Do you fight for today or tomorrow? I say we all should fight for tomorrow. Its what you will see when you look back that we are fighting for. Down the road will you wake up in a cold sweat wishing you did it better or will you sleep soundly knowing you did it right?
Every time you step into the ring, cage, mat…. you will be judged. You will be judged by those watching and more importantly, yourself. We are all different. Some will be satisfied with just getting in there. Some need to win at any cost. Others will be satisfied no matter the outcome if they know that they did all they could.

I am passed my career. I am here to tell you that you will look back. You will judge yourself and it will affect you. If you are proud of what you did, you will be more of a man for it. If you are full of regret, it will hang on you like a weight. I am not satisfied with my competitive career but I am comfortable with what I was able to achieve. As a competitor, you should never be satisfied. As a person, you need to rectify what you achieved in a way that allows you to continue forward.

At 39, with lots of battle scars, I am done fighting…….. maybe 🙂 My last fight didn’t go well for me. I got choked out cold in a MMA bout. It happens. I took the fight on 3 or 4 days notice after 4 years away from active competition. I was not in shape and I was nowhere near ready to compete. But some days you just have to say screw it and do something a little crazy to remind yourself you are still alive and still a man. I got caught in a choke and kept fighting til I passed out. No tap here unless something is going to break.

I can tell you for a fact that I think about my last fight every single day. I am not OK with it as a fighter but I am OK with it as a man. I would rather go out in a bout that I trained for properly. I would rather have gone out in a bout that I had a chance to throw down in. Maybe I will get the chance, maybe I won’t. Either way I am fine and no less a man for it.

I want the people I train to have the ability to end their careers the way they choose with the positive memories their efforts deserve.

What you have today may be gone tomorrow. One of my guys blew out his ACL while cutting weight! He passed out from shock due to cold water not agreeing with his system after a long session in a sauna. When he hit the deck, his knee folded funny and his ACL went. He also cut his foot wide open on the shower drain. Being stubborn and having sold a ton of tickets kept his head in the game. Knowing his knee was shot and foot was going to open wide, he still man’d up and fought. Not a pretty fight. Not a win, but a balls out, leave it all in the cage, war.

I would not recommend anyone ever do the above, but sometimes you are looking at an injury or life catching up to you and you have to go out on your own terms. How do you want to remember yourself? Some days you have to be carried out on your shield so you can live the remainder of your days in peace.

If you never fought, you probably think I am crazy. Only those that have lived with passion and desired greatness can understand what I am talking about. Ordinary and boring will never understand the level of commitment it takes to be a warrior.

Consider your later years. Know you will look back. Live in a way that you can be proud of. Live in a way that you can be proud to share with your kids one day. Fight like your life depends on it because it does. The quality of your life depends on your mental state. Give yourself every opportunity to be proud of yourself. Put yourself out there in a way that gives you strength that can carry you for the rest of your days. Live in a way that can lift others out of ordinary. Be inspirational.

You don’t have to fight to be a warrior. If you do, do it right. If you don’t fight, find what you are passionate about and give it everything you have while you still can.

Brian Wright
Real Elite