What Amount Of Training Makes A Difference?

"The purpose of training is to tighten up the slack, toughen the body, and polish the spirit."

-Morihei Ueshiba

"There are two mistakes one makes along the road to truth; Not going all the way, and not starting."

-Buddha

Boy, it's been awhile. I apologize.

I saw someone post on Reddit that practicing martial arts once or twice a week doesn't make a difference, and it had me thinking;

How do you define once or twice a week?

I agree, doing one hour a week will not do much for you physically.

I had a teacher who promulgated that you needed to practice at least three hours a week to see any kind of improvement, even if it might be slow.

And I honestly agree.

When I first started martial arts, for my first ten years that's what I did. I would go to two classes, and sometimes the sparring class on the weekend. But when I started Kendo, We would practice for 2 hours once a week.

Then my father and I joined another class they held on sundays, and our practice became four hours a week.

I saw steady improvement, which then accelerated.

Likewise, when I went to another school to learn another style of Tae Kwon Do, I didn't practice for two 50 minute sessions. I might have had class at 7 at night, but I would be there the moment the dojo opened, and left when it had finally closed.

And that's really when I saw not just improvement in my technique in that new style, but also improvement in who I was.

The more time we diligently invest in our training the more we see results that are worth the time spent.

The only way to do this art is to practice. That's the simple hard fact of it. But what is interesting is how many different ways we can train. Even thinking about how to do a form or technique can lead to improvement. But I suppose the question then you need to ask in however one may define 'training' is this;

'Am I focused'
'Am I seeking improvement.'
'What am I trying to improve'
'Is this enough for me'.

Which sounds simple, but is difficult to determine for each of us.

But a session should be defined by each of us, In the end, no matter how much guidance we receive from a teacher, we ultimately have the reigns of what we do with, and become from what we practice. From what we can tell is helping us. There comes a point as a dojorat that we have to acknowledge we might be overdoing things.

And that will differ from person to person.

But honestly, in my opinion, if you want to see minimal improvement over a period of time, you need around 3 hours. 1 hour won't go anywhere, 2 hours might keep you stable. 3 or more will keep you steadily improving.

What do you guys think?

"You can only fight the way you practice."

-Miyamoto Musashi