In May 2021, I picked up photography as a new hobby. After taking pictures while hiking with my phone, I decided that I wanted something that would give me slightly better quality pictures and bought an advanced point and shoot camera. Shortly thereafter I took a trip to the Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium in Omaha, Nebraska. I enjoyed my time there taking hundreds of pictures, and I was able to get some good images while there were some photos where the subject was slightly out of focus or I did not manipulate the camera’s settings the best I could.
Just a couple weeks ago in November 2023 I returned to Omaha’s zoo with a couple years of photography experience under my belt. This time instead of showing up with an advanced point and shoot camera. I was using a full frame camera with a telephoto lens. For those that don’t know anything about photography, I was using a nicer and more expensive camera that I invested in. While I am definitely a better photographer now than I was a couple of years ago, I would be lying if I said that the nicer equipment did not make a difference in the photographs. I was able to get many more good photographs than the previous time, but there were still some bad ones on my memory card (My friends and family don’t get to see those!). Overall, it was cool to see the ways that I improved in my skills as a camera shooter, my composition skills, and my ability to manipulate the camera settings optimally while also seeing the areas in which I can still improve.
We can benefit from applying this mentality the same way with our martial arts and professional lives. While it is important to constantly look for ways to improve, we must also celebrate the ways that we have grown. This reflection can come from looking at old pictures and videos of ourselves at a lower rank and analyzing how our technique has changed for the better (See my article on my analysis of my side kick https://urbanmartialartists.com/2021/08/12/my-side-kick-then-and-now/). In a professional sense as an engineer that codes, I can look at source code for something that I worked on close to two years ago and see how I have improved in my design choices and use of coding best practices. Just like the bad pictures that every photographer takes despite their experience, there will always be times where our martial technique will not be the greatest, but hopefully, these moments of bad techniques will come fewer and farther between.
Take a moment to revisit some old work and compare it to some work in the more recent past. Celebrate how you have improved and look for ways to get better.
