When You Can’t Train, Train Differently

There have been a lot of familiar faces missing from the mats lately.

Some guys are dealing with new injuries. Others are recovering from old ones that came back to haunt them. Back problems, cracked or bruised ribs, and the usual collection of aches and pains that come with doing something as physically demanding as Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

Some have been gone for weeks. Some might be out for months.

And when they finally come back, there’s that familiar mix of excitement and frustration. They’re happy to be training. Their bodies aren’t ready to do what their minds want them to do.

I understand that feeling.

But here’s what I’ve noticed lately. It isn’t only the guys with bad backs.

You’ve had your own version of this. Maybe you’re in the middle of it right now. Or maybe you’re the one whose body or circumstances would let them keep going, and you’re quietly relieved about it.

Think about what happens the day the thing you’ve built your identity around suddenly isn’t available.

The job ends.

The knee gives out.

The relationship changes.

The move takes you away from the training you loved.

Most of us have had a door close that we assumed would stay open.

And when it happens, one of the things we might discover is how much of ourselves we tied up in that one thing.

Watching these guys go through it has gotten me thinking about two things.

Bruce Lee.

And a year of my own life when I got knocked on my ass, both literally and figuratively.

When the Body Can’t Do What the Mind Wants

One of my favorite martial arts books is the Tao of Jeet Kune Do.

Not for the techniques. There’s plenty of good material in there, but what I love is that the book gives you a look inside Bruce Lee’s head.

How he thought about fighting. How he questioned the traditional approach. How he studied movement, strategy, efficiency, philosophy, human nature.

It’s like looking over the shoulder of a phenomenal martial artist while he works something out.

And the circumstances behind the book are part of what makes it fascinating.

In 1970, Lee suffered a serious back injury that forced him to stop training for an extended period. For somebody whose entire life revolved around movement and the development of his art, I can only imagine how frustrating that was. He spent months recovering, reportedly spending much of that time confined to bed.

But the forced time away gave him something he might not otherwise have had.

Time to think. Time to read. Time to write. Time to organize the ideas, strategies, and philosophies he’d been building through his whole martial arts life.

After he died in 1973, his writings and notes were assembled into what became the Tao of Jeet Kune Do, published in 1975.

A book I’ve gone back to many times.

Now, I don’t think Lee needed a back injury to become a great philosopher. He was already doing remarkable self-work and reflection. And I’m certainly not going to suggest getting hurt is a good thing.

But I do find it interesting that something that took away his ability to practice physically created the conditions for him to express what he’d been developing mentally.

He couldn’t train the way he wanted.

So he trained differently.

For any of us, that’s a useful starting point.

When your usual practice is unavailable, what’s the version of your craft or your work that doesn’t require the thing you’ve temporarily lost?

A runner who can’t run may still be able to study their training, read about recovery, or learn about movement. Somebody between jobs can learn more about their industry while looking for work. A parent in a difficult season might find a little time to better understand what their child is experiencing.

Not everyone has the time, energy, or resources to do those things, especially when they’re dealing with serious difficulties.

But sometimes there are opportunities to keep learning that don’t depend on our usual way of practicing.

The opportunity just changes shape.

And what changes shape is sometimes what gets missed later.

My Own Unexpected Time Off the Mat

In 1992, I returned to Hapkido after about three years away.

I’d spent those years finishing my electrical apprenticeship. I was 27, newly minted as a journeyman, and excited to get back on the mat.

A lot had changed at the dojang. Many of the black belts I remembered were still there, but there was a whole new cast of beginner and intermediate students.

And I was young, enthusiastic, and looking back, a little foolish.

I didn’t understand some of the people I was training with. I didn’t know their athletic backgrounds, their capabilities, or what kind of intensity they were comfortable bringing.

One of those students was a blue belt who, as I learned later, was a professional beach volleyball player.

I didn’t read that situation very well.

I came at him with an intensity I didn’t fully appreciate.

He matched it.

And I ended up in the hospital.

Not a quick trip to the emergency room. I ruptured my spleen and needed emergency surgery to remove it. A couple of days in intensive care, roughly a week in the hospital, and about ten weeks of medical leave.

Ten weeks without working. Ten weeks without training. Ten weeks with a lot more time on my hands than I wanted.

And that was only the first punch.

The lesson I took out of it wasn’t about jiu-jitsu or volleyball.

It was that enthusiasm and situational awareness are two different things.

I knew what I wanted to do. I didn’t know the room I was in.

Have you ever walked into something at full speed and found out later that you’d misjudged the people, the stakes, or the conditions?

A job. A conversation. A new group. A new responsibility.

Sometimes a setback reveals how much we didn’t notice.

And sometimes that discovery is more important than whatever we were trying to accomplish in the first place.

The Second Punch Was Waiting at Work

While I was finishing my apprenticeship, there had been warning signs about the construction economy.

I just wasn’t paying attention to them.

As a fourth-year apprentice earning 80 percent of journeyman scale, I was still working five days a week. But the electrical union had put journeymen on a four-day week, trying to spread the available work around and get more guys off the unemployment books.

It didn’t solve the problem. At least they were trying.

To me, the situation looked pretty good. When I journeyed out, I went from five days a week to four while making roughly the same money.

Four days of work. Three-day weekends. Same paycheck.

What wasn’t there to like?

What I didn’t understand was that the four-day week wasn’t a benefit. It was a warning. There wasn’t enough work to go around, and the union and contractors were already struggling to keep people employed.

I was looking at it through the eyes of a young man who’d just finished his apprenticeship and figured his career was finally taking off.

I saw what I wanted to see.

After the injury, I spent about ten weeks recovering. When I got back to work, the shop kept me on for what I understood to be the required period, then handed me my layoff check.

That was the second punch.

First the injury took me off the mat. Then the layoff took my job.

And the plans I’d been making didn’t look nearly as solid as I thought.

Here’s what matters for you in this.

Sometimes the thing you’re most grateful for is actually a signal.

The job with no new challenges. The relationship where the conversation stopped. The training that’s gotten comfortable. The schedule that’s gotten a little easier.

Any of those might represent a healthy, well-earned period of stability.

But they might also be part of a trend you haven’t noticed.

That doesn’t mean you should become suspicious of everything good in your life.

It means occasionally asking whether the situation is what you think it is.

What’s happening around you that you haven’t been paying attention to?

What would someone with more experience notice?

And what might you discover if you looked beyond your own immediate circumstances?

Those questions won’t protect you from every surprise.

But they might help you recognize a few before they become expensive lessons.

Sometimes Life Gives You More Time Than You Wanted

I hadn’t planned on an extended break from martial arts. I certainly hadn’t planned on being unemployed right after finishing my apprenticeship.

But there I was. Recovering from major surgery, wondering about my career, trying to figure out what came next.

Work was bad in 1993.

As a brand-new journeyman, I was competing against electricians with ten, twenty, thirty years of experience. Some were foremen willing to work at journeyman wages just to stay employed.

I had the same card they did. I didn’t have the same experience.

And the marketplace didn’t care that I’d just worked hard for several years to earn that card. It cared about what I could do.

Being qualified for something and being competitive at it aren’t the same thing.

I’d spent years preparing for a level of work I was now qualified to perform, only to discover that other people had experience and capabilities I hadn’t developed yet.

If you’ve ever been rejected for something you were clearly qualified for, you’ve felt that gap.

The degree and the job posting. The certification and the contract. The experience and the market that suddenly doesn’t have much demand for it.

It took a while to get steady work again. And even once I found work, I wasn’t ready to walk back into Hapkido.

Training takes time, money, energy, and a certain confidence that you can afford all three.

And when your employment is uncertain, those resources aren’t necessarily available.

Being unable to move forward in one direction doesn’t always mean every direction is closed.

That doesn’t make the situation easy. It doesn’t mean you aren’t facing real constraints.

But sometimes, even when you can’t do what you want to do, you can still examine where you are, what you’ve learned, and what you might need to change.

During that stretch away from Hapkido, I had time to think about the injury. About how I’d approached training. About the people I was sharing the mat with. About my career. About what I wanted out of life.

And about how I’d managed to miss so many warning signs that looked obvious in hindsight.

The four-day week. The lack of jobs. The different backgrounds of the people I trained with. My own enthusiasm getting ahead of my judgment.

The clues were everywhere.

I just hadn’t learned to read them.

Which raises a question worth asking when life interrupts your plans.

What was visible the whole time that I only noticed once I stopped moving?

Sometimes the answer is uncomfortable.

Sometimes there isn’t an obvious answer at all.

But examining the question can make us better prepared for whatever comes next.

Coming Back a Little Wiser

I got back on the Hapkido mat in early 1994. Almost two years after the injury.

I wasn’t quite the same guy who’d been sitting in the ER in 1992.

Still enthusiastic. Still wanted to train hard. Still loved the physical challenge and the process of learning.

But now I understood better why I was there.

I wasn’t trying to get back to where I’d been.

I wanted to be a better martial artist. A more thoughtful training partner. Somebody who paid attention to the people around him. Somebody who understood that intensity and intelligence are not the same thing.

My approach to work changed too.

I started paying attention to the industry instead of just my own shop’s week.

What were the economic conditions? Was construction expanding or contracting? Were contractors hiring? Were guys sitting on the union books waiting for a call?

I didn’t want to be blindsided like that again.

Paying attention doesn’t let you predict every downturn. Life will still knock you on your ass.

But you can get better at reading what’s around you. A little less naive. A little more prepared. A little more adaptable.

And sometimes that awareness matters as much as your technical ability.

Coming back differently is the part nobody plans for.

When you finally return to something you’ve had to leave behind, it’s natural to measure your progress against where you were before.

• How much strength have you lost?
• How much skill have you forgotten?
• How far behind are you?

But perhaps there’s another question worth asking.

What are you bringing back that you didn’t have when you left?

Maybe it’s better judgment.

Maybe it’s more patience.

Maybe it’s a clearer understanding of what you’re doing and why.

You might not be as fast, strong, or technically sharp as you once were.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean you haven’t grown.

The Mat Is About More Than Martial Arts

Now, more than thirty years later, I’m training Brazilian jiu-jitsu alongside guys who are often young enough to be my sons.

Every so often one of them disappears for a while. Back injury. Bad rib. Shoulder problem.

Then weeks or months later, they show up again. Sometimes eager to jump straight back into rolling. Sometimes understandably cautious. Sometimes frustrated that they aren’t where they were before.

When I see them come back, I feel a little wistful.

Because I remember being that young guy. Wanting back in. Feeling like the interruption was costing me something. Not yet understanding how much of my martial arts journey was happening off the mat.

I don’t know what each of them will take from it.

Some will heal up and go back to training. Others might discover something they hadn’t considered.

Maybe patience. Maybe how much they value the people around them. Maybe their training wasn’t sustainable the way they were doing it.

That’s their journey.

And it’s one of the reasons I love sharing the mat with them.

Watching them reminds me of my own experiences, but it also reminds me that we don’t always recognize the significance of what we’re going through while we’re in the middle of it.

Sometimes an interruption creates room for something we hadn’t considered before.

Perhaps it’s a skill we finally get around to learning. A person we grow closer to. A clearer understanding of what matters. Or simply a different way of looking at the situation.

The interruption doesn’t produce any of those automatically.

Room alone isn’t the same as growth. It’s just room.

And sometimes, depending on our circumstances, we can use that room to develop something worthwhile.

That’s one of the things martial arts continues to teach me.

It’s never been only about learning to fight.

It’s about learning to live.

And sometimes the lesson you need isn’t the one your instructor planned that day.

When You Can’t Train, Train Differently

I think about Bruce Lee and the work that became the Tao of Jeet Kune Do.

I think about that 27-year-old lying in a hospital bed with no idea another setback was waiting for him at the shop.

And I think about the guys at my gym right now, dealing with their own injuries and interruptions.

Different people. Different circumstances.

But there’s a thread.

Life interrupted the plan.

The question became what to do next.

That’s one of the ideas I’ve been chewing on from Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s Antifragile.

Resilience is being able to withstand a shock or recover from it. Antifragility is developing some benefit from certain kinds of stress and disorder.

But we have to be careful with that.

An injury isn’t automatically an opportunity. A layoff isn’t automatically a blessing. Suffering doesn’t automatically make anybody wiser.

Sometimes bad things are just bad things.

The growth, when it comes, depends on what happens afterward.

Bruce Lee couldn’t train the way he wanted, so he studied and wrote. I couldn’t get back on the mat, so I examined my mistakes, rebuilt my career, and reconsidered what martial arts was for.

And those young guys recovering from injuries will figure out their own version.

Maybe they’ll find that training differently for a while teaches them something they couldn’t have learned otherwise.

Not something worth getting hurt for.

Something worth carrying forward.

That’s one of the reasons I still love stepping on the mat.

Even now, there’s always something else to learn.

And sometimes you have to step off it to find out what.

⚔ The Dojo Drill

Think about something that’s interrupted your normal routine.

An injury. A career setback. A relationship that’s changed. A responsibility that’s keeping you from doing something you love.

Then ask yourself three questions.

1. What’s actually unavailable, and what’s still possible? Be specific. Don’t assume that losing one opportunity means you’ve lost every opportunity.
2. What can I still develop while the interruption lasts? Knowledge? Awareness? Patience? A different skill? A clearer understanding of your circumstances?
3. What do I want to bring back besides my previous performance? Better judgment? More realistic expectations? A stronger appreciation for what matters?

You don’t have to turn every setback into a self-improvement project.

Sometimes recovery, rest, or simply getting through a difficult period is enough.

And if you’re injured, healing comes first.

But when you’re ready, look around.

There may be something you can still learn.

Because an interruption isn’t necessarily the end of what you’re becoming.

Sometimes it’s a different room to keep practicing in.

📚 From the Leader’s Library

​Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder — Nassim Nicholas Taleb​

Why?

Most people try to build a life that can withstand adversity, but Taleb challenges us to go further: build a life that actually grows stronger through challenges, uncertainty, and change.

Antifragile explores how creating options, reducing unnecessary dependencies, and learning from manageable setbacks can help us thrive rather than merely survive. It’s a powerful reminder that personal leadership isn’t about controlling everything life throws at us—it’s about becoming more capable, adaptable, and prepared for whatever comes next.