Lots of interesting stuff coming out...
Everyone's different. I'm competitive by nature, so never had a problem with the drive part. As for putting a taste of reality in it all, well that all happened just fine as a teenager in the Nixon years with long hair working around rednecks. Nothing like some fat-bellied "rasslers" suffering from a serious case of white man crack wanting to f*** you up for being a smart-assed, college boy hippie.
Moi? Smart assed? Wherever would they get that idea??
Anyhow, I was studying Japanese karate from a crazy Japanese who was a samurai descendent. I would drive 45 minutes to Williamsburg to study from the man at W&M. He was a mean SOB, but I appreciated it at the time. Made those rednecks seem less threatening in comparison.
And this was where I got to get the crap kicked out of me by my first football players: Barry French, Jim Thomas, and Bill Stockey. Bill is still a good friend, and quite the martial artist. You can google a picture or two of him here and there around the 'net.
Those were the days... Sparring with no Safe-T-Crap, workouts in the summer w/o AC, getting beaten senseless with a shinai for backing up, having that sick feeling in my stomach through many classes... It was good and bad at the same time. But it was timely for me. These were tense times, and I'm not the shrinking violet. The hell in the dojo made the hell at my summer job much more bearable.
Several years later I started Uechi. And Rad Smith was on his own tear at the time. Big, and frighteningly fast. Loved to work with me because he could slam me, and I wouldn't break. Got hurt a few times...but wouldn't break.
People wonder where my feistiness comes from. Part nature, and part nurture. Part the Irish hellion, and part a product of the times.
You never lose that competitiveness, or the desire to kick the dust up a bit now and then. It's good for what ails you. It keeps rigor mortis from setting in the body and the brain.
To each his/her own.
- Bill