Taisen Deshimaru Quotes

Martial arts are a vehicle for developing your human potential.

Martial arts have two parts. One is external, other internal. The external is physical part. The internal is philosophy of how to be, what kind of person learns martial arts.

Martial arts has just made me a better person. It's a way of life.

The best way to pursue any discipline is the martial art way.

Martial arts has been a way of life for me since I was a young kid. It created a discipline and respect for everything. Martial arts has just made me a better person. It's a way of life.

I practice martial arts not to win over other people but to win over my own heart.

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

It's the philosophies of being an athlete that carry me today.

The fight game has never been just about winning.

I will always have that, 'I want to be the best fighter on the planet' thing in me.

For me the more important thing is fighting. You know, training, fighting. The sports side. I didn't choose my media life.

I love athletics and martial-arts and competition because it gets me right and puts me in the right place.

I'm a natural born fighter, so this is what I do, and it's normal. It's natural. It's what I've always done as a martial artist, and as a martial artist, it's what I always wanted to do - test myself and always fighting. It's what I'm meant to do.

There is still so much room for me to get better. Everyone in this sport evolves so quickly. You could take six months off and come back to a totally different game. That's why I'm always in the gym working. Even if I don't have a fight lined up, I'm still in there working to improve my overall game.

Martial arts, when I do martial arts, it's more of a life type of training.

My understanding of the world is all through the prism of martial arts. It's affected every aspect of my life.

I want to be great, I want to fight the best guys, I want to test myself, I want see what my limits are. I don't think a lot of guys in this sport really have that mentality.

I love to fight. I love the preparation. I love to learn new things, always overcoming myself.

I am a strong competitor inside the ring, outside the ring, in the journey through life.

When you're doing martial arts, you feel like you can master certain skills and be so much more in control of who you are, so that really appealed to me.

I consider myself a decent athlete but when I started to train martial arts like Kung Fu, I realised it had nothing to do with how athletic you are. It's all mental. It's what you know, how you use it and your mental toughness and composure. It's incredible.

The real purpose of the martial arts must be to purge oneself of petty ambitions and desire, to obtain control of one’s own character.

There is a ferocity to MMA and to the training, but there's such a humanity to it too. It takes so much sacrifice and humility to get into it and to rise through those levels. If you look at the fights as a means to test who you are, every one of these fights is an opportunity to see how far you're willing to go up against yourself - and to find and define your limits.

The thing is that oftentimes, we want to be everything all at once. We want to be strong and mature, and God wants that for us, too. But just like that flowerpot had to sit in the sun and receive water day after day, we have to sit in God's presence every day, too.

Aikido can be summed up like this: True victory is self-victory; let that day arrive quickly! (True victory) means unflinching courage; (self-victory) symbolizes unflagging effort; and (let that day arrive quickly) represents the glorious moment of triumph in the here and now.