Accuracy

Sparring in class this weekend, I was up against a lady who is a lower ranking belt than I am. We started sparring and I ended up only lasting about 10 seconds. She hit me so hard in the abdomen that I had to sit down and breathe for fear of puking. I was inaccurate in blocking the strike, she was inaccurate in the amount of power she put behind the strike. We talked about accuracy afterwards and it hit me. When do you need speed and when do you need to be accurate? I was then reminded of a quote I heard in the movie "Tombstone" by Wyatt Earp (Kevin Costner) "Fast is fine, but accuracy is everything." You see, people have varying degrees of speed. I'm fast, you're fast, she's fast, does it matter who's faster if you all are fast? Or do you need that little boost of accuracy mixed with speed to win the fight?

Webster defines accuracy as:

1. Freedom from mistake or error

Using that definition in a scenario. I'm sparring, I'm getting hits in to the arms, the shoulders, the legs. I'm fast and getting hits in but who's doing all the work? I'm not doing anything to gain points if I am just swinging wildly. Eventually I'm going to tire out and lose the fight. If I am accurate in my striking, it doesn't matter how fast or slow I am because I'm accurate. Point is, accuracy will win over speed.

How can you use this in your every day life? Well, the first thing that comes to mind, is don't drive faster than the speed limit. Why? The speed limits are set because of different things, like condition of road, amount of people around, if there's a school next door etc. If you go over that you become inaccurate in your driving. A pedestrian could step out and you not have time to stop. Another example of how accuracy wins over speed.

This is also true in your school work. Imagine, big test day. You fly through the questions and don't take time to check them over. How likely are you to have been accurate on the questions? Not very. The speed here could have led to mistakes and the need to finish the test quickly could have lead to inaccuracies. Another example where speed lost to accuracy.

My thoughts: Be fast, sure, but be fast when the time calls for it. Be accurate in your daily life. Keep your finances accurate, keep your speed accurate and have fun. Because accuracy will help you in all situations you come across.