Red Hawk Essentials #20
The Power of Letting Go
Let’s talk about resentment.
There’s been plenty of times in my life where I could’ve held some serious resentment toward religion or people. But I knew early on that resentment is a super toxic trait. The close cousin of jealousy.
An article from John Hopkins Medicine says:
Chronic anger puts you into a fight-or-flight mode, which results in numerous changes in heart rate, blood pressure and immune response. Those changes, then, increase the risk of depression, heart disease and diabetes, among other conditions.
Crazy, right? But we know most of the damage is internal.
To me, peace equals freedom.
Resentment and any other toxic emotions disturb my peace. Basically, it’s robbing me of my freedom.
I refuse to let resentment cloud my headspace and fill it with negativity. That’s like giving control of my thoughts away to someone or something else.
You know how the old saying goes:
Holding a grudge is like letting someone live rent free in your head.
In the end, the person holding the resentment will be the one punished even if they were wronged.
You’ll get trapped in a vicious cycle of negativity and anger. That will poison your thoughts and zap your focus, energy, and happiness.
In this space, it’s hard to be creative or grateful. So it’s impossible to be at peace.
If you even allow the seed of resentment to slightly exist, it’s going to grow bigger and bigger over time. Even if you stop thinking about it or ignore it, it’s still going to be there lying dormant. You’re always in danger of exploding like an awakened volcano.
The only way to get rid of it is to let go.
When you try to let go, you might notice your mind resisting the idea. That’s what Eckhart Tolle calls the pain body.
We can get addicted to the pain body and all the negative emotions within it.
So the only way to truly be at peace, is to let go.
It’s a powerful skill to practice, and I think it’ll help you with happiness and peace.
Fighting Against Friends
When you’re training in a room full of elite guys in your weight class, everyone has the same goal.
To be the best in the world.
So when it comes to the UFC and Pay-Per-Views, sometimes teammates are gonna have to fight.
If they’re really close and they’ve been training partners for years and years, maybe they’ll make the agreement to not fight.
But if you’re at an elite level, there’s always a possibility that you might have to fight your friend. The UFC is trying to put together the biggest fights possible, so they might try to match you up.
The question then becomes…
Do you want to put the friendship aside for 15-25 minutes?
With Merab and Aljo, it’s hard to say. I think that’s why Aljo is gonna move up after a couple more fights so Merab can have a chance at the title.
But sometimes fighting your friend does ruin the friendship.
DC said him and Stipe were really good friends before fighting each other. But after their rivalry, DC admitted they weren’t as close anymore.
When you’re close with someone and you know their family, and you know how hard they’ve worked… it can be a tough thing to cope with emotionally if you’re fighting each other. Because you know that winning comes with the cost of ruining their dreams for the time being.
It’s a hard thing to get over and it takes a certain mindset and savagery.
At the end of the day, it’s really up to the fighters. And it’s always going to be a tough call.
Thorne Supplements
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Back To The Ol’ Stomping Grounds
This past weekend, Suga and I went back to Montana. This is where we had a lot of our fights, both amateur and professional. Especially at the Four Seasons Arena, in Great Falls.
So we had 3 of our guys going to battle over the weekend. Seeing all the fans in the venue definitely brought back some good memories and good feelings.
The best part is that all 3 of my guys showed up, fought hard, and got their W’s.
Even in smaller shows, there’s a lot of pressure on the fighters. We had to fly in from Arizona, fight in front of a big crowd, and get the job done.
One of my favorite parts about coaching the amateurs besides watching my guys win, is watching their confidence build.
I really think the most important thing in a fight is confidence. It’s a real superpower in life. Helps you with fighting, girls, taking risks, etc. And I’m not talking about false confidence, acting cool and tough bullshit. I’m talking about real confidence that can only come through putting in the work.
Every fight you win, your confidence keeps going up. And a confident fighter is always a dangerous fighter.
That’s why Teddy Atlas said winning a title immediately makes you 30% better. There’s no higher accomplishment than being a champion to feed your confidence.
So I love seeing the journey. Especially since some of my students weren’t confident in the past when they first started. Seeing them get wins, start succeeding, and watching their confidence grows makes me feel really good.
Overall, it was a really good trip, I have a vlog of the experience on my Patreon. You can check that out at the end of this newsletter.
Super proud of the boys!
What I’m Reading: Deep Work by Cal Newport
Deep Work is focused, undistracted work.
This book talks about how important deep work is when you want to create something or learn something on a deep level.
Multitasking won’t help you learn something on a deep, deep, level. It moves you a mile in 100 different directions. Deep work moves you 100 miles in 1 direction.
Being able to sit there and do one thing and focus on one thing is a superpower. Especially in this day and age where we live in a world of distraction. TikTok, Facebook, or Instagram are constantly calling for our attention.
But I think practicing deep work is how you can really create something cool.
Quick Hits From This Week
Some goodies from James Clear’s 3-2-1 newsletter
“Focus starts with elimination, improves with concentration, and compounds with continuation.”
I always see people come to my gym for a few classes and never show up again.
You might notice this with your friends. The ones who try a bunch of a different things all the time, usually never finish or get anywhere far. But the few who do one thing for a long time, they’ve probably gone really far with it.
“The connective tissue between your failures and your successes is the lessons you learn along the way.
It is only by going through your early attempts (usually failures in some form) that you accumulate the insights, skills, and understanding required for success.
Everything is a lesson. Learn enough lessons and the failures become useful.”
Most people take failures the wrong way. When they fail, they quit. You should be thankful for failures, they’ll teach you what not to do the next time. They make you better. If you get rejected by a girl, are you gonna stop talking to girls? I hope not.
Red Hawk Recap Ep. 81
On this episode of the pod, I was joined by my buddy Ryan Sprague. Suga and I only get our weed from Ryan and we won’t smoke anything else.
Unhealthy relationship with weed
To help deal with an unhealthy relationship with cannabis, Ryan suggests you figure out your why. It’s likely you don’t have a cannabis problem, but a deeper problem that cannabis is helping you cope with.
Growing weed yourself
Ryan actually recommends that everyone who smokes should learn how to cultivate their own cannabis. Ryan has courses where he teaches his methods on how to naturally and ethically cultivate good cannabis. Plus, Ryan says his method of growing cannabis will help you grow other foods as well.
Truth about tobacco
The truth is, tobacco is not as bad as the media makes it seem. The tobacco we know of in mainstream media like in cigarettes, blunt wraps, etc - that shit is full of additives and doesn’t contain pure tobacco. Of course, nicotine is still addictive, but Ryan says it’s only to the degree as the stuff you’re running from.
Morning routines
Personally, I start with a 20 minute sprint or walk on the treadmill. Sit in front of my red light for 30 minutes, then have 30g of protein after. And then, I’ll have my espresso. This routine makes me have such fucking good energy, and I encourage you guys to find and dial in your own morning routines.
Red Hawk Academy Patreon
We’ve been going 4 years strong with our Patreon. There’s hundreds of videos on there, with new content going up all the time.
You can get exclusive access to technique videos, extra podcasts, and general healthy living videos.
I reply to everyone on Patreon, so if you have any questions, hit me up there!
»» Click here to check out Red Hawk Academy on Patreon
That ends it for this week’s Red Hawk Essentials.
Hope you enjoyed this one. Give me a like/comment/subscribe below.
If you’re new here, welcome to the fam! We’re dropping gems like this each week.
Remember if you got some grudges or jealousy within you, let that shit go.
Love ya, talk next week.
Tim
Every person in America should be tuned in for these weekly newsletters- gold Timbo
Another great read, Tim