The Myth of the "Self-Made Man"
And The Origins of Fight Smart
As a curious 16 year old, the majority of my strength related knowledge came from the Arnold Schwarzenegger Encyclopedia of bodybuilding... which is apparently 11 inches tall, per the random ruler in my Google image results:
Upon consumption of said 'encyclopedia', I put myself on one of the book's workout programs, which was designed for folks who frost their mini-wheats with synthetic testosterone.
I was... very sore. At all times.
Despite the horrendous over-training, I did learn quite a bit about muscle physiology... and I learned about the incredible life and mind of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Without being long-winded, Arnold came to America with $20 in his pocket and an unrelenting desire to succeed. He was broke... and he barely spoke English.
(But if you're broke and can't speak English, get outta mah country!! AMIRIGHT?!).
(jk. if that wasn't clear.)
Through obscene amounts of hard work, he became (in my opinion) the greatest body-builder of all time...
After teaching himself a second language, Arnold became the Terminator.
If any man could be considered a "Self Made Man," it would certainly be this guy... right? He pushed his body beyond what any human had every achieved (all in the face of abject poverty) and even broke through language barriers... just to chase his dreams.
He pulled himself up by his bootstraps while using them to generate a satisfying pump...
But again, as Arnold pointed out in this speech, Arnold doesn't believe in "self-made men", and he surely doesn't consider himself to be one.
I, too, have fallen prey to the delusion that I am a self-made man.
We're all proud of the things that we've "pushed through" in life, and I think it's natural to want to take as much credit for our achievements as humanly possible. After all, how else are we supposed to brag when we're old and broken?
Here are some things you probably didn't know about Trav... and the Origins of Fight Smart:
I used to be a professional grower of the "wacky-tobacky"... which other than being illegal and inducing a constant state of crippling anxiety, was a dream job! Since watching the "tobacky" grow didn't speed up the process, I was free to train all day, and spend a relaxed portion of my time teaching the savage arts to those who managed to find me.
Aaaaaand then after a brief period of time in Philadelphia County Prison, I was released back into the wild with virtually nothing.
I lost my training studio / apartment. I had no income. I had only my collection of luxurious board shorts, my training gear, and whatever skills I had built while the flowers were blooming.
In a stroke of good fortune, my brother had an extra bedroom and garage filled with 13 feet of piled garbage that he agreed to rent to me for $800/month IF I cleaned it out... which took a week of hand-lacerating, back-breaking work.
After applying for a host of credit cards and maxing them all out.. I put up drywall, painted the place, threw down mats, and bought some chain link from a local junk yard...
Boom... a new garage-based training studio was born ( the fancy printed T-Shirts came a lot later):
But then I needed students...
So late at night, perched from my stool-like throne as the local felonious bouncer, I engaged in an aggressive campaign of self-promotion to sell private MMA lessons with Trav... the friendly criminal cage fighter. Soon enough, I had a tiny personal training business in that formerly decrepit garage.
This business did not grow as quickly as my bills.
...so much like Arnold learning a new language, I learned how to code and build websites in the handful of hours between my last trainee and another shift at the bar.
(a historical reenactment:)
"I'll be back..." I'd whisper to my computer screen and hop on my bicycle to get to my stool on time.
Months passed...
My website scraped and crawled its way up the search rankings;
I experienced multiple word-of-mouth explosions;
And all of a sudden, I sorta had a successful business!
My schedule eventually filled, and I finally had some cash in my pocket which I promptly spent on Advil.
Because this life... was NO JOKE.
All day, every day, my students assaulted my hands, tried to bash my face during "Punch-Trav-If-You-Can" rounds, and essentially released their aggression into my intensely inflamed joints.
For 7 HOURS A DAY, I scrapped with trainees and sharpened my timing. I focused extensively on technique. I figured out to unlock every nugget of power, in every move.
But my body was being destroyed.
After a couple years, my hands were shaking so badly that I couldn't read a magazine. I had to put my preferred bathroom literature on the floor where it was steady... and with my head nestled gently between my knees, I would prepare to face another day of pain and savagery.
This was not a viable 'long-term plan.'
Then one day, my 400 pound Uncle John (and proud former owner of 'worldsgreatestvacuum.com') called me up with a life-changing suggestion. "Hey Trav... you should sell some 1's and 0's!"
Digital information mannnnnn!
After a brief explanation of binary code so I could understand his joke, I was fully prepared to start filming lessons and offering them to the world.
After all, my LinkedIn account was not exactly... robust.
So I forfeit social interaction for a month to save up for a Craigslist camera (and some lighting equipment), and set to work figuring it all out.
I mean... it had to work. Right? Surely if I shared all of my gnarly tips and tricks with the internet, someone, somewhere online would buy my stuff. Right? Right?!
RIGHT?!?!?!?!
It was a chance that I had to take.
All I had to do was teach MMA for 7 hours a day, and then push through that crippling exhaustion to set up a camera and lights all by myself... just so I could teach a several more hours of MMA... to an inanimate object: my camera.
On some nights I just demonstrated technique until I could no longer physically function, only to find out that the microphone had run out of batteries.
FOR ZERO DOLLARS...
For merely the chance at success.
And for a full year I filmed, without getting a single view. (I couldn't even release them.)
Because MY videos... were terrible.
Terrrrrible.
(a historical reenactment of my first video:)
I was just as uncomfortable in front of the camera as every other guy, wincing at the sound of his own voice for the first time.
Like every Karen and Tucker complaining about their "rights being violated" for having to wear a mask in a private business... I was cringe-worthy.
Like every 'found footage' movie that followed the Blair Witch project, my work was an insult to consumer grade electronics.
(I couldn't decide which simile to use, so I used both).
Every lesson went into the digital trash-bin, which I promptly emptied before I could look back.
Deleted.
And it was in this state of self-proclaimed failure, that my Uncle died.
The guy who actually thought of Fight Smart never got to see it... and I had no idea what I was doing without him.
(rest in peace, big fella)
I took some time to nurse my wounds.
Then in the wee hours one night, as I lay with ice on my ankles... this video made its way onto my screen.
After that video finished, in that moment, I decided that failure was not an option. I wanted to be successful more than I wanted painless joints; more than I wanted to breathe.
But THIS time, when I stepped in front of the camera to do it all over again... I didn't suck anymore. I had become accustomed to hanging out with my emotionless one-eyed robotic homie, talking about martial arts, and demonstrating techniques as hard as I could to impress nobody.
The garbage that I filmed the year prior was merely the price of admission.
And after a couple weeks, I had a handful of lessons completed and they were good lessons... but something was missing.
So I called up my buddy Casey Webb:
...who was not yet the host of Man Vs Food.
(I like to believe that Fight Smart (coupled with his unique gastrointestinal prowess) catapulted him into this artery-clogging form of fame).
So... we watched the videos together, and paused them occasionally as we thought of funny 'bits' that would enhance the entertainment value of said lessons.
While it's personally painful for me to watch my older videos... 'Tips For A Good Fighting Stance' was the first video that we completed... and it's packed with cringe-worthy gold.
"Tag... your nuggets."
This became the Fight Smart way. Made solid lessons, and pack them with vaguely relevant, utter stupidity.
Success was inevitable.
But I refused to release them.
I just kept arbitrarily filming stuff for the next three years. THREE MORE YEARS. Every lesson, including the infamous Head Movement Video sat on a hard-drive... collecting digital dust.
I... just couldn't bring myself to pull the trigger!
Nothing was ever good enough. And I was afraid. It had been too much work! Too much time had been spent for me to face the moment where I actually learned if this was going to work... or not.
It went on for four total years, and the project consumed every disposable dollar that I had.
One Saturday night at around 4 in the morning, my girlfriend (now wife) finally had enough...
She collected the soggy magazines from our bathroom floor, and stood in the door of my office. My bloodshot eyes peeled away from my computer screen, and drifted over to her as she spoke. "Trav... this is getting ridiculous. You're releasing your videos next week, or you have a problem. Pick the day, and I'm going to bed."
So I picked the day.
And that day quickly came... Sarah got home from work, and immediately asked if 'it had been done'.
Of course, it had not. I provided many excuses.
So she refused to leave me alone.
She followed me around the house, and shunned any activity that was not directly related to releasing the videos. I couldn't even escape to the bathroom... which was a problem. Due to my unorthodox reading habits, I'm a shy pooper.
So to restore gastrointestinal regularity, I approached the computer... took a deeeeeeep breath... and uploaded the videos.
*POOF*
7 days passed...
I remember looking at Google Analytics to see how many people were on my site. SEVEN PEOPLE! Holy crap! Seven soon-to-be loyal members of the Fight Smart army were consuming content like hungry savages! Woo hoo! A huge success indeed!
And hour later... I checked again. 70 people. o.O
Another hour... 700.
And then my site crashed.
The Head Movement Video had gone viral... and the game had begun.
Fight Smart was finally brought into the public light. Thousands of people were learning my martial ways in a state of mild amusement.
No one saw the pain.
No one saw the fear.
No one saw the failures.
No one saw my face after recording for hours with the microphone off.
They just saw some dude dodging punches with giggles in his heart, and they wanted to be a part of it.
On the surface, it may seem like I'm a self-made man...
I did train relentlessly for a decade to build my skills and become a fighter... and then in the face of post-prison poverty, I built every facet of a business with my bare hands; learning everything necessary, while breaking my body and bank account to do it.
But at each step, I was never alone.
During my time as a fighter, many of my coaches were volunteers... they taught at the gyms that I attended for free.
When I went to prison, my friends chipped in for my lawyers... otherwise, I might still be there.
When I got out, my buddy Dimitrius (owner of The Greek Lady restaurant in Philly) loaned me $1,200. Without that money, I couldn't even have rented a room. (My brother needed a paying tenant).
My dad helped me to build that studio. I still remember the final touches, as we put the padding on the cage to make it look "cool".
My uncle gave me the computer with which I edited my videos... and he died before I could pay him back.
Without Casey helping to 'act out' my comedic visions... the chuckles may have been absent. He made my first videos awesome.
Without my wife, I may never have built up the courage to press "GO". She became my courage.
And without YOU reading and watching this stuff, I suppose it would have all been for nothing. I would still be in an empty room talking to myself...
Just me and that camera.
It's easy to look back on our lives, and think about everything that WE put into them... and how we single handedly achieved the accomplishments that have made us who we are.
Just remember that it's hard to pull yourself up by your boot-straps, if you were never given a pair of boots.
Arnold's words reminded me of all the help I had gotten over the years... and it gave me a much deeper appreciation of the teamwork required for success.
Take some time and thank those who have done the same for you in the upcoming days... and if they're not here anymore, try to help someone else in the same way. Your mentors will watch over you with pride.
After all, we all have something to be proud of, and so do the people who helped us to get there.
Have a fantastic day.
-Trav
Yes of course we all have been helped in life. But you do make yourself who you are. No one made him into a bodybuilder just like no one made you into a martial artist. You both had to Make Yourselves into that, so yes you are self made with help from others. No one made you to be who you are, you did. You guys always trying to be politically correct.
You are missing the point, Steve. It is not political correctness. It is the recognition that we are in this together. No matter how hard you work, if you lapse into the erroneous thought that you achieved everything on your own, it can lead to selfishness and thoughtlessness. If you instead embrace your connectedness to others during your journey, it hopefully will lead to kindness and generosity. We need to get past the idea that it somehow takes away from how hard Arnold or Trav or you or I have worked when we acknowledge the fortunate turns in our journey. In reality, the help we received is the source of our greatest strength: we will allows go farther together than we can alone. And then once we have achieved something, we will remember to reach down and offer our hand to the next person making his or her climb.
Buddy, you missed the point. “Because when you understand that you are here because of a lot of help, you will understand [here it comes, wait for it….] that NOW IS TIME TO HELP OTHERS. Step outside yourself for a minute.
Not sure it’s political correctness, but yes – Trav worked his ASS off to get where he is. With some help sure, but he did it. It’s also noble to suggest helping others.
I agree with you man, fascism is the enemy. I’m not sure I expressed myself quite clearly enough which led to some confusion, I was calling out the user above named Steve for blaming you for being a good person who espouses good ideals. Instead of questioning his own beliefs, Steve would rather hold onto the sentiment that selfishness is the way and that people who strive to recognise and appreciate the people around them are just doing so falsely for some magical “political correctness” points.
Usually the term “politically correct” gets brought up by people who generally are against social or even liberal policies. The sad irony though is that right now in America the establishment is also against social and liberal policies, even going as far as escalating crackdown on mostly peaceful dissent (which according to their own manuals is a very bad idea if a fast and smooth resolution is the goal), this means that it could purely linguistically make more sense to say that being pro-protestors or socialist policies are currently the true politically incorrect stances as far as the U.S. establishment is concerned.
Sorry for making yet another comment. My intention is not to agitate the ban-hammer, it’s just that you seem to have mistaken me for a fascist, which deeply disturbs me considering that some of my family were executed for being leftist partisans in Nazi-occupied Norway, so I’m hoping you can understand how I felt a need to clear things up.
“Politically correct”? Trav has openly expressed anti-fascist and anti-police sentiments, under an authoritarian state like America that is certainly not striving to be “politically correct” unless you’re using that term as a dogwhistle to mean “Ayn Rand was right” or some other “Socialism = Evil” jackboot propaganda.
All good man… no worries!
Thanks for sharing. It’s important to remember all who helped us along the way.
Steve I agree that personal motivation has a lot to do with how life unfolds for an individual. I think it is both. For example, there is a gym in my town and, even though I can work out at home, going to the gym I am always waaay more thorough. So, even though it is my own motivation that gets me in the door, could I have mined the metal and fabbed all that equipment? No… so both individual will + help. It seems with this as in pretty much everything the most complete lies in the middle way.
Fascism is bad. Police kneeling on people’s necks until they are dead is bad. According to Julian, these are ‘politically incorrect’ positions. We’re not going to talk about politics, on this thread. Further political commentary will result in the ban-hammer.