Martial Arts Lessons You Can Apply to Your Software Career
Every since high school I’ve been in love with the martial arts. The history, culture, and lessons that all of them give to the practitioners. I believe the lessons taught in the martial arts school can be applied to all aspects of life, and that includes your software developer career.
In this post, I’ll detail some martial arts lessons and also how they can help your software development career.
Leave your Ego at the Door
This lesson is mainly from Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ). A lot of people who just get started in BJJ learn this. They soon realize that there’s always someone better and there is nothing wrong with someone putting you in a submission. You learn from it and move on, and that’s it. You don’t worry about how you should have seen the submission coming or how you should have defended. Your ego is the enemy and it can prevent you from learning.
The same can be said in software development. How many times have you seen someone get upset during a code review when someone goes over their code? Code reviews are to better the overal product and reduce the number of bugs you get so they are helpful to have. Plus, I’ve learned several things from folks reviewing my code, so it’s helpful to look at it as a learning experience.
Be Like Water
You may have heard of this quote from Bruce Lee. In fact, there’s a fairly popular video about it:
What this is saying is to keep your mind open to new things and ideas. Doing this will allow you to see things differently and in a new perspective.