Why The Critics Opinion Doesn’t Matter (EVER)!

When I lived in Iowa and trained with legendary Coach Pat Miletich, they used to have a saying written on a dry erase board for everyone, fighter or casual student, to look at, read and study.

It’s a quote taken from the late great president of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt. It goes like this:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

Let me assure you, that’s a great quote. Maybe the best ever, at least in my opinion.

And everything Roosevelt says is spot on. The critic doesn’t count. Someone who takes joy in pointing out the flaws other people have is a weak minded, shallow person.

No matter how good you are, or how nice of a person you are, or how much you’ve achieved, there’s always gonna be someone waiting to tear you down.

The worlds full of critics. So goes life. Get used to it early because with everyone and their brother on social media sites like Facebook, all the sudden everyone’s a critic.

Then key for you, and I assume you’re looking for success, either in MMA or out in the real world, you can’t let the critic get you down.

I’ll use myself and Ivey League MMA as an example of being the target of critics.

About 2 weeks ago we got a really nasty review on Yelp from a former student. This person is someone I once considered not only a good student but also a friend.

Now this “friend” has turned into enemy and taken to social media for revenge and whats considered a good audience.

In his review, which you can find easily on Yelp, he criticized pretty much everything about Ivey League, and me (Danny Ives) as the head coach.

I read it and was like #1 This is all false and flat out lies and #2 wow what a turdbag.

I treated this person so well and went out of my way time and time again to help out with training.

I can’t tell you how many times I came in and worked 1 and 1 when I didn’t have to. And for no charge.

I treated to lunches, knew the whole family. I did my best to make this person happy and as it turns out, my best simply wasn’t good enough.

It’s a tough pill to swallow but as time goes on you learn to accept that some people are just insecure, self-hating losers who take their frustrations out on you.

I’ll let you in on a secret; you can’t make everyone happy. No matter who you are, or what you’ve won or how hard you try, sooner or later you’ll take some heat.

Look, I work super hard to make sure Ivey League is a great place to learn Mix Martial Arts. I work easily 75 hours a week making sure my students are happy.

I do all of that and for some people it’s just never good enough. Like this person.

You’ve gotta brush off criticism and keep moving forward toward your overall goals. You need to keep things in perspective.

And at the same time, who really cares what a Yelp critic thinks anyway?

I don’t that’s for sure. That’s cause I know I’m good at what I do and my students are some of the best in the land.

Shoot just the other day I was watching a HL video of the greatest boxer of all time, Sugar Ray Robinson.

I looked below at the comments and people were saying all types of awful stuff. Stuff like he sucks, he can’t box, how they could beat him in a fight blah blah.

Dude, we’re talking about freaking SUGAR RAY ROBINSON! The best of the best and people still find reasons to criticize.

Unreal I know but this is the world we live in and if you wanna make a name for yourself and be somebody than you better have thick skin and be prepared to take some heat.

It comes back to self-believe and not letting the critics get you down or stop you from achieving your dreams.

No matter what, when it’s all said and done, you and you alone need to believe in yourself and believe you can be successful no matter how daunting the task.

I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve seen someone who could’ve been great and gone really far in MMA fail only because others said he couldn’t do it.

One thing I’ve learned over the years, and sadly more often than not learned the hard way is this:

As time goes on friends will come and go but…Enemies, they don’t come and go, nope….enemies accumulate.

And like I was saying, everyone gets criticized no matter who they are or what they’re accomplished.

Be the great champion that I know (and hopefully you truly believe) you can be. What’s the saying? Haters gonna hate? Yeah that’s pretty much 100% right.

Critics, losers and weak-minded people wanna see you fail. Let that be your motivation to not only succeed, but succeed big time!

After all, if they’re gonna hate you might as well give them something really nice to hate you for 🙂

That’s my Thursday rant about yelpers, and people that try and use online sites as a weapon. Get a life, no really, get a LIFE pal.

Below I’ve included some neat videos that are sure to motivate the heck outta you. Check them out!