What is the most important thing in (start) learning martial arts?

"What is the most important thing in learning martial arts?" "Why?! Wingchun is girly and Aikido is for old people,".  "What is the first rule of learning self-defence & martial arts?"  "Winning without fighting", and if you must fight,  "Make sure you win first before fighting"

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I have been doing martial arts all my life. At a very young age, it was from mimicking heroes from martial-art movies. I fought and got myself into trouble at school - a lot! Strangely and ironically, I stopped unnecessary fights, when I started learning how to fight properly - learning Muay Thai. I, then, drifted between boxing, karate, kung fu, wrestling, and Aikido. 30+ years later with nidan black-belt in Aikido and a brown belt in Wing Chun, I was facing this question again when choosing a form of martial art for my kids - What is the most important thing in learning martial arts?

When I started learning martial arts, it was all about fighting. Then it was comparing. Then a lot of research, a few victories, and lots of defeats and got beaten up, I started to discover: discipline, the codes, honour, friendship, and respect - the gems of martial arts.

20 years ago, I moved from Thailand to Australia. After doing many years of muay thai, I was looking for something different. I have tried: kung-fu, wing-chun, karate, and aikido with different styles: Aikikai, Tommiki, Yoshikan, Iwama's takemasu. I walked in and out of many dojo's or kwoon. I remembered visiting one of the guys who was teaching tiger-style kung-fu. He asked me what (else) I was looking at learning. I told him that I was also interested in wing-chun and aikido. He chuckled and said,

"Why?! Wingchun is girly and Aikido is for old people,". 

I politely thanked him and never went back to his kwoon.

Then, there was this guy who was renting Bayside City Council's town-hall teaching Aikido Takemasu. He offered first 3 sessions free! I went there and attended the first class. At the first class, he asked the question that nobody has ever asked (me) before -

"What is the first rule of learning self-defence & martial arts?" 

That was intriguing, I had never thought of this before. We all gave our answers, all incorrect. He answered:

"Never put yourself into a situation where you can be harmed", 

he said that this comes first, even, before:

"Winning without fighting", and if you must fight, 
"Make sure you win first before fighting", etc, etc

Muay Thai's Kick

I asked him many questions comparing different art forms, he explained, but in the end he said:

"It was never about the art, it's always the person, not the art..."

I ended up spent 12+ years with him learning the art of Aikido. Through his instruction, I learned to discipline body and mind, he taught me the Codes and Honour. Over the years, I gained friendship and then I learn to Respect (to yourself, your friends, your opponents and all the people around you). Some people spent their lifetime learning to fight and have never discovered these gems.

"Doumo arigatou gozaimasu - Thank you, sensei"

So what do you think the most important thing in (start) learning martial arts is?




* Muay Thai's Kick, By Loura Conerney from Manchester, England (Flickr) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons