Earlier in my life, when I had fewer commitments and a much larger collection of Batman comics, I went through a phase of spending my biggest yearly holiday – usually a month or so, because I was a freelancer – going somewhere far-flung and learning to fight there. Back in Blighty, I’d put it all to use at my local boxing/Muay Thai/BJJ gyms, and then I’d realise I was rubbish at something and head out elsewhere to fix it. Some of the styles I learned were practical, others less so, and (spoilers!) I never reached the martial heights of a young Bruce Wayne. But still, those were experiences I’ll never regret, because of what I learned on top of all the teep kicks and armlocks. Because fighting is a tough thing to do, and it will teach you about the right way to do other tough things. Here’s some of what it taught me.

1. I am not so tough

Once you can hold your own in the soft, warming cocoon of your local gym, it’s easy to think you’re pretty badass. In the wider world of fighting, this goes away quickly. For me, the holy-shit-I’m-weak moment came when I watched my first practice at Taguo, China’s toughest san da school and home to more than 13,000 students. At Taguo, which is a major recruiting ground for the Chinese police and military, students train twice a day, in forms, sparring and weapons. Every day. For three years. It’s probably fair to say that most of them would smash you to bits in a fight. Being humble is good, and sometimes it’s a good idea to good somewhere where it’s basically impossible to be otherwise.

2. Overtraining is less likely than you think

Recently, it’s become fashionable to worry about ‘overtraining’ – like your three-day-a-week workout schedule is going to smash you into the ground if you don’t foam roll and douse yourself in magnesium every night. I don’t entirely disagree with this – I’m pretty sure I’ve dabbled with overtraining myself – but it’s certainly overexaggerated. In Shaolin, the monks train for about four hours a day. Ditto in many Muay Thai camps. In Brazil, guys will happily turn up in the morning, train MMA, then turn up again at night for two hours of rolling. Most of them have side-jobs, or at least other responsibilities. Very few of them have access to magnesium.

3. Fighters are friendly

Fighting is one of the best ways to see the world – providing you approach it in the right way. In Brazil, where BJJ is a fairly middle-class sport practised by the cool kids, I spent more than one night getting blitzed in some terrifying club that I’d never have normally gone in…with a gang of black belts at my side. In Shaolin, I played basketball with the monks, who consistently dunked on me despite having an average height of about 5’3″. In Japan, where I had a sling on my arm from a Thai-clinch accident, I ended up drinking with a local who’d spent six months practising Muay Boran after he watched Ong Bak (it later emerged that he managed to get shot in Afghanistan after watching Apocalypse Now). He even offered to spar with me. By getting on the mat or in the ring, you’re (hopefully) showing that you have a respect for the traditions of the country you’re visiting, and are willing to work hard and get beaten up. Money can’t buy that kind of connection.

4. …And mostly nice people

It’s rare that you’ll meet someone who’s good at Brazilian jiu-jitsu and also a total dick. This is a Darwinian thing: you will spend a lot of time ‘losing’ throughout your BJJ career, and if you haven’t got the ego to put up with that, you’re going to leave. Similar things are true of many fight sports, which means that most of the people you meet on a fight vacation will be excellent.

5. Basics are crucial

If you go to the right places, you will meet people who are incredible at fighting. And the best of them will mostly do the same thing: the basics. I met Brazilian black belts who could tap almost anyone with the same cross-collar chokes I learned as a white belt, and Shaolin monks who could make lian huan quan, one of the most basic forms, look more impressive than any acrobatic routine. The best guys elevate the simplest things to a level beginners can barely comprehend. This is a good thing to aspire to.

6. Bruce Lee was right

In Rawai Muay Thai, every day finished with 100 teeps, 100 knees, and 100 hard roundhouse kicks on the bag. That’s the most basic moves possible, for a total of roughly 2,000 kicks each in under a month. When I went back home, my instructor remarked on how much harder my kicks were. Flashy stuff is nice, but kicking really hard is better. Or, in the words of the little Dragon: ‘I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.’

7. You don’t need to go abroad to learn any of this

Travelling is fantastic for what it will teach you, and the experiences and fun you’ll have, but you don’t need it. I’ve trained in enough boxing, MMA and BJJ gyms in the UK to know that the instruction is just as good over here – and so are the lessons you’ll learn. The most important thing is to start: pick the thing you want to do, and start doing it. Do it as hard as you can. And see where it takes you.

HOMEWORK: Practice something basic every day this week. Improve.

‘Well, at least that was quick, I’ve got the keynote to do in the morning.’

In The Usual Suspects, one character says that he doesn’t believe in God, but he’s afraid of him. Well, I don’t believe in God either, and I’m only afraid of two things: sharks, and commitment. So my biggest fear is getting married to a shark, and I won’t be doing that any time soon.

In general though, I think it’s healthy and productive to do things that scare you slightly. Why? Because I think that if you make a habit of intentionally stepping outside your comfort zone into situations that are weird and unnatural and where you’re not sure how you’re going to cope, you’ll fare much better when you accidentally get into (or are thrown into) one of those situations unintentionally. It’s training for life.

Along these lines, I recently agreed to give a presentation on social media to a roomful of doctors at the prestigious BASEM conference, and I can honestly say that I lost more sleep over it than I did my last cage fight. Yes, last cage fight. I’ve had three (amateur level), and that’s more than my lifetime tally of speeches (now standing at two). But, true to my prediction, there were commonalities between both disciplines. Here are my principles for both, with the disclaimer that I am still very much an amateur in both areas:

PLAN, THEN SIMPLIFY
In a cage fight: Professional fighters might study tapes of the opposition – at the amateur level, that isn’t an option, since you turn up on the day and fight whoever. So my gameplan for most fights (BJJ or MMA) is always fairly simple.
-Get on top somehow.
-If you end up on the bottom, get up.
-Once you’re on top, force the other guy to make a mistake. Don’t give up position. Tap him out.
This has gone wrong for me, but it’s gone right more often. It’s easy to remember, and easy to act on.
In a speech: Acting on various recommendations, I put together some notes, then wrote out my whole speech verbatim, tweaking the flow as I went (100 words per minute is a good guideline if you’re new to public speaking). Then I mercilessly hacked that down to a single easy-reference page of notes reading ‘Understand > Remember > Do’, ‘Einstein Anecdote,’ ‘Cat Joke’ and so on. As in the fight, this gave me a plan to follow, alongside plenty of space to improvise. On the day, I even threw in a semi-improvised Jehovah’s Witness joke. It got a laugh.
PRACTICE LIKE YOU’LL PERFORM
In a cage fight: Though it’s actually there for safety reasons – to stop you falling out, basically – getting inside a cage for the first time is an intimidating experience, and not something you want to do for the first time in a fight. You also need to get used to fighting off the cage, using it to stop takedowns or get up, and so on. I made sure I got to practise in a cage before my fight.

In a speech: When I asked Tom Miles, a professional photographer of my acquaintance who does lecture tours, for advice, he gave me a gem that I’ve never seen elsewhere: check what kit will be there. Are you going to have a podium to stand behind? A remote for slides? Clip-on mic, handheld, or just shouting? If you’ve practised walking around and making expressive hand movements, how are you going to cope if your movement’s restricted? Make your run-throughs mirror the reality, and you’ll face less nerves on the day.

PREPARE PROPERLY
In a cage fight: This is simple, but not everyone does it. Pack everything you need for the fight (gloves, shorts, gumshield, groin guard, towel, warm-up sweats, etc) at least the night before – I’ve heard some fighters say that doing it two days before will help you get mentally into fight mode. Know how you’re going to get to the venue in plenty of time, and have a back-up plan in case that goes wrong. You don’t want to be the guy who turns up late, has no time for a warmup, and has to scrounge some unfamiliar shinguards off a stranger.

In a speech: It’s almost exactly the same. I packed everything and decided what I’d wear a day in advance, and planned to get there in plenty of time. I also brought a copy of my presentation on USB even though I’d emailed it to the organisers, because you never know.

GET TOTALLY PSYCHED

In a cage fight: I’ve found that the mindset that works for me is calm and collected, but ready to go. That means a last-minute think-through of my plan, followed by much the same warmup as I do before hard sparring in classes, followed by thinking of the music that gets me most hyped in the world – the closing bars of the theme from Street Fighter The Animated Movie. I don’t need to actually listen to it, which is handy in situations where headphones are detrimental – just thinking about it now makes my neck-hairs bristle.

In a speech: Much the same: a last-minute run through of the notes, a quick bounce on the spot, a small but vicious coffee, and that Street Fighter music again. Go get it, champ.

HOMEWORK: Arrange to do something that scares you. Caveat: it has to be something where you’re at least partly responsible for your own well-being, so going on rollercoasters and watching J-horrors is out: joining a martial arts class, signing up for dance lessons or doing an open mic night are all acceptable.