I don't give a fuck if your street-fighting record is 200-0. Some kid trying to "knock you silly" is WAY different than a trained fighter trying to beat your ass in front of several hundred/thousand people after you've been training for A) at least a year in all aspects of the game before your first fight B) training for this one fight for the past 6-8 weeks. You're going to be in the gym 5-6 days per week, you'll be staying in on a Friday night so that you can train in the morning, you'll probably be staying in on Saturday night so that you can recover and not drink/eat too much, you'll be constantly looking at everything you eat so that you can cut weight, and you'll be doing things like not jerking off so that you can save your testosterone for fight prep. And you'll be doing it so that you can have a 50/50 shot of winning that night. You will lose some fights, you'll get the crap kicked out of you on a weekly basis in the gym, you'll probably wind up broke and unable to hold a real job because your head will be so beaten in from those years spent in the cage, and you may suffer long-term brain damage. Sound like the lifestyle that you want to have? Does it really? For a few people, this is the life for them. For most, it isn't. I was 8-0 as an amateur fighter, but after a few years, I realized that I was never going to make that GSP money. I was going to lose some pro fights, and I'd never make it to the highest levels of the game where the money is actually at. So I decided not to quit my day job, and I saved myself a pretty miserable life. Fighting was an absolute blast for a few years. But that shit gets old after a while. Go train for a year, and then ask yourself if that's how you want to spend all day, every day for the next 15 years. Go to your local gym and ask yourself if those guys are going to propel you to the highest levels of the sport. Are you Jon Jones special?
