Anime isn't for kids, it's for Everyone: Persistence
I know plenty of people that don’t really like anime(japanese cartoons) but never really watched it apart from the early morning cartoons.
For those people, and to those that already love anime and want to remember some awesome scenes from some anime I write this post and any other that follows. This post is about persistence and perseverance.
Let me start by introducing some of my friends here, enter Rock Lee (Naruto).
“Even without a gift or talent, I will beat genius through hard work” – Rock Lee
“You need to accept the fact that you’re not the best and have all the will to strive to be better than anyone you face.” – Rononoa Zoro
There is one more from Zoro that I gotta put here: “Either in belief or doubt, if I lean to one of these sides, my reaction time will be dulled if my heart thinks the opposite of what I choose.”
Now, why this blog post? I want to talk about persistence and what I learned from imaginary characters that shaped my life.
ANIME: Naruto, CHARACTER: Rock Lee
Lee, unconscious after a fight, but still on his feet.
In the Naruto world, every being has a “magical” energy, the energy of life that is called chakra. With chakra you can manipulate the elements, your body and the realm of reality. So there are 3 types of uses of chakra. Ninjutsu(elements), Taijutsu(You body, martial arts), Genjutsu(The manipulation of reality through family genetics).
Here we have the example of ninjutsu by a character called Jiraya.
Here is taijutsu by Naruto kicking Pain in the face
Finally, genjutsu, when Itachi used his genetic trait to put another character Kakashi into a mental torture that lasted months inside the dream, but only hours in the real world.
Now that you understand the basics of Naruto, you can really see the genius of the Rock Lee character. As you can imagine, he is not the protagonist, he doesn’t have family issues, or if he did, it’s not important to his story. He is a ninja that can’t use Ninjutsu, and he can’t use Genjustu. He is like Batman in a world of super heroes, but he is a special kind of Batman. He couldn’t use any of those “powers”, and to add to that, he sucked at Taijutsu.
He was a failure in everything.
“I don’t know why are you still here since you can’t do Ninjutsu nor Genjutsu and you are worst than average in Taijutsu”
Lee trained his ass every day.
“If I can’t do 1000 punches I will do 2000 push ups”
His training was very intense. Eventually he got into a team of 3 ninjas tutored by Might Guy, their sensei.
Lee, Tentei(the girl), Might Guy, and Neji
Lee then got confronted with Neji a true genius, he had everything Lee hadn’t. Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, and was a master of Taijutsu.
What would you feel if you tried and put effort in something for years, and for years you’ve found yourself frustrated that you were no good at that?
Perhaps you already do. You try and try, and every effort in that direction turns into sh#t. You can’t pass that exam, you can’t attract the person you want, you can’t get a job, your business fails.
There is a scene in Naruto where Rock Lee is training, counting jump ropes(“If I can’t jump 1000 jump ropes I will kick 2000 times”) and he fells down and hits his head on a tree. Might Guy always watched him training, even before he was his student. But this time he intervened and joked “Taking a break already?”.
Lee face is full of tears.
Might Guy goes on to say “You have a gift that Neji doesn’t have, the gift of perseverance, you work hard and that makes you a genius too”.
Lee than says: “Is that true sensei? I wonder. Sometimes it feels like the whole thing is pointless and I’m a loser and I will always be a loser. […] but every time I go to a mission my legs being shaking, I don’t know what to do”.
If this video doesn’t touch your heart… I believe you should come here once you’ve become frustrated in something you really put your heart on. Then you’ll probably understand.
There you have it, his story so far. He developed a Nin Do, a Ninja Way, “Even without a gift, even without talent, I will beat Genius through Hard Work”. And to make things even more cool he has the best fight scenes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMTLHpdUKe0
If you want to see more there is a video compiling most of this story here:
If this full video doesn’t turn your head towards Rock Lee, I don’t know what will. The dude is the eternal Underdog, came from nothing and turned himself into a true Ninja. Wouldn’t you with you could do the same? Become the best at what’s most important to you?
Next post will be about someone just as awesome, Rononoa Zoro. See you there…
