I have trained for years, why didn't my training work?

When a fellow martial artist contacted me he was really down in the dumps because his years of training failed him in a moderately dangerous situation. He survived, I consider this to be a success regardless, but wanted to know why all that training and practice failed him.

There are many reasons and they may or may not be contributed to the training and practice itself. It may have been excellent stuff but if certain principles have not been addressed then it has a greater chance of not working. Remember that even those professionals who deal with violence almost daily suffer from things not working from time to time. It is like they say that everyone freezes, everyone. It happens for a variety of reasons and I asked my friend to let it go for now, relax and let himself off the hook. 

Once he accomplishes this then go back and self-reflect and self-analyze the actual situation. Try to discover why it happened to not work "this time." Then take it to someone who can stand outside of it and help you see what it was that may have caused the failure to work. You may find out that it could be something simple that happened to occur at the wrong time and has nothing to do with training, practice and the application of your martial art.

I like the quote below from a recent post at the Chiron blog by Rory Miller regarding conditioning, training, and play to make it work. 

Responses that have only been trained seem to require experience before they can be accessed under stress. - Rory Miller, Chiron Blog "Three Things."

p.s. this is not the full picture on this subject. it is just a glimpse and I recommend you find the complete story by individual research.