I have had to process more than a generous amount of feelings and thoughts these past few days since Rousey vs Nunes and have found myself unmistakably in touch with perspective and the views of others. I’ve learned a lot of things I feel like I have always known and been terrified to admit because it would mean that I would have to deny truths I had felt were at my core, and were no longer of pivotal importance, in fact, they were like false dirties that I’d worshipped and come to realize that I was fool to look at these ideologic rocks as if they were the maintainers of my values. I’ve been so angry and I decided that in honesty, I would not censor myself even if it seems superfluous or ridiculous. I will not cloud my true emotions and words to make myself more presentable or feel more honorable. Honor isn’t avoiding cursing, honor is being honest, so here is my honesty.
Ronda Rousey.
Let me say some things about Ronda and the people of the world.
I. THE WORLD IS FICKLE AND HATES ANYONE WHO WORKS HARDER THAN THEIR OWN SELF.
It hurts me to be in this world so much of the time in realizing how greatly people enjoy seeing someone who has achieved infinitely more than they ever have, fall; BECAUSE it gives people the justification that their choices to stay safe, do NOTHING, take LOW risks if any, and live out predictably, THESE WILL NOT RESULT IN FAILURE.
This is unparalleled when I say it is infuriating to me. It is the whole idea that there lies a fear of progress because progress could result in pain and suffering and failure. GUESS WHAT, PROGRESS IS HARD! You can find over millions of people now saying how “garbage” or “undeservingly promoted” Ronda is and how she should retire because she sucks or how she had no business fighting a striking phenom in Amanda Nunez or awful things that boil my blood to such a level that I’m afraid I’ll bite through my lip if I even mention them here.
People LOVE to be right, and in order to be right all of the time, you have to say you knew the past was going to happen (that is trash if I ever heard it) and to make the person who works harder, gives more of herself than anyone could ever imagine because truly, who of us can say we have given what Ronda has given to something we are passionate about, SEEM SMALL. Are any of us as passionate if we don’t give our whole self without any thought or consequence? I know I haven’t and I haven’t met anyone like Ronda Rousey and don’t expect to. She puts more emotion into what she thinks is right than anyone I’ve ever known. And those others that I do know to give their lives for their passions are known as idiots, extremists, or failures to the public. Why is it that the world is run by envy, that people show HATE to those out of fear that they would fail? Why are these people worth fighting for?
Ronda has been booed so many times. She’s had articles written critiquing how she doesn’t smile at certain times or how she answers questions, how her body has looked or how she moves her arms.. Hardly brought up in these articles is her honesty about her struggles and efforts in life and that wrote a book about them. If you read it, you will see it doesn’t make her life glamorous, nor does it paint her as a victim. It’s emotive; it’s blood and sweat.
People, the world, grabbed onto Ronda Rousey when she started coming up. Most saying, who the hell is this piece of ass trying to fight? She should be on a magazine and shut up. Saying she has no place in a man’s sport or saying that she will fail to more stereotypical “manly” woman fighters like Amanda Nunes or Cris Justino (Cyborg), cheer when she gets knocked out because “she deserved it.”
I have taken on so much hate and disdain from being around Ronda’s comeback. Her comeback was a return from her own hell, her feeling that all the doubts and failures were overcoming her life and her only meaning was to win, without it, she had nothing. The world called her a coward for taking time for herself to figure out what her heart wanted and contested her ability because she “didn’t have the mental strength to do it.” I didn’t think the world would revert back to trying to use mental illness to call someone weak and unfit for success. I read articles about people saying that because Ronda had suicidal thoughts and was devastated in her loss that she would never be able to come back and was a loser for not getting right back into it.
The day Ronda stated that she would return, I screamed. I literally screamed with so much joy that my heart beats hurt my chest. I was so elated that she had found in her heart to return to the fight and said her reasons were driven by those who believed in her. I believed in her. Even so, it wasn’t enough to beat Amanda Nunes this past Friday, and again, the world attacked what her faults could have been caused by and how the past-knowers are gloating that “of course she lost, and people believed in her HA what fools! Like she could beat a real fighter or come back from being weak.”
I couldn’t understand the world and was in shock by Ronda’s quick loss. I couldn’t understand a world that didn’t have a decent fight for someone who had worked so hard for over a year, how she didn’t even seem to really fight; it was my hero getting pummeled and it was helpless and horrific. To have that as the showing after all she’d been through, to seemingly fail to the world when it was her one chance to prove herself… it was inconceivable and depressing.
I woke up the morning after Ronda’s fight sick. My voice was gone, and there wasn’t really a reason for it to be. My body ached, there wasn’t an excuse for that either. I was upset and on edge. I couldn’t get out of bed for an hour. What kind of sick world is this? When the world I woke to reveled for the most part in how badly Ronda showed up.. It wasn’t even a fight with a loss, it was a demolition. She showed none of her skill, no judo, no anything. She maybe connected 2 punches, yet the world couldn’t have seemed happier and more smug. The support for Ronda was drowned out by the insults and attacks. I don’t understand and will never understand the fact that people gloat when others lose. To me, that is the definition of pathetic. Furthermore, how people turn on someone once they see them getting TOO close to seeming perfect or powerful… Look at this election. There were statistics on the polls of Hillary and every time she ran for some office, her ratings dropped. For no reason. They dropped. She was getting to close to having influence or seeming like she could make more things happen and people feared this and turned on her, and instantly she became the villain.
This keeps on happening and it twists my stomach so much that I find I have no appetite for this life I’m a part of.. I certainly don’t feel welcome to do much of anything.
So after Ronda lost that night, I took a walk. Yes, it was around 2am in the east coast of the US but I felt like taking a walk in the 30 degree weather, as I was, short sleeves and jeans. I needed to figure out how I could cope with living in a world that constantly lives to hate woman who work their lives to succeed as no other has, or as their heart calls them to. And mind you, Ronda is an American woman, a good portion Venezuelan but known WHITE by the majority. Imagine the length of this if notable women of other races were brought into this essay here! Wilma Rudolph, for example, is a woman so so close to my heart, and I could go on and on about her; but to me, Ronda Rousey is my heart. And my life partially belongs to her influence.
Thanks to Ronda, I have learned so much about myself and in learning about myself, I think I understand her a lot better. I say this with the utmost respect and honor because I see this as an immense gift that I hold in my heart with esteem. We both have a lot of things in common on the surface and my empathy can take on the struggles of working so hard on something, giving it everything, and failing when it was seemingly the only chance at showing you could be the thing people thought you were and prove the others wrong, that you are worthy of who you believe yourself to be. We both have had physical issues, known what it’s like to be at the top and feel the world crumble as it seemingly disappears. We both have feared that we had no purpose and ought to die at one point. We both know what it’s like to see no brightness in life, if even for a moment.
But after the fight, I learned that my heart didn’t break because of Ronda at all. All of these feelings, they were all the surrounding world concerning Ronda’s fight, but Ronda never let me down ONCE and I didn’t cry because she lost. My tears came from others who forced her into their simple categories. I was upset about the consequences I saw from that fight and the feeling of failure. But I also learned that I didn’t think any less of her, not even forcibly telling myself I still thought she was the best, I truly knew it, and my definition is of many factors. Ronda didn’t have to prove herself to me, I already loved her and still love her. She didn’t need to win that fight, she didn’t need to do anything more than be who she has been. She has chosen an incredibly difficult path led with difficult things happening in her life. She chose a job that didn’t exist, at something she only had a portion of experience doing, and knew somehow that it would provide her with a life and fulfill a part of her that the Olympics didn’t. She created women’s UFC (and seemingly in the blink of an eye if one did not look deeper into her inimitable ethics and determination). She put the weight of the world on her shoulders and didn’t change who she was to do it. She stayed Ronda Rousey, there was no other persona.
II. I AM GOING TO CREATE.
I want desperately to have that ice that Ronda has in her eyes. To anyone that has really looked at Ronda, they know exactly what I’m talking about: the deliberateness in her determination and fortitude, the inability to allow anything to get past them.. It’s like those eyes are from another world when she is completely immersed in her motivations.
I have destined myself to walk a path in which the career choice isn’t available, it simply doesn’t exist for a pharmacist. I have no other goal other than to have a job in this field where all odds are stacked against me. I don’t know if even my family believes that I will be able to achieve what I pledge to, but I don’t care. Ronda did all she did not believing, but knowing she could. She didn’t feed into the “past-knowers” of the world. Ronda didn’t stop fighting because of the boos and hate of crowds and questioning public. She didn’t stop when the media turned her into a mental patient, or objectified her, or called her whatever they wanted to gain a following of voices. The yelling wasn’t what stopped Ronda or made her take a break from fighting, SHE chose to, and it was her personal loss and pain that caused her to reflect and, no doubt, it will be her heart that guides her next decision in life. People have asked me if I think Ronda will ever fight again, expecting me to be sad and disappointed or angry and reply with an outburst. Without thinking, my first response was, “Well, if it’s what is in her heart, she will come back, and if not, she won’t. I want her to follow her passions wherever they take her.”
I felt like I’d gained 5 years on my life when I said that, like I had unlocked some secret and it took Ronda to give me the privilege of speaking it aloud. To love yourself is to allow yourself to follow your passions, wherever they take you and no matter what you risk in the journey, how they can potentially hurt you or what the world may think. To be a person that others hate because you are giving your soul and putting so much at stake in order to come close to greatness, that is who I want to be. I can’t want the world to not hate me, just as I can’t will the world to not hate Ronda Rousey. It won’t happen. The people who feed into fear and simpleness will never allow such love and admiration to enter their roofs and I have come to pity the days they spend. These people simply don’t deserve the admiration of Ronda Rousey or what she has done if they don’t see hard work and fervor for what they are.
People don’t understand why I care so much about Ronda Rousey. Truth is though, I DO understand why I feel so connected to her and hope that inspired by her, I will proudly accomplish even more than what I am setting out to do. With the world cheering me on or calling me awful things, telling me I ought to quit or that I’m not meant for what I’m striving to do, I will forever be proud to call my road that of which I follow inspired by the steps of Ronda. I will never have my heart broken by Ronda Rousey, and I too, will remain in my own way, undefeated.
Ronda Rousey has been a public figure for years, but what people fail to understand without her a lot of women would not feel the empowerment they feel now. I am one of those women. I’ve been a fan for years not just because she’s a Badass UFC fighter, the first 135lbs champ, but because she’s true to herself and doesn’t have a care in the world to change herself for others.
The Rousey Effect 