Break out of that pattern

Tonight, I sparred someone with whom I began sparring about two months ago. We had gotten into a specific pattern with each other. He and I each stand our ground and trade, but he normally hits me pretty hard when he lands his shots and my head would ring as a result. But tonight was not his night to get hard shots because I decided I wasn't going to let him land any shots. As we began our round, I asked myself why must continue with the pattern of hitting him the same way and getting hit the same way? Just because our fighting stablized into the same routine doesn't mean it can't be different tonight. Why not try something else? So I decided to not stand in front of him and trade punches. I knew the outcome of that would be a ringing head. I decided I would simply move out of his range when I saw his coming forward with agression. And when he would miss, I would immediately come forward with my agression. That worked well enough for me to gain confidence in trying other things that I normally don't do. I tricked him with a kick to his head while looking downward to his leg, which I actually have never tried in sparring before. My strategy of trying new things worked well on other partners, too.

I think by breaking out of the patterns of fighting that I developed with my sparring partners, I began to bring new things to otherwise predictable matches. My partners were expecting behavior that I decided not to exhibit tonight and it worked to my advantage. If you catch yourself falling into a pattern that doesn't seem to help you progress, for goodness sake try something new. Your pattern will still be there, and there's nothing wrong with expanding your repertoire.