Boston: Juggling a Career, Social Life and Boxing After 30

“I was completely hungover two days ago. There was a crazy party on Friday so I felt like death the next morning. But I’m feeling better now and back to 100 percent after resting at home the whole day, yesterday.

I guess my friends and I party hard because of work. After a damn tough week at the office, you’ll see everyone party extra hard on Friday night when we know there are no deadlines to meet the next day.

I currently work in the ad industry. I’m a copywriter and I deal with a lot of government accounts, so I actually write a lot of the content you see on posters, bus stop ads and television commercials. 

Where’s the joy in being a copywriter? I think it’s damn shiok because every brief is a new challenge; every brief is a blank cheque. I’m not saying every brief will be exciting to work on, but you get the occasional interesting campaign that really stretches your imagination.

There are challenges, of course. Copywriting is the craft of writing good lines, and that can be very subjective. You can have the best idea ever, but the client may not be feeling it that day and boom, your whole weekend’s work is scrapped just like that.

The schedule is really erratic. That’s why I hardly get a chance to box these days. I’m struggling to find the time to train!

I first joined a boxing class at a commercial gym because I wanted to lose weight. I used to sit all day and play a lot of games like World of Warcraft. One day, I felt my chest bone sticking into my gut because my gut was so big. I thought shit man, I need to lose weight.

When I first tried boxing, no sport in my life felt more right. You know why? Because I have sweaty palms! I can’t play ping-pong; I can’t play basketball. But when I box, I just wrap my sweaty hands, put on my gloves, clench my fist into a ball and start throwing punches.

For that one hour, you forget about everything and just focus on what’s in front of you. Because if you don’t, you’ll get hit in the face, especially during sparring. So you have no choice but to be in the moment.

But what I really like about boxing is how you can compare it to many aspects of life. It’s so cheesy and cliché, but boxing really is a reflection of life and how you react to it. When you box with someone for a long time, you can really see who a person truly is.

Fighting is primal, so when someone gets hit during sparring, will he/she fight or flee? Then there are those who are willing to die in a fight because that’s a reflection of how much work they put in, but 100 percent effort does not guarantee a 100 percent win.

That’s how life works too, doesn’t it? How does a person deal with a loss, then? And if you win a few fights, what will that do to your ego? How do you react? Just like the adversities in life, boxing reveals who you are as a person and lets your true colours shine.

I joined Legends about two years ago, and I joined the fight team six months into training. I decided to turn competitive because I always questioned why was I training so hard? If I’m working on my technique, logically the end goal is to test myself in a competition.

Today, I have two wins and one loss on my record. I turned 32 this year, and I don’t think that’s too old to fight. I mean look at Pacquiao! He’s 40 something, right? And look at (Legends founder) Ridhwan. He’s my age and still at it as a pro boxer.

These people give me no excuse, and age is definitely not an excuse if you want to make boxing a part of your lifestyle, at least not in amateur boxing. But career does make it very, very difficult.

To be a good boxer, I personally believe it’s impossible to have everything. You have to constantly shift priorities in your life and question your goals again. What do you want in boxing? What do you want in your career? What do you want in your personal life?

At the end of the day, everybody has their own pace and goals in boxing, so don’t be pressured by what others think you should or should not do. You know where your heart is. Everyone has their own journey in boxing so do what feels right to you.” – Boston, 32

Interview by: Arman Shah

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This story is part of an interview series called People of Legends, a collaboration with Legends Fight Sport. To read more click here.