What an amazing and inspirational weekend this has been. Ok sure, the fact it was jammed pack full of karate might have been part of the reason!
However it was having a weekend seminar led by Rod Martin (and his father Graham for one day) that was the cause of all this excitement and inspiration.
So whilst never one to think I was anything that great in this karate caper, I guess after doing it for awhile, you have a notion of what you know, right? Well kind of...what you don't know, is how damn much you don't know! Well after this weekend, we could park this universe and the next into the space that fills what I don't know!
BUT this is not a woe is me, life is horrible I'm going to go eat worms kind of what I don't know kind of post...oh no no no!
This is a how awesome, how amazing that there is so much that I don't know, yet now have an opportunity to learn. Perhaps even more amazing - the realisation that I will never stop learning, there will always be things to learn, to contemplate, to delve further into in order to gain a better understanding.
Being the not so nice side of 40, it has been in my mind that perhaps at some point, it will be time to call it a day because I'm not going to be able to do a head high mawashi geri for ever.
And you know that doesn't matter! It is so clear to me that there are several lifetimes of learning there just waiting for the taking. These men in their 70's still training, still living karate, still brilliant practitioners of their art, and passing their skills and knowlege onto others - how can you not be attracted to that? To be able to keep learning right on through to your later years.
Case in point Leo Lipinski born in 1946, and Shuji Tasaki in 1931 both of whom are still practising and still managing to frighten the beejeepers out of their students with their power and skill!
Leo Lipinski (Left picture) Shuji Tasaki (Right Picture)
Now this weekend has not been without its "interesting moments" - like in the first 10 minutes when I nearly did the "big girl"thing and burst into tears! Oh yeah big tough karate-ka reduced to big girl in near record time! It wasn't the notion of not doing it right, nor was it the notion of being
corrected that nearly caused the big bottom lip drop! It was the sheer blind frustration of seeing it, processing it in my brain and then have my body feel like it belonged to someone else's brain stem because it sure wasn't doing what the signal from mine was telling it to do! Seriously glad the tears didn't flow because then I would have been seriously cranky pants at myself for the big girl routine.
It's a funny thing that often times as adults we dwell in the comfort zone of the known and we learn bits and pieces here and there, yet to put yourself out there as a complete beginner is sure heading into scary territory. Add to that putting yourself out there standing side by side with students you teach, that my friend is humbling on a big scale...yet equally how empowering for all of those lower belts and kids to see us as their instructors struggling with new concepts and being corrected on our mistakes right their alongside them and blending in as complete unco's.
Perhaps it is all the karate talk of the weekend or the fact that much of our talk also touched on the more spiritual side of what we do, but it was sure a weekend of contemplation. In terms of actual physical techniques/applications, there were many ahhh-haaaa light bulb moments when concepts or ideas just clicked or became clearer than they had ever been.
On a more philosophical level, there were as many lightbulb moments. Like that we might regret that our opportunity to partake in this didn't come along sooner - yet as Rod suggested, things often come along at the right time, the time that you are ready for them. It is highly likely without having trod the path of the last 3 years, I would not be as engaged and motivated and keen to take this stuff on as I am now.
It got me thinking on a different level about our westernised system of coloured belts and levels and kata. Do we get too caught up in what belt we are, when we might next grade and lose sight of the learning, the growing, the fact that we will continually be learning, or should I say, we should be continually learning!
I think I read somewhere that historically in Japan, there were no colour belts, you were a white belt until such time as your sensei decided you were now ready and had developed within yourself on the journey to be a black belt, and that the black belt was representative of your white belt that had become so dirty during all those years of training it was in fact almost black.
So after the most amazing weekend in which we gained just a snap shot of what is possible, of how much there is to learn - I now have a new outlook on my karate - to now being that of the eternal beginner!
Thanks to Rod, Graham and Hoshindo for a brilliant weekend and the beginning of a beautiful friendship : - )
