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Most of the time I blog about the good things that are happening. I’m growing and learning from all the fun things I get to do. I sometimes touch on the negative, but my tendency is to draw the positives from it. Maybe I’ve given the impression on this blog that my karate journey is entirely comprised of roses and song. It’s not. Stuff does happen from time to time. Yes – surprise! Human beings, including myself, are imperfect. If we have a customer mindset we walk away when there’s something that needs to be worked through.

Customers feel they deserve the best for their money. If a restaurant serves a bad meal, we don’t return. If the landlord decides to bulldoze his strip mall, we find other places to shop. This isn’t bad, it’s just the way it is. But many people are so used to everything being customer-oriented that they find it hard to understand why someone would stick with a dojo through the “speed bumps” (presuming the dojo is a good one). A lot of people don’t understand that Karate is (or should be) relational.

Americans have almost no concept of senpai/kohai relationships  and unfortunately Americans have a tendency to treat teachers with less honor than they deserve. I don’t for a minute think that the relational dynamics among American karateka are exactly like the relational dynamics among Japanese karateka, but a good American dojo will at least echo the Japanese norms. Teaching one’s kohai and being taught by one’s senpai not only is good for growing in the art, it also creates camaraderie and fosters loyalty. The focus shifts from individual to group.

Assuming a good dojo, it’s not about the value you’re getting for your money. Your focus should be on the group as a whole.  It’s about you doing your part to:

1) Make sure the dojo can meet its fiscal obligations (rent, staff and instructor salaries, utility bills, etc.)

2) Promote harmony by treating everyone with respect

3) Transmit the art of Karate to the “next generation” to ensure the continuation of the art

4) Develop future leaders

It doesn’t matter if a sticky situation originates from inside the dojo or from without – if you’re focused on these four responsibilities you’ll find ways to survive and yes, thrive even when things aren’t optimal. Of course one can grow from wonderful, positive things that happen. Heck, my blog is full of sunny, happy, everything-is-hunky-dory examples of that. But can you grow from challenging situations that make you feel anxious or frustrated? Yes. Absolutely. Adverse circumstances are the fires in which we are forged. But one has to decide to go along for the ride.

When the decision is made to stick with the dojo during tough times, it opens one’s mind to engage in positive pursuits such as

1) Coming up with creative solutions

2) Encouraging others

3) Building bridges

4) Asking questions and actively listening to the answers

5) Understanding all perspectives and rendering sound judgment

6) Tempering one’s own knee-jerk responses

7) Not exceeding one’s authority

Doing these seven things during hard times is hard. Sometimes the resistance will be so strong that you might not make any headway. Things might break down past all repair in spite of everyone’s best efforts. But you at least will know that you acted with integrity. And you might discover that the next time something comes up you’re that much better equipped to deal with it because of what you’ve been through.

I’m going to borrow some inspiration from an internet acquaintance, Clifton Bullard, who posted about pearls on his Facebook page yesterday.  Think about pearls.  A grain of sand gets inside an oyster’s shell, and the grain of sand irritates the soft, pink flesh of the oyster.  We all know what the oyster does about that situation – it coats that grain of sand in layer after layer of aragonite and calcite, making a lustrous smooth sphere that most people value as gems.  Making a metaphoric pearl out of an irritating situation isn’t easy, but it’s worth it.

Disclaimer: I’m not targeting this to any one particular group or individual. OK, that’s a lie. I’m pointing my finger at myself. I’m human, and I’m not perfect – never will be. Someday I may need my own words to be “in my face” so that I can persevere in making the right choices. If this writing benefits even just one other person, I will be happy.

I’d dreamed of going to brown belt training for a little under two years. Being with a cohort of “advanced” students every other month was something I really looked forward to. Now it’s no longer a daydream but a reality. I earned san-kyu (low brown) in August during Gasshuku (camp). Gasshuku counts as brown belt training, as does Godo Renshu (unity training) held two months later. At last, the first Saturday of December, after nearly two years of anticipation I made the three hour drive to our Hombu Dojo (our Karate organization’s headquarters/school) and participated in my first brown belt training.

I could give a narrative of the entire class but I won’t. I wouldn’t want to ruin the surprises for any of my kohai (anyone lower-ranked than oneself). I was out of my comfort zone but I already knew that the end result would be growth so that didn’t bother me. I found out that I’m now better at something that used to vex me no end – yeah, I still struggle but not nearly as badly. And of course I got feedback – “homework,” if you will.

There are three degrees of brown. The first is san-kyu, the rank I am now (low brown). The next is ni-kyu (middle brown), and the last one before black is i-kyu (high brown). So if I’m a brand-new san-kyu I’m one of the lowest ranked karateka at brown belt training. It’s almost like being a white belt (brand new beginner) again both in etiquette and in the difficulty of the material presented relative to my present abilities. The sensei urged me to ask questions, and I soon found that, like a white belt, I indeed had questions.

“Please show me this again.”

“What is the name of that kata?”

“Do my arms go like this?”

“Oops – how do I make that turn?”

Do any of those questions sound familiar to any of you who have had more than, oh, say four lessons in any given martial art? Do these questions sound familiar to any of you who teach a martial art?

The beginner’s mindset keeps us from stagnating or (worse) becoming arrogant. I love Wikipedia’s definition:

Shoshin (初心) is a word from Zen Buddhism which means “beginner’s mind.” It refers to having an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions when studying a subject, even when studying at an advanced level, just as a beginner in that subject would.

If I’d come to brown belt training with whatever the opposite of shoshin is, I wouldn’t have lasted five minutes. I certainly would have been miserable during the last hour, which we spent doing something that has been an especially challenging thing for me all of my Karate career. The sensei wanted to learn who I am, what I am made of, and what I need to work on. I was, after all, a brand-new student to him. I not only survived, I not only learned, but I also had a smile on my face at the end. Not a relieved smile but a smile of happiness with what I’d gained from the time.

Brown belt training was everything I anticipated. I am looking forward to more in the future. There is a lot for me to learn and three more difficult tests to take before I tie on a black belt. I intend to enjoy these years, and I’m glad to have this training available to me.

Bear with me – I will get to Karate in a few paragraphs…

When I was a kid I thoroughly enjoyed Beverly Cleary’s books. Her characters are fictional, but the neighborhood in which they “lived” is real. I cannot go to the fairy-land of Oz but I can go to Klickitat Street in Portland, Oregon. So I did.

My first stop was Grant Park, a few blocks south of Klickitat Street. In that park are sculptures of two of Cleary’s main characters: Ramona Quimby and Henry Huggins. With a jolt I recognized that my imagined images of the characters did not match the reality of the sculptures. For the first time, I saw the characters through adult eyes.

The sculptor captured these characters perfectly. I was nearly in tears with the beautiful realization that this sculptor knew the subjects quite well. But up until that moment I thought of Ramona Quimby as being the same height as I am, and Henry Huggins as taller because he’s older than Ramona. But I am now taller than Henry Huggins. I no longer see Ramona as an equal and Henry as greater.

I took pictures from Ramona’s perspective and from my own. Ramona from a child’s perspective could be looking up at the sky in a moment of exuberance, not really aware of the presence of another. From adult height, she could be looking me full in the face, hoping that I will echo her happiness and validate her joy.

The sculpture of Henry as seen from Ramona’s perspective almost seems to sigh, “Ramona, what are we going to do with you?” His expression is a mixture of big-brotherly love and half-amused annoyance. Perhaps he looked like that after he pulled Ramona out of the sticky mud. But if I look down on him from my adult height suddenly he’s explaining what happened – “Yes, ma’am, I know I’m late… It was Ramona. Again.”

The statues didn’t change. My perspective and my interpretation changed. When I was a kid, these were children who were my equal and greater. As an adult, I see them in terms of how they might relate to me as a mother or teacher.

OK, nice story, what’s this got to do with my Karate journey?

If you haven’t been reading this blog for very long, you might not know  that I trained in Karate from age 13 to age 16 or almost 17. At age 44 I started again. Yes, my perspective of karate has changed and my interpretation of what’s going on in my internal and external world in connection with karate has changed just as radically as my view of Beverly Cleary’s beloved characters.

I remember the first five minutes of my very first Karate class very distinctly. I knew I was part of something wonderful. Within fifteen minutes I was empowered – I’d learned how to make a fist and punch. I carry that feeling with me whenever I help with new beginners’ first classes. This is a great reaction, but it was all about me.  Now my perspective on this event has shifted from the “then” to the future, from just myself to others.  I want this memory to fuel my words and deeds so that I can help create similar memories for the new students who I am helping.  I’ve shifted my perspective on other long-ago karate experiences too.

The angst that came towards the end of my first Karate career and how my mixed-up interpretations colored my perspective of karate is unpleasant to think about. I can blame some of this angst on undiagnosed IgG subclass 2 deficiency that left me vulnerable to every illness the littlest children brought to the dojo. I can blame some of it on the clinical depression I was hiding. Most elements, though, were my own darn fault. An honest talk with my sensei would have helped me to make the needed changes in training and in attitude. Even without a diagnosis the connection between assistant teaching the little kids’ class and me being almost constantly sick was obvious. The best solution was not to quit karate but to stop teaching four year olds. I feel bad about quitting, and yeah, I’d like to forget everything that was behind my leaving something I once loved. But all that mixed-up teenage “stuff” is part of my journey too.

My perspective on all that teenage drama has changed. For one thing, my life would be different now if I’d stayed with karate then. I would have a different degree from a university closer to home. I might or might not have married – certainly not to my husband of almost 26 years, whom I met in college in another state. Our two daughters would not exist. And maybe, just maybe, by now I would have retired to have children or quit because I was burned out, injured, or whatever. That’s a sobering thought. Even more sobering is that if I could somehow erase all that unpleasantness, doing so could be detrimental to someone else. The memories of that sour teenage perspective sting me, but that pain could someday drive me to help someone else grow past their own angst and burnout.

I won’t spend many words on how I view and interpret Karate now – at least not in this particular blog post. The joys, sorrows, triumphs, and struggles of my present journey are recorded in this blog. I hope that the overall theme of growth pervades each post. Sure my techniques are getting better, yeah I’m earning belts and the occasional tournament medal… But there’s so much more to Karate than what one can see with physical eyes. I didn’t recognize the mental/spiritual side when I was a teenager, but those aspects impacted my life nonetheless. What little training I had then impacted my future life in so many ways. The subsequent life experiences which benefited from those early years in the dojo are now helping me and my dojo. Further growth in the discipline of karate is helping me in my personal and professional lives. What goes around comes around.

 

Like most karateka I have a long-term goal of earning Shodan (first degree black belt). I’d like to earn more degrees after that too. But there’s so much more to Karate than the belts. For quite some time I’ve known what I’d like to possibly be in the future – sensei, referee, coach, bunkai expert… But the main focus of my hopes and dreams is gone.  The good news is that big dream could shift and morph into something else.

For most of the last three years I’ve dreamed of being a junior instructor at two particular dojo. I was very heavily invested in those dojo, but due to circumstances beyond any karateka’s control those dojo don’t exist anymore. From what I know of the history of our organization in this state it’s not unusual for dojo to move or close down and for new ones to open. The shifts so far have been due to changes in the host facilities. There are worse reasons for dojo to shut down and we’ve been very fortunate to have never experienced anything truly dreadful. Still, it’s hard and I do mourn a little when I think about those two dojo.

I admit part of why I dreamed of teaching at those two particular dojo is because I felt the pull of being desperately needed. I had responsibilities beyond the rank I was because there was no one else. Maybe I naturally felt this was my destiny because that’s the way things were when I was a teenager. I trained for three years under the auspices of another organization. When a group left that organization, one of the two dojo sensei went with them. He left a big gap, especially because the dojo sensei was pregnant with her first child and needed the help. She saw potential in me – a scrawny little intermediate-ranked teenage girl. I began teaching “first lesson is free” people, getting new white belts ready to join the main class, and leading the opening ceremony and warm-ups. As an adult re-starting Karate, when I found myself as one of two senior students in one dojo and the senior student in the other it was natural for me to dream along the same path I had been and was going.

Most people would say the dream has died. I don’t think “died” is the right word. Maybe that dream is like a seed – it has the appearance of being dead, but someday I might come back to the spot where I laid it aside and I’ll find something new and beautiful growing there. But for right now I can’t base my dreams on a desperate need because there is no desperate need for me right now.

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am very much valued at my new home dojo. I do still contribute significantly to the functioning of my dojo. I very much appreciate having many people who outrank me instead of just one or two. I’m thoroughly enjoying a good balance of giving and receiving. I’m sure I’ll find a new niche I can grow into. It’ll just take time. I still need to develop skills both in old areas and new and it’s nice to have the time and space to grow. I’m sure someday there will be some path that I can claim as my main road – a path that will benefit others as well. It’s just that right now my vision of the future is pretty hazy. And that’s all right for the time being.

One thing I have learned from 47 years of spinning around on this planet is that one has to adapt and change to circumstances. Dreams and visions of the future keep us going but it’s not the end of the world when they have to be changed. Sometimes it’s OK to be in a place where one is looking for a new vision. For now I’ll just keep going for the sake of the love I have for my art and for my fellow karateka. I’m sure the rest will fall into place at the right time. Looking back, I can see that it always has.

*****

What’s really funny about this blog post is I wrote the draft before reading Andrea Harkins’ recent article, “Find Clarity in Your Life” and discovered that what I was writing dovetailed beautifully with what she had to say.  I’ve been reading her blog for three years now so it’s no wonder I ended my article on the same note as hers.  I must say, Andrea is an excellent teacher 🙂

I’ve been keeping a spreadsheet of information about my belt tests. I record when and where I earned rank and who presented me with which new belt. Because one can program spreadsheets to calculate, I have it keeping track of how many days total I’d been training when I earned each belt and how many days elapsed between tests. I decided to make a graph with the total days training on the X axis and the days elapsed between tests on the Y axis. Here’s the result:

When I was done I suddenly remembered Jackie Bradbury’s article, “Martial Arts Growth is Not Linear.” I felt foolish for trying to capture my progress in a line graph.  I thought wryly that at least I had learned a great deal about how to efficiently draw a line graph in GIMP (an image editing program).  I was about to give up writing a blog based on this graph.  Then I looked at the shape of the line.  It looked familiar.  I had something to write about after all.

 

This is Mt. Rainier, a 14,411 foot (4,393 meter) tall dormant volcano. Whenever the weather is clear I see it from my living room window. I had to laugh when I observed that my line looks a bit like Little Tahoma, a “bump” on the side of the mountain.

I haven’t “climbed” much of the “mountain” at all. I have a long steep way to go – and in fact, I will never reach the “summit.” Actually, in martial arts, there is no “summit” – there is only learning until you die or quit. Any analogy breaks down somewhere.

I “stood” on the top of “Little Tahoma” between 8th and 7th kyu. It looks like I coasted along until 5th kyu. Then I hit a challenging slope. The graph ends with my test for 3rd kyu. With tests coming far less frequently in my future, the slope of the line might not continue to mimic Mt. Rainier.

But let’s run with this analogy for awhile.

If you look to the left of the box in the picture of Mt. Rainier, you’ll see I had to climb a bit even before I reached the point that represents the start of my Karate journey. I had to wait for better financial footing before I could join my daughter.  That was my best excuse for quite some time. I thought of myself as too old, too fat, too out of shape. I thought I had to be as young and athletic as I was years ago when I trained, and I knew I was a long way from what I once had been. Once the financial issues were gone, I decided to get back on the mats. I had to overcome a lot to even put on a gi and bow into the dojo for the first time in 27 years. I was intimidated by how much work I had to do to even catch up to where I once was. It turned out I handled it and I am now much further up the “mountain” than I used to be all those years ago.

Tracing the journey on the graph is interesting. It turned out that prior experience helped me rocket through the no-rank white-belt days and the first two kyu ranks. The length of time I spent as 8th kyu was about right for that rank, but I distinctly remember something holding me back. I was intimidated by the upcoming test for 7th kyu. At 7th kyu we tie on a purple belt. That was the color of belt I’d last worn as a teenager. For some reason I thought I did not compare favorably to my younger self, thus I might have consequently hindered my progress. No matter. I sailed right through 7th and 6th kyu.

The line tracing my “mountain” dips down through the purple-belt period, meaning I was taking less and less time between tests. I decided to look back at how I trained during that period. Just from scanning blog posts alone, I see that I did quite a lot outside my “home” dojo. Any one of those activities would give anyone of any rank a boost, but the timing was fortuitous for me. I had just enough understanding of the art to incorporate what I learned. Therefore I was very well prepared for those particular tests.

Some of the opportunities I took advantage from 7th to 5th kyu are closed to me now  but most of them aren’t. I will still benefit from wonderful “extras” like seminars, tournaments, and training alongside those competing at USA Karate Nationals. Sure some doors have closed but one new, very significant door has opened. I will, as often as possible, be attending bi-monthly brown belt training at our organization’s Hombu dojo (about 3 hours drive). My first is in December.

I’m very likely to see the line of the graph climb higher because the tests will be progressively harder and I will, as most karateka, take longer and longer periods of time to prepare for those tests. I already see this in the length of time I spent as 4th kyu.  The chart in the future won’t look exactly like Mt. Rainier, but I find it interesting that thus far there’s a resemblance. I’ve climbed “Little Tahoma,” and enjoyed the little downhill slope. Mind you, I’m not complaining about the climb I’ve started now. Yes, it’s hard work, but the view of where I’ve been is spectacular and I can see some interesting things on the slopes above.