May 29, 2012

• Down Your Body

  I have a few moments and thought I'd share about the time with the karate sensei today.

  I took Skyler the opposite direction we usually take when "going to karate" because Skyler had been invited to the second home of his karate sensei. Sensei met us at the train station and then we walked to his building. For about an hour he instructed Skyler in what I felt like were all the things that he wanted to explain to Skyler in class but never got the chance to do so. He explained the reasons behind some of the moves and worked with him on doing the moves more precisely. Two thing that I will always remember from Sensei are the admonition to focus and the phrase "down your body."

  After about an hour of this private instruction, he told Skyler that the remainder of the time was for a "small farewell" party. As I suspected, I think he really wanted to share with Skyler this one last moment. He spoke to Skyler about just keep on practicing and trying. He told Skyler to do his best and that the attitude of doing one's best covers all areas of life not just karate. He told Skyler to keep working to try to attain his goal of becoming a black belt. BUT he also said tht once he is a black belt, he must not use karate to ever solve his problem. He said karate is for building strong, healthy bodies and for training the mind and spirit. He reminded Skyler to always remain calm for calmness is better at solving problems than actually using karate moves. Besides, he said that as a black belt it is very dangerous thing and people can be killed by karate. It was fun listening to him speak to Skyler, and he was so encouraging and loving.

  We will miss this karate sensei. We didn't know the treasure we stumbled in to when we enrolled Skyler in karate some three years ago.

  • 4:25 am
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