I've only just begun

That's what it feels like anyway with regards to my martial arts "endeavors". I'm not calling it training here cause it don't feel like I been training very hard lately. Yes, I go to this dojo 5 days a week but most times I walk out of class going, "I don't feel like I did anything." Ugh. I'm not soaked in sweat like when I would train with Sensei. My muscles don't ache. My body isn't sore. Of course, that didn't happen ALL the time with Sensei, but enough times to know that you were getting a good training session with him. And I suppose you don't need to be dripping wet everytime you train but it's kinda like an indicator for me as to the amount of effort I put into the class.

I want a vigorous workout when I train. I also want the training to be connected to reality. Both of those things mean that: I want to be training for my overall health and being in shape (fitness) and I want the martial skill I'm learning to correspond to the reality of violence and aggression in the world (self-defense/personal safety). It's really just not important for me to go to a tournament or be a competitive fighter. At the same time, fighting skill is what I need and want. Without that kind of experience, I don't see how I can call myself a martial artist. I'd be more of a paper tiger. Yes there's more to martial arts than just acquiring fighting skill but that is of course why martial arts needs to be holistic. And I'm just not finding that holisticness in my training endeavors right now.

At age 30 now, I feel as if I'm starting my training all over again. When I started at Sensei's karate dojo at age 24 I didn't really know what my goals were with training. I remember just thinking that I wanted to learn self-defense so that I could have a skill that could be of service to the people I was politically involved with. I wanted to be capable of "defending my community" so to speak. Sounds a bit naive perhaps but that's really the truth. At the same time I was looking for a way to connect with my Okinawan roots. What better way to do both than take up karate! Or so I thought. I connected with my roots for sure. Since that time I've been to Okinawa twice (although not for training) and I was involved with the Okinawan Association of America in Southern California. But my confidence and self-esteem were not growing in my training. Partly that had to do with my own personal maturity, but partly, and I've realized this now by being in Detroit, that modern karate was incapable of helping me to develop real-world fighting/self-defensive skill. So my confidence about self-protection was just not being boosted. In fact, I was becoming so increasingly insecure over my ability with karate that I quit for nine months. And I was attributing my lack of ability to some kind of corresponding lack in my ability to handle life. I mean c'mon, how many students are really going to perceive that it's the pedagogical model that needs re-structuring and not themselves? You fail your standardized tests in school and how does that make you feel? Like YOU SUCK. But that's cause we been playin by the system's rules and not our own. You don't suck.

My concern with developing "real-world fighting skill" has more to do with the question of how does the modern martial artist connect with the world? (rather than, how can I kick somebody's ass?). Specifically, how can the martial arts, which is a skill, serve the needs of something larger than the individual? Fighting in defense of a community, literally and metaphorically is important I think. My interaction with Feedom Freedom in Detroit (a local neighborhood community garden/org) showed me that young people in these neighborhoods need to feel invested in their community; starting from their homes, to their blocks and to the city at large. Feedom Freedom was doing that with growing food. It was Wayne Curtis (a founding member of that group) that got me thinking about how to do that with my karate.

Okay I gotta stop writing now. It's getting too late in the day. These are all ongoing thoughts anyway...

Elbow SMASH!
- Hiji Até