The Green Eyed Monster It was typical locker room room talk…. There’s always one black belt that just can’t control his arrogance.  Duncan was typical of this kind of person; he’d moved in from out of town and therefore hadn’t grown up in the spirit of the dojo.  He couldn’t keep his counsel and had to pontificate on everything.  He was a typical ‘snake oil vendor’ – in that what he said almost made sense until you realised that it was only a game of ‘one upmanship’ and he was shaping his words to gain acolytes and admirers and in … Continue reading The Green Eyed Monster

Working Together It was a warm night… With three children’s and an adult beginner class previously, the air was quite humid.  Sensei had worked this class through a good ‘warm up’ and some highly corrected basics before it was time to work on kata… Sensei had divided the class up into small groups with a black belt in charge of each group as this class would be followed by the dan grade session, we had quite a few black belts in already – and the kyu grades could get almost private instruction from them, with Sensei moving between the groups. … Continue reading Working Together

The Old Days They were a lively lot tonight, most of the students were in their teens and playing off each others energy, but as young energy has a wont to do, it faded all too quickly, leaving a large group of flushed, animated but physically tired teens. “Sit down”…  Sensei recognised this and realised that this was a perfect ‘window of opportunity’ to inject a little wisdom. “Any questions?” – a good coaches ploy to get the students to start the conversation… Sensei looked along the line of young, flushed and animated faces… The hands shot up… “Jamie?” “Sensei, … Continue reading The Old Days