About a week ago I took two of my young students to do a martial arts demonstration at a local elementary school. Both of the students are 10 years old and have been training for 4 years. They train primarily with adults and work at an intensity level well beyond their years.
For one of the students, it was his first demonstration. He was nervous to put it mildly; the people, the pressure, doing a board break and all the worries of making a mistake in a gym full of people. This young man put all that aside and made his break on the first attempt. Although the demonstration appeared to be for a gym full of school children, it was just as much of a learning experience for this young student. He was faced with the pressure of an unkown, overcame his nerves and performed well. Life-based reality traning at its best.
The other student, a young girl, is no stranger to demonstrations. As always, she did an exceptional job. The gym floor was polished and slick. She did a flying side kick for her break and upon landing, her foot slipped and she fell flat on the floor. The loud noise brought the gym to a silence. However, she jumped up and was fine. Later that week, I watched the video of the break. As she landed on her back from about 3 feet in the air, she executed a perfect break fall. Her natural reaction to break her fall was instinct, made possible by years of hard training. However, the most amazing part of her performance was not apparent. After the demonstration, her parents came up to me and told me that she would not be in class the next day because she was sick with the stomach flu! Most children would have used the illness as a reason to not do the demonstration. This young girl never once told me she was sick. Rather, she mentally put the fact that she was not feeling well aside and delivered.
Fast forward 1 week and the phone rings. It was a parent calling who had seen the demonstration. She said that she was amazed watching the level of discipline with which these two young students demonstrated the martial arts and wanted the same for her two children. The call ended with her telling me that it was so nice to see young people doing extraordinary things.
Young people doing extraordinary things, that's what the martial arts is about......