End of the season means for us a week full of important events. The first event yesterday was a special double-training day with the european head instructor of our karate style (let's call him simply the grandmaster).
The trainings were full of useful and interesting techniques, self-defense drills, physical exercises, kata and bunkai development ideas, and so on. Practically everything the grandmaster made us do was new to me, quite different from what we've been doing during the year, even the warm-ups were quite unusual! But then I've been here for such a short time after all, that it's hard to tell how many of these alternate exercises felt like novelty to the others.
Nevertheless, amidst the abundant food for thought, both technical and non-technical, three things the grandmaster said stroke me the most. I feel I might as well forget the rest (I'm sure I've already had), but I want to treasure these few words and carry them with me, inside and outside the dojo. I realize that these may sound quite trivial and generic to some, but personally I believe there's a lot to ponder about them:
- be humble, for what you know will always be much less than what you still have to learn
- do not be afraid
- always keep the good spirit
Even though I only have a glimpse at the meaning of our grandmaster's lesson, it sounds just like what I want karate to be for me.