NEVER STOP LEARNING On Saturday the 19th April I woke up in the morning feeling excited, just thinking how lucky I was to have the opportunity of spending my weekend, training with Sensei George, Sensei Andy and the rest of the Goju Ryu family. I must admit I had this feeling right from the early days of my training with Sensei Andy and Sensei Terry at Sheffield Hallam University. Not surprisingly my feelings have not changed since those days. I have asked myself why and how? Besides from the obvious fact that I have being taught karate by very good instructors. I believe the answer is because of the drive I get from my desire to learn! When you watch Sensei George, Sensei Linda, Sensei Andy, Sensei Terry, and the rest of the very valuable people performing the art of karate, it reminds me how little I know about the art. I try to learn from these people by listening and watching. They give me inspiration to seek more knowledge and this helps me to work towards reaching the full capacity of my technical and physical ability. As a Turkish proverb says: “see with your mind, hear with your heart”. Whichever activity you take up to learn in your own time, let the communication flow between your mind and heart. Avoid being someone you are not but, be who you are. The training we had last weekend was excellent! On Saturday, like the majority of the people, it was my first time in the English Institute of Sport (EIS). What an impressive venue! It made me feel like I was participating in an International Gashuku elsewhere in the world. On Sunday we were back at our Dojo, which may be smaller than EIS but I suppose the size of the venue does not matter as much, as long as your heart is with the people you are training with. Sensei George took us from essential warm up, cardiovascular exercises to punching/blocking techniques, kata, kumite and their applications. He spent time with students at all levels on technical details in kata and made them perform their katas over and over again. Again, it made everybody realise the importance of practicing every technique as this would be the way for students to move towards perfection. You could see the improvement in students after each attempt. One of the challenging parts of the training was when Sensei asked everybody to perform kumite techniques individually combined with ‘star jumps’ on a ‘non-stop’ basis. With Sensei’s encouragement everybody did very well. I lost count of how many times I had to wipe my sweat patch off the floor with my belt. One thing for sure, the feeling I get from all my hard work doesn’t change as well as the habit of using my belt instead of a towel to collect my ‘sweat’ during training sessions. This gives me an extra satisfaction for achievement and recognition within myself. I imagine that like everybody else there, I was proud for my achievements and was so grateful for the new things I was able to learn over those two days. The training finished on Sunday with everybody doing ‘sanchin’ and ‘tensho’ katas under Sensei’s instructions followed by stretching exercises. The message I would like to share with you is: “keep training, keep improving and more importantly keep learning.” Not everybody is expected to have the same capability. Some take the training seriously, some don’t! If you do take it seriously, the art becomes part of your life. Nevertheless, you must enjoy being taught without possessing any negative thoughts in your mind. Learn but try to produce at the same time, that is to say, every time you learn you should be able to feel the improvement. Another old Turkish saying “A scholar who does not produce is like a cloud that doesn't rain”. Karate training gives you a purpose and should make you focus to observe learning but you must try to improve, even if it is a small amount, slowly but surely. As a result, like I do, you would enjoy it more by pushing yourself physically to the limit with the right frame of mind. We should try to remind ourselves, the art of karate is consisted of a mental and physical training. Once the purpose is fulfilled, it will make you to look forward to participate in trainings in coming years. With respect to you all. Esref Ulas, Sheffield Hallam Dojo, April 2008 |