umi no ko

The story goes that I used to train in Auckland; I trained for about 3 years (ages 15-17) in which time I got my red belt. I was aiming for my black belt in the next year when I quit, now quitting is not something I do easily.

I decided to quit because I felt it was the right thing to do, primarily for faith-based reasons, I felt it was something that “God wanted me to do.” It was a hard decision to explain to my instructor who wasn’t a Christian and who was relying on me as her assistant instructor.

Looking back now I still feel it was the right thing to do, my time at university was great and I needed to be able to focus on other things (I guess the thing with the training is that it can be quite time consuming). I also feel that I’ve had a chance to figure out my own value as a person because of God and not because of other things. (Like the colour of your belt)

But here the slightly contentious thing; at the time friends had bought up the whole thing of martial arts not being spiritually wholesome. I had for years told them that the ITFNZ brand of Tae-Kwon do (TKD) was in no way dodgy spiritually. We did not chant or meditate or have any idols or anything. The patterns (like set moves equivalent to Katta in Karate) have meanings but they represent Korean history they tell a story not anything suspect. There are some marital arts I would not do for spiritual reasons but not TKD. However this talk did get to me and I think in the end I thought a martial art is not worth risking damaging my relationship with God/Jesus over. However now I’m thinking maybe I was wrong to give in to that pressure??

When I did quit I never sold my uniform and I always said to myself I would only go back if I again felt that was what “God wanted”.

So it’s been 6 years so what made me go to a class?

Well I suddenly stared thinking about it a couple of months ago and I do need some sort of regular exercise and I know that it’s great for my asthma.

I think that it was a God thing; I think that he did lead me to go to that class, I think there was some release going there and feeling like I could look at it with unbiased eyes, and actually make an adult decision about it. You see for me quitting/giving up on something is so hard and there is still a part of me that would like to reach my goal of getting my black belt, but being there I realised that I don’t actually need it.

The question I have now I where to from now?

I’m not entirely sure I want to start back again there are things to think about.

-Time commitments especially as I train for black belt

-Time away from Paul

-Is it worth it maybe there’s something else I could do (the only other sport that was really get me excited is rock climbing and I do like soccer) One of the nice things about martial arts is you do it alone and I think I really prefer that.

-Possibly violence issues? TKD is not a very violent martial art, it is known for its kicks and jumping techniques and as being an particularly artistic martial art (I always loved the challenge of perfecting techniques the precision of a human body) HOWEVER you are learning how to hurt some one. Anyway I’ve been going on long enough, these are just some of my thoughts, I guess Ill think about it some more.

# posted by anne @ 7:41 PM