Sunday, November 15, 2009

I didn't fail, but thanks for thinking I should be an expert by now

This weekend was Tae Kwondo testing again, and this time I had several kids that I help to teach at Gabe's school testing for their first belt.  It was so fun to see them come in so excited and curious about how it would all go.  It was neat to feel a tiny bit of "ownership" over their success.

But you know we never leave one of these things without a story!

We were outside warming up, I was having some of the kids with more advanced belts run the white belts through their routines, getting stretched, practicing their kicks, blocks, forms, etc, we were having a good time and accomplishing something while the other adults were getting the room set up for testing.  The boys were really into it (I didn't have any girls this time) and weren't really paying too much attention to the other adults around them, they were in their own world.

We went inside to begin testing, and one of the students noticed the black-belt panel seated at the front of the room (keep in mind he's only ever met one black belt, John, the main instructor) and he notices that except for  the parents in the room, the very large majority of adults in the room were black belts.

With a very worried look, he comes to me and says quietly, "Miss Lisa?"-I answered "Yes?"  "Miss Lisa, how many times have you FAILED this test?!"  I answered "none....whyyyyyyyyyyyyy?"  His answer-"Well then WHY are you still a green belt!?"--apparently he assumed that all adults were black belts, but fortunately, I did get to test for an advancement, and it was fun to show him that the adults have to earn their belts just the same way the kids do.  In fact, that's one of the things I love, we all wear the same uniform, we all do the same things.  Nobody's special, nobody's different.  We all start from the beginning, and that's good.

4 comments:

Kristina P. said...

And I love how tenacious you are!

Anonymous said...

that is awesome...=D

rachel said...

Great lesson. That must be so much fun! I was hoping my son would love his short time in Tae Kwondo, but unfortunately it didn't take. Think it may have been the fact that the instructor wasn't very engaging or helpful to the newcomers. We've talked about doing it again.

Chef Tess said...

Lisa, I love you! This post reminds me so much of a lot of people who don't know how to cook...and yet assume that it just comes natural or comes with age. Not the case, as with any skill worthwhile...it is the ones who work at it and admit they can learn more who become amazing! Great job earning your next belt though! So proud of you!