The BUSHI Group Children and Martial Arts
I would like to share with you the positive aspects any child, because they often have differences other kids tend to pick on, can benefit from related to the centering of ones self, the life skills to thrive through the transition adolescent years and the foundation to be successful as an adult. Additionally, it is important to note the cumulative effects, as investing early in a child's life will pay more dividends in the long run and set them up for success as they mature.
Karate or martial arts is not what we teach. We teach life skills and the medium of which we teach them is through traditional martial arts. These life skills and our core 6 values at BUSHI are: Honor, Truth, Hard Work, Self-Confidence, Self-Awareness and Teaching Others. Learning how to center ones self with these life skills is critical for children, again especially as kids tend to pick on each other because of the differences they perceive. The true teachers are those who teach these life skills as a priority and have the experience to do so. Too often children, and people in general, get lost or not centered with inexperienced teachers who are simply volunteers (i.e. untrained t-ball / soccer / etc. coaches) who also do not prioritize teaching life skills and may have different agendas (i.e. having their son play more or only the good athletes play). Imagine for a moment if you were a lawyer and you were to send your office secretary into a court room to try a case for you because they volunteered, this would most certainly not be in your client’s best interest.
As children grow, having these skills, especially self-confidence, is important as other children can be mean. Often children terrorize others because of their differences. This unfortunately is what happens too often and those terrorized soon either become extremely introverted and / or backlash severely (i.e. the recent high school and college shootings). Martial arts, taught the correct way, will provide these essential life skills, due to the discipline involved and the key difference versus sports, as it encourages each individual to be the best they can be at a non-predetermined rate. Celebrating a child's individual progress, regardless of how little and from what point they started, is important in building self-confidence. Too often sports teams are about encouraging the good athletes only and this does not build self-confidence for all (i.e. kids getting cut from teams – please also read the other article for more on this topic titled – strong foundation). When a child is centered in these life skills, especially self-confidence, it is more difficult for them to be knocked off-course in the turbulent times through adolescence when other children or society are mean.
During adolescence, while self-confidence is still important, other attributes now gain in importance level (i.e. self-discipline, honor, truth and hard-work). Traditional martial arts will serve as a discipline foundation if parents are committed to consistent training. Consistent training is having the child train whether he/she wants to or not because it is good for him/her. A question to consider; if this is how we approach academic schooling – being mandatory, shouldn't we treat life skills schooling the same as one could argue they are of equal or possibly greater importance.
The two most important questions parents must answer for their children are: 1) what are the most important things we should have them do? and 2) can we as the parents commit the time and effort to support these activities? Unfortunately, too often parents concern themselves with the amount of activity their children are involved in versus the quality of activity they are involved in. A book I read recently (Zen in the Martial Arts) said – sometimes doing nothing is more important than doing something. The meaning was; we all need time to rejuvenate from the quality activities we have chosen to fully absorb the lessons we face. An analogy the author used for illustration was; imagine having the conductor of an orchestra skip the pauses in a musical piece, while technically all of the notes were played the piece is still very incomplete.
For obvious reasons these life skills continue to be important into adulthood and serve as a foundation for success. One example I will share is one of self-discipline and self-awareness. Life is about sometimes doing things you don't want to do. As one goes into the workforce and discovers they do not like their boss for good reasons you may quit this job. But if this situation happens too often and you do not have the self-discipline and self-awareness to manage in a challenging environment and continue to quit job after job, soon it does not look like your bosses are the jerks, but that you are the one incapable of holding down a job. When we choose the important things for our children to do, it is just as important that we teach them that commitment is essential as they will take this life skill with them for the rest of their lives.
It is for these reasons, and the fact that we care about your family, specifically your child, noting that he just like other children may have challenges ahead, I encourage you to stick with his training in traditional martial arts now and / or in the future as he / she gets older.
