2021 - What is a Blackbelt?

(I wrote this back in 2021 a bit before I decided to join the Year of the Tiger Team, and wanted to have it on my blog to look back at if I ever needed it)

What is a Blackbelt?

Kayley Burke

2021

Like most things in my kung-fu, I am overthinking how exactly to begin, rather than just starting, so this might be a bit disorganized, and maybe even poorly written, but the important part is that I’m staring and hopefully it will get better as I go on (wow really heavy with the metaphors right out the gate I guess?). 

The very first idea that comes to me is a Blackbelt is a perfect person. Someone who gets up at 6 am after getting 10 hours of sleep to go for a run, do 100 push-ups, and works on their forms for an hour before they even really start their day. This idea extends beyond training too, this person gets everything they planned to do for the day done, lives a healthy, well-balanced life, and contributes to their community. They are able to do these things because they have exceptional discipline, hard work and respect. 

When I think about this idea of a Blackbelt, and where I am, and how I would get there, it seems so impossible. I hate running, I barely practice my forms outside of class, I constantly struggle with procrastination and involvement with anything outside of my university course work. 

However, the more I thought about this question, the more I realized that that is not actually how I would define a Blackbelt. I started to remember phrases like “the only difference between a white belt and a Blackbelt is repetition” and “being a Blackbelt is about doing little things everyday” and I started to change my definition. A Blackbelt is not some perfect superhuman who never makes any mistakes, and never struggles, but someone who does little things everyday to become better than they were yesterday. And when I think about that definition, and where I am, and how I would get there, it seems actually attainable, rather than the impossible path to reach the previous definition; I know myself, and I will never be that perfect person I initially described, but I do know that I can take it one step at a time, getting better than I was before. I know this because last year I wanted to get better at my push-ups, but things like “50 000 in year” sounded so daunting that I never wanted to start, so I compromised and told myself I could start slow, but I had to start. I would do 10 push-ups three days a week, then the next month 20, the next 30. Now I can do 40 push-ups without taking a break and get 330 done in a week and I’m still trying to do more. The same thing happened with my horse stance, doing 10 minutes straight seems impossible, but starting at 2 minutes and adding an extra 30 seconds on after a while doesn’t seem so bad, and before you know it, you’re at 10 minutes. 

I still need to get better at practicing more out of class, and setting new goals to improve my kung fu, and working on my time management, and becoming more involved in the community both with the charities and engaging with the silent river community, and, and, and … there are a hundred things I need to work on, but instead of trying to become perfect at everything at once, I am trying to get better than I was the day before, and that makes the path to Blackbelt seem a little shorter than it was yesterday.