It’s one of those questions that raises a little flag in any teacher’s mind but I’d dare say even more so in Aikido.
“How long until I’m a black belt?”
It manifests itself off the mats as well:
“How do I make money from blogging?”
“I need to go on a Kara run”*
Then there are all those Internet debates of which Martial Art is the best. I’m not talking about the constructive kinds but rather the “Aikido sucks” variety.
These questions and discussions – if they can be called discussions – are signs of people scrambling to get to the top, to be the best of the best and not stopping to realise that once they reach “their” top there’s only one way to go, down.
Which is why this week’s theme of daily meditations is going to be related to perfectionism starting with this one:
[Martial] Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything.
- Eugene Delacroix
*A reference to World of Warcraft
No related posts.
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
You’re just saying that because karate is better than Aikido.
But you’re right to explore competitiveness and perfectionism. So many confuse them with focus and the determination to be the best we can be at any given moment in time. My post today is about the importance of defining what’s important to us, in areas that can’t be graded with belts or blog stats.