When I was a kid growing up in Pearl City, folks used to say that PC had some of the best drinking water, straight from the tap. I don’t know if that’s true, but my usual way of slaking thirst was to go up to the faucet, cup my hand, and drink my fill of cool water, standing at the kitchen sink. Guess what? I never do that anymore. That was years before we worried about “stuff” in the tap water, decades before the advent of drinking from water bottles or having a high-tech filter affixed right onto the faucet. Nowadays, I fill my glass with chilled water straight from – my refrigerator dispenser (I change the filter cartridge every 6 months). My, how things have changed over the years, even the simple act of drinking water. Ironically, nowadays, beer drinkers would rather have their brew come straight from the “tap” versus from a bottle, haha.

In a smooth segueway from slaking a parched, dry throat to quenching a thirsty karate mind, I now shift to the striking image of having a nice sip of water from…the fire hydrant! );0…I’m talking about the incredibly large body of “stuff” there is to learn about karate. Every once in a while, when I reflect on just how much there is to learn about the martial arts and Shotokan Karate in particular, I start to get a false sense of urgency. It’s like there’s so much more that I, and your other senseis, need to transmit to each of you…. So much to share, and so little time! Then there’s that nagging thought – Will someone be ready to take our place once we are gone? Are there essentials that will never be transmitted and be lost until rediscovered by someone? It would seem reasonable that what’s taken us decades to learn, surely will takes decades to pass on.

And then I realize that I’ve just been feeling just tad too self-important – we’re not the essential fount of karate knowledge, spewing out a mighty geyser of information onto your thirsty minds. Common sense and perspective reasserts itself, and the voice of reason tells me that we’re really all in this together. It’s more like we’re all immersed in a vast ocean of knowledge that surrounds, buoys, and sustains all of us…some of us have just been in the water a little longer than the rest of you. Each of us is treading, floating, swimming, diving, etc; at our own pace, surrounded by all the water we ever need, and more. Boy, that image makes me feel better, and the responsibility shifts from your senseis somewhat, onto your own shoulders. And the senseis are probably taking in even more than the students. I’ve said many times before, so much of what your senseis and sempais know, was actually learned during the process of teaching others.

I recall that old principle – “If you want to teach a child how to swim, you throw ’em into the water and they learn to sink or swim.” As a metaphor, one immediately realizes that to learn karate, one can’t rely simply on just thinking about it, talking about it, reading about it, or watching videos about it – you actually have to spend the time and effort in physical training, and immerse yourself in the art. (Playing “Streetfighter” video games doesn’t count, haha) Well, the same principle applies to teaching the art…you actually learn how to do it, by doing it. Unlike sinking or swimming, in karate, you either stick with it and learn something, or you quit and learn nothing. Applied to teaching, you can learn a lot from hard training – but once you start sharing the art with others…well, as that old saying goes, “The teacher is twice taught.” The saying seems self-explanatory, but I think that this phenomenon occurs because while a student’s full energies are concentrated on a mono-experience about what they’re trying to learn, the teacher’s energies are enhanced with both the student’s effort to learn added to the teacher’s effort to share. It serves to convey a broader, more multi-layered experience for the sensei or sempai. A successful instructor is not only observing the students’ efforts, a portion of his/her mind is in touch with the vast unseen waters of karate, constantly seeking inspiration on how to better give guidance to those efforts. I know this sounds a touch metaphysical, but I do believe it’s true.

The first karate classes I ever held on my own were informal ones in a large unused room at my place of work at Vandenberg AFB in California. When several of the airmen working for me discovered that I was a black belt in karate, they enthusiastically requested that I teach them some of what I knew. So began, the lunchtime karate sessions and I was able to teach my small group, karate basics from my perspective. Of course, I had helped instruct back home, as a sempai in several of the dojos, but this was the first time I ever had the freedom (and responsibility) to do it, my own way. It was fun, though none of these highly motiviated young men ever got above the blue belt level of knowledge. About six months later, I began my graduate studies, which would consume my lunch periods for the rest of my tour. So while I’m not sure as to how much these airmen picked up, I believe that I ended up gaining the most – I was being taught how to teach. In the same way, when we meet for class each week, our hope is that we are not merely teaching and showing you ways to improve your execution of technique; but rather, that we are equpping each of you to share your knowledge with others some day.

Recently, I told our more “mature” members in the second class that I really valued them as part of the “yeast” of our ministry. No, I’m not talking about beer again, or about bacterial infection. I’m talking about the starter that’s used to produce the very finest sour dough bread. The dough comes and goes, but the real secret to making and baking fine sour dough bread lies in the yeast, usually a variety of lactobacillus bacteria, combined with various yeasts in what’s called the sourdough starter. Such starters can be used for hundreds of ensuing batches of dough and bread loaves over a period of years to produce a fine product. This starter, however, takes folks who are willing to invest the time and effort to become not necessarily the best technicians, but to become the best teachers that they can become. This is how the health of the group, now and in the future, is maintained and how karate is best passed on.

I apologize, got carried away again; meant to write about learning to teach and teaching to learn, and ended up talking the bread and the water.