my karate journey

Today I found my old white belt from when I was 8 years old. It kind of made me think a little bit about the my karate journey so far. Seeing my white belt really made me realized just how far I have come as a martial artist in the 8 years I have been training.  Back when I was 9 and ten I competed a lot more than I do now and I really wish I competed more. It was during this initial part of my karate journey where I really enjoyed it. I don’t think I would have continued doing karate if  I wasn’t enjoying it. Eventually the 2020 came along and at that point I was orange-white belt. That time was really difficult for keeping up the desire to keep going. Since all the classes were on zoom, I couldn’t get any live feedback, and during this time I think this really stopped any sort of progress I could have felt like I was making. In 2021 we finally started doing classes inside the dojo again, and in august 2021 I tested for green belt. That test was by far the hardest thing I had ever done at that point in my karate journey. Today I look back on that test and I view it as something a lot easier now, but that is only because my brown belt test was twice as long. It is an interesting feeling, seeing this thing you did where you thought it was really hard, and then you do something a lot harder than that and all of a sudden it feels easy. Both my green belt and brown belt tests were pivotal points in my karate journey. I learned a lot from both of those tests, and I learned something a lot different about myself.  After my green belt test I learned that my sparring was not very good. At that point I had sparred like three times in the previous year, so my sparring ability was not very good. Throughout my time as a green belt my sparring improved quite a bit. After my brown belt test I learned about my stamina. I definitely didn’t have very good cardio at the time, and that is something that I desperately need to improve this year.  Seeing my white belt really reminded me of how far I have come, and especially how far I have come in the past few years. It is so interesting to see just how much different I have become thanks to my karate training.

My current Challenge progress as of December 23, 2024.