Josh GoldWhat is your dojo to you? It is closed and may remain closed for months. Some of your instructors depend on the dojo for part or all of their livelihood; others need a certain amount of money to maintain the dojo, pay the rent, etc. If you regard this as recreation or a service in exchange for a fee, then it is quite natural that you would stop paying dojo membership fees, as you are getting no service.
However, if martial arts are more than this to you, I believe it is the right thing to do to pay your fees for the next months, until the almost surely temporary conditions we must currently live under have lifted. If you don’t, surely some dojos, maybe yours, will fail. And if what you are studying is more than a recreation or a hobby, that would be a misfortune, that something so valuable would die in this world. A true martial arts school is unique – a band of brothers and sisters, under the guidance of experts who are part of the same family, all studying together to make each other stronger and safer.
Of course, if you must reserve this money for your family, for your own perhaps threatened business, then survival must come first. However, if the continuance of your dojo is part of your survival, or part of what brings life to something more than mere survival, then I urge people to consider that the money you continue to offer may truly pay forward into the future, both for you and for other members of your community.
There is another side. What is the instructor’s responsibility? Our main responsibility is to teach the martial art you know in as effectively as we can. This includes uploading videos that explain in detail how to hone technique; writing down the things your instructor taught you, that you’ve never taken the time to organize; seting up virtual classes. Beyond this, check in with your students. You are in a leadership position, and it is possible that some of your students may be having trouble, but are reticent to ask for help. Perhaps someone is sick and needs help getting supplies? Perhaps the dojo may have been one or another persons only real community – ensure that they have not lost this during the interim.
Martial traditions were not originally means of self-cultivation. They were methods of community protection. This may prove to be the most valuable thing that we recover as we go through this crisis.
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Antonio Aloia
Staying within my range of effectiveness is good aikido and protection from COVID-19. Thanks for sharing,
This is the right time to see and reflect on what we have been teaching and what our students have developed.
The meaning behind this article is very transparent.
Greetings Ellis..! Yes, I think you’re right: it’s about community, and more… if Covid-19 was begun by Pangolins under stress from inhumane captivity, there is some irony in our need to stay indoors, huddled up…since the Pangolin’s main self-defense system is to curl up into an armored ball. Maybe this is a time of reflection on the meaning of self-defense. Curl up into a ball and think about nature’s designs: how safe we feel when we do a roll, for example… how natural it feels, when, really, if you go back in time, who would have thought that. In the West, we tend to be stiff, rigid, square but maybe there’s sense in the idea of the protective roundness of all things. 😉 There’s definitely a silver lining or a bunch of them: apparently, pics from outer space show that air pollution is down by a huge amount, no traffic noise in the streets, peace reigns…
When I am in the dojo it makes me feel purposeful and alert. the dojo should be considered your personal pure place in which to work out and train. Its a positive atmosphere is created from the beginning of class during the dojo. I will learn the principles of many other styles, I will learn basics (Kihon), self-defense, how to respect yourself and others, how to earn your peers’ friendship, my internal balance, physical techniques and levels of stamina might have never thought possible of oneself, and principles by which to live I life. Confine mind that defense, fighting, and pushing yourself physically is merely the start of Karatedo.