Monday’s are the greatest aren’t they? After another boring Sunday where I got to work out, then relax, have a great meal and spend time with my wife, it is great to be back at work (what is the emoticon for sarcasm?…).
Right now I should be ‘working’ but instead I just finished reading an interview of highly successful wrestler, wrestling coach and groundbreaking strength Coach Ethan Reeve. As usual I associate what I read with what I love (that would be Kung-Fu, grasshopper) and with Pui Chan Kung Fu Pioneer showing at the Sunscreen film festival, this article revisited one of the major themes of the movie: Is tradition still relevant in today’s world? Here is an excerpt from the interview with Coach Reeve:
“There is one other thing that we did at UT Chattanooga that no other wrestling team did that I am aware of. We made our wrestlers bow as they entered and exited the wrestling room. This was not done as some religious sort of thing. We emphasized to our wrestlers that they need to come into every practice with the intent to leave the room in some way better than when they walked in. Did they get better at technique, stronger, better conditioned, more mentally tough? Better and better every day was our motto. A wrestler cannot get better if he knows everything. He must come in with an empty glass to learn and improve. If he walks in with a full glass, if he knows everything, he will not make the changes needed to become a champion. Bowing as you enter and exit the room promotes humility. Humility allows the humble to learn and get better!”
Any student of a traditional martial art knows, one of the first rules learned is to bow when entering and exiting the training hall (have you read your manual lately?). We do it so often that many times we bow when entering a restaurant or home! But I don’t always think about why I do it. What if I did? What if you did? I have my theories as to what would happen but I will leave the philosophizing for the masters and just keep hopping along, bowing here and there and maybe even occasionally stopping to think about what I am doing…
Sifu Marcus Chinfatt from the Wah Lum Temple bows before performing the Kwan Do
Photo Courtesy of: Laura Elliot Monroe
Guest Blogger: Oscar Agramonte
