This got me thinking back to when I first started teaching Kung Fu. I felt like I had to be the fittest, strongest and best in the club and in the end I stopped enjoying my training and ultimately quit altogether. Now I’m not teaching Judo so I haven’t got that added pressure but it certainly got me thinking of how I would feel if/when I got my black belt.
In randori last night I got thrown cleanly on my back by a green belt. This green belt was bigger and heavier than me but I still felt like I should be good enough to handle someone of a lower grade despite the disparity in weight, not that I’m small by any stretch of the imagination. I then went on to throw David, a black belt, with a tani-otoshi. I wonder if he was sitting at home last night wondering how he got thrown by a brown belt. Maybe he was. Maybe this feeling never goes away. So for those of you who are black belts, how do you deal with the added pressure of everyone expecting you to be an “expert”?
