Niketa Wells - International Taekwon-do Federation of New Zealand

FEATUREHOW TAEKWON-DO TRAINING CAN INFLUENCE ONE’SBy Mr Norman Ng IV dan, Pioneer of Taekwon-Do in New ZealandGeorge Bernard Shaw once wrote: “Thereare two tragedies in life - one is not to getyour heart’s desire, and the other is toget it”. Similarly, there are two tragedies inTaekwon-do: one is to give up before onereaches one’s potential, and the other isto get the black belt and beyond. So thedilemma is do I continue or do I stop orwhatever, and if you continue what are yougoing to do?Today I’ll talk around 10 words. First let’stalk about COURTESY. In the dojangwe bow, and this is oriental courtesy, whenwe meet each other we pay each otherrespects, and particularly in Japan. Thesame etiquette is also required outside thedojang. In the king’s court in years goneby various etiquette and rituals have beenpractised. You see how they did it in someof those old movies. You have respect foryour seniors. But sometimes you feel thatthe seniors’ words go through one ear andout the other. You aren’t really listening.That’s the same for your parents - yourparents might say something to you andyou say it goes in this ear and out the other!Well do we sneer at others, and badmouthabout people behind their backs? Nothingworse than doing that, because the persondoesn’t have a chance to defend him orher self. If you want to say something bad,say it in front of the other person andlet the person defend themselves. If youhave nothing nice to say, you’d be betternot to say anything at all. Whatever is saidcannot be withdrawn. So ask yourself ifyou practice courtesy at all times. One ofthe criteria would be that when you meeta person for the first time you are alwayspolite and careful what you say. You shouldpractice that all the time, even with yourwife, your parents, your sisters and yourloved ones and all that, because that is topractice courtesy. I know it’s difficult. Youtake each other for granted after you’vebeen married for about 30 years, but ifyou really care for each other I think youshould go back to that. And in years tocome I hope this talk will enable you tothink back, and say well I should do that; atleast treat each other as though we metfor the first time.So next we come to ATTITUDE. Weshould treat the study of Taekwon-do asseriously as we do our tertiary studies,because as I always said, getting a black beltin Taekwon-do is just as difficult as gettinga degree in the university. We should reallystudy Taekwon-do with dedication, andI’m sure you have otherwise you wouldn’tbe here today. The dojang is the mirror ofone’s life while you are doing Taekwon-do.In the dojang we wear the simplicity of thewhite dobok, and we train in the bare hall,and there is really no class discriminationwhen you come for Taekwon-do training.Not like when you go to golf - somewear designer clothes while you’re in $5The author – Mr Norman Nguniforms! So when you come into thedojang everybody’s the same because youare wearing the same uniform, so it doesn’tmatter what your occupation is, doesn’tmatter at all. Once you put on the uniformwe are all equal.During Taekwon-do training, we experiencemany obstacles. I’m sure you have. Physicallimitations, not all of us are good at highkicks. Injuries, we all have those over theyears. Boredom, you say oh this is gettingboring, I’m going to give it up, but youhaven’t, you’ve got this far. Family crises,financial problems like mum couldn’t affordto pay the grading fees for example, weall have those. And emotional stressesand so on.So we seek to develop non-quittingattitudes. I mean, if all these are problemsand you didn’t have good attitude youwould have given up by now. But youhaven’t so all of you here have the nonquittingattitude, and I hope you continuewith that. Obstacles and problems willalways be in front of us because that’slife, and it’s up to us as martial artists tocontinue to overcome these problems andcrises and never quit.28TAEKWON-DO O TALK MAGAZINEAZ