Episode 807- Conversations on Martial Arts with Mark and Craig
In this episode, Jeremy is joined by Sensei Craig Wharem and Tashi Mark Warner where they answer questions about Martial Arts.
Conversations on Martial Arts with Mark and Craig - Episode 807
In this episode, Jeremy is joined by Sensei Craig Wharem and Tashi Mark Warner where they answer questions about Martial Arts. Some of the questions include:
When do we release the book, Women in Martial Arts
What happens when someone who wants to train but something is wrong physically
How do you restore yourself
plus more!
After listening to the episode it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it. Comment down below!
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So the idea for this is that it's not just like Q and A cause why? Right? This is the first time we've ever had an audience for an episode so it's kind of fun and it's kind of unknown how we're gonna this. But my thought was the three of us would chat here, scoot a little bit, and then you move in, you're kind of off to the side.
Mark Warner:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And the premise being, it's your questions. It will spark the conversations that we have and the things that we talk about. So it's as much like improv as anything else.
Mark Warner:
Oh, I see. One of this has been studying.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's right. My fourth class is tomorrow.
Mark Warner:
Nice. Excellent.
Jeremy Lesniak:
See, there's a great example. So who wants to go first? Who's got a question?
Audience 1:
I would love to.
Mark Warner:
Go ahead.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Do it.
Audience 1:
So you often see in the martial arts, love the male instructors going bald. You're not going bald, but being bald. Craig, what happened?
Craig Wharem:
I got better as the hair grew.
Mark Warner:
Ah, see.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Imagine how good I'd be if I had hai?
Craig Wharem:
The first time, actually, I don't know that you've heard this story. I know some of the listeners will have, but the first time Jeremy and I met, the first thing he said to me was I'm jealous of your hair. Not even like, hello. He like walked in and shook my hand goes, I'm jealous.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well look how much hair he has. I've been shaving my head not to the skin, but you know, back when I had hair, it was buzzed to, I think I started a half inch at 12. I had one bottle of shampoo in college.
Mark Warner:
I totally knew.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Four years, one bottle.
Mark Warner:
Bar soap.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It was a big bottle. I don't even use shampoo.
Craig Wharem:
I go through a bottle…
Jeremy Lesniak:
There's no point.
Craig Wharem:
I go through a bottle of shampoo in like a day.
Mark Warner:
Nah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You can use my share. But you know, I've made the observation when I was very young that somehow the majority of men in martial arts do not have hair. And I have no idea why, but it seems to be a higher percentage than just in the general population.
Mark Warner:
Well, I think there's a couple reasons of that. The first is cause we all wanna look like Bruce Lee, so we grow the hair out like Bruce Lee, it doesn't look good at all. Then it gets as much when we just get kind of going to get our haircut, buzz it all off. And the third is, we have students like Noah, I mean, what's that gonna do to you?
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's true.
Mark Warner:
Those are my reasons.
Craig Wharem:
I have the opposite. I didn't want to, I don't like getting my haircut so I just don't go.
Mark Warner:
Oh, there you go. See?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I once had someone try to just explain it to me that, oh well, you know, hair and hair can be grabbed and all this. And I was like, yeah, but what about all the women in class? Like, whoa. So I don't have a good answer to your question that you didn't quite ask in the way that I'm answering it. It's just a thing. Martial artists tend to have less hair.
Mark Warner:
The ones that do have hair, I'll add on, you know, most of 'em have a tight back, either real short hair or they have a back in either a man bun or a ponytail.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You ever put your bun on top?
Craig Wharem:
Sometimes, but it takes a little extra…
Jeremy Lesniak:
I don't think I've seen that.
Craig Wharem:
It takes extra effort. So it depends. It depends on my mood.
Mark Warner:
Katan's agreeing about getting the bun on top takes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, it takes.
Audience 2:
It's a workout. I have to do it every night when I go to bed.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. Yeah.
Audience 2:
I'm exhausted by the end of it.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. I'm sweating. I'm huffing in. It's a mess.
Mark Warner:
See, I'm working out all day, so I don't wanna take your time.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Next.
Audience 3:
So back to that, what about all the women in the class? I think you just finished a book about women in martial arts.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We just released a book, "Women In The Martial Arts" rooted in episodes that we've done. I had some say in which episodes we were referencing in that some of the women that I think heads with the strongest stories are people that I personally think are very inspirational. Like my original instructor was a duo. She's was hard and her husband, she's in that list. So yeah. It sounds like there's a part B.
Audience 3:
No.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay.
Audience 3:
No, I haven't read it, so I was wondering if you would talk about it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So, a lot of the books that we do refer back to podcast episodes that we've done. Like the Martial Artist Handbook started as a collection of episodes. You know, we went, it's like, okay, what episodes do we want to do? And then we broke those down into an outline and then I narrated it, and then we transcribed that. Like that's how we did that process. This one is a little bit different in that the interviews pretty much stand as they are. And then Jenny, who heads up our book division, approached a number of women that she knows in the martial arts women that she finds inspirational or connections that she's made that she appreciates and got them to kind of write introductions because let's face it, women in most martial arts schools do not reflect the general population of women in the area, right? Women are roughly 50% of the population. There are some exceptions, but pretty uncommon. And women are rarely 50% in the martial arts school. With a caveat that I've seen, if a woman owns a school, it's much closer to 50-50 and we can kind of extend that out. And I'm curious what you guys think, what you've noticed. When women are in a position of leadership, there is much more participation by women.
Mark Warner:
Yes, I agree. We have Tashi Deborah here and she encourages the woman and the children to participate more. I'll go back to that in a minute, but I think women in the martial arts is key. Now if you look at this table here, Craig's actually the tallest out of the bunch. And that's a good thing because I remember, I'm sure Jeremy remembered back when we were beginning, we'd walk into the martial arts school and they instructed to be like this, be tall and a lot of 'em were like really big guys.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Everyone is taller than me and always has been.
Mark Warner:
And as I'm coming up, I'm like why does he need martial arts? It's women and small guys like me, I'm only 5 foot 8. Those are the people that need martial arts most. So what we teach, I know what all of us teach, especially you saw with Jeremy seminar today. It works for everyone. That's the trick. If it works for everyone, it's really good. Now, I'm gonna go back to women because they're God's gift to a martial arts academy. I'll say that. Why do I say that? Point in case, [00:06:31] was here yesterday. We had a four year old girl come in with her mom, and the girl just looked at me, I stepped back, I pushed [00:06:40] in front of me, and she ran the introduction who ran great after the young lady didn't wanna leave. She was having so much fun. So there you go.
Jeremy Lesniak:
The energy that men and women bring to anything that we do is different.
Mark Warner:
Different.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And not that a man doesn't necessarily have female energy or can not even be overwhelmingly feminine energy, but typically, right? And so that variance, that balance, I have more feminine energy than most men. But, you know, the exact you know, percentage isn't gonna be the same as yours or as yours or, and there's something really good in that.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah, I mean, I agree with all the points made, I don't know that I have much more to contribute cause you guys split expressed my thoughts pretty much. I have noticed as I've been kind of traveling around schools a bit more, I've seen you know, I've been the martial arts for 20 years. When I was in class, when I first started, there was maybe one or two girls in the class with me. And now I go to seminars to, even the one we had today, it was 50% women I counted.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh wow.
Craig Wharem:
I counted specifically just to know, and you know, Jeremy, you and I went to a seminar a few months ago and I get it was actually, there were more women than men there. And it was one of those things where it's really cool to see that kind of break away that idea that martial arts is only for men are only a masculine thing.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah.
Craig Wharem:
It kind of, because martial arts, once you walk through the door and you bow on the mat, you're a martial artist, you're not, you know.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Right.
Craig Wharem:
At least at my school, we don't have a distinction. You're a martial artist and that's how you're treated.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I've done research, it's a little bit too formal of a term.
Craig Wharem:
Perused?
Jeremy Lesniak:
But I've explored that question you know, why does it tend to be overall? I mean, it's no secret if you go to any martial arts event, if you go to a big tournament, you know, the male divisions are larger than female divisions. The overall participation is more men. While we don't make a concerted effort with Martial Arts Radio to bring on a certain percentage or alternate, like, here's a fun thing that many of you may not know. In terrestrial radio, it's generally accepted you go male, female, male, male, female stocks, right? You're trying to, it's usually close to 50-50. We don't do anything like that. So what does that mean? Most of our episodes are with men because we have far more men that are applying to be on the show than women. But why is that? At the heart of it, what we do tracks back to something that is if we explore the biology of it is inherently masculine. It's combat. If you look across species, the male tends to be the defender of the nest or the pack or the whatever, right? And it just something that happens in our physiology too, doesn't mean it should be that way. But I think as we understand why it is, it could allow us to create a more welcoming environment and not just be, fight, fight, fight, which only appeals to even in modern times. Like it's a, even a narrow subset of men that want that.
Craig Wharem:
I agree.
Mark Warner:
I concur.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. Sounds like we're at the module in that thought.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. I feel like we…
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay.
Craig Wharem:
Felt like we, the word I would've used was you've perused. You may not have researched but yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I definitely didn't research, but I peruse.
Mark Warner:
Peruse.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah.
Craig Wharem:
Gander.
Mark Warner:
Gander.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Examined.
Craig Wharem:
Evaluated.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay, we can stop with the…
Craig Wharem:
I thought we're doing word association. Sorry, Andrew.
Jeremy Lesniak:
What else?
Audience 4:
I have a question. So, you all have had schools or are you afraid Tashi Mark?
Mark Warner:
Oh, I'm always. You speak, I'm scared.
Audience 4:
So you've all had schools in the past or have them now and I believe most schools, well all schools have a curriculum. They have a plan of how they're going to teach. You know when a white belt comes in and you know, you gonna teach the white belt this and then move up in ranks. Most are belt ranked. Not all schools have belt ranked, but most are. So, I'm curious to hear your opinion on, you have all these different people coming in with different abilities, ages, you know, shapes, sizes, all that. You have a curriculum. In order to get your yellow belt, you say you need to be able to do thus and such. What happens when you have people who come in, they're very motivated. They have a good heart. They wanna do this, but something is awry. They might have a physical disability. They might have, you know, a mental challenge, an emotional challenge. Do you promote them? How do you deal with that?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm not gonna speak first on this cause this is the thing that I yell the loudest.
Mark Warner:
I'm gonna, I'll start because I'm approaching the age of 65. I've been doing this for 50 years.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I thought you were saying it's like in the next 20 years you'll be 65. I'm approaching 65 too.
Mark Warner:
I know. We're all approaching. Some are a little…
Craig Wharem:
Some are a little further away than others.
Mark Warner:
But as I go through my martial arts career, I notice my physical aptitude changing. Even my emotional aptitude changing things. Some of my students changing my mind on many things. So I see things different. Some of the things I would've taught three years ago, I won't teach to adults now. I'll teach to the teenagers and anybody up to the age of 35. So you're always talking about exploration, you're talking about that in a recent podcast. That's what martial arts has to be. Because for me, to continue, we had four new students. One was in their 50s, the other were in their 60s. So if I teach them things that I teach my teens, they'll be out the door real quick. But from working with like Jeremy and Craig and Andrew and others, we have curriculum that can fit in the proper place at the proper time. So there's my aspect on it. You have to be flexible. I realize I am one of the, I'm almost the end of the baby boomers and there's a lot of us out there, and they're starting coming in the door. So that's something we have to look for. Always adapt, always change.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Be like a ninja.
Craig Wharem:
You make up.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You've got a bunch of students that are maybe, I mean, you've got some, not some, yeah. Neurotypical and…
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. So first, as far as the curriculum thing goes, my advice is always just teach. If you're running your own school, you're running your own program, you have to teach what you're comfortable doing and you have to know your limitations. And so part of that is if you have trouble identifying with people who have a mental or an emotional or a physical hardship and you don't think you will best serve them, then point them in a direction that will best serve them. Don't try to act like you will and you won't. So what that does is that allows me to have a little flexibility in my curriculum to go, okay, this person, I have a student and they've worked on in warehouses and all sorts of things, and they're in their mid to late 50s now. The lower half of their body is so shot from standing all day on a cement floor and not with the best shoes sometimes and things like that. Kicking to the ribs is just not something that's gonna happen unless the person's on the ground, right? And so we just modify it. It doesn't mean that the technique is gonna be any less effective, honestly, kicking the knee is probably more effective at times than kicking the ribs, right? Depending on what your focus is. If your focus is on tournaments, you can't teach knee kicking because you're not allowed to do that, right? If the focus of my school is I'm going to help you become the best version of yourself that you want to be. So, however, and that the most important part of that is that you want to be. Because as a teacher, it's my job to always see you 10 steps ahead of where you are. That means when you reach what you think is your best, I can see 10 steps past that. But whatever steps you take to reach the best you can do, that's you. Martial arts is a personal journey and as an instructor, as a school owner manager, it's our jobs to help facilitate that growth. Last time I did the math based on my own experience in teaching, it was something like 9 out of 10 students that I've taught in 18 years have never had to use their physical skills in a fight. So if I'm only ever teaching them and preparing them for something that 9 out of 10 will never encounter, thankfully, right? Like that's a good statistic, right? 9 out of 10 never encounter and I'm not doing anything else and factor in an emotional need. Sometimes people need confidence. And if all I'm doing is telling them what, setting them up with the material that they are not able to accomplish for any limitation or depending on what the hindrance is, right? Then I'm setting 'em up for failure and not success. That's not to say that if a jumping kick is in my expectations for a black belt and that’s their expectations, I still want them to jump. I just don't care if they jump up and their head on the ceiling. I just wanna see their feet leave the ground and that I don't allow an excuse, right? A hardship isn't an excuse I had, I've worked with students in wheelchairs, and I've gotten em to soft through boards and break boards. They can't walk, but they can break the board because it wasn't an excuse. It was, okay, we're gonna find a way to make this work for you. We're gonna work around what you need, not what I, don't do it like me, do it like you. I guess it's the long, that was a lot of words.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's okay.
Craig Wharem:
I'm outta words, so.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right.
Craig Wharem:
It's your turn.
Jeremy Lesniak:
When I take a question like that, I approach it with logic, right? And there are a few things that I've come to believe very strongly in that, in a sense, paint me into a corner on how much leeway I have with something like that. The first is very rare, and I think very few people agree that as one's aid progresses and physical abilities diminish that you should be demoted. So if that is true, then rank is not about physical skill. Some people say, but you achieved it, so maybe you don't progress, you hold. Okay, fine. You know, when I carve out space for pretty much any ideology on this, but to me, rank has never been about skill. It's about growth on your own journey. And I'm very fortunate in the school that I grew up in was a bit progressive for the time. It was never, okay, you need to know how to do this. Everything was up for grabs. The one thing that was, I think, strongly enforced was you had to know your forms right. This was primarily a karate school, and so you had to know your next kata or your next two katas for progress. But it was loose enough that I knew like three or four katas ahead of where I needed to be. There were other people who could fairly remember how to do a form, and they would get out there and the instructor knew that they tried, that they had been practicing, and that their brain just didn't work that way. Maybe there was something atypical about the way they processed that information. I don't know. But if you showed that you had made the effort, maybe they would prompt you a little bit. And maybe that same person, I'm thinking one in particular was an absolute monster sparring. There was that element of martial arts that they loved. I love doing forms, always have. So more was expected of me doing my forms and you can look at that and say, well, is that fair? No, it's not. Should it be? Because we're all on our own journey. One of the things I've said often about martial arts is it gives back exactly and only what you put in. And if I'm putting in my effort to become a better version of me and I become a better version of me, and you put in effort to become a better version of you, you put in effort to become a better version of you, why should we expect that the, if we're starting from different places, why does that effort mean we're gonna end up at the same place? And I think that holding people to rigid standards, I think there are two important things to say there. One, I think it's silly because I think it reduces the likelihood that someone is going to remain and gain the benefits of training, number one. And number two, I think a lot of times people will go to that because over the course of my life, we've become far more standardized in public education. We see that as, and, you know, I feel quite confident in this, the caliber of teachers has degraded because they are given less opportunity to develop. And there's more teaching to test, more scoring, more metrics. And so our expectation is that we should pull that same concept into martial arts, where if you've been teaching for a long time, as the three of us have, if you have, you know that you don't work with each student the same way. Because they're doing things differently and that you can recognize, you know what? That person is at a blue belt level and that person is also at a blue belt level because I know what they've done. I know what they've overcome. I know where they're at. I know that this person is great at forms. This person's great at sparring, or this person is an absolute wizard when it comes to putting a weapon in front of them. That there are so many different avenues that they can find and explore on their own path that when we factor all that together, they don't look anything close to the same, but they're both on that blue belt level for them. And some of you may not understand quite what I'm talking about, and folks that are listening or watching might not understand, but I'm sure you do. And I think that that is not only a liability, I think it's an asset. I think it's one of my favorite elements about martial arts because there are so many different pieces to it. In fact, there's so much that you cannot reach a very high level of expertise in all of it simultaneously. You're never gonna show me someone who is a world-class fighter, world-class at forms, world-class with weapons, top-notch self-defense practitioner in good shape, understands the philosophy and the history, and they break board, right? Like just all of it at a super high level? There's a time. I've forgotten more forms than I know. I could relearn any of them. There are plenty of technical things that I've regressed on that I could find again you know. There might be a couple things with some jump spinning kicks. Maybe I wouldn't be able to get back to where I was in my 20s. I don't know. Yeah. I think I still have the physical ability to get back there on all that, but that's not gonna last forever. So it's kind of a long-winded three-part answer, but does that, what do you…
Audience 4:
Yeah, definitely. It's kind of what I expected to hear knowing you guys, you know. But I wanna put it out there. And so when you think about, particularly let's say, you know, almost any, I think anyone, if they go to a good school, they're supported, they're steered on the right direction, they can get a, it might take a longer time, obviously someone, and if you're honest with 'em and say, you know, you need to work on this or do that, or whatever, but they can get that black belt. Now after black belt, I feel that the journey becomes very individualized. And you could select, you know, I'm really into weapons training, so I really wanna focus on that, or I want to do this or that. But then where, you know, when you see, grand master this, grand master that, professor this, this and that, you know, it kind of makes me wonder is that person 10 times better than that black belt? And how do you kind of guide, you know, mentor those people or who does mentor those people or, I mean, I don't know. It is just kind of an open question mark in my mind that you know, how do you get to that point? And I know I've tested several black belt tests and I've done what I was expected to do, but am I really, is it really necessary? I mean, once you reach a certain level or once you know it's in your heart that you are a martial artist, it really doesn't matter, does it?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I don't think it matters.
Audience 4:
No.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I don't think it matters. And when we, you know, is there an argument that sparks more passion and disagreement than rank? And I don't think there is. I dunno if you guys would agree, but just what is a black belt, right? I mean, I routinely get into arguments on the internet with people about that. It's the one thing that I will step up and argue with people about because I don't want people to say, you are not a black belt. You have no right to say that that person is not a black belt. Maybe they wouldn't have a black belt in your school, but there's also somebody else's school you wouldn't have a black belt, right? Like, it's totally fine. And our traditions in the martial arts, especially western implementations of martial arts like in America are rooted in military tradition. You know, we brought all these concepts back and it doesn't take much. What's the word you use? Not exploration, perusing.
Craig Wharem:
Perusing.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It doesn't take much perusing to learn that it's handled dramatically differently in Asian countries. You know, sometimes so differently that you wouldn't quite recognize it. Well, so you can look at those military traditions and it doesn't take much conversation with someone in the military, active or prior service, and they'll tell you, it's problematic there too. That just because you're promoted, you served, right? I mean, I'm sure you were around plenty of people that were promoted over and they didn't deserve it, and it, this person was bent outta shape. And it happens constantly. It's just as political in the military as it is in the martial arts.
Mark Warner:
How much time we got? Skip that one.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And so that's why I think it's the best analogy I've heard, and I wish I remembered where I first heard this, but isn't comparing rank more to academic titles, you know. Baccalaureate, masters, PhD, postdoc, et cetera. Because if you talk to someone who is, you know, has their doctorate in biology, you don't assume that they know everything about biology. And that if they're talking to another person about biology, that if one of them got their doctorate before the other person, that they are inherently better wiser and know everything more about everything, right? Like we do that. It's why I'm resistant to titles. I don't put stripes on my belt. Because I'm still learning.
Mark Warner:
Oh, I'll go both into this. In my humble opinion, a grandmaster is somebody that has their own style, a definite style of martial arts. Like a name. He has his own style. He has [00:26:19] his colleague. That's his family's style. He's the head of the system. That's your grandmaster there. Now, as far as age and rank, May come up here. Come up here.
Mark Warner:
You can just stand right up here. Because I know, right? No, wait. Right over there. Right over there.
Craig Wharem:
You gotta be in the camera there. Come towards.
Mark Warner:
Now there's a debate on what age is a black belt? May, how old are you?
May:
Nine.
Mark Warner:
She'll get her black belt in September.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Assuming she keeps coming and works hard?
Mark Warner:
Yeah, well, she works. Undoubtedly, she keeps coming and works hard. If you had crossed hand with her in Jeremy seminar today, I was amazed. I was shocked. I didn't believe one of the best ones out there. Hands down. So this, good job May. So this…
Jeremy Lesniak:
Is your face red yet? Yeah a little bit. A little bit of flush on it.
Mark Warner:
So this is what a black belts about. Thank you, May. Now, if you look back to Japan and you see some of the black belts six and seven, they look like they deserve it. So we get it over here and we say this is not a certain age for a black belt but that's crazy. Which is crazy. I mean, my belief for the longest time was 11 years old was minimum age and then May shows up. May and Mike, I'm like, alright well, you're gonna have to change that.
Audience 5:
[00:27:53].
Mark Warner:
Yeah, but that was a whole another story.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Maybe that's why he thought it was 11.
Mark Warner:
Exactly. But there you go. I mean, if these kids put out their best and they show up time and time again and work hard, you want to be, I am something. That's not what martial lot is about.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I wanna pass it to you. I wanna say one thing first cause I know I'll forget if I don't. If you see someone training, say they don't have a belt.
Mark Warner:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Can you tell what rank they are? Give or take?
Mark Warner:
Hopefully, yes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
How about you?
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. Rank not necessarily, I can tell how long they've trained. I mean, that's more so…
Jeremy Lesniak:
If we roughly correlate…
Craig Wharem:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Experience, time training, rank. Right. If we roughly equate those, you can watch someone and you can say even a cross style.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That person has the heart of, they move like a…
Craig Wharem:
Right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And that's how I was raised. It's that spirit that you can see and sometimes kids have it at nine, sometimes adults never get it.
Craig Wharem:
I think I've only said this to you, maybe both of you, but I've never said it on an episode. In my somewhat humble opinion, I believe that the greatest detriment to martial arts is rank and title. I don't wear a belt hardly ever. I don't use the title. I just show up and we have fun. I don't care what order my students learn things in. I don't care what piece of cloth is on their waist. I don't care if they've been there for three. I had a student who had trained for less than three months and went to free training day Northeast.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Great.
Craig Wharem:
Right? And I said, this is gonna be a lot. You're new to this, but go and if you want to go and have fun, go and have fun. As a somebody who jumped right into doing this professionally, like right, like I was 17 years old when I took over a program, right. Outta high school, six weeks. The single hardest part about doing this professionally for me in those years up until a few years ago, was that I was always too young to know it. Too young to know anything of value in conversations. Now, I also surrounded myself with people who didn't care about what I had to say and what I did well and we're humble enough to exchange ideas with me and not just talk at me. But I go out of my way. The thing that I like least about running a school is having to do the rank thing. Like that's my least favorite part. Watching somebody have an aha moment on the mat where they feel empowered is more powerful to me than putting a piece of cloth around their waist. But on the flip note, people need goals and watching students accomplish those goals and getting that physical thing as my recognition that they've accomplished it is the best part for me. But, you know, and we did talk about this so we don't have to talk for long, but last time I was promoted in Kenpo, I talked to both of you. Cause I was not comfortable with it. It bumped me above my original instructor. My original instructor has not promoted in 20 something years because he instilled in me that the stripes don't matter. Just keep learning and the stripes don't matter. I have more stripes than him now and I still wouldn't want to spar.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And he still has things he can teach you.
Craig Wharem:
Right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And you've pretty much always had things you could teach him.
Craig Wharem:
Right. Right. Because to tie it back to what we talked about before, he and I run the schools together because he is excellent at sparring and the grappling and the kind of the combat sports side doesn't like doing forms and weapons. I love doing forms and weapons. So, my training, my experience, the way I move, the way I do things is much different than his, but we were humble enough together to compliment each other and both kind of suck it up by it. You know, I'd be like, he'd say, all right, we're sparring this staff meeting. I was like, oh, come on. Can't we just do forms? And then the next month I'd be like, all right, my turn, we're doing forms. And then he'd be like, right? But we respect each other enough to give our best effort. But, yeah, as far as if the goal is to become the best version of yourself that you want to be, then the belts, the stripes, the titles, they don't matter. They don't. It's nice. I've never ever had a problem referring to you by your title Tashi. I've never had a problem referring to you as Sensei Jeremy. But to me, that title is not so much you demanded of me to give you. It's, I am showing it out of respect and reverence for the things that you've taught me, you've shared with me. When it's somebody who walks up and demands, you call them by the title, that's where it starts to really seem like it gets closed off. That bridge of learning goes away because it feels less accessible.
Jeremy Lesniak:
They've put a barrier.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. And…
Jeremy Lesniak:
When you call Tashi Mark, Tashi Mark, you're not, that one needs to be built between you, but it's like building a bridge, right? You're creating a conduit between the two of you. You are asking for his knowledge.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Whereas if he came up to you and said, call me Tashi Mark, now it's a barrier you have to overcome to even get to what he's offering.
Craig Wharem:
Well, and the thing is, I mean, we didn't even talk about this yet, so it's worth mentioning. Tashi Mark's one of my instructors actually. I'd honestly say my primary instructor for five, six years now. Maybe more. I don't remember. It's been a while.
Mark Warner:
It's been a couple days.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. Lot of sticks to the head. But when we're not in here, I call him Mark.
Mark Warner:
Yeah, yeah.
Craig Wharem:
Right. Like when we're not training together, I call him Mark.
Mark Warner:
Yep.
Craig Wharem:
He calls me Craig. Like, there's no, that goes away completely. It's that it just drops. So when we fall into an environment where we're doing martial arts, we fall into the titles.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Right.
Craig Wharem:
You know?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Because it's a role.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Not ROLE, role, right. You're assuming the role of instructor, you're assuming the role of student, and it just, because it has to work, right? You're…
Mark Warner:
It does.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You're a pretty terrible instructor if you don't have any students.
Mark Warner:
Yeah. Well, that's…
Jeremy Lesniak:
It doesn't work that well.
Craig Wharem:
So tell me.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We need both parts of the equation have to be there or it doesn't work.
Mark Warner:
Right?
Craig Wharem:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And then martial arts is not passed on, and that's sad.
Mark Warner:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Feels like a good ending point. What else? What's next?
Audience 4:
So hopefully just a…
Jeremy Lesniak:
Please.
Audience 4:
Add onto that. So hopefully the days are gone or pretty much gone which, I mean, we've faced this before, going to tournaments and things like that, where you have somebody walk up to you and say, hey, hey, I outrank you.
Jeremy Lesniak:
They're not gone.
Audience 4:
And with a finger pointing, I outrank you. Count these stripes on my belt. I've had that…
Jeremy Lesniak:
Sure.
Audience 4:
In tournaments.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Those days are not gone.
Audience 4:
We can hold.
Jeremy Lesniak:
But they are I believe they're going.
Mark Warner:
They're waning.
Jeremy Lesniak:
For two reasons. One, I think there are more and more people like Craig, and I'm pretty close to your philosophy on this about rank and title. People wanting it to go away, [recognizing that it doesn't necessarily correlate with a system that is conducive to learning on the one hand. Then on the other hand, you have people who have created a culture in their school and their system that so prioritized as chasing rank that you, we'll end up with people who are 30, 35 years old that are 8th, 9th, 10th degrees, and then where do they go? Are you saying that that person at that age has learned everything they can and that they're not gonna get better for the next 30 years of their training? Right. Regardless of how you feel about someone at that age being that to say that they've maxed out at that point it starts to a beg a question. And I think the more that question is asked, the more people go, is this the best way to do this? And I think more and more people are saying, there's some value here, but maybe it's time to make a change.
Mark Warner:
It's interesting you say it that way about the the 30 year old, 9th, 10th degrees who they're supposed to know everything. Well, that's silly. I have regressed through the martial arts I've been doing for 50 years, I know nothing. I know nothing as compared to my instructors. Like, I'm gonna say this because some of these other grandmasters, I have progressed past them. Like I said, again, I still don't know anything. But yet they're wearing 10 stripes. And I'm like, okay, all right. Oh, okay. So rank has not much meaning. Recently, when we were up with Andrew on a Saturday, one of the black belts asked what my title is. Well, somebody said I was a guru. Oh, you're a guru. I'm like, whoa, slow down. Said I asked, what does sensei mean? Sensei means teacher or one who's gonna be forced. That's what guru means. These are just titles. There's no magic behind them. Call me guru, call me Tashi, call Sensei. Just don't call me late for dinner. That's all I asked. But these titles that people take upon themselves are ridiculous. I was given the title of Tashi. I found out the title Tashi meant helper. I got that when I was fourth degree. Promoted my fourth, that's the highest title you'll ever get at my school. You become a helper and that's what you do. You help. That's what martial arts is about. Gotta help.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I've come to like, the title coach.
Mark Warner:
Coach.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. I mean, so for me titles, I think I have like five or six of them cause I do so many different systems and styles, so I have them in a bunch and I use none of them. Most students call me Mr. W or whatever, but again, as long as people are talking to me with respect, I don't really care. Right. Like, just be respectful of me. I'll be respectful of you, you'd be cool. I'll be cool. Right. That's kind of my rule. But as far as like, you know, figuring out, you know, I outrank you this time I usually just say, okay, all right. But the idea that if you become higher and higher and higher in belts in one system, that you then know every answer to every system, it's not accurate, right? Because you know, my base system is Kenpo. You know, in Kenpo, they may not do any groundwork at the school that somebody gets a black belt or higher in, and that's a white belt skill in jujitsu. So you're a black belt to one thing, you're a white belt to another. And another thing you gotta humble up. When I came here to start learning kung fu and the things that we've been working on, I hope it's already a black belt with bunch stripes on my belt. I never once wore it here. I asked for a white belt and I said that made me work through it again. Because if nothing else, maybe I'm not a white belt because I know how to make a fist and I know how to hit. So that may happen quicker, but I don't want, I'm not going to put the belt on and assume that I know everything that I'm about to be taught and that's important. And putting on that white belt and getting the chance to just learn and not have to know it is an excellent feeling.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Good ending point?
Craig Wharem:
I think so.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Are you gonna, okay, because you had your hand.
Craig Wharem:
I'm feeling passionate, so…
Jeremy Lesniak:
I can tell.
Audience 6:
I did have a question. More on longevity. I think. Training kind of goes in waves sometimes. You're really intense.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes.
Audience 6:
Some says tied to belts or other times. And then I think you kind of need to recover from that. And I was wondering if you would talk a little bit about how you restore yourselves? How you take that time to step back and think what's next?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I preach connecting to your why. What is the reason you're training? Because I think if you have a very clear understanding of why you're doing what you're doing, it stems from that. If your reason and I don't judge anybody's reason, right? If your reason is I want to be the most prepared I can possibly be for a street confrontation, you probably do have times that are more intense as you get closer to simulating what that might look like and that probably bangs you up a bit. You probably need to physically recover. You might have times where if your why is more around competition that you become emotionally drained, and so you need to take a step back and recover emotionally. I think, and I've said this for a long time, one of the worst things we've ever done in martial arts is condition our students that taking breaks is such a terrible thing. To say, don't go take a month off. Don't go do that. Why would you do that? Oh, you're not gonna come back. And most of the time when the instructors say that it's coming from a place of fear, they're afraid of losing that student. And quite often, sadly, they're afraid of losing that student cause they're afraid of losing that tuition. Now, it's no secret and you both deal with this, I don't have a school at this point, but you both have students that you lose sometimes temporarily, sometimes permanently to other sports and other pursuits. But if they get something beneficial out of their time with you, have you lost them? Or did you simply give them different preparation than someone who sticks around for a long time?
Mark Warner:
Right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So, I see nothing wrong with okay, this week I'm gonna go five times and next three weeks I'm gonna go once. In August, I'm gonna go, you know, hang out on the Cape for a month and I'm not, you know, maybe I train a little bit on my own. And maybe this year I'm focused on physical training. Maybe this year I'm focused on, you know, the academic side. You know, for the last few years, I have not had what I would call a full-time instructor that I've been training under, but you better believe I've become a better martial artist. I spent a lot of time thinking, talking about this stuff, and the way that I approach it is different than it was, you know, 20 years ago. And I think that's not only okay, I think it's a good thing. I wanna see what you think.
Mark Warner:
You want me or him first? He better go first.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well, he just talked.
Mark Warner:
All right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Your turn.
Mark Warner:
My OCD kicks in there. On this one I get very, very nervous. But recently myself, I've been making sure that I take time once a month to get away and go somewhere whether it's up to keen, up to Exeter. I go for a weekend now. It's good to keep away once in a while. Now, if a student can come and train hot with their heart for six months, we've giving them something. And if they decide to do something, if they decide to do something that progresses them in a direction that they should be going, my heart's all in it. I mean, one of the happiest heartbreaks is when I see my youth go off to college, my team's going to college. I mean, it breaks my heart. They're leaving me, but then they're going off to do great things and I've seen many great things cover out in school and I'm gonna see many more great things to our school. But that's living, that's growing, that's blossoming. That's becoming who you are. Everybody has to become who they wanna be and what they want to do.
Craig Wharem:
If you're feeling burnt out or tired, or you're trained a lot, one of the best things you can do is Jeremy said, find your why. For me, it's redefine your scope, right? Like, I've just spent a month staring at this jab trying to figure out how to make it work. My arm hurts. One arm is way more jacked than the other, except a little bit punching with my left, my right. Whatever it is, right? Redefine your scope. Say, okay, what did I get out of that? What do I want to do next? And one of the things that one of my other really good friends in the arts, and somebody who's taught me a lot told me, he said he's on a decade cycle. He's trained. For most of his life every 10 years, something shifts. Right now, 10 years is a long time. He's looking backwards and he's trained his whole life, right? But every couple of years, something might shift. You might say, I've really been doing forms for the past year like I've learned 12 forms, form a month. I need a break. I'm gonna go hit the bag for a while, and then you spend time doing that. Or like Jeremy said, like, cause that resonated, right? I need a break. I need a month. Take a month. I mean, there were times, in my training with you where there still are because life happens and I get busy and I'm gone for three or four weeks and then I come right back and we just pick up where we left off. I'm nowhere not training with you, right? Because the other benefit I have, cause I have a school cause I'm teaching, so I'm still getting my practice in. But even at that, there were times when I'd be gone for a while because of work or whatever, and I'd come back down and he'd say, oh, show me this form and I'd be like, hmm, you first.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I've heard these stories, I've heard these story.
Craig Wharem:
Or he'd watch me do it and I'd do it wrong. And he'd say, what is that? That's all what I showed you, I'd say. Oh, that it was the remix.
Mark Warner:
The remix.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah, it was the remix. I got excited. I'm sorry. So the thing that's really important is breaks are okay. Like it's fine to do. And that's again my mantra. I am going to help you find the best version of yourself that you want to have. And at that time, you may value time off more than that version. That's perfectly fine. That doesn't mean you're gonna go away forever, it just means you need a break. Going away, changing your scenery, having a guest teacher, all those things help you stay engaged in the arts in different ways. But I also agree with what Tashi said, that you have went, the greatest heartbreak is when a student leaves, right? And I'm gonna add in, you know to college or off to the career going into military, whatever it may be. But I'm gonna add in one of the proudest moments I ever have is when a student who leaves me after a year or two when they're 9, gets an athletic scholarship somewhere to go to college.
Mark Warner:
Yeah. Yeah.
Craig Wharem:
And I almost always will drop a note somehow. I'll email their parents who I haven't talked to in year. So I'll hand write a note and send it because I'm still proud of 'em.
Mark Warner:
Yeah.
Craig Wharem:
They still got something and it's my job as a teacher to plant seeds and I don't get to see what the tree grows to become sometimes, but at least I was a part of the process.
Jeremy Lesniak:
If martial arts is always your top priority, that makes me sad cause it means other really cool, big things are not coming into your life. Does that answer your question?
Audience 6:
It does. Thank you. Thank you. Good discussion.
Audience 7:
In addition, recently, this is something that I've found, come up more in conversation than I, you know, speak about martial arts of people outside of you know, the school that I train at and just but in addition to there being so many pro martial arts communities and people who enjoy as much as also I've seen a lot of that demonization of martial arts and the basis of promoting violence and then I'm just curious to know what your thoughts might be on that.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Go for it.
Craig Wharem:
Well, my hand was up. So, I spent a lot of time teaching in public school, and I'm the karate guy, right? Like, that's literally what the kids call me, the karate guy. Okay.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Sometimes with a remix.
Mark Warner:
That's right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Some of you know that story. We're not gonna repeat it.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. I'm not allowed to repeat it, but there'll be a different avenue for me to repeat that story at some point. Anyway, that is the biggest hurdle. You know, administrators or parents say, I don't want my kids learning violence. Okay. Come in and watch me do what I do and tell me I'm violent. It also helps that I'm probably the least assuming violent person on the planet, right? Tashi Debbie's granddaughter calls me the kung fu panda and she laughs when she thinks of me because she just thinks I'm funny. Right. When somebody approaches me specifically and says, why are you teaching violence? I ask them what movie they watched to make them feel that way. That's what I ask, what did you watch on TV that made you feel that I'm promoting violence? And then when they tell me, I go, oh yeah, well, okay. Of course you watched. Whatever you watch.
Jeremy Lesniak:
John Wick is not a documentary.
Craig Wharem:
I was gonna say The Raid, but I can't. They should watch best of the best then they know.
Mark Warner:
Yeah, exactly.
Jeremy Lesniak:
They wouldn't be concerned at all.
Craig Wharem:
So violence is when you set out to hurt someone. Martial arts doesn't teach violence because we don't teach you how to hurt someone.
Audience 7:
Right.
Craig Wharem:
Right? You know, there's, I don't remember the title of the book, you might, by Funakoshi. It's like the 20 Guiding Principles of Karate or something. Something like that? Does that sound like…
Jeremy Lesniak:
20 Guiding Principle? Yeah.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. The first one's Karate Begins and ends with Ray. It begins to ends with a bow, respect. It's about discipline and hard work, and again, finding the best version of yourself. Martial Arts is one of the oldest forms of character development and self-improvement in the world. It just doesn't get promoted that way through media, like TV and movies because no one really wants to watch a movie of someone coming in and being, getting spoken to nicely. That's not compelling enough. Those are the TikTok's I scroll by. Then I find the ones yelling those ones.
Mark Warner:
Martial Arts nowadays in any civilized country, is about self-defense, character development, taking care of yourself and your loved ones. If you are in an art where you can hurt yourself just by training, that's not really martial arts, that's not really self-defense, that's not self-protection. You're hurting yourself. If you're a martial art view, where your main thing is to go beat people up. That is not a traditional martial art, not in my eyes. They call it other things which is not a traditional martial art. Traditional martial arts is when you are a warrior planting a garden, you are always ready. Now you never want to use it. At the same time, a traditional martial arts teaches you to walk down the street and for some reason none of the bad guy just bother you. They just consent it. You don't walk down the street trying to be one of bad guys. You just are a really confident person. That's what traditional martial arts is. We are in men, especially in today's society, martial arts is a whole category. Kick, you punch your martial artist. No, that's not true. If you learn character development, you're a martial artist. If you just kick and punch, you are a bully in my eyes. There you go.
Jeremy Lesniak:
The pushback on martial arts faded for a while, right? We had all the movies in the eighties and that's where people came to know, most people came to know martial arts, and a lot of those movies were kind of anti-heroes, right? Like people that would pop up and they'd, you know, defend somebody and they often took it a little bit too far and, you know, you root for them, but you know, you can see that they're a flawed person. And that kinda went away. And then the UFC happened. And the terms MMA, everybody knows what MMA stands for, whether you train or not. Everybody knows that stands for Mixed Martial Arts. So what's the part that people hear? They hear martial arts. They hear it's a mixture of martial arts, and then they hear Taekwondo as a martial art and they draw an equivalency that it, oh, it's the same where it's similar. And just by hours across a year, the average person who doesn't train, what do they get? More of information about what's going on in professional mixed martial arts or what's going on in the dojo down the street. How much time has Connor McGregor gotten on TV versus, I don't know…
Craig Wharem:
Me.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Every single traditional martial artist on the planet combined, right? Like, it doesn't even come close. So if you look at someone like him or the John Jones steroid controversy, you know, any of these things, I follow MMA a bit cause I find it interesting. It's exciting to watch, but it's not what I teach and it's not what I do. Is there some overlap in the punching and kicking and the physical skills? Absolutely. Are there people who train MMA that are absolutely wonderful people? Yeah, I know some of them. But I think that's where a lot of it comes from. And I've, I wish I could go back in time and I wish I could go to the beginning of the UFC and say let's call it MMC, Mixed Martial Combat. Can we do that? Can we make that very small change? Because I think that would be just enough for people to go, okay, there's similar, but they're not quite the same.
Audience 7:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And I see myself as a self-appointed A guardian of traditional martial arts. I mean, nobody gave me that role. I took it. And not to say that I don't want help, you know, it's not mine to do solo, but anything that makes people less likely to train or send their children to train, I see as a negative. And for all the good about the UFC, these are some things that I would like to see changed and not just all of them, because it creates confusion. And this is where as whistlekick rose, one of the things I want to do is essentially, you know, this is sort of an awareness based nonprofit so that people start to see that there are differences. You all know what the differences are. I don't have to explain that to you, but if we grab 10 random people off the street, you're gonna go get the ten random people? Okay. Alright. Well, don't use martial arts to get them in, right? Like, don't hurt them.
Craig Wharem:
Tell 'em we have gator.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes. So that's where I think it is. Let's do one more because I have to drive through a snowstorm. Apparently everyone's looking at you, Katan.
Katan:
Why is everyone?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I don't know. But now we are too.
Craig Wharem:
Noah, if you have a question you can ask.
Noah:
I think Katan can same something.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well, it's good she has you to give her ideas.
Noah:
Ah. That sounds, I don't know.
Craig Wharem:
It's terrifying. Noah's ideas are scary.
Audience 9:
I don't think it went overwhelmed.
Katan:
We're not saying that one.
Mark Warner:
Oh, thank you. Katan.
Katan:
I'm gonna filter you there.
Craig Wharem:
If everyone looks at her more, she'll come up with a question.
Jeremy Lesniak:
If someone else has something?
Katan:
That not how that works. Yeah.
Mark Warner:
May, do you have a question?
Katan:
You have a question?
Mark Warner:
Any question? Any question at all?
Audience 11:
All right, I got another one. For teaching, when you have a new student that comes in that's acting like they know everything, how would you, and they've had like no experience on martial arts. How do you not combat that, but understand that and deal with it in your school?
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's a great question.
Craig Wharem:
They're just trying to relate to you. So I just say show me your moves. That's really cool. You wanna see how I do it? And I just engage with them. Cause all they're trying to do, it's one of two things. Anyone who runs a martial arts school teaches martial arts classes know that the first question they're gonna get from the parents is how much does it cost? And then the first kid, the question the kid's gonna ask is, can I hit this right? Those are the first two questions always. And the reason why is because people really don't know what to ask. They don't know how to relate to you. All they know about you is what they think they know about you. And what they think they know about you, we just talked about it. Stuff they see on movies, TV shows, UFC, right? Like all of that stuff is what they think they know about you. So when that happens, say, oh wow, that's really cool. Let me show you how I do it. And then connect with them on almost a kid level is usually the easiest way to handle that. The most common way in, I've found in working dramatic and stuff with instructors, that instructors treat that is this kid's trying to tell me how to do my job. I know better than the kid, I'm the teacher. Remember that that idea and that concept comes out of a place of ego. It doesn't come out of a place of empathy and wanting to teach somebody. Teaching is just sharing. So, let the kids share with you. If the kid may do something, here you go. Oh, wow.
Jeremy Lesniak:
If you're threatened by a first day student, if that threatens your ego, you shouldn't be teaching
Craig Wharem:
Yeah. Potentially or you're a newer teacher.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Or maybe, okay. All right. Yeah. I'm being unfair.
Craig Wharem:
That's why you keep me here, buddy.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's true.
Mark Warner:
What, me?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. You.
Mark Warner:
Noah, how old are you?
Noah:
16.
Mark Warner:
Yeah. Good. You're 16.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It gets worse.
Mark Warner:
Well, the thing is Noah, he's right, but it's more apt to act, it's more apt to happen to you than it's gonna happen to me. 16 year old comes in, looks at me, and goes, oh, okay. He's an old guy. Maybe he knows what he's talking about. 16 year old looks at you, says, oh, he's my peer. Maybe I can outshine him. Like Frank said, just say, okay, just see what he is, see what he is got and said, here, this is the way I do it. This is the way we do it here.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It can come from ego, but it can also come from a place of fear. Because one of the things for all the good that we do, getting people to come in, they have to acknowledge to come in. Most of them. I don't know what's gonna happen. I don't know how to act. I'm terrified, but I'm gonna do it anyway, right? Like that's just about everybody's experience when they walk in the door. And people handle fear in different ways. Some people handle fear by trying to act like they know what they're doing. How many times, sure, if you've taught more than five people, you've had at least one of 'em say, I know. You show them a correction. I know. Yeah, I know. Right? And it can seem like that's coming from a place of ego, but it's usually coming from a place of defensiveness. They're being protective of their own self-esteem because just existing in this space can be terrifying. So I find when I get somebody like that who is like that, I take it as a challenge. I need to make them feel more comfortable and the better a job I can do making them feel comfortable with being a white belt, with being wrong with not knowing anything can be really helpful. I've seen some instructors that will literally take their black belt off and put it on a kid, you know. Cause this usually happens with kids, but it does also happen with adults. I've seen adults, especially if they come in, if they've got boxing background or a wrestling background, so, you know, they're not, they don't realize they're uncomfortable. They recognize they want additional skills in this other thing. But they're used to being in a similar environment where they do know what's going on and they're not quite sure how to be vulnerable at that time. So I think compassion is really the heart of it and the more compassionate you can be. It's rare that throwing compassion as at a situation makes it worse. In fact, I would say never.
Audience 12:
I like that thing of taking off the belt and putting it on someone cause it gets you into that situation of who's really teaching you here.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah.
Audience 12:
You know, you're learning from them as much.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. It depends on the age, it depends on the circumstance and the way I handle it in a group is different than the way I handle it one on one, you know, I'm sure you guys would say the same thing. And I find it that is less common now as trials happen or one-on-one, you know, intros are happening cause all that stuff gets, you know, by the time they step foot into a group class, they've usually had, you know, half hour, an hour one-on-one or maybe two on one and they know a little bit about what to expect.
Craig Wharem:
Yeah, I remember when I first started meeting with like, you know, newer students and that sort of thing, I would always make sure to put on my most like faded uniform that had clearly been around for a decade, and I'd put on like the ripped and tattered belt because I wanted the parent to see that I've been doing this for a long time. But what I came to realize is I matured in my own training is as much as that was to show the parent that also was for me to come from a place of expertise. And it didn't serve the child, right. Didn't serve the kid. So now, what I'm dressed in currently, my D pants and a dragon hoodie or some sort of sweatshirt is usually what I do those in because I still, like I said earlier, I believe that titles and rank is the biggest detriment to what we do because it breaks bridges, right? It makes it harder for people to find us accessible. You know, back in the day, you know, we didn't know what car our instructor drove. We didn't ever see them wearing normal clothes. They came down, they talked class, they went back to the office.
Jeremy Lesniak:
They teleported out.
Craig Wharem:
They walked away. They weren't there right at the beginning. And they weren't there right at the end. They were gone. They came in, they instructed, they left. And that makes that, that adds, at the time it was to add mystique. Right. It was to, I am the sensei. I am because that's what it was. And then, you know, fortunately for me, the instructors that I had early on who did things like that kind of phased out and my primary instructor wasn't like that at all. We knew what car he drove. He used to bring his dogs to the dojo like we knew everything about him. There were just pugs running around in the karate school all day. It was, and one black. But anyway, I found that students learn better, are more engaged, they stay longer, they're happier, and ultimately become more skilled and talented than what I'm asking of them. When they realize that the person sitting in front of the room is just a normal human being. That also gives me permission to make a mistake when I'm teaching something and then be able to go, oh, hey, I tell you the remix. Let's go back and do this the way. So when my teachers come up, you do it the way that they think you're gonna do it. And sometimes that works and sometimes that doesn't. And then I hear that the form is very interesting.
Jeremy Lesniak:
If you wanna add.
Mark Warner:
That's pretty good. Works for me.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's we're gonna call it then. So I'm gonna, we'll stop recordings, but if you guys wanna keep asking questions well…
Mark Warner:
Wait, do we want to see that?
Jeremy Lesniak:
You flipped two of them.
Mark Warner:
I know I do. Okay.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah.
Mark Warner:
What are they?
Jeremy Lesniak:
It's train hard, smile, and have a great time.
Mark Warner:
All right. Okay.
Craig Wharem:
I'm actually, I love that they're there because that is the biggest thing gives me anxiety about these episodes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Really?
Craig Wharem:
Yes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You've only listened to almost 800 episodes.
Craig Wharem:
You know what? Listening to it and then having to repeat it, two different things.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay.
Craig Wharem:
Are we gonna do it all together?
Jeremy Lesniak:
We're gonna do it together.
Mark Warner:
And we look up there because we're all gonna do it together. Ready?
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right. 1, 2, 3.
All:
Train hard, smile and have a great day.
Craig Wharem:
That was fun.
Mark Warner:
I like that. That was fun. That was fun.