Episode 825 - Martial Arts Word Association 7
In this episode, Jeremy and Andrew use a word association game to see if Jeremy can relate random words to martial arts!
Martial Arts Word Association 7 - Episode 825
Here at whistlekick Martial Arts Radio, we like to mix things up once in a while. We’re going to do “Martial Arts Word Association” where Andrew gives Jeremy a random word that he could connect to martial arts. In this episode, Jeremy and Andrew discuss randomly generated topics from FM Radio to Mail. Find out how they relate it to martial arts!
After listening to the episode, it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it. Don’t forget to drop them in the comment section down below!
Show Notes: This episode is sponsored by The Safest Family on the Block by Jason Brick
Jason Brick has dedicated himself to teaching others to apply their skills to protect their family and loved ones. Begin the journey to becoming the “Safest Family on the Block” with his book, “101 Tips, Tricks, Hacks, and Habits to Keep Your Family Safe”.
Use the code: whistlekick23 to receive 25% off!
See everything they have to offer for yourself by visiting: www.safestfamilyontheblock.org
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Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey, what's going on everybody? Welcome. This is whistlekick Martial Arts Radio and today's episode is Word Association number seven. If you've not been around for one of these episodes, yes that's this many. If you've not been around for the Word Association episodes, you're missing out. They're a heck of a lot of fun. This is where Andrew and a bunch of you try to, let's say stump on me, in a sense, to give me words. It doesn't have to be to stump me, but the general premise is take concepts or words that are generally considered unrelated to martial arts and my job is to relate them to martial arts in some way that makes me think and thus hopefully makes you think and they're fun. Andrew and I have a good time if nobody else, and that's okay. Today's episode is gonna be available in audio and video. It's all over the place. Remember, we do video every episode. Now, I don't remember the last time we didn't do video on an episode, so you can find us on YouTube if you want to see our collective cranial shine, you can check that out. But you can also check out Safest Family on the Block. So, we have our second sponsor. We had Kataaro a few weeks ago and now we have Safest Family on the Block. Some of you may know Jason Brick. He's been on the show. I've been on his show. Long time friend, great guy. I've had the chance to train with him a little bit, and he founded a, I guess we can call it a company, a podcast, a thing called Safest Family on the Block. And you could probably infer from the name what it is. Great stuff. He's putting together some wonderful material and really the root of Safest Family on the Block is a podcast that brings together Jason's experience with martial arts and journalism and parenting. And he brings on experts. I was on the show, I don't know if we wanna call me an expert, but he brings on some pretty incredible people that know stuff about everything you might think of involved in family safety. You know, here when we talk about martial arts, you know, we stretch the bounds of what we call self-defense. And we talk about some of these things, but Jason doesn't have to stretch the balance cause the format he set up is just headlong into it. It's self-defense and crime prevention of course, but it's also fire safety and driving safety and emergency preparedness and mental health and basically anything else you could think of that kind of fits a paradigm of safe and family. You know Andrew, you've got kids. I'm sure you're thinking of other things. Oh, this is relevant and this is relevant.
Andrew Adams:
It's very inclusive. He's got a lot of stuff. He's wrapped up in this, he's got project. It's really cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And three years after starting the show, he did a book. 101 Tips and Tricks and Habits and Things to Make Your Family Safer, and it's got some great stuff. I've got a section in the book, but there are other names in the book that are so much bigger than mine, which I was really humbled that he invited me in and he's offering 25% off this book. So I think you should check it out. Use the code whistlekick23 for 25% off. Check out the book. Find him on Instagram and Facebook, Safest Family on the Block. It's gonna be a link in the show notes to this stuff so check it out.
Andrew Adams:
whistlekick23.
Jeremy Lesniak:
whistlekick23, whistlekick two three.
Andrew Adams:
Awesome.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And of course, if you wanna support whistlekick, you're doing the thing that we asked you to do, you're checking out the show, but don't forget, you use the code podcast15 and hang out, join the Patreon, all kinds of good stuff. So Andrew, my friend, are you ready?
Andrew Adams:
Yes, I am ready. I have on my phone here a list of words that I'm gonna ask you. I say we, cause you know, sometimes listeners send them in. So you guys are, you know, all part of the collective we are gonna ask you these…
Jeremy Lesniak:
No, no. The French word for yes. It's in a bit we, it's not wee.
Andrew Adams:
That's right. That's right. And so, I'm gonna give you these words and you're gonna try and somehow find a way to relate them to martial arts somehow.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Sounds good to me.
Andrew Adams:
Are you ready?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Sure.
Andrew Adams:
All right. Word number one, FM radio.
Jeremy Lesniak:
FM radio. So, if you think about the period of time of communication of, let's say the spoken word, FM radio came on pretty hard, pretty fast, and has been in a decline for a very long time. You can tune into FM radio. It's in your car most likely. When was the last time, Andrew? When was the last time you listened to the radio? Do you listen to the radio when you drive? I don't think you do...
Andrew Adams:
So when I bring my daughter to school, she only wants the radio. So yes, I listen to the radio fairly often.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay.
Andrew Adams:
But I only listen to it for like five minutes to school and then five minutes back on.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. And what I think is interesting about FM radio is not it's so much it as a technology, but it in contrast. Think about FM radio versus podcast versus AM radio. AM radio is still fairly large. AM radio hasn't lost much in terms of listenership. The audio quality isn't as good. It's not as great for music, but it has such longer reach. And so for the spoken word, it works pretty well. Podcasts, you can say the same thing. You can certainly download some shows offer very, very high audio quality. We try to find a balance between audio quality and file size. But FM radio came up and it's coming down. And if we think about trends in the martial arts, trends in anything, well, let's talk about trends in the martial arts, we have those, right? There were periods of time in the 80's where everybody wanted to be a ninja. We still all wanna be ninjas, but the ninja movies show Kizuki, right? I mean, how many people know that name from martial arts films in the 80's? And people walking around wearing ninja uniforms and you know, Tabi boots, right? But everything that comes up fast tends to come down fast. And we see that in, I mean, I see that all the time in business. If something screams up, it's probably not going to last. And to me, that FM radio, if we take a step back for radio technology and communication technology does kind of fit that. Very fast up and now, if you think, oh, well FM, you know, it's still out there. See, how many jobs are there? You have these groups that cover these huge geographic areas in there, relaying between towers. You know, there might be five or six people doing what a hundred people were doing just 10 years ago.
Andrew Adams:
All right. You ready for the next one? That was good. That was pretty good. So this one, my wife and I often we go down to Cape Cod. Vacation sometimes and down there is oceanographic and atmospheric place that's called Hui but the larger organization is the, this is your word, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So, do I have to run with that sequence of four words or do am I running with the letters?
Andrew Adams:
It doesn't matter. Whatever.
Jeremy Lesniak:
NOAA.
Andrew Adams:
No. Sure, NOAA.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So I'm not gonna go there. There's a very, there's a private joke that involves an expletive that I'm not gonna run with but just had to call attention to it for those of you who understand. But what does NOAA do, right? What is the National Oceanic Atmospheric...
Andrew Adams:
Administration.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Administration, you know, what are they doing?
Andrew Adams:
Oh, no, it is association.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. What are they doing? They're looking at weather and atmospheric trends. They're pulling a lot of data. It's a data organization. They look at all the data that's out there and they're able to look at, here's what happened, and that's what we think is going to happen. And they're not so concerned with, okay, here's the weather in your town today, right? This is not micro, these are macro trends. And one of the things that martial arts is a little bit behind the ball on is responding to macro shifts in society. And we're playing a bit of catch up now with that. And some examples, it was not that, relatively, not that long ago that martial arts curriculums in some schools and still not all dealt with firearms. A lot of them that do deal with firearms, I'm sorry to say, deal very improperly, very poorly with firearms. And I'm not going into that, but just acknowledging that firearms, martial arts, right? It took a long time. Firearms have been around a very long time. But when I was growing up, we really didn't have firearms defense. It's stuff that was kind of figured out, right? Now, we've got people who are like, okay, this is what we've gotta do. We've spent some time figuring it out. But you know, a hundred years later, there are plenty of other things that we haven't responded to. Martial arts educational trends, the way we teach classes, are still very much behind the times in terms of academic theory, which is part of why we have MATTaC, the Martial Arts Teacher Training and Certification division of whistlekick. But also fail to acknowledge the realities of where kids are at in terms of mental health and what is expected of them during the day. Growing trends in autism spectrum or, you know, similar terms, right? This is not my ballet lip, but I think it'll all get there with me. We're being reactive. And if we could come together and do a better job with some forecasting, with pulling big macro data, we could set some of this stuff up and we could do a better job of saying, okay, I'm gonna do what I do. You do what you do, you do, you do. But if we all come together and put our resources together and say, okay, this is what's going on with people. We can choose how to interpret that data and take action based on the perception.
Andrew Adams:
All right. So, next word is going to be checkmark.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Checkmark is what everybody wants to be able to do with their martial arts training. Cause checkmark says, I did this. It's done. I don't need to do it again. It's over. Nothing is ever over in the martial arts. You might be done with your test, but if you don't continue to practice those skills and remember those forms, practice that whatever, it fades. And it's one of the reasons that I think in Western culture, we struggle with getting broader martial arts adoption because people wanna check boxes. They want to go do a six-week program, a 30 day on this. So seven week that martial arts is ongoing. A lot of martial arts schools find success bringing people in by having six week, you know, intro to martial arts program. So you try it and it's finite. They can check the box and if they wanna go deeper, they go deeper. But for a lot of people, I noticed that they reject the things that as many things as they can, they can't check the box on. I think this is part of why people don't like forms. Because I can spend a bunch of time getting really good at a form, and if I don't continue to practice it, I'm no longer as good at it. Incidentally, the same people who would do that think that they can do that with their sparring. They're fighting...
Andrew Adams:
Doesn't work. All right. Next word.
Jeremy Lesniak:
What we do is not a checkbox pursuit.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, good call. Good call. All right, next word. Paul Revere.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Who came up with this one? Who do I have to hit? I'm trying to think of any of the, kind of the founders of any of the Okinawan styles where Paul Revere-esque, and I don't think I know enough detail to say yes. Why is Paul Revere famous? One off by land, two off by sea, the red coats are coming. Provided a warning. He actually had a, from what I understand, a much larger role as a founding father, and we just kind of reduce it down to that one night. I could give an answer that's very similar to the checkbox one, but I won't. Pardon me as my eyes wander around while I'm trying to roll through this. Alright.
Andrew Adams:
We are trying to stump you.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We are trying to stump me and I appreciate that. I like thinking. How about this? Paul Revere had a role. He had a role to play, a role that was acknowledged. He took on that role. People trusted him, and he got it done. He made sure everybody had what they needed at the time they needed it, so they would be prepared. We live in a world where we expect that we are surrounded by Paul Revere’s. But we are not. We expect, many of us, and I would say most of Western culture expects that when push comes to shove, someone will help, someone will come out of the woodwork. Whether it's law enforcement or a good Samaritan, that we will not have to face these things on our own, whatever they may be. That is not the reality. I'm not gonna connect dots any further than that because it starts to get political adjacent and that's not what we do on this show.
Andrew Adams:
That's right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
But I would encourage people to recognize that you are the only one that is truly responsible for you and your wellbeing and take 'em for great action.
Andrew Adams:
Okay, good. Next one, a bear den.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Like roar?
Andrew Adams:
Sure, yeah. Like a den where bears would hibernate or whatever.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. Okay. Not an empty den room in the house. Okay.
Andrew Adams:
I mean, it was given to me just as the word den and I chose to add bare den. I guess it could be den as an empty room in the house. Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. Alright. Got it. So what is a den? A den is where bears go to hibernate, they hang out, they feel safe, they feel comfortable, they are protected. There aren't a whole lot, you know, we haven't built our society around, oh, I'm gonna go hang out for four or five months and just chill, right? Things would be really different. You know, we would have probably a room in the house that basically like a panic room in everybody's house, right? Just, you know, it's got a bed and you sleep for five months.
Andrew Adams:
Great.
Jeremy Lesniak:
But we don't have that. But it doesn't mean we don't need the same thing. The idea that we are always on, our training is always on, we're always at a hundred percent is, it's ridiculous. Most people are not doing themselves a service. Training 5, 6, 7 days a week. Most people are going to be best at two to three days a week. Now, it doesn't mean that you can't train more often. But it does mean you probably shouldn't be training at a hundred percent every day. What happens to a bear when they hibernate? They lose weight because you know, they're hanging out, they're not eating, and people get really concerned when they stop training for a little while that they're gonna lose everything. How quickly does the bear get back their body weight when they come outta hibernation? It's not that long. Just as, if we take a break from training, whether it's for a couple days or a couple weeks or a couple months, even a couple years, it comes back much faster than you think. The more time you have in, the longer you can tolerate a break without major degradation in skill and knowledge. It comes back fast. So don't be afraid to crawl into your den, literal or figurative from time to time. Take a rest, shake off what needs to be shaken off. Because if I asked anybody on the planet, I want you to get ready to run as fast as you can, what would every single person do? They would take a step back.
Andrew Adams:
All right. I'm gonna throw an audible and throw a word in that wasn't on my list. Cause thinking of talking about bears got me thinking about camping for whatever reason. So, camping.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Camping. Why is camping fun? Cause it strips off the unnecessary. A lot of people like camping because it gets back to basics, you know? Why else would you spend a day packing up stuff that you need into a car to drive somewhere and live a lower caliber, quality standard of life for a few days, and then come back and unpack everything? Because there's a simplicity. There's something that we appreciate by not having all the trappings of life. Not having home, not having to worry about bills. And we often do the same thing with our training. For a lot of us, we go into our training because it's a period of time where we're not worried about all the other stuff. We've talked about it on the show that if someone's trying to punch you in the face, it's really hard to think about other things. You have to be present. And there's also, I think another way to think about this, a lot of us really enjoy training in nature. Camping is generally in nature. You could camp somewhere else, I guess, but generally, we're in nature. And there's a lot of benefits to training in nature including, you know, just having a different environment, uneven ground, and just stuff like that. Yeah, indeed, camping.
Andrew Adams:
All right. Next one, hotdogs.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Gross. Never liked a hotdog. I think there is...
Andrew Adams:
You don't have to like it to relate it to martial arts somehow.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It's true, it's true. Hotdogs, I'm trying to come up with some, I'm trying to come up with hotdogs are the insert style here of martial arts. Everyone seems to like them when they're children, but once they realize what's in it, they decide they're gross and they're not gonna eat them anymore. But I can't come up with a style that actually fits that, nor would I, even if I could probably. Hotdogs are, let's see, they're fairly ubiquitous, right? I think they're an example of one of these foods that is, for most people, we eat them in terms of tradition, more so than taste. A lot of people will get a hotdog if they go to a baseball game because it's what they do at a baseball game. Or they have hotdogs, you know, for a lot of people, a hotdog on the grill means summer to them, right? Hotdog is a food that's really rooted in tradition. Even if it's not everyone's first choice. I don't know too many people who choose a hotdog over other things, right? It's an option. And for most of us, there are techniques like that. You know, it's like, yeah, everybody knows how to do this and I'm intentionally not naming it. Everybody knows how to do this movement and it exists and we all know it, but I'd never use it. You have hotdog opens.
Andrew Adams:
I like that you went with the tradition that I hadn't thought of as well. That, you know, like hot dogs are steeped in tradition for at least here in the United States. And I don't like to, I personally enjoy hotdogs as an adult. I don't like to call 'em hotdog. I like to call 'em by their fun name the Frankfurter, just cause it's fun. All right, you ready for your next word?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm ready.
Andrew Adams:
Wood. Not woods, not nature, but wood.
Jeremy Lesniak:
W O O D, like a boar.
Andrew Adams:
Correct.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Or a plank.
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. That was the obvious. Most of us had broken boars before. They are made of wood most of the time. It feels awfully simple though. No, that's where we're going. We break 'em, learn things.
Andrew Adams:
All right. Wear and tear.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Wear and tear.
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. Wear and tear happens by being alive, right? Everything we do breaks down the body at least a little bit. And when we sleep, theoretically, we repair. Sometimes wear and tear is greater than one sleep session, we'll repair and we have to crawl into our den, literally or figuratively and repair that damage. But as martial artists, because so many of us are hellbent on training some certain number of days a week, you know, we've had people on the show, I've trained every day for 40 years. Really? That's great and I hope you're proud of that, but I'm gonna guess that there were days you probably shouldn't have. There were days that your body would've benefited more by not, and the older we get and the more we compound any deficit of wear and tear, the more we run the risk of injury. Why am I, tomorrow, turning 44 and in the best shape of my life? Because I know when to take a step back. I know when to hibernate. I know when to let my body rest because of the wear and tear. I've learned where appropriate wear and tear is, what it looks like, what it feels like, and how to recover from it. You know, there are a lot of people that just think it's inevitable. Your knees are gonna fall apart. You know, I'm a martial artist, so I have to, I'll have to replace my hips. There are plenty of things that make you more predisposed, but nothing is guaranteed. There's nothing that's required about that. That's why we made the knee clinic program. You don't have to have crummy knees as a martial artist.
Andrew Adams:
All right. Last word. Are you ready?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm ready.
Andrew Adams:
Mail, M A I L.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. The mail or the post, perhaps if you live across the pond, the notion of sending letters or packages to people through this service prior to the internet was the main way that people learned martial arts other than being there, right? Because what would you do? You would send away for, you'd send a check in the mail, right? Remember doing that? You'd write a check and you had to put it in an envelope and send it away and not know when they got it, and not know when they were gonna send it. And they would send back to you DVDs, or if you're older, VHS tapes of somebody doing something martial arts. It was the easiest way to cross train. Most of us are looking in the back of magazine and seeing these things and sending away from them, right? That involves the mail. But at the end of the day, what was that? It was us looking for more. It was us looking to cross train to experience something that maybe somebody was teaching that you know, you were never gonna see them on YouTube cause it wasn't a thing. You lived somewhere where they probably weren't teaching a seminar so you couldn't go train with them personally. Well, having these tapes or these discs kind of the next best option. But the only reason it worked was because of the mail. You would never be able to afford those VHF tapes if somebody had to drive them to your house outside of a government-funded and controlled postal service.
Andrew Adams:
Cool. Great job, man. There were some tougher ones in there.
Jeremy Lesniak:
There were, there were. You guys are making me stretch and I appreciate it. All right. If you like what we do, remember we are here to connect, educate, and entertain, go to whistlekick.com, check out all the things that we got going there, the projects, the products. Buy something using the code podcast15. We have an ever-growing list of events. Some are free, some are not. Make sure you're checking those out and staying in touch. Get on the newsletter list so you can know when we are gonna be around, because otherwise we have to mail things to you. And we're willing to do that, right? And of course, don't forget to support today's sponsor, Safest Family on the Block. Use the code whistlekick23 to save 25% on Jason's incredible book packed with some really, really great information. I think you're gonna find some good stuff in there. And the best way to engage with Jason in everything that he's built out as a brand, Safest Family on the Block on Instagram and Facebook, and you can spider off from there. And even, you know what? Even if you say, you know Jeremy, I don't wanna book, please go, go check out what he is doing. At the very least, support these sponsors that we're bringing on because they're supporting the show and they're helping us grow. And we need your support of them because you never know what you simply knowing about what these companies do. You might bump into somebody who says, you know, I feel like I've gotta do more for my family. Mom, I just read about this book. I just heard about this book. And you can direct them and you use the code ,give them the code whistlekick23 and save 25%. Anything else we should mention, Andrew or fade here?
Andrew Adams:
No, I think that's good.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right. Great. Well, I appreciate everyone being here. Thanks for coming on. Until next time, train hard, smile, and have a great day.