Episode 880 - Dr. Berta Cohen

In today's episode Jeremy chats with Dr. Berta Cohen, a neuroscientist and TKD practitioner. 

Dr. Berta Cohen - Episode 880

In this episode, we are honored to host Dr. Berta Cohen, who holds a PHD in neuroscience and a Tae Kwon Do practitioner who embarked on her martial arts journey at the age of 40. Join us as Dr. Cohen shares her unique perspective on the profound connection between the mind and the body in the realm of Tae Kwon Do.

In this fascinating interview, Dr. Cohen delves into the challenges and rewards of starting her martial arts journey later in life, unraveling the transformative power of discipline and perseverance. As a seasoned neuroscientist, she sheds light on the cognitive benefits of martial arts training, providing a scientific lens on the mind-body connection.

Dr. Berta Cohen's story takes an inspiring turn as she discusses her work with students with special needs, emphasizing the inclusive and therapeutic aspects of martial arts.

Show Notes

Connect with Dr. Cohen through her email: pairodox831@gmail.com

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Show Transcript

Jeremy (00:03.417)

Hey, what's going on everybody? Welcome to another episode of Whistlekick Martial Arts Radio. And on today's show, I'm joined by Dr. Bernard Cohen. Welcome, we'll start our chat in just a moment to the audience, thanks for being here as well. Remember, if you wanna go deeper on this or any other episode, you know, we talk about things, we link things, we mentioned, oh, this video clip or that whistlekickmartialartsradio.com is the place to go. You do have show notes in your podcast app or if you're watching on YouTube.

but there are a lot of things we can't put there. So whistlekickmarshallartsradio.com is the place to go. Now, if you want to see all the things that we do as an organization to connect, educate, and entertain the traditional martial artists of the world, whistlekick.com is where you want to go. And there's lots of great stuff over there. Maybe grab something in the store and help us out. Use the code podcast15, saves you 15%. Well, Dr. Cohen, thanks for being here. I appreciate it. Yeah.

Dr. Berta Cohen (00:54.434)

Thanks for having me here.

Jeremy (00:56.525)

So we're here, we're gonna talk about martial arts and all the things that you've got going on. We were talking just a moment ago.

you use the word overachiever, right? And as someone who could also identify as an overachiever could also use the word words not ever good enough, right? It's a bit of a double-edged sword. And we'll talk about how you got into martial arts, but have you found that approach to be a benefit or a frustration?

Dr. Berta Cohen (01:11.525)

A little bit.

Jeremy (01:36.665)

or maybe even both in your martial arts training.

Dr. Berta Cohen (01:40.686)

A little bit of both actually. I'm the type of person that when presented with a challenge, I always want to rise to it. And once I have that goal achieved, I wanna push the goalpost a little further to try to get further. The problem is that as a overachiever, you wanna make sure that perfection happens like the first time. Well, that's not how things work. So with martial arts, it's been

Woohoo, I know how to do this kick. And then the instructor presents a new kick because you're doing a harder form. And okay, yeah, I did it. I did this other kick. So of course I'm gonna be able to do this one. And then you fall and you go, yeah, I was just practicing. No, you just failed. And failure is okay though. I mean, when I was younger, failure felt like the...

rock of atlas was falling upon my shoulders and the world was going to end. Now failure is more of how do I get from this point A to point B in the most direct path, which of course doesn't happen, but we like it too, and then push forward. So it really drives me as a person now, both business, life, martial arts, whatever it is, even when I'm instructing my students, I like to keep pushing

most people are like this gem that they don't know that they are and they just need a little bit of that polishing and continual you can do it you can do it you can do it to get to a better place so that's kind of where I come from.

Jeremy (03:19.373)

Yeah, yeah, I would agree. You know, the word failure has really been been, I think is used a little more broadly than it should be in our society. Because to me, failure is when you give up, right? Not getting something right is perfectly fine. But it's when you say, okay, I'm done. That's what, and you didn't do the thing that you wanted to do. That's where the quote failure.

comes in, but the idea of constantly looking for other ways that iterative progress is kind of baked into martial arts and sounds like, did that, I guess I have to ask, when did you start training? Did you have that philosophy before training or did that philosophy come from training out into the rest of your life?

Dr. Berta Cohen (04:11.338)

had some of that before I started martial arts because I come from a science background so I've been in science a long time and when I first started it was a really uphill battle for females because my background is in chemistry where everyone was a man except for me so that hill was pretty steep so you had to push harder do better find better so

the rate of failure for females was pretty high because you honestly were not encouraged to do so. So I took that as, oh, you tell me I can't? No, I'm gonna make sure that I can, which translated then to going to graduate school, I got a PhD in neuroscience, which again, not a heavily dominated field for females, but again, the challenge didn't wanna fail, so I pushed myself forward.

That actually did translate into my martial arts philosophy. I started late in life. I was 40 when I started because my son, we wanted to have him do something, how kids are, and he was five and of course, terrified of doing anything. So we went together and I figured if he saw that an adult,

could not necessarily pick something up right away and have to really kind of push forward, it would help him as well. So we kind of did it together. I like the whole concept of, it's okay if we fall down, one, two, 10 times, your character as a human being in terms of failure is whether you get up that 11th time and go, I got this, I'm gonna keep going. So a little bit of both.

Jeremy (06:03.685)

Yeah, you know, it's no secret that female involvement in martial arts is nowhere near 50%, right? We know that. Now in some schools, there are plenty of schools that are exceptions to that rule, but if we take a big step back and we look at it, was that something that you were aware of early on and kind of, you know, wanted to have that rebellious

tone to it or was it just that your son really wanted to do this? You know, I'm going to ask the question in a second way. I wanted to get that context out first. There I have heard from some women who have said, I want to do this, but I don't want to be the only one. I don't want to be in the minority. It makes me nervous to do this, especially with hands and feet flying.

Dr. Berta Cohen (07:01.61)

I did realize that in martial arts, it's a little uneven, but the first thing was I wanted to support my son. So I thought that was the initial thing. The other thing is that I've always been intrigued by the discipline that comes with martial arts, whether it just be 50, 50 male and female, it doesn't matter to me. So I saw it more as you can't change the percentage unless you become part of it. So I figured if I...

go in there. Maybe I can encourage some of my other adult female friends to come play as well. So you can't elicit a change unless you do it yourself. Talk is cheap. Nothing about podcasts. But I mean, if you

Jeremy (07:42.784)

Well, yes, the show is rather inexpensive.

Dr. Berta Cohen (07:46.198)

Hey, that's okay. Bang for your buck. I mean, you can't elicit a change unless you do something about it. You can talk all you want, but you're not doing anything about it. So what are you really doing? So, and I think over the years, at our school especially, it started with a lot less females, a lot less female adults. Over the years, we have increased the amount of females that are there and it's-

wonderful. I mean, it's nice to have that peer type of fighting. But at our school, we're so respectful of one another, even when we're sparring the men. I mean, we know that we don't smash people in the head with a flat self-control, and they're really great about it. So although some of the females are worse than the males.

Jeremy (08:36.113)

So.

Jeremy (08:39.845)

You said that, not me. I'm not gonna say, I'm not. I'm not stepping in on that. But you did say something that I find really interesting and that is about the representation or participation of women in your school. I have found, and I'm curious how this plays out in the demographics of your school. I have found that in martial arts schools where there is more female leadership, whether that be the owner, head instructor, or the senior students.

Dr. Berta Cohen (08:44.29)

haha

Jeremy (09:09.481)

that in schools where there is at least some, I tend to see 40 to 50, even 60% female participation versus when the head instructor and the top two or three students are male, it tends to be 10 to 20. It's a marked difference. I'm curious how that plays out at your school and did.

Dr. Berta Cohen (09:36.826)

I think that we have a chief instructor who is male. His wife is the secondary instructor, amazing people. They do have very different styles and you can tell with some of the students that one is more amenable to the other in terms of the girls. But it's not because the male instructor is overbearing, it's because

The female one is just so you just want to hug her. She's amazing She's just so wonderful you want to do stuff with her Totally different style, but I do see that as we've increased the female Instructor because we haven't we have instructors now Myself a Mrs. Hooley. She's another one. We have a miss Hooley. We have a miss quit long

So as the females have increased in terms of instructorship, we've seen more girls coming up because they see these role models where, hey, maybe it's not an unattainable thing. And the confidence builds up, the school has expanded substantially. So I think it's kind of like, if you see the example, then, hey, I can do that too.

And it's okay if I don't get it right the first time because they do it too. So yeah, I've seen an increase, definitely.

Jeremy (11:07.417)

Yeah, and just something I want to kind of throw out to the audience. You know, if you are in a school that is male dominated, especially if you own that school, if you're the chief instructor at that school, I'm not saying you should go necessarily pull women from the street and, you know, you have to come train at my school, but looking for those more subtle opportunities and making sure that when women come through the door, that they feel welcome. And if you're, you know, I've got plenty of male friends that

They don't know what they don't know, because they haven't had these conversations.

Find a way to find the answer, right? Because it's a chicken and egg problem. If you don't have female students, how do you get and keep female students? And if nothing else, half the population you're missing.

Dr. Berta Cohen (11:57.038)

Absolutely, absolutely the example the example should be there. That's the thing I think I think you're right where many people don't know what they don't know strange but if you see that there is a female there and She's doing the thing and you're her age or her body type or her personality It's finding your tribe

And when you find your tribe, you feel more comfortable to go out of that comfort zone. Because let's face it, nothing grows in your comfort zone. You have to be challenged. So to what extent do you take that challenge? Obviously, personality driven. But you're going to get better if you push yourself a little bit. And seeing that there's someone like you, you'll push. You'll join.

Jeremy (12:48.945)

Absolutely agree. So you give this a shot about 10 years ago, your son's five. Did he like it? Obviously you liked it. You stuck around. Did he also like it?

Dr. Berta Cohen (13:00.934)

Yeah.

He did for about three years. He got his first degree and then he decided it wasn't for him anymore. We do song on taekwondo, so we have forms. I'm sure there are forms in other styles as well, but the forms get longer and longer and longer. I suppose it's the same thing in all of them. He's not really good about memorizing forms. And the other thing is that he is like stage fright.

I mean, it's all over. So we have to perform our forms in front of the instructors. And he would get halfway through and he'd just go.

Dr. Berta Cohen (13:42.654)

So it was more, it became more of a anxiety thing. So it wasn't fun anymore for him. And I wanted him to finish out his first degree because if you start something, you should finish it. You know, mama didn't raise a quitter, so let's go. And he did. And I think it was really good for him. The discipline was great. It helped him focus. Cause I mean, like most kids, they're just, woo, hello, woo, pretty, yeah.

that type of thing. And it helped him a lot. For me, I found it more aside from the discipline thing. I am an exercise junkie. So I love the fact that there were different ways to move your body and different ways to expand on things you can memorize and learn and the self-defense and all the things that went with it.

And it helped me use some of the stuff that I did in my past, like the gymnastics and the ballet and everything. So it was very akin to what I liked to do. So it stuck around.

Jeremy (14:50.617)

At what point, because I'm gonna guess that if he stuck it out for three years, it was probably around two years that maybe he wasn't having as much fun, but I'm getting the sense that you found something that was important to you very quickly. I'm gonna say three to six months.

Dr. Berta Cohen (15:11.286)

Oh yeah, yeah.

Jeremy (15:13.186)

What was it? What was it about that?

Dr. Berta Cohen (15:16.858)

I love structure. I am all about structure, setting goals, attaining goals, and then pushing the challenge button. I think martial arts in general is something that you can achieve at any age. That's the first thing. So I like the fact that there's longevity in it. I mean, I started at 40, I'm 51 now, and I don't see myself stopping anytime soon.

I think it's adaptable to all body types. So that was important to me as well. I wanna start something and keep going. I wanna be able to exercise. This is a great exercise, you know? So that was part of it. The other thing is I loved the environment that I was in. The chief instructor, the other instructor, they make you feel like when you walk in there, you're seen, you're heard, you're respected, and you're family. So that's important to me.

to have that type of environment. That and I love, it's gonna sound horrible. I like hitting things. It's very therapeutic and we got to hit things. When I became a camo belt, I started competing nationally.

Jeremy (16:34.03)

Where does that slot in? Most schools don't have a camouflage belt, so where does that slot in on the progress?

Dr. Berta Cohen (16:39.014)

Uh, that is, let's see. So you go white.

uh, probably about a year. Yeah. Close to a year. Um, a little less. Um, when I started competing, it was, it was about a year. So, you know, it, okay. Um, and I went to my first competition and it was fall nationals. And I had no idea what that meant. I was just like, okay, yeah, you know, we're going to go to competition, you know, and, um, I did, I did well. So I,

I'm very competitive.

if you can't tell. Yeah. And I did well. So I kind of got the bug for that as well. So that made me want to learn more and compete more and go to higher ranks because it's fun. It is fun to win. It's fun to compete. No, but in the times, you know, I've lost as well.

Jeremy (17:18.081)

I would have guessed that. That adds up.

Jeremy (17:38.065)

It is. It's a lot more fun to win than to not win.

Dr. Berta Cohen (17:46.494)

And you know what, those I see more as learning experiences for me. Why did I not lose? I mean, why did I not win? Did I not practice enough? Was I just being in my own head? Was I being cocky? I mean, let's face it, we all have that little voice in our head that's saying, cares, I can do this. And there are times that that's happened as well. So, um, the humbling experience that comes with losing is wonderful.

Jeremy (18:12.901)

We generally learn more when we lose, right? Oftentimes when we win, we don't get that feedback of don't do this way, don't do this thing, this doesn't work. But when we lose, whether it's forums or it's sparring, you have some feedback. You've got something to go back and work on to practice and say, okay, now this is how I get better. I've seen, maybe you've seen this, I've seen this in

Dr. Berta Cohen (18:15.691)

Absolutely.

Dr. Berta Cohen (18:22.498)

Thank you.

Dr. Berta Cohen (18:38.53)

Yep, absolutely.

Jeremy (18:42.085)

Competitive circles where a younger student, generally it's that eight to 10 year old age, where they are so far beyond the other kids in their group. And they just stay stagnant. And the other kids develop these habits. And then in a couple of years, they pass them. And that kid's going, I used to dominate what's happened. You didn't get better. You didn't get feedback. There weren't people in your ear saying,

Dr. Berta Cohen (18:53.588)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (19:10.633)

Now let's push it up, let's get better because sometimes it's relaxing to sit at the top for a while.

Dr. Berta Cohen (19:17.358)

it is. Yeah, absolutely. I've seen that as well. I saw that with myself. Um, during the color belt years, I was, I did really well. Um, because for the most part I was still more athletic than the women in my age ring. Um, it, it's horrible to say, and this is the reality of the matter and women, when they get to 40, all of a sudden decide that I don't need to exercise. I'm not, I'm not going to do this.

Dr. Berta Cohen (19:49.698)

That's the time that you actually should be doing those things. You know, I did my thesis on the effects of exercise, aging, and hypertension. And, you know, all the things that I did show that if you exercise, when you're aging, your blood pressure goes down, your nervous system adapts to that. You have a much more relaxed nervous system, which is great. Nobody needs hypertension. Nobody needs a heart attack. Guess what?

you're aging, those things happen, so fight it. So that's, with me, I decided that, okay, you need to focus on aging better. And that's what martial arts has brought to me. Like I said, in the color belt rings, I was more of a, I was more dominant because I was a little bit younger.

But when you move to the black belt ring, it doesn't matter what age you are. I mean, you go from that red black where you're like, I'm still pretty cool, I got this. And then you move into that, you know, first degree black belt ring and all of a sudden they go, wake up son, you know? It's a whole different, it's a whole different world. And you do have to level up. So that was fun. That was fun. But you adapt.

Jeremy (21:08.613)

Hmm. It's, you know, there's often this dynamic because once you step into that black belt division in different schools, different competitions, separate things differently, the quality of competition can become so much more difficult that sometimes people wash out. Right? Was there a point where you were thinking about that? Like, oh, this is a lot.

Dr. Berta Cohen (21:29.358)

Mm-hmm. Oh, absolutely.

Jeremy (21:38.613)

Or did maybe the competitive nature that you have overcome that concern?

Dr. Berta Cohen (21:45.562)

No, I've never thought of quitting. I thrive on the competition. Whether I'm competing that year or not, I always have that drive to keep going. I actually love the fact that there was more competition, there was more for me to work on, more for me to get better. We have a very competitive school in general, and we kind of all drive each other to get better. We train with a lot of...

They're adults at the school, but they're more teenager and younger kids. So in general, we have to compete with people that are literally 30 years younger than we are. So it's great. I mean, they show you things, they teach you things, and then you take that, you adapt it to whatever it is that you can do, and then you take it out there. And it's great to see the successes and the failures. Quitting is...

never really been an option. Not in my nature.

Jeremy (22:47.129)

Yeah, it doesn't surprise me that this doesn't, this isn't, doesn't seem like remarkable news to me. Now that competitive nature, you know, we talked kind of at the beginning, you know, it can be a bit of a double-edged sword. Do you find that your competitive nature gets in the way of things? You know, you talked about your thesis involving hypertension. I mean, I know some type A high-functioning folks who

maybe we'll prioritize the to-do list over the I need to take a break.

Dr. Berta Cohen (23:25.126)

I think that the competitive nature has gotten in my way in terms of sometimes when I do things in competition itself. But there have been a lot of things in my background where I have seen that type A crazy not paying attention to the flowers that are around you have caused really detrimental effects, mostly in my family.

So I have been hit with that early on in life where I know that you do need to compete and you need to be forward thinking, but you also need to realize that we are not on earth for that long. Even if you're here a hundred years, that really isn't a lot of time. So sometimes you need to actually slow down and pay attention because, hey, you know, I'm 51. I am in...

I would say pretty good shape. But that doesn't mean that tomorrow I couldn't have a heart attack. It happens. I mean, perfectly healthy man has a heart attack at 49. I mean, it happens. So, yeah.

Jeremy (24:35.409)

happens. Yeah. So maybe you're a good person to ask of this and maybe this is a selfish question. Maybe the audience doesn't find as much interest in this as I do. But I'm going to guess as a PhD that you have a demanding career. You're a mom. You're training. Probably have other things on the list that we haven't even talked about. And I'm guessing you're doing a lot of them at a high level because that seems to be your nature. How do you find the balance? How do you decide?

Dr. Berta Cohen (24:50.431)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (25:04.562)

where to put that limited time and energy.

Dr. Berta Cohen (25:09.226)

My family will always come first, no matter what. My kids, my husband, that will always come first. Aside from that, then I do prioritize. I mean, I prioritize what I do in science. I prioritize what I do with my own business. I actually homeschool my son. So again, he is priority. So.

I am a list person. You know, I have Excel spreadsheets in my head. So I know that everything, it sounds funny, but that is pretty much how things work in my mind. When I do something, I slot out times and it is 100%. That is what we do. It's not, oh, I'm doing this. Oh, but I'm kind of look, nope, nope. When I go work out at the Dojang, that's what I do. When I go teach.

That's what I do. Because if you don't, you're doing a half-assed job with everything. You can do a million things, but if you're half-assed at all of them, you're really not doing a million things. So if I'm going to do those 10 things that I know I need to do, I'm going to do them 100%. Family always comes first. Anything career-related will probably come second.

Business related will come third because you can always go back to a business. You can never go back to your family.

Jeremy (26:37.893)

What I'm hearing is if you're gonna do it, do it right. If you're gonna commit, actually commit. And that makes sense. You mentioned teaching and I'm a huge fan of teaching not only as sharing what I've learned, but teaching helps me learn more about the thing that I'm teaching. I'm gonna guess that you were aware of that prior to teaching within the context of the Dojang.

Dr. Berta Cohen (26:40.246)

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

Jeremy (27:07.611)

When did you start instructing? Where was that in your journey?

Dr. Berta Cohen (27:13.802)

Let's see, it's been a couple of years now. We have, I'm sure it's the same thing in other forms of martial arts, but we have level one, two, and three instructors. So, oh, it's not, okay. Yeah, we have, oh, okay. Well, in Song on Taekwondo, we have level one, two, and three instructors. Level ones are the lowest ranking instructor.

Jeremy (27:26.633)

not the same. Most schools do not do that. But please continue.

Dr. Berta Cohen (27:43.938)

They pretty much just need to know forms and you assist in class. Level two, you need to know all the forms and you should be teaching some classes. And there are a whole bunch of, we have a manual that we need to learn. There are instructor points, student points, things that you should be able to do and maybe even run classes by yourself.

in order to teach and then a level three instructor is a fully certified instructor that can teach all the things, do all the things and even run the school if be. Right now I'm a level two instructor. I'm working toward my level three and it's been amazing. I was teaching the foundations class which is the basic class. You come in, you're a white belt, you know nothing. You know the white belt

philosophy is pure and without the knowledge of Sangam Taekwondo, like the pine tree, the seed must be planted and nourished to develop strong roots. That's the foundations class, right? So teach them everything they should know before they become a color belt. And I learned that in teaching that class alone, there were things in my foundations that I needed to make stronger in order to make those kids or adults understand as well. And then

It's been a wonderful journey. So now I help with the color belt classes as well, because we have more color belts than we do white belts. And with that, it has helped me grow as a martial artist as well. And when you work, when you start to get into the black belt arena, you forget those other forms that you did as a color belt because, you know, out of sight out of mind. And...

Now when you have to teach them, you have to go back to those forms. And there are things that I did not realize I had not learned as a color belt with those forms. And it's great to be able to kind of break down that process a little bit better with more understanding that I have now as a black belt and be able to maybe explain something that I didn't understand why I did not understand this move or why I did not understand the function. Now that I have

Dr. Berta Cohen (30:01.93)

more of an understanding of what it's doing. So that's been kind of fun.

Jeremy (30:10.701)

Like I said, I love teaching and I think there's just so much in there because the more we teach the more we realize, oh, I missed this. Oh, that's why we do this. Right. It's really fascinating to me the psychology of that. Now you said your PhD is in neuroscience.

What is there specific research that you're working on now and does that at all play back and forth with martial arts?

Dr. Berta Cohen (30:39.362)

I am no longer doing research because I'm with my kids. When I was doing, the last time that I was doing research, it was on astronaut health. I worked out at Kennedy Space Center and I was doing research on astronaut health and when they come back from their space missions, deconditioning, heart rates, all that other thing, all that other things that go along with being out in space.

Jeremy (30:42.231)

Okay.

Jeremy (30:52.674)

Hmm.

Dr. Berta Cohen (31:08.73)

Um, but, um, I do call upon a lot of my neural background when it comes to, uh, behaviors with people and they asked me a lot of questions. This hurts. What do I do about it? You know, I'm doing this move and my leg, I feel this pain. So it's more, it's almost more medical than it is neurological, but the neurology behind it is why they're doing it. I mean,

Jeremy (31:18.833)

Hmm.

Jeremy (31:32.677)

Hmm.

Dr. Berta Cohen (31:37.694)

So in our kicks, we pivot. I mean, our base leg needs to pivot, right? And I see that a lot of my students then come up with these pains in their legs because they're not pivoting. And I mean, I know that you're tweaking your nerves and that's why you're getting that pain. So I mean, no, they're not. And your knees, you know, they don't wanna be doing that. So, you know, turn the foot.

Jeremy (31:57.628)

Hips aren't meant to do this, right?

Dr. Berta Cohen (32:07.434)

um, in terms of how it works with martial arts, I think, and this is going to sound awful, but I think part of doing martial arts for me is to show other women that if you take care of yourself by exercising, by doing martial arts, you are neurologically helping yourself. You see a, when I was doing my thesis, I found that, um, exercise would create

a change in the neural composition of the subject within two hours, right? So you decrease that blood pressure, you exercise, you're going to see neurological changes. So if you can see something as immediate as two hours, what do you think you would do for your body overall as we're aging because these effects are coming, whether you like it or not?

Think about what you do over the longevity of your life. When you increase that exercise, you decrease that blood pressure, your risk for heart rate related activities will decrease. I mean, women do not like to talk about it, but you're gonna go through menopause. Those hormonal changes are gonna increase that blood pressure. You know what? You can fight that with exercise. So help that nervous system out.

Jeremy (33:33.925)

Yeah, and you talk about those effects, two hours. Over time, it's kind of like the revs on a car. You can let off the gas pedal. You don't instantly stop. There's a lingering effect. And if you build up to a critical mass, you can miss a week of training and get back to it and keep yourself healthy. And it's, hmm.

Dr. Berta Cohen (33:46.207)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Dr. Berta Cohen (33:53.07)

Absolutely.

Dr. Berta Cohen (33:58.198)

Yeah, the threshold stays. The threshold does stay. I mean, but you gotta keep going.

Jeremy (34:03.621)

So with that knowledge, do you teach your classes? Do you instruct any differently than maybe others do?

Dr. Berta Cohen (34:12.858)

I think we all definitely have different teaching styles. If you ask the people around me, my teaching style, I am like a drill sergeant. I like structure in my classes, but fun structure. So we have students that are called tigers. So it's like four to six year olds. Those are the tiny tigers and they have energy that,

is comparable to a volcano erupting. It's just like, you know? So I think that my teaching style is a combination of tiny tigers and drill sergeant. I want you to have fun, but I want you to do it in a structured fashion, especially when it comes to foundations. Because if you don't, I think you miss all those important points that come with learning something. I think initially, unfortunately, it's kind of a little bit.

Jeremy (34:45.629)

Yes, yes.

Jeremy (34:53.146)

Hmm.

Dr. Berta Cohen (35:10.338)

dry learning, but then after that we can have fun with it. If I'm teaching a black belt class, they know that kind of stuff. So there's definitely more play and fun and silliness that goes along with it because.

Jeremy (35:24.041)

silliness you mean you can you martial arts can be enjoyable too we don't just have to

Dr. Berta Cohen (35:28.914)

Oh yeah, last night, so this is totally on a tangent, but last night we were doing combat weapons. So I don't know if that's in other styles, but it is a large, it looks like a bomb on a knee and it has a foam on the outside and there is a PVC pipe in it. And what you do, yeah, so we hit each other with it, combat weapons sparring, it is my favorite game on earth, but we do drills to get better. So I was paired up with

Jeremy (35:46.234)

Oh yeah.

Dr. Berta Cohen (35:58.706)

one of the, what I call the kids, cause he's 14, but he is like lightning. I mean, this kid is just, he'll definitely be a world champion at some point in time. He's just amazing. So we were each on one side of the wave master and we were doing strikes. So we decided to play combat weapon chicken. So you would go up and up and up and down before your partner knew, go around the other side and try to hit them. It was...

So, but we were doing the drill, but in a fun fashion. And it actually worked on our reflex timing because he knew I was coming, but how fast could he move out of the way before I got him or he got me in the same way. So it's fun. It's fun to find those games with learning.

Jeremy (36:48.277)

I find with adults that if you call it a game, they'll kind of, you know, they'll become resistant, but if you just make it enjoyable, it's like, all right, we're gonna do this drill now and just kind of make it something a little more enjoyable, they learn.

Dr. Berta Cohen (37:04.426)

Our adults, I think our adults are a little strange, because they love to play. Yes, they're awesome. The adults at our school, I think there are some that are a little more hesitant because they have this thing where, oh my goodness, if I do it wrong, everyone's gonna be watching, I'll be embarrassed. I've told them, I've fallen, I have wiped out completely.

Jeremy (37:10.802)

Oh, good! That's how it should be.

Dr. Berta Cohen (37:31.666)

I've gotten hit by, it doesn't matter. I mean, you're still learning. We all do it. No one's perfect. But our adults in general, we love the games. And it makes it so much more enjoyable for all of us, whether you're teaching or whether you're learning. I mean, you learn better when you're having fun. No one, I'm not sure people, if you've ever taken a calculus course, no one learned, really learned.

Jeremy (37:53.21)

Yes.

Dr. Berta Cohen (38:01.246)

Now we must integrate. Oh yeah, please sign me up for a whole bunch of those classes. Yeah, so anyway.

Jeremy (38:07.225)

Yeah, it's one of the things, you know, I spend some time teaching teachers within the martial arts. And one of the things, one of the points that we stress heavily is that.

Learning through play is so innate that that's how animals learn everything. Right. You, you watch that kids will make up games. Even if you don't want them to, right? Like we have this, this drive towards finding enjoyment in the things that we're learning. And I think we can all attest, think about the last thing that you learned that did you enjoy it? There's a direct correlation for most of us in most things. The more you enjoyed it, the better you learned it.

Dr. Berta Cohen (38:25.038)

Absolutely.

Dr. Berta Cohen (38:49.142)

Yep, that was my economics class in college. My goodness. Yeah, that was not.

Jeremy (38:53.553)

Hmm see and that could that can be subjective. I find economics kind of fun kind of fascinating, but Yeah, you're that that's how most people seem to respond to it. So yeah, there's a subjective element there. All right

Dr. Berta Cohen (39:01.55)

Definitely not. Definitely not.

Dr. Berta Cohen (39:09.11)

Yeah, but then again, I found organic chemistry pretty interesting. So, you know.

Jeremy (39:13.256)

There we go.

Jeremy (39:16.813)

was never gonna be my scene. All right, so training, competition, teaching, loving martial arts, investing a lot of time, enjoying structure. When we look at all of these things together, oftentimes when we get someone on the show, they started training at four, 10, 15, maybe 20, and we can look back and we can see that, okay,

You know, martial arts probably had an impact on the way they approached the world, but we don't really know. You started later. If I were to ask the folks who have known you for a long time, maybe your husband or your family, how has she changed because of martial arts or after starting martial arts? What would they say about you?

Dr. Berta Cohen (40:14.958)

What would he say?

That's a good question. My husband would say that I am obsessed with the martial arts, but he's okay with that. He's very supportive. He would say that I have been able to channel my desire to help people that are afraid of doing something new, as well as...

Jeremy (40:26.238)

Hahaha

Dr. Berta Cohen (40:47.81)

We've had a whole bunch of special needs children that have joined the Dojang and that has been a super, super experience for me. We do have a special needs child. Our daughter has autism. And many of the things that I feel as a parent is the difficulty in understanding a child like that. And a lot of people do not give them the chance.

to do different things. So through martial arts, I've had quite a few special needs kids come through and it has been my pleasure to be able to have them understand that they are super important and that it's okay if I have to repeat something a million times because I want you to be part of society. I do not want you to be just over there. And he would say that

My heart has grown a million zillion times because I have been able to do that. And he would also say, well, most people would say that I've softened a little. I was very, oh, I think I still am, but very constrictive in my thoughts of myself. I'm very, very hard on myself.

I think through martial arts, I have learned that it's okay not to be perfect, but like I said, if you fall down, will you get up? And through martial arts, I've learned that I can get up again and keep going and get better. So maybe that's what they would have said, maybe. Or that I'm just crazy, who knows?

Jeremy (42:32.561)

Okay, I can see that.

Dr. Berta Cohen (42:37.347)

possible.

Jeremy (42:39.933)

Let's talk about those special needs kids because it's this is something that I think is really important within the martial arts because there are a lot of places where. Most other places in the world you're either doing something by yourself or you're doing something as part of a group. And martial arts is this you sort of unique thing that is you're doing it by yourself, but with other people and that's really fascinating I think a lot of us resonate with that.

Dr. Berta Cohen (43:05.015)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (43:08.729)

because we're not held back by the team or we're not holding the team back, depending on where we see ourselves in that grouping, but we also get to be around other people. So there's a social element there. And I think that this is probably why for so many special needs individuals, kids and adults, martial arts is a place that they can thrive. You mentioned a number of them coming through in your school. Do you?

Dr. Berta Cohen (43:12.235)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (43:36.189)

offer separate classes at your school or are is everybody in together?

Dr. Berta Cohen (43:42.154)

It's integrated, it's together. And I think that's what's really unique about our school. I mean, when I said that you feel like your family, we absolutely feel that it doesn't matter. I mean, there are children that are a little bit more, they need to be a little more individualized, but for the most part, we have found even those kids we've managed to integrate into the classes. So there's no difference. And

Some of them come in so shy, so I don't want to be here. And now, you know, a year later, they are flourishing and they're joining. And you know, their parents say, wow, he is so different than what he used to be a year ago. And I always tell them that they are no different than anyone else. We all learn differently. So that's all you really need to do.

If you're a parent, you understand that patience is the one thing that you must have. There is no way you're going to tell your kid something one time and they're going to do it. That is just not going to happen. It's no different than teaching. So with these kids, so instead of 10 times, you tell them 50 times. Eventually they'll get it. And it has been an amazing experience for all those kids, I think, as well as us because

I feel like not only am I helping to educate people about what it is to have a child with special needs, because that's a whole different world, it is showing those kids that they're different, but only as being an individual and not just their special needs first and then they're an individual. That is an important lesson that I think that coming to the Dojang with those kids helps to spread.

And I love the fact that their parents aren't going, oh, I'm so sorry, you know, you need to repeat this a hundred times with him. Okay, no problem. The relief that you feel as a parent, so I look at it in both directions. I'm an instructor, but I'm also a parent and I've had to tell people, she's not gonna answer you. She's not gonna understand. You're gonna need to repeat it. And it breaks your heart because you're okay with it.

Dr. Berta Cohen (46:06.786)

but you don't think other people will be tolerant of it. As I said before, you can't change something unless you do something about it. And this is my way of trying to do something about it.

Jeremy (46:08.497)

Hmm.

Jeremy (46:18.965)

So let's talk about that because, you know, if we take autism, the statistics show that it is. It has grown, whether it continues to grow that that's a whole other subject that we don't need to get into. But the numbers are large enough now that this is a group that, you know, is often underserved in terms of extracurricular. I believe that martial arts is a wonderful place for kids with some challenges to find their footing.

Dr. Berta Cohen (46:43.041)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (46:48.621)

literally and figuratively. And maybe you're a great person to speak on this for a little bit. And here's where I want us to start. You have a, not unique, but a rare combination of having a kid at home and teaching them in classes. Or maybe not you're teaching your own child, but you understand the dynamic from both sides as instructor and as parent.

Dr. Berta Cohen (46:50.552)

Yeah.

Jeremy (47:16.005)

And a lot of the instructors that we're going to have in the audience here aren't necessarily going to have that other side. So maybe you could speak to that first. Where do you see most instructors going wrong? And I understand every child is different challenges, different challenges lead to different things. But if we were to take a big step back and offer some general advice, what might you suggest to them that they tweak in their approach?

Dr. Berta Cohen (47:43.722)

I think one thing in general that happens with autistic children is a lot of them look normal. So as an instructor, I mean, you kind of know who's coming into your class, but you really don't. I mean, you don't sit there and go, hey, what's your medical history? Do you have autism? Do I need to pay attention to you? You just don't. You're an instructor, you're going to teach. And there are usually a lot of kids in the class. So you start teaching and you wonder why this child isn't paying attention.

So I think in general, try to approach the class as, it is possible that every single person in that class is not gonna get it the first time. Like patience, I mean, I can't express enough how much patience really is important. It's with anything, and that's with even normal people. I mean, I've not figured something out until the instructor said,

No, do it like this. It happens. So in general, patience is kind of important. Know that it's not something that they're doing personally against you. I mean, sometimes, I don't know why.

Jeremy (49:00.591)

I laugh because I've watched this.

Dr. Berta Cohen (49:02.942)

I mean, you, you get up there and for some reason your brain decides, Oh yeah, they're, they're doing that to annoy you. No, it's, you know, the short circuiting sometimes is so overwhelming that your brain just literally freezes and they just kind of look at you and think, not a clue. So remember that it's not a personal thing. It's them. They actually can't get it.

The other thing is if you can, if you have assistants in the class, which we happen to have assistants always, and you happen to know that there's a child that's struggling, maybe you can kind of put an assistant on them so they become more comfortable. Because chances are, if you get the assistant to rep with them a few times, they'll fall into line.

Dr. Berta Cohen (49:58.614)

For the most part, the big thing is patience. Just be patient with them. We all need that.

Jeremy (50:05.669)

So it's kind of, I don't want to say funny, but it's interesting to me because everything I'm hearing you say, lines up with what I would say a good instructor would do anyway. Recognize that people want to succeed, they just might not be able to see the path forward and your job as an instructor is to help them. Recognizing that everybody learns differently and facilitating their whatever methodology helps them progress is a big chunk of what we do.

and then having the patience to give the student time to figure things out and screw up and get better and fail if you wanna use that word, and eventually they make progress. Is that fair to say that it's, maybe the methods are different, but the approach, the philosophy is really no different?

Dr. Berta Cohen (50:54.214)

I think it's absolutely no different. And I think that's part of my, at least my philosophy in trying to integrate people that are special needs with the rest of society. They're not, they're different because they learn differently or maybe it takes them longer, but they're still people. I mean, inherently speaking, they're still a human. And if it takes a hundred times for me to explain a knife hand strike to you as a special needs person versus 10 times, you're still explaining it.

You know, it's just how much of the percentage do you use for each of those things. So, yeah.

Jeremy (51:30.013)

One of the biggest changes for me as an instructor came when I realized if I'm explaining a knife hand strike for the hundredth time and I'm getting frustrated, it's not about them. It's about my fear that I'm not doing a good job as an instructor, that I have failed my student because I haven't found another way to teach them. And whether it's because that's what that student needs, they need more repetition,

Dr. Berta Cohen (51:45.506)

Mm-hmm.

Jeremy (51:59.089)

creative way to teach that thing, whatever that thing might be, when I was able to switch it into, I'm trying to solve a problem.

That really opened the door for me as an instructor. And it allowed me to look at everyone as a different but the same puzzle. What's my goal? My goal for each one of these people in front of me is to teach them this thing. Maybe they're at different places on the path learning that thing, but how do I, okay, so you need this and you need this and you need these words, you need these words. I need to move your arm. I need to put another person there. Hey, you two switch places.

Hey, I want you to stand two feet in front so they can watch what you're doing with the hand.

It's an interesting puzzle for me, because my goal is to help people progress as quickly as possible.

Dr. Berta Cohen (52:50.53)

Yep. When I have encountered things like that, what I like to do is I see where the student has responded better to a cue from, let's say, a different instructor. So if I'm teaching you a knife hand strike, and it's, like you said, the hundredth time and they're still not getting it, but I see that, let's say, Mr. Belford has really kind of...

drawn your attention to whatever he was teaching. Perhaps there's a word or a style or something that he's done. So I'll say, hey, Mr. Belford, come and look at, come and look at Sam's knife hand strike. It's got so much power. And then that's usually a cue as to something's going on. Can you kind of help me figure out what it is that I'm not getting through? And then they'll come over and they'll do it. And so I can observe them.

So I'm learning through another person, so then maybe I can transfer it to another student. So it's kind of like ping-ponging the ideas. That happens a lot with us as well. We kind of feed off of each other's teaching styles because there are students that respond to me well, and there are ones that don't. There are students that respond to, you know, the male instructors, females, and we do. We talk to each other about it all the time. We also have an instructor class on Saturday morning that we go to.

where we go over all the class plans, you know, what works with Tigers, what doesn't work with color belt classes, is this not something we need to teach, you know, a camo belt versus a red black belt, you know, we have all of that stuff. And I think that doing that has helped us grow as instructors because there are things that you're very set in your ways as to how you think it should be taught or how you learn. But that's not how...

you know, Joe might learn. So anyway, so.

Jeremy (54:49.841)

Good stuff, important stuff. Now let's say we reconnect in five, 10 years, you come back on the show and I said, hey, what's happened since we last chatted? What would you hope you were telling me?

Dr. Berta Cohen (55:03.422)

Let's see, I would be hoping that I told you that my son is happily married and graduated from college and doing his thing. That I am retired from doing many things, hopefully, but not martial arts. I am hoping that maybe in 10 years I'll be going toward Mastership. That is like one of my ultimate goals to become a Master.

it'll probably take between 10 or 12 years maybe. That would be really an amazing goal because although the leadership in the martial arts industry for females is getting better all the time, all the time, which is a wonderful thing. I think it always needs to expand. Like you said, you can't go 100% forward without 50% of your population lagging behind.

So I would like to add to that. I would like to be able to say that I helped a whole bunch of little girls find their inner warrior and go forward. That's always a big thing for me.

I don't plan on opening a martial arts school anytime soon. No. I don't think I honestly have the time for it. Much like anything else, if I'm gonna do something, I'm gonna do it 100%. I don't think that I would have enough time set aside from that. For that, I would like to continue teaching at the Dojang that I'm currently enrolled in and helping them grow.

Jeremy (56:19.682)

No, no interest in that.

Jeremy (56:30.79)

That makes sense.

Dr. Berta Cohen (56:44.434)

and maybe expand to other schools, that would be fantastic. But I don't see myself with my own school. I mean, things could change, I'm sure, but I don't see that happening. Retirement, retirement, yes, that's it.

Jeremy (56:57.056)

could change.

Jeremy (57:02.041)

Yeah, retirement. Yeah, you're, cause you're one of those. I don't see you kicking back, staring out the window hours a day.

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:04.907)

We're done.

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:08.322)

Absolutely.

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:13.343)

No, don't think so. I haven't found that yet.

Jeremy (57:18.349)

If people want to get a hold of you, maybe they want to bounce something off you or, you know, just tell you that they enjoyed this episode, how would they do that?

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:26.794)

They can email me at pairdocs831 at gmail.com. I can spell it out, or I can let you know what it is, and you can put it somewhere.

Jeremy (57:41.162)

Yeah, paradox831.

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:42.902)

Yeah, that's pretty much where I'm a email kind of girl.

Dr. Berta Cohen (57:52.706)

I'm willing to talk to anyone about anything. I'm okay with being a sounding board. I think that's super important, especially as an adult. A lot of us.

Jeremy (58:02.385)

Yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if there are some folks out there who listen to your words today and said, but or and they reach out to you. So we've got a we've got a pretty great audience like that. They want more. They want to go. They want to go further. They want to go deeper. I'm going to pass it back to you in just a moment, but to the audience out there. Thank you. Thank you for being here. I hope you really enjoyed and learned a lot in this episode. Remember if you have great guests that you want to put forward or maybe topics for

Dr. Berta Cohen (58:15.874)

Yeah, you do.

Jeremy (58:32.069)

the show. Reach out to Jeremy at whistlekick.com or social media is at whistlekick. You can support us via Patreon or grabbing something at whistlekick.com with the code podcast one five. But the most important thing is that you help spread the message, spread the show, spread our mission to connect, educate and entertain. Well, Dr. Cohen, I really do appreciate you being here, but it's your job to send us off. So what are your final words to the audience today?

Dr. Berta Cohen (59:04.086)

You are stronger, you're bolder, you're kinder. You have more patience than you think you actually have. Dig really deep inside and try that new thing. I mean, it's ladies, especially to you. Just because you hit 40 doesn't mean that you can sit back on your laurels. And you know what? Try the martial arts, it's fun. You can have, you can do it.

forever and you know what? One of the reasons that I like to keep going is because you don't think that the little one is watching but they're watching, they're sponges. That little eight year old girl that is afraid because oh, I should, no, you are an inspiration whether you think you are or not, you are an inspiration. So go forth and you know.

Put your crown on and be that warrior princess that you know you are.