Oh what fun

Stuart, I have been seperated from my instructor for about 6 years now. I moved from Dallas to a town 3 hours away. I was only with my instructor for less than a year after I got my 2nd, and I spent that year teaching. I never learned the stuff for 3rd before I moved.

since then,I have had to work out on my own, since there is no other TKD here. PLUS even if i had learned the forms for 3rd, the requirements have changed since I was there.

So NO, I dont have my material already, since I have not been there. But I have been teaching my own students in my own school for almost a year now.

Now you might wonder why I wasnt at least attending class every now and then for the past 6 years?

I moved because my mother's husband died, and left her alone, isolated, in poor health, and in pretty serious debt. I am an only child, so there is no one else to take care of her. She couldnt move to where I was, So I HAD to move there.

Part of her health problems is that she suffers from night terrors, if she is alone at night. And she had a heart condition, So I cant stay gone overnight. It is too risky.

It simply isnt feasable for me to drive 6 hours in one day to train.

So I have had to train on my own.

I hope thats a good enough answer for you?
 
Best of luck on your test, TF, and I'm hoping that you find a burst of serious creative energy that lets you come up with a really sharp, imaginative and technically demanding weapon form. Keep us posted on how it's going, yes?
 
Wow, that's quite a deadline...good luck man. If your instructor feels your ready, then I suspect you are. :)

Peace,
Erik
 
Good luck, Twin Fist. I am in a similar situation with my instructor, so I get where you're coming from about the forms.
 
Good luck Twin Fist, I hope you do well.

I do have a question though,

If you haven't seen your instructor in over 6 years, and do not have the requisite material, and do not know your form, and have not actually worked on a new weapons form, why is it that your instructor feels you are ready to test for 3d Dan?
 
Last edited:
i KNEW someone was gonna ask that

in her words:

time in grade alone doesnt do it, if you are not doing anything in the arts

contribution to the arts alone doesnt do it, if you dont have the time in grade

time in grade plus contribution to the arts in the form of starting my own school and actually producing students? Not to mention the training exercises i created.

two kicking sets- not the Parker ones, I created these on my own

two striking sets- same thing

two blocking sets- same thing

a series of two man kata (attacker and defender)

that does make a difference

THATS what i have been doing for the last six years, creating training exercises to make it easier to learn martial arts.

I figure some people will disagree with that, and say "unless you are IN CLASS" you shouldnt test. Maybe for people that dont have a BB yet that might be true.

Not to mention the traditional aspect. I cannot, under the rules I came up under, promote anyone to 1st Black untill i am a 3rd. Thats the rule of the Allen Steen lineage. As a school owner, I will eventually HAVE to have a 3rd since I will eventually HAVE to be able to promote someone to 1st

whats your idea?

should I just promote myself? look up any list of great masters in the past, MOST of them promoted themselves at some point.

should I be forced to hook up with someone local? there are TWO TKD instructors within an hours drive besides me, one does WTF, one does ATA and you people KNOW what I think of that crap. So I should have left my instructor just so I can go to classes from one of the two local people so i can chase rank?

screw that

should I FORCE my students to drive 3 hours to test? thats ridiculous

And just to point out, i did not ask to test. I called my instructor out of respect, to let her know I was testing some students. Thats all. And to let her know I would be at her tourny to help out by judging all day.

She even said if I had asked to test, she wouldnt have tested me.

now, look at all that.

if that isnt a good enough reason she wants to test me, too bad.

Put yourself in my situation, and ask yourself what you would do?
 
TF,

I meant no disrespect. I merely wanted to know why your instructor felt you were ready to test. In your 1st post YOU made it sound as though you were unprepared.

Our instructors are in the same position as you at this time. They test for 3rd in the next few months. Anyone testing for 1st must either make the 6 hour drive to Boston, or test when one of the 3rds or above from Boston come here for a visit.

Our instructors go to Boston to train for a full day on a monthly basis.

By the way......it's an ATA school. They always know what is expected of them, and when it will be expected. No surprises. They have been working steadily for years on their 3rd Test. They are prepared.

Like I said in my first post on this topic, Good Luck, I wish you the best.
 
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First off, John-good luck!

Second off, thanks for answering all those questions-more than adequately, I think-as someone who has been in a similar position.

Third off:


Twin Fist said:
.

Put yourself in my situation, and ask yourself what you would do?
Click to expand...

Stop posting and get to training, my good man.Let us know how it turned out in March!
 
un-prepared? in a sense yes. I have not been "in class" I have not been under the supervision of an instructor. I wasnt even thinking of promotion. It hasnt been an issue for me, as i really dont care about rank.

so in a way, it is fair to say I am un-prepared. Generally, in our system, you have 6 months warning, for BB ranks, not 6 weeks.

Not to mention, in my experience, Dan ranks spend thier time teaching, not working on thier own stuff. Thats why the 6 month warning. To give them time to get boned up on thier stuff.
 
Twin Fist said:
Stuart, I have been seperated from my instructor for about 6 years now.
Click to expand...
Many instructors no longer train at their original club for one reason or another but it doesnt change the fact that if someone doesnt know the required material, then they are not ready to grade! This isnt a dig at you, just a general observation and was a respnse to your OP (as you hadnt posted the rest at that point).

I DO understand your predicament, and have empathy for it as you are not alone - many have been there, including me, however, there is plenty of reference material around to help those who need it and and for an instructor/senior, learning this way isnt so hard and sometimes its the only way. It may not be ideal, but most seniors could easily manage.

Sorry if I came across aggressively.. must have been having a bad day or something when I posted, as students learning forms just to grade (ie. just before) is a little pet peeve of mine.

Stuart
 
Twin Fist said:
Ok,
I got Po Eun down pretty well, starting on Sae Jong
Click to expand...

May I ask what patterns you have to know. I ask as Po-Eun is usually a 1st degree pattern and Se-Jong is a 5th degree pattern (in Ch'ang hon anyway)

Stuart
 
Stuart,
Like I said, part of the reason i dont already know it is because it has changed since I was there, and since i wasnt chasing rank, i didnt worry about it.

Our BB requirements are currently:


Black-Chung Mu and a Bo form
1st Dan- Chul Gi, Bassai, Tae Bek, Koryo, Bo Form 2
2nd Dan-Gae Bek, Kwang Gae, create a bo form
3rd Dan- Po En, Sae Jong, create a weapon kata, demonstrate kata Bunkai
4th Dan- Sam Il, Chong Jang
5th Dan- Ul Ji, Ko Dang
6th Dan- Choi Yung, Tong Il
 
Twin Fist said:
Stuart,
Like I said, part of the reason i dont already know it is because it has changed since I was there, and since i wasnt chasing rank, i didnt worry about it.
Click to expand...
I hear ya!

Black-Chung Mu and a Bo form
1st Dan- Chul Gi, Bassai, Tae Bek, Koryo, Bo Form 2
2nd Dan-Gae Bek, Kwang Gae, create a bo form
3rd Dan- Po En, Sae Jong, create a weapon kata, demonstrate kata Bunkai
4th Dan- Sam Il, Chong Jang
5th Dan- Ul Ji, Ko Dang
6th Dan- Choi Yung, Tong Il
Click to expand...
Wow.. what a strange order (and mix).

Cheers,

Stuart
 
yeah I know, it doesnt make a lot of sense to me, but I am not one to question my instructor over little stuff like that.

Thats the way she wants it, so I go along with it.

Tho I will say that i think Sa Jong is too simple to be a 5th Dan form.
 
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