Post by fujicolt on Dec 1, 2010 17:33:03 GMT
here is another small chunk out of another chapter. again i would be most grateful for critiques. I hope you grasp the points i am trying to make here. the remainder of the chapter shows stage three and then diagrammatic examples of how to design and draw up goal orientated study and training plans - with examples.
It is blatantly obvious that Shotokan Karate, as with many other things, will only become a proficient and productive Art for it’s practitioners IF they put the required time and effort into their study and practice.
However, I have often been saddened over the years when I hear Karateka say
‘Oh, I packed in because I wasn’t getting any better, Karate takes too long for you to get any good’.
Invariably examination of the situation shows that they weren’t getting any better because they weren’t putting the required effort in and as a result they reacted to the situation by blaming Karate and not their ‘attend twice a week and never practice otherwise’ approach to what is a very complicated and continually expanding art form.
It is a simple fact that the equation works like this -
- Put little effort in and little progress will be made.
- Put the required effort in and the desired progress can be achieved.
However, this is where the equation can become complicated. Firstly you have to decide exactly what your desired progress is and then you must evaluate what will be required for you to achieve those goals. It sounds simple but actually isn’t and it is the failure to be proactive about planning your ongoing Karate Studies that is often the cause of lack of, or slow, progress.
What then is the solution? It is my belief that the solution is a 3 step process that if followed will enable you to not only plan your intended progress but it will also enable you to systematically check your input and the resulting progress (or lack thereof) in such a clear and logical manner that you can make unambiguous records and therefore adjust things accordingly when required.
I would love to be able to tell you that this process was devised by me but it wasn’t and is actually part of the brainchild of one of the worlds leading task management consultants: Stephen Covey*. I first came upon his work about twenty five years ago and it is, in my opinion, a simple but ingenious process that will aid you to produce the required results if you follow the planning procedure and thereafter put the necessary Karate training and study in. I many years ago adapted this process and I assure y0ou that it is repeatedly productive if adhered to strictly and diligently.
The first step is vital and involves you and you alone so there is no reason for you to lay blame elsewhere if you do not take this first step. Quite simply you have to adopt a proactive mindset and thereafter be vigorously proactive in what you do to get things moving.
Fundamentally this is about choice. You can choose to be proactive and set in motion the required elements that will enhance your karate study, training and subsequent progress or you can do nothing and therefore be reactive to the situation and look for excuses or lay blame elsewhere.
To quote Stephen Covey:
Your life doesn't just "happen." Whether you know it or not, it is carefully designed by you. The choices, after all, are yours. You choose happiness. You choose sadness. You choose decisiveness. You choose ambivalence. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear. Just remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice. And in doing so, it gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results.
Therefore, in terms of your Karate - Be proactive, choose progress and put everything necessary in place to achieve your personal goals. Once you have adopted an a proactive attitude that says I want to achieve x, y and z (whatever that may be for you personally) you can move to the next stage and get things moving. Then once you have things in motion the third stage kicks in and the results will come.
Being Proactive about your karate is about taking responsibility for your study and training. It is useless setting goals if you then do not carry out everything necessary to achieve them. You must choose to take control of things and in doing so you must not allow anything to unnecessarily divert you or stop you from actioning your carefully considered plans.
It is important that you do not misunderstand me here. I am not suggesting you become an obsessive fanatic that fails to prioritise and goes to the training weekend (because it is in his/her training plan!) when he/she should have accompanied their child to the hospital after the road accident!
Your planning to achieve your goals must firstly give full consideration to the fact that Karate must always be what it is - a worthwhile and fulfilling activity that is within an appropriate hierarchy of importance in your life.
I would strongly suggest that part of your goal setting and subsequent action planning must be discussion with your nearest and dearest to ensure that there is support for your aims and plans. This is not a small point and I have far more than once witnessed relationships becoming strained or even broken due to selfishly high levels of karate participation by certain Karateka who prioritised wrongly. It must be given deep and clear thought and attention. In fact it may be a good time to encourage them to start training also.
Once you have established your proactive attitude you can then move positively forward to stage 2.
‘If you know your goals you will come to know
your role in achieving those goals’
At this second stage you must begin with the end in mind. That is to say you must take the time to think deeply about exactly what you wish to achieve with your karate study. This is, of course, a very personal process and it is important that you set high targets that are worthy of your forthcoming sustained effort but are also realistic. Again a seemingly simple process at first glance but it is not in reality.
I strongly recommend that you do not set yourself too many short term targets. Good Karate is born out of diligent study and effort over long periods of time that allow each factor to become a natural and ‘’mind and body trained’ ability. There are no quick fix solutions and that is a fact. Karate is a well prepared and slowly cooked meal - it is not a microwaveable TV Dinner.
It is important at this stage that you understand that goal setting for Karate must not be a case of aiming at a single goal. Instead you must set a range of goals that are part of a logical and progressive course of action that will create a synergistic process when the accumulated gains begin to gel. The reason for this is quite simple, karate is a very complex activity that requires attention to a vast array of mental and physical factors. By setting goals that allow you to (grade appropriately) give attention to a wide number of factors you will find that the sum of the whole does become greater than the sum of the parts.
It is also important for you to realise that there are factors that will, for all Karateka, be important even though they are themselves not directly karate. (please see Chapter: Primary and Secondary Elements).
A simple example could be Body and Limb Suppleness. A factor that greatly influences our karate abilities. Therefore you may choose as one of your goals -
‘I will improve my body and limb suppleness’
Please note that the aimed for goal is not written as a desire, meaning ‘I want to’. No, you must have a proactive attitude and set your mind positively = ‘I will‘.
Even small approaches to the process such as the wording of your ‘Mission Statement/s’ are very important because they set a tone to the whole procedure that is clear and decisive. This approach is not only helpful to success but is also the required mindset that Karateka must develop anyway if they are to be proficient. Thus the synergistic process begins!
Other example goals could be -
sorry guys that's yer lot for now
BE PROACTIVE NOT REACTIVE -
SETTING TRAINING AND STUDY GOALS
SETTING TRAINING AND STUDY GOALS
It is blatantly obvious that Shotokan Karate, as with many other things, will only become a proficient and productive Art for it’s practitioners IF they put the required time and effort into their study and practice.
However, I have often been saddened over the years when I hear Karateka say
‘Oh, I packed in because I wasn’t getting any better, Karate takes too long for you to get any good’.
Invariably examination of the situation shows that they weren’t getting any better because they weren’t putting the required effort in and as a result they reacted to the situation by blaming Karate and not their ‘attend twice a week and never practice otherwise’ approach to what is a very complicated and continually expanding art form.
It is a simple fact that the equation works like this -
- Put little effort in and little progress will be made.
- Put the required effort in and the desired progress can be achieved.
However, this is where the equation can become complicated. Firstly you have to decide exactly what your desired progress is and then you must evaluate what will be required for you to achieve those goals. It sounds simple but actually isn’t and it is the failure to be proactive about planning your ongoing Karate Studies that is often the cause of lack of, or slow, progress.
What then is the solution? It is my belief that the solution is a 3 step process that if followed will enable you to not only plan your intended progress but it will also enable you to systematically check your input and the resulting progress (or lack thereof) in such a clear and logical manner that you can make unambiguous records and therefore adjust things accordingly when required.
I would love to be able to tell you that this process was devised by me but it wasn’t and is actually part of the brainchild of one of the worlds leading task management consultants: Stephen Covey*. I first came upon his work about twenty five years ago and it is, in my opinion, a simple but ingenious process that will aid you to produce the required results if you follow the planning procedure and thereafter put the necessary Karate training and study in. I many years ago adapted this process and I assure y0ou that it is repeatedly productive if adhered to strictly and diligently.
The first step is vital and involves you and you alone so there is no reason for you to lay blame elsewhere if you do not take this first step. Quite simply you have to adopt a proactive mindset and thereafter be vigorously proactive in what you do to get things moving.
Fundamentally this is about choice. You can choose to be proactive and set in motion the required elements that will enhance your karate study, training and subsequent progress or you can do nothing and therefore be reactive to the situation and look for excuses or lay blame elsewhere.
To quote Stephen Covey:
Your life doesn't just "happen." Whether you know it or not, it is carefully designed by you. The choices, after all, are yours. You choose happiness. You choose sadness. You choose decisiveness. You choose ambivalence. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear. Just remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice. And in doing so, it gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results.
Therefore, in terms of your Karate - Be proactive, choose progress and put everything necessary in place to achieve your personal goals. Once you have adopted an a proactive attitude that says I want to achieve x, y and z (whatever that may be for you personally) you can move to the next stage and get things moving. Then once you have things in motion the third stage kicks in and the results will come.
Being Proactive about your karate is about taking responsibility for your study and training. It is useless setting goals if you then do not carry out everything necessary to achieve them. You must choose to take control of things and in doing so you must not allow anything to unnecessarily divert you or stop you from actioning your carefully considered plans.
It is important that you do not misunderstand me here. I am not suggesting you become an obsessive fanatic that fails to prioritise and goes to the training weekend (because it is in his/her training plan!) when he/she should have accompanied their child to the hospital after the road accident!
Your planning to achieve your goals must firstly give full consideration to the fact that Karate must always be what it is - a worthwhile and fulfilling activity that is within an appropriate hierarchy of importance in your life.
I would strongly suggest that part of your goal setting and subsequent action planning must be discussion with your nearest and dearest to ensure that there is support for your aims and plans. This is not a small point and I have far more than once witnessed relationships becoming strained or even broken due to selfishly high levels of karate participation by certain Karateka who prioritised wrongly. It must be given deep and clear thought and attention. In fact it may be a good time to encourage them to start training also.
Once you have established your proactive attitude you can then move positively forward to stage 2.
‘If you know your goals you will come to know
your role in achieving those goals’
At this second stage you must begin with the end in mind. That is to say you must take the time to think deeply about exactly what you wish to achieve with your karate study. This is, of course, a very personal process and it is important that you set high targets that are worthy of your forthcoming sustained effort but are also realistic. Again a seemingly simple process at first glance but it is not in reality.
I strongly recommend that you do not set yourself too many short term targets. Good Karate is born out of diligent study and effort over long periods of time that allow each factor to become a natural and ‘’mind and body trained’ ability. There are no quick fix solutions and that is a fact. Karate is a well prepared and slowly cooked meal - it is not a microwaveable TV Dinner.
It is important at this stage that you understand that goal setting for Karate must not be a case of aiming at a single goal. Instead you must set a range of goals that are part of a logical and progressive course of action that will create a synergistic process when the accumulated gains begin to gel. The reason for this is quite simple, karate is a very complex activity that requires attention to a vast array of mental and physical factors. By setting goals that allow you to (grade appropriately) give attention to a wide number of factors you will find that the sum of the whole does become greater than the sum of the parts.
It is also important for you to realise that there are factors that will, for all Karateka, be important even though they are themselves not directly karate. (please see Chapter: Primary and Secondary Elements).
A simple example could be Body and Limb Suppleness. A factor that greatly influences our karate abilities. Therefore you may choose as one of your goals -
‘I will improve my body and limb suppleness’
Please note that the aimed for goal is not written as a desire, meaning ‘I want to’. No, you must have a proactive attitude and set your mind positively = ‘I will‘.
Even small approaches to the process such as the wording of your ‘Mission Statement/s’ are very important because they set a tone to the whole procedure that is clear and decisive. This approach is not only helpful to success but is also the required mindset that Karateka must develop anyway if they are to be proficient. Thus the synergistic process begins!
Other example goals could be -
sorry guys that's yer lot for now