Beating the Blues ..

Perhaps I should entitle this blog ... SO YOU WANNA BE A PURPLE BELT? If this is the case, be careful what you wish for.The nicest rank of all is WHITE Belt - there's no pressure, no wild and crazy expectations .... there's just training and learning. Oh, what a nice place to be!
Once you get blue belt around your waist, the pressure starts to mount. The blue belt is supposed to innoculate you against all white belt efforts ... and then, there's the dreaded purple belt. To be a purple belt is easy ... just tap out all of the blue belts! maybe on a good day, this is an achievable task ... but on other days, it can be a challenging task indeed. Those pesky blues are getting better each year.
jean Jacques Machado told me something one day, that really stuck in my head; he said "Always remember - we are NOT Supermen. Somedays we win, sometimes we lose ... and sometimes we lose to even white belts."
it is my belief that the pressures we experience as we work our way up through the ranks - are largely, self-imposed. We are, after all ... only human.
JBW