How long does it take to get a black belt?

[Jiffy]

I see what you mean bushido_man. In the end, it is all the about the individual and their mentality. No particular art's system or outlook on progress is "wrong", as long as the students remain students.

That is a good approach. However, I would maybe say that practitioners remain practitioners. But, I do agree that masters can still be students, but some don't see themselves that way.

Then I would say this. If a master no longer considers themselves a student, they are no longer a master.

[Jiffy]

I see what you mean bushido_man. In the end, it is all the about the individual and their mentality. No particular art's system or outlook on progress is "wrong", as long as the students remain students.

That is a good approach. However, I would maybe say that practitioners remain practitioners. But, I do agree that masters can still be students, but some don't see themselves that way.

Same concept. No matter who you are, you should always be a student. There will always be someone who has advanced farther along the path than you have. Find that person and learn from them. If you can't learn, you can't teach.

I agree, except for the fact that you need to find someone higher to learn from. I believe that as you progress, you learn to self-teach. You learn to research and also to discover things for yourself. I don't believe a mentor is required for you to learn more.

[Jiffy]

I'd be leary of any master that didn't still consider themself a student. If your no longer learning anything, then your journey is over.

I find that very all-or-nothing thinking oriented and don't agree with it because it is too absolute of a concept. People don't operate in absolutes - they just think in them.

There are plenty of people who are still learning things who might not consider themselves "students" necessarily of another person but who might consider themselves "students" of a field of knowledge. There are plenty of people who have outgrown the need to have a mentor out there. In almost every field of endeavor, people "graduate" eventually to become experts in their own right.

It is only due to Japanese cultural influences, for the most part, that so many martial artists believe that if they are not attached to some greater organization or calling someone else "Sensei" that they are not really working their thing.

I've done Shotokan for a long time. I don't know everything little thing about it, but I long passed the point when my learning curve was steep, and I find it more stimulating to look elsewhere for things to learn. Mostly, when I learn new things about Shotokan, they are pretty small things and I'm not particularly impressed to have learned them.

But right now I find Shito-Ryu and Goju-Ryu kata fascinating, and I am enjoying learning their technical methods and learning more about where Shotokan's highly modernized system came from.

So, I still consider myself to be learning - learning is fun. But let's not be so bold that we assert that martial arts are like rocket science and that they are bottomless pits of information. That's mostly just a warm and fuzzy platitude - it doesn't really play out on the floor where many very intelligent long-time experts yawn hearing the same old speeches and performing the same old kata over and over again for decades and yearn to do something a little different.

So you reached a level in which your considered an expert in Shotokan, and what did you do? You became a student of other things. If your learning something from someone else, regardless of what you want to call it (its just symantics), your a student, plain and simple.

That's not a narrow minded way of looking at things, its exactly the opposite. I can't be the expert at everything, and it is my, as well as just about every other human on the face of the planet, wish to attempt to learn new things. Unless of course you want to take what you've learned so far, and lock yourself away from the rest of the world with it, never to return. Everyone is always a student in something, or we cease to have drive to do anything that we haven't already done.

I agree with the whole mentor thing (hahaha, check my previous post), but what I don't agree with is the whole "Non-Bottomless pit" idea. Martial Arts have been formed by hundreds of people in many countries at the same time over thousands of years. If you think you can learn all that in one lifetime, you have a somewhat different view than I do.

[Jiffy]

I'd be leary of any master that didn't still consider themself a student. If your no longer learning anything, then your journey is over.

I find that very all-or-nothing thinking oriented and don't agree with it because it is too absolute of a concept. People don't operate in absolutes - they just think in them.

There are plenty of people who are still learning things who might not consider themselves "students" necessarily of another person but who might consider themselves "students" of a field of knowledge. There are plenty of people who have outgrown the need to have a mentor out there. In almost every field of endeavor, people "graduate" eventually to become experts in their own right.

It is only due to Japanese cultural influences, for the most part, that so many martial artists believe that if they are not attached to some greater organization or calling someone else "Sensei" that they are not really working their thing.

I've done Shotokan for a long time. I don't know everything little thing about it, but I long passed the point when my learning curve was steep, and I find it more stimulating to look elsewhere for things to learn. Mostly, when I learn new things about Shotokan, they are pretty small things and I'm not particularly impressed to have learned them.

But right now I find Shito-Ryu and Goju-Ryu kata fascinating, and I am enjoying learning their technical methods and learning more about where Shotokan's highly modernized system came from.

So, I still consider myself to be learning - learning is fun. But let's not be so bold that we assert that martial arts are like rocket science and that they are bottomless pits of information. That's mostly just a warm and fuzzy platitude - it doesn't really play out on the floor where many very intelligent long-time experts yawn hearing the same old speeches and performing the same old kata over and over again for decades and yearn to do something a little different.

So you reached a level in which your considered an expert in Shotokan, and what did you do? You became a student of other things. If your learning something from someone else, regardless of what you want to call it (its just symantics), your a student, plain and simple.

That's not a narrow minded way of looking at things, its exactly the opposite. I can't be the expert at everything, and it is my, as well as just about every other human on the face of the planet, wish to attempt to learn new things. Unless of course you want to take what you've learned so far, and lock yourself away from the rest of the world with it, never to return. Everyone is always a student in something, or we cease to have drive to do anything that we haven't already done.

Exactly. There are actually many instructors out there that fit into this category. They reach a certain level of competence and knowledge in their one art and think that is all there is. They are more happy being a big fish in their little pond than stepping out of their little comfort zone and really embracing the arts as a whole. How unfortunate that these people are permitted to teach others.

[Syphax]

I see what you mean bushido_man. In the end, it is all the about the individual and their mentality. No particular art's system or outlook on progress is "wrong", as long as the students remain students.

That is a good approach. However, I would maybe say that practitioners remain practitioners. But, I do agree that masters can still be students, but some don't see themselves that way.

Same concept. No matter who you are, you should always be a student. There will always be someone who has advanced farther along the path than you have. Find that person and learn from them. If you can't learn, you can't teach.

I agree, except for the fact that you need to find someone higher to learn from. I believe that as you progress, you learn to self-teach. You learn to research and also to discover things for yourself. I don't believe a mentor is required for you to learn more.

This is true as well. Especially after a long time in training, self-mentoring comes into play. However, for most Masters, they are affiliated with at least one or two higher ranked Masters who they can, at the very least, have a lesson with a few times a year.

[Rick_72]

This is true as well. Especially after a long time in training, self-mentoring comes into play. However, for most Masters, they are affiliated with at least one or two higher ranked Masters who they can, at the very least, have a lesson with a few times a year.

Exactly, and you don't even have to call it a lesson. Its more of those guys just getting together to do a little training with each other and sharing ideas.

[24fightingchickens]

Especially after a long time in training, self-mentoring comes into play. However, for most Masters, they are affiliated with at least one or two higher ranked Masters who they can, at the very least, have a lesson with a few times a year.

That's not really how we tend to look at it - at least not in my experience with the other high-ranking guys that I am friends with. In fact I have never heard anyone with long years of serious training ever use the word "master" to refer to anyone else or themselves. Instead we tend to view one another as colleagues with different interests, experiences, and things to share.

In my corner of the martial arts world (Japanese Karate) what we tend to do is get together and spend hours teaching each other kata we learned from other systems, older versions of the kata we found via Okinawan or Chinese arts, or applications of the kata we either came up with or found someone else in possession of. We also share our professional expertise from outside the martial arts with one another - but it isn't like a class.

It's like two friends getting together to trade baseball cards. After a certain point as you age and gain experience, the whole thing where you are looking to someone for parental mentoring really doesn't fly any longer.

My point was that when I am in a Shotokan training situation, I'm not really looking to anyone as my instructor. I might be interested in some tidbit here and there that some other people think, but mostly I have my own ideas, and I'm not really interested in someone else moving my punch 2" to the left or telling me I turn my foot out too quickly. I'm way past caring about that kind of thing.

The guys who insist on a hierarchical relationship tend to be less experienced and thus feel the need for that kind of thing in order to have the sensation of being "authentic" - or they tend to be really controlling jerks who just cannot accept that other people are as experienced as they are - but with different experiences.

Again, I recommend reading about Situational Leadership. You guys in this thread would LEARN a lot from a book on that. As people develop a skill area, their needs from their leaders change, and giving the wrong kind of leadership only drives them away rather than helping them to develop. At the highest levels of development - the self-motivated high achiever - controlling direction tends to be highly ineffective.

One of the reasons Karate associations tend to self-destruct repeatedly is, I believe, because the leaders usually fail to acknowledge when their members have joined them as colleagues. They try to keep them as students forever, instead of recognizing "graduation" and maturity. As a result, people leave in order to find independence and get out from under the smothering "help" from Sensei.

It is exactly the same thing that happens when you grow up at home. At some point, having your mom bathe you is inappropriate. At some point, having your father ride with you when you drive is inappropriate. At some point, having your parents pay your bills is inappropriate. Eventually, it is human nature to become competent and seek independence. We can either recognize that fact of human life, accept it, and leverage it, or we can get involved in the dysfunctional pursuit of being a dependent child in the martial arts forever.

So, I don't "take classes" in Goju-Ryu. I just have a friend show me some stuff, and I try it out for myself and with him. I don't call my friend "Sensei." I call him "dude." I don't bow to him and beg his mercy for a good class. I say, "Cool. See you next week? K. My best to your wife."

It's like we played golf together.

[Brandon Fisher]

There are plenty out there that do refer to themsleves as master. I have masters rank but don't use it. Even on my rank certificates it reads shihan in kanji and thats only because the japanese calligpher almost insisted on it. In fact she wanted to Hanshi but I said no.

[24fightingchickens]

There are plenty out there that do refer to themsleves as master.

Unfortunately, you're right, but none of the folks I know do that.

I have masters rank but don't use it.

I don' think there is such a thing as a "master's rank." Above the 4th dan or so, in most organizations ranks are purely political.

Even on my rank certificates it reads shihan.

Shihan = teacher in Japanese. It is the kanji used to write the word teacher. You call others "sensei" personally, you refer to yourself as a "kyoushi" verbally, and you write "Shihan" when you are preparing legal documents.

師範 【しはん】 (adj-na,n) instructor; (fencing) teacher; model; (P)

先生 【せんせい】 (n) (1) teacher; master; doctor; (suf) (2) with names of teachers, etc. as an honorific; (P)

教師 【きょうし】 (n) teacher (classroom); (P)

Shihan doesn't mean "master." Just teacher or instructor.

[Brandon Fisher]

Thanks.

I agree the masters rank thing is very political.