"This is NOT about ME! This. Is. NOT. About. ME. We are all equals here! Jump in and talk to the students! This will only work if we all put our own way of teaching and explaining into this! Even if only one kid gets it, that is one more kid who is going to get better!"
-Master Mark Williams
"It's about training your mind! I can train your body until I am blue in the face, but that's not what this is about. Anyone can train their body. You have to train your mind!"
-Master Mark William
About ten years ago, when I first began to seriously learn Olympic Taekwondo, Master Mark Williams would hold these Regional Center of Excellence (RCE) seminars to bring together students from different schools to work together. I went to one tournament only and I did very well, but I knew I needed to really get comfortable sparring. So a family friend, Pete Crespo, told us about this guy named Mark Williams and it would be a great experience. So my mother and Aunt Karen would drive me to the different schools Master Williams would hold the seminars.
It's funny because a lot of the people who I know to this day I met at these seminars a decade ago. Recently, my friend Carlos put a video of the very first seminar I went to up on my Facebook wall. I met almost the entire crew of whom I still speak to today at that very seminar. But it was a great experience not only to do sparring but the camaraderie that was built among the students who attended was fantastic. It built uniformity and everyone was there to help each other.
The last of these seminars I went to was four years ago. It was at the end of "the old era" for me and just entering my new one. A few weeks ago, I got a phone call from Master Williams, saying that a few masters and their students were getting together at a local dojang to kick around. So I went this past week with a couple of students. It was great. A lot of us (us meaning the Taekwondo coaches and school owners) run into the problem where our students get too used to sparring the same people from our schools and not have enough variety of bodies and age groups of people for them to spar. This was a great experience for them and I of course took part as a student in the seminar as well. Lead by example.
Mark Williams is a phenomenal educator. He relates to the students very well, and to all the age groups. He uses association when speaking to us, and he encourages questions saying "There is no such thing as a stupid question!". Sometimes he comes off very strong and one can easily be a little intimidated but he does what any great educator would do: he holds you accountable. He asks the right questions, he makes sure everyone is paying attention, he makes sure you see your mistakes so you don't make them again. He leaves out the right words in his sentences for us to fill in, so we can apply what we are learning. He gets us to think, and he gets us to understand.
Master Williams is a lot like my old master and something I am very much too. He is studious! He studies and studies and studies! He watches, he writes, he takes notes, and I was thrilled to hear some things he says that I say to my students! If they don't listen to me, maybe they'll listen to him! And Master Williams does NOT need to be the center of attention. He continuously said to myself and the other coaches "This is NOT about ME! This. Is. Not. About. Me. We are all equals here! Jump in and talk to the students! This will only work if we all put our own way of teaching and explaining into this! Even if only one kid gets it, that is one more kid who is going to get better!"
That's the goal. No personal agendas, just TEAMWORK. Working together to make our students better. To build that camaraderie among the students that is so beneficial for the students, and keeps the spirit of martial arts alive. Master Williams at one point pointed to all the coaches (me included) saying, "We've all known each other a very long time. That's what is so cool about Taekwondo! You'll make friends for the rest of your life." It's so true. My truest, most loyal, and longest lasting friends were all through martial arts.
At the end of the seminar, I was happy to see my students mingling with the other students, and I got a chance to talk to some of the other people I got to spar and met, and the other coaches. We want to continue keeping these sessions up as best we can. Master Williams is a great leader, and a great leader gets other people to lead. I respect him very much. As I sit back and reflect, it's so funny how now with my own school, and making great strides to move forward in my training toward masterhood, how these great characters come back and the old spirit resides with the new. Training every week at Master Bardatsos and sparring with Steven Lin made me think about this. But getting that phone call from Master Williams and being at one of these seminars as a school owner now, it's so coincide-al.
I am looking forward to bringing my students to these seminars and continuing to bring schools together to really make a nice thing going once again like in the old days, and even better! I feel a very good year coming along.
Yours in service,
ANDREW TRENTO
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