Heidi Anderson
Mat Wenzel
ENC 2135 0021
14 November 2019
Taekwondo Tenets
Imagine a short, brunette haired little girl with braces being kicked in the middle of her forehead padding over and over again. That was me eleven years ago in a sparring match at Gordon Martial Arts. Gordon Martial Arts has always been a place of comfort for me. It has always been a place that I can go to talk to someone if I need or want to. It is a little martial arts family-owned facility on the main street of my hometown. To me, when I think of taekwondo, I think about how I can always speak to any instructor in the program and feel like I am being listened to, and like I am heard. I can laugh with them. But I also know that I can learn good lessons from them, and I have.
When I was younger, my stutter was really bad. I mean having to repeat my order at the drive through three or four times for them to get it right, type of bad. I could hardly speak a sentence without stammering and struggling my way through it. When I didn’t struggle, it was a miracle. While the speech therapy I went to from elementary school through high school helped me through the challenges of having a stutter a lot, I believe that martial arts helped me even more. When I started going to Gordon Martial Arts, I had no idea what help they would be to my self-esteem and confidence. I had no idea what five words on a wall would do to change my life and the lives of people around me. Courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control, and indomitable spirit took on a new meaning once I was immersed in the taekwondo community. A meaning that I do not believe I would have gathered anywhere else in the world. I met a group of people that are always willing to talk with you about anything, who are emotionally invested in their students, and who will go above and beyond to help their students do what they need to in order to succeed. I walked in with a stutter, and even though I walked out with the same (annoying) stutter, I had gained a lot more confidence in myself. The instructors at Gordon Martial Arts are very accommodating and emotionally invested in their students. One in particular that comes to my mind first is Master Gregory Bledsoe. Master Bledsoe has been someone I have always looked up to and have considered family for a very long time. He has known me since I was eight years old and has watched me grow up. He has never been one to tell you something that you want to hear for the sake of sparing your feelings. Don’t get me wrong, he’s not a mean person. He just always gets straight to the point. But he is also always the first to help you improve. Growing up with him in my life, he has always been very honest with me. He told me when I was doing something wrong, but also told me how to fix it. He came to me and asked me what was wrong when I was feeling upset, and he asked if there was anything he could do to help out with the situation. He made me more confident in myself by giving me constructive criticism, and by praising me when I did not make a mistake. He made me a better martial artist and person by telling me what I was doing wrong but telling me how to fix my mistakes on my own.
With growing up with this kind of person in my life, I grew to love the taekwondo community and everything it has to offer. Every instructor at Gordon Martial Arts is like Master Bledsoe. They are all very warm and welcoming and they do everything they can for their students. This is why I chose to pick this community, because I know that they have a lot to offer people and they do it gladly. I became very interested in how my instructors developed the dojang, and especially in how they used the five tenets, learning more about what exactly they did for the school, and how they are similar to and different from similar texts.
Moving on, there is a text within the community that is extremely influential: the five tenets of taekwondo. Courtesy. Integrity. Perseverance. Self-control. Indomitable spirit. These words are pasted on the wall in big black bold letters above the large mirror on the front wall in the dojang. Only a blind man could miss them. From the outside looking in, they may just look like words on a wall with not much meaning to them, but they carry a lot of weight in the taekwondo community. These words are the guiding influence of taekwondo at Gordon Martial Arts. These tenets are implemented into daily instruction and are mentioned frequently throughout the classes. They are more than just words on a wall. They are the basis of which students learn how to control their mind and bodies through the trials and tribulations of life. My first thought when I thought of this project was to sit down with Master Gregory Bledsoe, a long-time family friend and mentor. I revised my plan slightly and decided to email him questions that I wanted him to answer instead.
One question that I asked him was: What do the tenets do for the students and/or the instructors? His answer was very straightforward. “First of all, the students become more sensitive to the people around them. Second, it helps them develop the characteristics in themselves that they value in their friendships and acquaintances.” (Bledsoe, Gregory. Anderson, Heidi. 2019 October 31, Email.). This reaffirmed my original thought that the tenets are influential to the students. He carried on saying that “I can’t speak for all instructors, but for me and those I train with, it gives us a moral culture/grounding, which is extremely important in a skill that refines your ability to inflict damage upon others.” (Bledsoe, Gregory. Anderson, Heidi. 2019 October 31, Email.). The words that Master Bledsoe gave to me were very confident, honest, and well thought out. When I asked him if students’ behavior was altered within Gordon Martial Arts, he replied by saying “…They show control over their actions that were often missing before they entered our program.” (Bledsoe, Gregory. Anderson, Heidi. 2019 October 31, Email.). With this information, I believe that it is apparent that the tenets are more than just words written on a wall. They help kids to control their actions and think before they speak. The principles of courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control, and indomitable spirit are in all of the students at Gordon Martial Arts. These tenets follow students and instructors not only in their lives within the building, but out into their daily lives as functioning people of society. They teach them how to always be nice to others and to think of others when making decisions. They teach them how to always do the right thing, even when no one is there to see what they do or say. They teach them how to never give up and to always keep pushing ahead no matter how hard the task at hand may be. They teach them how to control themselves and how to express themselves appropriately in situations that push them to their limitations emotionally and physically. They teach them how to never give up and to never stop believing in themselves. Not only do they influence the students themselves, but then the students go on to teach others, either on purpose or subconsciously, how to be more caring, honest, and strong people.
In my community, there are several events that happen throughout the year, and other texts circulating within this community that are influential to everyone involved. A few examples of these events are the Korean Martial Arts Festivals, which occurs in Crestview, tournaments, which happen largely in northern Florida (some of which are held in Crestview as well) and promotion ceremonies that are specific to the students at Gordon Martial Arts and their family members and friends. What all of these events have in common, is that they bring the taekwondo community together to celebrate the skills that have been learned, and the effort put in to learning them. At the Korean Martial Arts Festivals, several highly trained masters come to instruct children from Gordon Martial Arts on different things than they learn in their everyday instruction. They typically teach specific skills and/or movements that are not commonly taught within the dojang itself. This gives the students something new to focus on other than the normal instruction, which makes these events particularly special. When the students gather around world-renowned instructors and are able to learn from them, a sense of respect is brought out from within them. They listen to every word that they speak, and they follow their lead without thinking twice. The tournaments create a space for other dojangs to come together to compete against a panel on a variety of different subject within taekwondo, such as patterns, sparring, and board breaks. These various competitions allow students of taekwondo to compete cordially with others within the community and communicate with others. This gives them a chance to practice the skills that they have acquired by engaging with the martial art and lets them compare themselves to each other in a healthy way that improves their skills and goals. It also rewards those who have worked especially hard and have been deemed the best in their division. At promotion ceremonies at Gordon Martial Arts, family and friends are welcome as students advance onto their next belt. The promotion ceremonies are held in the local police station gathering room, that has a stage, lighting, and plenty of tables and chairs. This event is a time for celebration for the students, families, and friends. Gordon Martial Arts provides food and beverages to everyone and each student receives a spotlight moment as they walk across stage after their name is called out to receive their certificate and new belt. In the spotlight, they are reassured as they are applauded that they have earned their next belt and that all of their hard work that they put into taekwondo has payed off. With all of these events, students are faced with fun and communication all while advancing their knowledge on how to defend themselves. Students grow and learn together in a variety of settings that is healthy to them and that redefines their own meanings of the tenets. During all of these events, students show that the tenets have become a part of their daily lives, with or without recognizing it. Most of which is thanks to the instructors at Gordon Martial Arts that guide them on their path of self-defense.
Gordon Martial Arts is located in downtown Crestview, FL, and has been there since 2003, as stated by their website (gordonmartialarts.com). Master Thomas Gordon and Master Gregory Bledsoe founded it together and have been running it together since its opening. Their goal is to better the community of Crestview and to reach out to children and to help them better themselves. They invest time and effort into the students they have and have the hopes of seeing them grow up and be able to defend themselves while learning life lessons through them, other instructors, and other students. This specific dojang has had a large impact within the taekwondo community, as Master Thomas Gordon is good friends with Grand Master Kwang Sung Hwang, who was a direct student of General Choi Hong Hi, the founder of taekwondo, before he passed. Master Thomas Gordan “has been published, featured, and covered in 100’s of magazines and newspapers” (gordonmartialarts.com). He also has been “featured six times on the cover of Taekwondo Times (TKDT)” (gordonmartialarts.com). He is very well known by several Grand Masters of taekwondo, and so is Master Gregory Bledsoe, as they have travelled together among other taekwondo masters on business trips. Grandmaster Hwang visits the Gordon Martial Arts dojang almost every year to see Master Bledsoe and Master Gordon, and to spend a day instructing the students. All of this to say that most everyone at Gordon’s loves them. Though, every student has their favorite instructor. While taekwondo is all about kicks and punches and blocks and being able to defend yourself, it is also about the connections. It is about being able to have a place to go where you feel heard and where you feel safe. Master Bledsoe and Master Gordon do just that.
Master Bledsoe and Master Gordon make it easy to want to come to class and run around on the mats and exercise. They make it fun and enjoyable. While they talk about why everyone is there, and why we move our bodies in certain ways, they also are personable and talk about their family lives and their doors are always open if someone wants or needs to speak to them about anything whether it’s something serious or just about last night’s football game. They make it very clear that they can be a sounding board, a shoulder to cry on, or someone to talk to if something is going on outside of the dojang. They are strict on the mats when instruction is going on, making sure that the students are doing what they are supposed to be and that they aren’t having so much fun that they aren’t paying attention to what is going on. However, off the mats they are family friends who would give you the shirt off of their backs if need be.
Personally, the tenets have taught me a lot, and have impacting my life in more ways than one. They taught me how to hold myself responsible for my own actions and to understand how they affect other people’s thoughts and feelings. They taught me how (and more importantly) why I should always do the right thing whether I was alone or being watched. They taught me not to give up and how to how to not be angry when someone mocked me for my stutter. While I had learned how to punch someone in the correct manner, the urge to do so was overcome by my sense of self-control and courtesy. Even though it would have been easy to punch the kids in the face that made fun of me, it made me a stronger person when I was able to realize that humans make mistakes and that those kids often have problems of their own that they are likely projecting onto me. When sparring on the mats of Gordon Martial Arts, I was humbled. I walked in believing that martial arts would not be that difficult to do, that it might even be easy. I mean, how hard can it be to punch someone? After I was kicked in my forehead padding among other places a few times, I began to realize the reason I was brought to Gordon Martial Arts, be it by fate or whatever God or almighty entity you choose to believe in. I was brought to Gordon Martial Arts not only to defend myself physically if I ever needed to, but also to defend my mental state and my morals. I learned how to brush aside people’s comments and mockeries. I learned how to control my anger and to walk with confidence and to believe in myself when no one else did. Although, within Gordon Martial Arts, everyone believes in everyone. No one is left behind, and no one is deemed unworthy of support and effort.
In the community, it is evident that the tenets are living within the people. The children say “ma’am” and “sir” to higher authorities. They say “please” and “thank you” to people around them, including their parents. The instructors listen with patience and respect, which in turn leads to others doing the same. The parents sit quietly watching their children learn how to defend themselves with grace and honor. They talk among themselves and compliment other’s children when they do something admirable. The students do not talk over one another (at least not very often) and they are always helping each other and laughing. Even though taekwondo is an art that is meant to inflict harm onto others in the sake of defense, it is also an art that brings people together in a way that may not always be apparent. There is a sense of community in the way the students “bow in” and repeat the tenets before starting class. There is a sense of community in the way that the parents talk together and laugh together. In Gordon Martial Arts, there is an invisible bond between everyone involved. You may not always see it, but everyone supports everyone there in a way that makes everyone feel seen and respected.
At Gordon Martial Arts, there are five tenets that run in the foundation of the building. They are always in the back of students and instructors’ minds. They are always being used and being talked about. They follow everyone within the community outside of the dojang and into their everyday lives. They give everyone involved a tie to each other, one that makes them stronger people. They are all capable of causing a lot of harm to a lot of people based on the skills that they have learned within the walls of Gordon Martial Arts, but they have also learned the meaning of kindness and honor. They instead teach others what it means to be courteous, to have integrity, to be self-disciplined, to be perseverant, and to have an indomitable spirit. They have learned that they can fight if they have to, but that it is not necessary. They have learned that the skills they hold are strong, but that the skill of holding the principles of courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control, and an indomitable spirit, is stronger.
Works Cited:
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