Ms. Chinmayee Chalamalasetti - Thanks for my Grandfather’s Advice

1st Dan Thesis
By Chinmayee Chalamalasetti

I started Taekwon-Do almost 6 years ago. When I started, I didn’t truly understand the value of Taekwon-Do and I was only participating because I thought it was fun and my friends were doing it too. But as many people do, I hit a point in my Taekwon-Do career where training was getting tougher and the expectations were higher and I wasn’t seeing results fast enough. I wanted to quit, so I begged my parents to let me stop. Obviously, my parents didn’t want to hear it so I went to my grandparents who happened to be living with us at the time and tried to convince them to let my parents let me quit. My grandfather made me sit down and asked me why I thought my parents wanted me to keep doing Taekwon-Do. I think I told him I thought it was because they wanted to ruin my life. He just smiled and said that back in India, he had known people that had been assaulted, that maybe if they had been able to protect themselves, they wouldn’t have been in those situations. He said that ever since I had started Taekwon-Do, I had become more focused and aware of my surroundings. I had been more dedicated to my work without my even realizing it. And most importantly, he wanted to ensure that I would be able to protect myself if I ever needed to. There have been many memorable moments in my training that have inspired me to continue when I was on the verge of quitting.

Most recently, I had come back from a 1 year long vacation - 3 months of the summer in India and the whole school year- and coming back to Taekwon-Do as a red belt when the expectations of your performance are high was really difficult and it forced me to face what really mattered to me when it comes to Taekwon-Do. I am doing this for the black belt or am I doing it to learn valuable skills that could potentially save my life? I realized that if I was just doing this for the black belt then I might as well just quit because I wasn’t gaining Taekwon-Do. For an hour, I get put aside all my worries, stress, and problems and I get to focus on one thing. This is why I specifically love patterns. For the time when you’re doing your pattern, executing move after move after move is the only thing on your mind. Taekwon-Do clears your head and calms you and you come back into the world, more ready than ever to conquer your own personal challenges. I also chose to stay because of the people here and the unrelenting support and sense of community.

Of course, it wasn’t easy to come back after a long break and immediately make friendships when some of the friendships at the studio have existed for years. But the people here support each other and you can feel that in the studio. It’s why Jue’s Taekwon-Do has so many gold-medalists and World Champions, because we help build each other up rather than the jealous sense of competition some of my friends face at other martial arts studios. I also stayed because of commitment. Perseverance is one of the tenets of Taekwon-Do that I have trouble applying in my real life. I hate to admit it but sometimes when things get tough, I quit like I quit music in 9th grade. But the real world beyond high school and college requires commitment. And I had come this far in my Taekwon-Do journey. I had faced a lot of hardship and moments where it would have been easier to quit and move on to something else. But perseverance means that you stay with something through thick and thin. It doesn’t matter how tough it gets but you always have to get back up and keep going. Moments when it was extremely tough to remember patterns when I came back after a year or when I lost my flexibility or when I would get easily beat during sparring competitions. I could have thrown the towel down and walked away. But I forced myself to commit to this, to commit to learning Taekwon-Do even when it's easier to quit. Taekwon-Do has taught me a lot about myself and life in general. It has pushed me farther than I thought I could ever go. Running during Saturday class is basically torture for me but I kept forcing myself to put one foot forward, then another, then another. It has shown me that you should never do things because they are easy but because they are difficult. These are the things that made me commit to Taekwon-Do and have eventually brought me to this stage in my Taekwon-Do journey.