Black Belt Determination

Will the bio of any successful person describe them as someone who gives up when the going gets hard? Someone who always sets goals but seldom follows through? This amazing person got to greatness because all they ever really wanted to do was sit in their bedroom, play video games, and not talk to anyone?

Of course not.

So that leaves the question: What is determination? Is it like height or hair color? Or is it a muscle—a skill that can be gained and grown?

By now, I’m sure you’ve figured this out. You were only born with things like your height and hair color. No, determination is not something you have or don’t have. Determination is something you build, just like your arm strength for a push-up.

The Path to Determination

The path to black belt is specifically designed to build a student’s determination.

The goals and accomplishments are easy at first. Those first couple of belts and easy board breaks ignite a fire of confidence within a student. Just watch the faces of new students when they break a board—you can physically see the feeling of Wow, I can do this! come across their faces. (It actually shows up even stronger in older adults.)

The confidence gained when a student sets a goal and achieves it becomes sticky. It’s not something that goes away easily and usually leads a student to want more. Then the next break and the next belt become a little harder.

I like to compare this process to boiling water on a stove. For a brand-new student, it’s like the flame is at the lowest setting—just a little heat to get it going. Then, with each belt, the flame turns up just a little bit. By the time a student is getting ready for black belt, they’re at full boil.

Too often in life, we jump in with both feet and then judge ourselves harshly for not achieving a goal. It’s like trying to draw a flower once and giving up because it doesn’t look perfect. However, if you give someone something easy to draw, like a stick figure, and say, “Wow, you’re pretty good at this! Now let’s draw something a little harder,” you’re building their confidence.

Similarly, by building a student’s confidence early, you can build their drive and feed their determination to be better.

After all, determination is really a memory:

I have faced challenges before and conquered them. I’m not giving up this time. I broke that board on the first try at my white belt test—I should be able to do that now.

Building Determination: Making Students Thirsty for Success

When building determination in your student, we follow a guideline based on an old saying:

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink; however, you can make him thirsty.

When a student breaks an easy board or gets a high five for good effort, we are building a connection between work and reward. We are making them thirsty for more accomplishments—more broken boards, more high fives. But as they progress, the boards get a little harder each time, and the instructor gives out fewer and fewer high fives.

At first, we give the student a taste of success, showing them what it feels like. This leaves them thirsty for more. Then we slowly make it harder and harder.

For example, as they progress through the belts the skills become more and more difficult. The first 3 WTSDA forms follow the same pattern with the same number of moves—only 20. Then the next set of forms start to do all sorts of different things. As they progress past these forms, they will learn a form with 52 moves.

Every time a student earns a new belt, they unlock a new challenge. We are always building on success to help them keep wanting more.

Ready to help your child grow their determination and confidence?
True Balance Karate is here to guide them every step of the way.

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