Valuing the Black Belt

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A very subjective process and yet one commonality drives the value of a black belt - the degree of pain and suffering a person is voluntarily “willing” to go through to give the black belt they wear its intrinsic value.

A black belt signifies the results of our personal self-test. You see, it is about testing oneself and the harder and the more painful and the more challenging and so on the greater the end value of the black belt is to us. Even when we don’t truly know the requirements it is about the feeling we get as humans before, think trepidation and apprehension, during, think about the duration of extreme difficulties that provide pain both mental and especially physical similar to the trials and tribulations of say being a special forces military person, and then after, the feelings of accomplishments and the how you feel when you found you could do and go further then anything you have felt during your entire life. 

It is things like this that provide our human minds value such as winning the pennant in Baseball or the ring in Football for champions, etc. The value of it all depends on just how long, how much you can and do endure and the challenges involving all sorts of pain, agony, blood, sweat and tears. When all is said and done, that is of value to the individual as it is of value to the group…karate-ka and dojo and dojo-mates!

Lets not quibble on this, if you do the minimum and feel accomplishment while donning the black belt this then has value to you; i you do the maximum and beyond that leads you through all the above while you are donning the black belt this then has value to you. Yet, when all is said and done and each person then does something else completely human, compares with others as were are bound by nature to do, the value to one diminishes while the other gains more value. It is why we humans tend to compete in everything, right? 

• You completed the requirements to basically qualify for your black belt, does that make you feel good about your accomplishments?
• You completed not just the basic requirements, you went so far beyond that and endured so many days, weeks, months and years of self-challenging above what you thought could be, types of challenges and not just completed it but did so with distinction recognized by all your peers, does this make you feel good about your accomplishments? 
• Which would you choose if you could to achieve the value of a black belt? Choose wisely one very good black belt told me, I did!

Research and experts tell us in their findings as you can imagine that humans give greater value to those things that require a considerable bit of hard work, a greater deal of sweat equity, a lot of concerted time and effort beyond what is thought of as ability and a lot of pain, blood and tears - physically, mentally and philosophically - that is what provides value to everything including the value of one’s black belt. 

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