Why I teach

There are many reasons why I teach. Maybe because I’m too old to do anything else in karate; I have no aspirations to become a fighting or kata champion (besides, my house probably wouldn’t be big enough to display all the trophies!). Maybe it’s just because I like the sound of my own voice. Or maybe it’s because of this article I wrote for the Herald Island Causeway newsletter back in 2006 to advertise the start of the SKUHD class:

“I feel somewhat compelled to teach karate out of a desire to extend the lineage that flows from my teacher, Sensei Paul Masters, and from his teachers in turn. This lineage, I have only recently discovered through an exchange of letters, is far broader and much closer to the origins of modern-day karate in the UK than I realized.

“So there is now a degree of obligation to forge a new link in the lineage chain by way of transmission to others. I would never have learnt karate if my teacher had not set up a class and taught me, so it would be remiss of me if I did not offer the same opportunity to others.”

It’s that last sentence that I have to remind myself of, it means that I couldn’t allow it to stop with me, regardless of how unqualified I might have felt.

“If not me, then who? If not now, then when?”

So please remember the challenge I have laid down before you on a number of occasions now; your mission is to become a better teacher than me, for that is the only way that karate can continue. If not you, then who?

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