My first martial arts trainer informed me, “you at all times must be prepared for a take a look at.” I used to be in my 20’s and life was free and simple. I believed he merely meant I ought to at all times be able to be examined for my subsequent belt rank, it might occur anytime. In truth, my Black Belt take a look at was a shock. I walked into the dojo, become my uniform and commenced practising as normal. Earlier than I knew it, he was placing me via my paces in way more rigorous methods than the standard sweaty class rituals of throws and tumbles. Within the midst of all of it I noticed, “that is my black belt take a look at.”
I handed that take a look at and this refined and sometimes undetected lesson has stayed with me all through my life. I, like all of us, encounter a number of assessments alongside our approach. Typically day-after-day has greater than I can bear. Typically it appears years go by the place life simply ticks alongside in common methods with no testing required. Once they come, typically like with my black belt I acknowledge them as such, typically I don’t. Typically I go them, typically I don’t.
You do not want me to spell out this metaphor for you. This can be a take a look at. That is our large take a look at, possible the most important certainly one of our collective lifetime. Nobody informed us it was coming now, however right here we’re, right here it’s. We’re all on the mat having circumstances flung at us in unpredictable and unprecedented methods. There shall be and are already a number of passes and fails alongside the best way. When class is over, when the take a look at is over, what is going to our rank be?
And extra primarily what’s our take a look at proper now? It’s positively completely different for every of us. For the well being care staff, for the musicians, for the grocery retailer stockers, for the UPS drivers, for the politicians, for the tai chi academics, for these already affected by sickness, abuse, loneliness, it’s completely different. It’s simple to really feel we have now no energy to go and even to fail or to even take this take a look at. It’s so far out of our coaching. What does go or fail even imply proper now?
It isn’t for me to outline what this take a look at is. What’s mine to know is that whereas I acknowledge the a part of my humanity that’s freaked out, scared, and overwhelmed with nervousness, I additionally acknowledge these emotions as my examination. Do I wish to reside there? Are these the emotions I wish to take into battle with me? No. Then, what does my coaching inform me? My coaching tells me, appropriate! I have no idea what the longer term holds. My coaching really jogs my memory I by no means did know. My coaching teaches me to not ignore my emotions and the circumstances, however to deliberately discover methods to maneuver with them. To search for choices and potentialities inside the present scenario. I’m certain I’m not the one one who has thought of this Chinese language time period: 危機, Disaster/Alternative.
My coaching additionally tells me to maintain my coronary heart/thoughts and physique versatile. To maintain either side of the current second coin. So, day-after-day, I permit my humanity its yin and its yang. I really feel my emotions, I take note of the circumstances, however I additionally hold transferring. I hold sharing. And I deliberately search for magnificence. I deliberately search for methods of supporting others. I deliberately permit different folks’s generosity and like to help me. Is that this my take a look at? Sure, I consider it’s.
When historical past is written about this time, what is going to our rank be? By doing what we are able to to help our personal and others’ well being and well-being, by merely connecting with one another, by staying or changing into sort, by committing to or going deeper into our practices of grounding and flexibility, maybe we’ll on the very least keep on the mat. Maybe if we breathe in and breathe out we’ll keep in mind we’re human and certainly, we may very well have all the abilities we have to not solely survive this take a look at, however to even thrive from it, as soon as the historical past of it’s written.