WELCOME!

For those few of you whom I've invited to join this blog, it's the brainchild of TC Advanced student & RKC candidate Nikki Shlosser.

The blog will be a means where you can all see my Google Calendar, which I'm slowly transitioning to from Yahoo Calendar. As soon as I figure out how to make it such that the details of the appointments are visible only to you guys, you'll be able to see what's up with my time more easily.

The impetus for this latest web-interface comes from my realization of two facts:
1. I have too little time to accomplish all the things I need to accomplish, and therefore must delegate out more of my responsibilities... AND
2. For all of you included on this group, you need to teach to be able to grow. As I was telling Nikki this morning, for me to have achieved what I've achieved so far in martial arts, TCM, kettlebells, whatever.. a great deal of it's from me being forced to teach on my own. Instead of having you guys in my shade all the time, the opportunity to stand on your own as instructors will not only force you to grow, but allow you to develop your own teaching styles and followings.

This blog will serve as a place where each and every one of you who are invited to it can post. So for people like Big Steve who take copious notes, it's a place to put those down for everyone to benefit from, ask questions about, and reflect on. We can all put down what our insights were that day, and raise what we feel are the important points or relevant questions about technique, teaching, etc.

As Nik pointed out, even if I'm travelling, I can be part of the class, and vice versa. Video, stills, and lots of text can make this a tremendous teaching/reference tool for all of us. And I'd like nothing more than to see you all take a bigger share of the sunlight!

What does that mean for you & me?

Simple... I'm going to spend less time teaching the general public. Why? I just don't have the time. I've already gotten squeezed out of teaching the Saturday class for the most part, as many of you have noticed.

So that means that for the select few of you, you'll have access to me before anyone else does. For Saturdays, that'll mean that in a couple of weeks, I'll only be teaching the Advanced class on a regular basis. I'll be checking the "Open" level classes on a more sporadic basis, just to see how you are teaching and what the general level of the students is. But we're at a point now where I trust the people who are in teaching positions to pass on the knowledge I've given them in an accurate manner.

I'll be doing the same thing with KBLA's Sunday workouts in the near future, too. I plan to have a KBLA instructors' blog with the same limited access I have here. Each instructor will have a day on the calendar where they are the "chief instructor" of the group, and will handle the flow of the class, the delegation of teaching duties, and collect the pot. That will rotate among all of the instructors and be posted on a public calendar which will be linked to the KBLA website.

Why am I pulling back from teaching so much? Because I realize that trying to do everything myself is injurious to everyone. It's taking away too much of my energy so that I have less energy to focus on YOU, my advanced students. It's keeping me away from handling more pressing matters of business and family. And perhaps worst of all, it's keeping you from growing as experts in your own rights. The time to change this all is now, and I want to do whatever I can to help you all grow!

Let me know your thoughts!