Middle-aged Martial Arts

We enrolled my eight-year-old at MEKA in 2013. I took him to class twice a week and was, admittedly, a bit jealous because it looked like so much fun. My wife reminded me that there were classes for adults, too, but I was unsure about signing up. I was nearly 44 years old and I weighed a very unhealthy 255 lbs. karate didn't seem like something that someone my age and my fitness level should really be doing. However, after some deliberation I decided to give it a shot, hoping it would be a fun way to get some exercise that I might actually stick with. That and a not-quite-forgotten teenage obsession with the original "Karate Kid" movie.

I'd been unsuccessfully fighting my weight since I was a teen. I’d tried various types of diets and exercise including weights, swimming, jogging, etc., but nothing ever worked because I was inconsistent and lost interest after a few months. Karate looked like something that might be fun and interesting enough that I might get into the habit of doing it at least twice a week.

Starting something like karate at the age of 43 can truly be daunting. I was very anxious about attending that first class. In fact, I almost turned the car around twice on the way to the dojo. In the end, the only thing that made me go was that I didn't want to have to admit to my wife and kids that I'd chickened out.

There were about a dozen students in the dojo that first night - all adults ranging from early twenties to mid-fifties. The other students ranged in experience from white belt to black belt and several stops in between. After lining up and bowing in - all somewhat familiar after watching my son’s class - a few of the more experienced students were asked to show me the first kata in the Shuri-Ryu style called Tai Kyoku Ich. I'd seen the kids practicing kata and I thought that I'd really hate it because it was, in my mind, too much like dancing. I hate dancing. Even after running through it several times, I felt like my body was being asked to do things that it wasn’t built for and, for as much sense as it made, the guys teaching it to me may as well have been speaking Japanese. Neither my body nor my mind understood this vocabulary.

In the second half of the class, Renshi Mark showed me some different types of blocks and was very encouraging. When the class ended I was physically wiped out and mentally overwhelmed by everything I had taken in. From dojo etiquette, kata patterns, different types of blocks, bone alignment, etc., my head was swimming.

I won’t lie, it was difficult, but I went back for more.

The following week I received my gi, which had to be ordered since they didn’t have one large enough for me. The pants were about eight inches too long, so I had to roll them up. As luck would have it, the class focused on kicking that night. Every three or four kicks my pant legs would unroll and I lost track of how many times I almost tripped over them.

It was really embarrassing, but I kept going back.

Those first couple of months were exhausting and continued to be embarrassing at times, but I kept going because it was also really fun and a great workout. In addition, I liked that my son and I had started down this path - separately, but together - so we shared this new connection. It wasn’t something that I was introducing him to but rather something that we were both being introduced to simultaneously.

The first year flew by and I got into sparring, grew to love kata (which really isn’t like dancing at all), and started to compete in tournaments (winning my first trophies ever, halfway through my 40s). I saw other students come and go and was welcomed by the core group in the dojo as a “regular” with people who have since become great friends. Ironically, there's something about punching and kicking one another that brings people together.

In December 2017, I earned my Shodan (first-degree black belt), which is something I never would have thought possible in those first few months. Over the last decade, I’ve learned a lot, realized how much more I don’t know, gained self-confidence, and found a new hobby that never seems to stop being rewarding. Best of all, I lost over 80 lbs. and got into the best shape of my life. A cardiologist even told me that I now have a “Lance Armstrong” heart, meaning that my heart rate is very low because it's so healthy and efficient - something that I never would have thought possible when I weighed 255 lbs. and had to quit sparring after about 90 seconds to avoid passing out.

Over the years I’ve had other people around my age tell me that they've considered starting martial arts training but felt they were too old or out of shape. My answer to that is, don’t let anything stop you. Like the Chinese proverb above, yes, it may have been better to start as a child, a teenager, in your 20s, or even your 30s, but karate has endless benefits for people of any age. The thing most people don't realize is that karate isn’t you vs. your opponent, trying to bash each other's brains in. Karate is really your "best self" trying to defeat your "worst self”. Age has nothing to do with it. Not everyone who starts training will get into regular sparring or competing, but there is so much more to it than that. You can learn karate at any level you wish and still receive life-changing benefits like self-confidence, self-discipline, and improved physical fitness.

The first step into the dojo is by far the hardest but if you keep at it, karate can become an amazing hobby, a fun social activity, an outlet for stress, an opportunity to learn self-defense skills, and perhaps the best exercise you could ever find. If you're interested in trying karate, don't hesitate because of your age or physical condition. Join us in the dojo and find out what you're capable of.