You are not the same person.

Growth in the Dojo. This is how it should work.

I started my career path as a high school teacher of art and design in 1982, and I can confidently say that no matter how thorough the training process is for teachers is, nearly all of the valuable skills are accumulated across your career. (I also know this because I worked as a subject mentor and tutor for teacher training students).

This is the same with martial arts instructors, but with understandable differences and caveats. More of that later.

In 2025 (and into 2026), I am still going in to schools and teaching across the curriculum, but on days when it suits me (I officially retired in 2018) and I am still learning how to be a good teacher, 43 years later.

The main rule.

Over time I made a specific commitment to myself; one that applies in both the classroom and the Dojo, and it is this:

In the unwritten contract between the teacher and the student, a solid measure of success is when the individual who leaves the classroom/Dojo is not the same person who entered it. If the student has not changed during the lesson, in small or larger ways, then something has broken down in the contract.

It’s a great point for reflection for both parties. Education is not something that is ‘imposed’ on us, we are supposed to be in a learning environment designed to help us to flourish and reach towards our potential (we never achieve our potential because that possibility with humans is almost limitless). The teacher/Sensei is the example, the facilitator and the mentor, and many other things on top.

Of course, it is entirely possible that it is not the student who gets sloppy over the contract, but the teacher. There can be many reasons for this but one of the main problems can be complacency. There are others, like; an ego that overrides the student needs; a fixed mindset, stuck in an orthodoxy that they never really understood, or just a failure to subjugate their own requirements over those of their students.

But what are these possibilities for change?

Self-knowledge is a huge benefit, as long as you have enough self-awareness to pin it down. Youngsters struggle with this and it often occurs to them retrospectively. Adults are much more open to self-reflection and to reviewing the effects of experiences in the Dojo or the lecture room, this is because they have a more developed timeline and don’t wrestle with finding perspective. They are also more likely to be able to navigate a challenging experience, or a failure in a reflective way, rather than let it crush them. Summed up in one word, resilience.

(It’s worth looking into the idea of the ‘growth mindset’ versus ‘fixed mindset’ a concept championed by psychologist Carol Dweck).

Adults don’t have it all their own way, because youngsters are often the ‘blank slate’. But that has to be handled sensitively. From experience, I would say that information should be drip-fed at a steady and manageable rate. With adults, you can engage on a higher intellectual plane; but, never talk down to adults (school teachers often have this problem).

Too much or too little? A game of tennis.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his groundbreaking research on Flow States says there is a sweet spot for maximal development. He gives the example of a tennis player faced with different opponents: If an opponent is too easy for him to deal with, he can become bored and demotivated, considering it a complete waste of time. Whereas, if the opponent totally outclasses him and he finds himself getting hammered; again, his motivation drops to zero and the exercise becomes demoralising and futile. But if the opponent is maybe one notch above his own ability, then he rises towards the challenge and it can become an amazing growth experience.

In his book on Flow, Csikszentmihalyi maps this out on a centile-style graph showing the optimum zone for engagement and growth.

Diagram explaining the Flow State Model.
Source: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Graph-of-Csikszentmihalyis-flow-state-when-a-persons-ability-to-execute-a-task_fig1_279226015

A word about soft skills.

Again, from my teaching career: So-called ‘soft skills’ are not so soft. They are often the oil that moves the gears.

Soft Skills, definition; ‘Personal attributes that enable someone to interact effectively and harmoniously with other people’.

These same things should be encouraged and looked for in the Dojo. The Sensei should not be presenting themselves as some kind of hidebound book of knowledge; but instead be looking for opportunities to really engage with their students in a two-way-street of sharing their thoughts and ideas, and not being afraid to be up-front with their own gaps in knowledge.

To martial arts students; at the end of your training session; do you think that the experience has helped you to grow? To all the Sensei out there; what are you doing to facilitate this growth?

Personally, when I am directing training in the Dojo I am mindful of my own growth opportunities. Often, these come in the form of students asking searching questions, or sharing their own revelations. As someone recently said on another Substack post, ‘The Dojo is not always a battleground, often it is more like a laboratory’. I like that idea, but it doesn’t mean it’s not a place of hard graft and working things out with sweat and through your body.

I don’t want to get all preachy on this, because these are the same questions I ask myself, and I don’t always get it right.