Jr. Instructor Program
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The Junior Instructor Program we provide was designed with the aim of guiding students to become honorable leaders. Students will experience what it means to become a leader by learning how to manage and assist in class. When the roles are switched, a different viewpoint is exposed to our Jr. instructors, which helps open their perspective towards the mindset that we have the power within us to become anything we want, to change for the better, and how we can use that to help others. We mentor our Jr. Instructors beyond Martial Arts, by guiding them emotionally, and mentally so they can train their minds to endure any challenge life brings to them. We have a few factors each Jr. Instructor who enters the program must follow to acquire the qualities of a Legacy Martial Arts Instructor.
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Self Control: Self control is all about understanding that we have the permission within ourselves to control our actions. In every moment, we have the opportunity to choose whether we respond to things poorly or positively. By obtaining self control, we acknowledge the simplicity in the power of choosing what we do and how we allow it to impact us. In order to be a leader, we must remain disciplined within ourselves, holding ourselves accountable for our wrongs, and challenging ourselves to always be better than just our own weaknesses. By achieving self control, we can lead by example how to remain disciplined and continue to choose where we put our energy to.
Compassion: Compassion is more than feeling sympathy for others. It's about caring for others through their flaws, and forgiving those who make mistakes because no one is perfect, as we make mistakes ourselves. Most importantly, compassion is recognizing that every persons path is different in life for a reason and that we all move on our paths at different paces. In life, we all can't move in the same pace, and others might be behind us on this path. By acknowledging this, we have the capability to be open towards the differences in others. This allows us to instead of judging and identifying others by their weaker attributes, to offer a helping hand to others regardless. Our Jr. Instructors must remember that at any time, we ourselves can fall back on our path or more so, we need to remember where we started from in the first place. Some students learn differently from others, and our Jr. Instructors must in their hearts, genuinely care to administer compassion for the achievement of being a part in helping others succeed, despite their differences or position. Lastly it is important for our students to adapt compassion for themselves to understand and recognize our personal flaws by accepting them. By accepting ourselves, we humbly understand that no one is perfect and we are all equal. What matters in the end is our intentions towards trying to live honorably.
Patience: Developing patience helps us to use our self control by choosing how we react towards things that challenge us in life. Our students need to recognize that not everyone has the same mentality as us, or maybe not as easy of a life as us. Therefore, some students may not grasp our teachings as easily. In this instance, these very encounters can test our patience. The attitude we want to encourage is to not give permission to let this negativity affect us. Life will always challenge us in which to teach us great lessons, and evolve us. When others take longer to understand, grow, or execute certain material, our Jr. Instructors are to never give up on them, by guiding them through with compassion and patience. Nothing is impossible, and we want our students to know we can all achieve anything we want as long as we remain patient during our journey and never give up.
Confidence: Confidence is important so we can establish our personal voice. Our inner voice is who we are, and sometimes it takes time to find that. Our Jr. Instructors soon realize sometimes it’s not always easy to be in the “spotlight”. Sometimes we may have a challenging day, or lack of energy to complete our daily tasks. Enduring class during a hard day is easily achieved with confidence in oneself to pursue hardships. This is how we achieve success in our journey through life. A standard tool in our Martial Arts training is simply ones voice. Being confident in your own voice is what allows us to be able to stand up for ourselves. Standing up for ourselves is essential, so others can understand us and treat us the way we need and deserve. Using our Confidence to express our inner voice strengthens our ability to direct when certain treatment towards us is not acceptable. This is our approach in our speeches on “Bullying”. Bully’s are individuals who express themselves in the wrong way. They use others weaknesses to gain what they want. Sometimes wrong happens in the world, and while there’s not much we can do to change others, we can change how we let them impact us. By expressing ourselves properly and saying what we feel we need to say, we achieve inner peace. This is in relation to our inner peace, because when we hold in how we really feel, we don’t conquer establishing the tools we need to reach our goals, from expressing ourselves.
Humility: Our most important factor we require our students to learn, is to be humble. Just as our famous phrase “Keep a white belt mentality” we enlighten our students to acknowledge that learning is boundless. No matter what title or rank we possess, there is always room to grow and learn from everyone around us. An ideal mentality we encourage our students to retain, is to conserve the same mindset as their first day as a student. In our dojo, our students are taught there is no room for arrogance. Our teachings display examples of how our ego can get the best of us and to recognize how to defend ourselves against it to keep our mentality at remaining a “student” in everything in life.
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Important qualities the Jr. Instructor program develops in our students
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Experience: This is a great opportunity for our students to learn to observe people, understand the differences in others and learn from them. To learn why and how others act. Everyone that walks into our lives is meant to, for a reason, and to teach us something. In this experience our students have the capability to develop getting to know themselves, what they can manage/handle, what their weakness vs. strengths are and how to change and evolve in recognizing so.
Time Management: By learning to master time management, our students can make their lives easier. This develops responsibility, so our students understand that by prioritizing properly, we can make the time for important things, and achieve everything we need in our daily schedules. More importantly, timing a class full of students, who need individual timing to learn and understand things, make mistakes, and ask questions takes a lot of patience and practice.
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Listening: Listening seems easy to comprehend but there’s a big difference in hearing someone or something, and actually listening. Listening to ourselves when we need a break emotionally, physically or mentally is respecting and nurturing ourselves to achieve this inner peace that we mentioned earlier. Our Jr. Instructors will learn in this program how to listen to others, whether it’s in verbal communication, body language, or understanding others enough when they need something without expressing it. Sometimes others can’t help themselves, so it is our duty as mentors to step in and read them to help them understand themselves and what they need that they may not be aware of or understand how to express. Listening helps us reach our full potential in being an aid to others, so we can help them in the best way possible.