Episode 557 - whistlekick LIVE Season 2 (Episode 2)

ep557 box.jpg

In this episode, Jeremy brings us the second Episode of the whistlekick Live Season 2 and he is joined by co-host Andrew Adams.

whistlekick LIVE Season 2 (Episode 2) - Episode 557

Today’s episode is the second installment for the whistlekick Live Season 2. Jeremy answers questions, reads stories from the listeners, as well as some cool fun games about martial arts. In this episode, Jeremy is joined by co-host Andrew Adams and we bring back our first guest, Justin Lee Ford of MartialJournal.com. We have a much-improved show, at least by our standards! Listen to find out a lot more good stuff!

Show Transcript

Jeremy Lesniak:

Alright. Welcome everybody to whistlekick live season 2 episode 2 also known as the fourteenth episode we've ever done or the second episode of season 2. Thanks for joining us as always. I want to give a big shout out to Gabe for all of his work. I point over here because he's on the laptop. This is how we monitor because we are across time zones. Gave does all this great stuff from Oregon. The beauty of the internet, I mean we couldn't do this kind of stuff even just a few years ago. It's totally awesome really doing it. First off, if you hear some background noise that's a fan on the computer. The computer's been overheating a little bit today and so I've got a temperature of a thermometer here, measuring tape to a box. So, It's that no show. So, that's what we're doing. So, thanks for joining us thanks for tolerating as we continue to figure this stuff out. This is all kind of experimental show and show me a show like this. There are plenty of people who do this stuff, prerecorded. There are people who you know. I'm going to zoom in just put it out over the internet. That's great I love that stuff but what we're trying to do here is bring you into the fold. We're trying to give you some fun, some conversations, some discussion, some entertainment, some conversation in the Facebook chat and we're experimenting with weird technical things like putting me in the mountains with blur and you can't see my headphones and it's silly and you know what? Because martial arts are silly and if we take ourselves too seriously especially in 2020, we're going to go insane so why not have some ridiculous fun and that's what we're here doing this evening. We're here to celebrate martial arts, we're here to celebrate whistlekick and just kind of have a good time. So, I want to thank everybody for joining. Looks like we got a bunch of people in the Chat and I’ve seen stuff going on, people watching as they drive home from work and I know that. Who's saying that? Stacy saying, I know she's not behind the wheel so she's en route to home. I see a lot of familiar faces and some names I haven't seen before in the chat. So, that's kind of fun. So, thank you everyone for joining us.

Now, one thing I want to mention. So, if you follow me on Facebook, if you're paying attention to things we got going on, we've got a pre order for some sweatpants. Now, how am I showing sweatpants if it's a pre order? Just compare it with sweatpants that I've had for years. So, way back like 2 years, which in coronavirus time, is like 100 years when we started doing martial arts events and will be starting to set up towards the first item that we did outside of our protective equipment, that people really love to wear the sweatpants. So, they're comfy, they last, they have a drawstring even though I tore this one because it rips you know. When your drawstring but it also has an elastic waist, it has pockets and it's not jogger style in bottom sweatpants. And you can get those, we're closing the orders on Monday morning, it’s going to be a little less a week there, 45 Bucks including shipping. Shipping tax, well, if you're a robot the system, it’s going to make you pay for tax but 45 Bucks shipping. all of the kid's sizes for $40. The timing of this was chosen, this might make a good gift. Well, the only difference in the kids once is that they don't have pockets. So, a few colors. Check about there on the website and seriously these are the best weapons you've ever had. I've got multiple pairs by black players in the laundry because it pretty much as soon as it's cool enough to wear them, I pretty much just alternate between the 2. So, I'm bummed. I can't wear them because I'm talking and you have to show them. So, what else did we get Gabe? What else is going on? I guess the whistlekick product from the Amazon review, bought my son a pair for karate. The quality for the price was on match from what I've seen the other kids using his class use them 4 times a week and they hold up very well. Let's see a pair, so that's not a helmet. It's got to be gloves or boots or shin guards, could be the taekwondo handguards, attack windows socks or semi contact gloves. it's karate, so it's probably not techno. It's probably not semi contact. I'm going to guess it's the phone gloves or the phone boots. I was wrong. It's a semi contact glove, the pursuit gloves. Those are good gloves. We actually have. So, as you might imagine right now, people are not buying a lot of protective equipment. We've got people buying some, not a lot, because in a lot of places nobody's making contact with everyone. But we're selling some and we are, I believe completely out of those gloves. So, I mean communication with the factory right now to say, hey what's the smallest batch you can make because I don't want to order 500 pairs who's going to take a long time to sell right now but looks like they're willing to do a smaller order. So, I think we're gonna be doing that. All that stuff, if anybody wants that stuff, yeah, we've sometimes put up on whisltekick.com but really the best place to get it is Amazon because the price is the same. They deal with all the shipping and everything and yeah, that's the way to do it. So, check on Amazon, we have none of it in our warehouse right now, what we have left is a must check out.

Next for any martial art, what are your thoughts on, Freddy Moore short, what are your thoughts on training in uniform or in regular clothes? Well, I'm curious to see what people in the chat think. I think it's important, no, I've said this before many times. A diverse martial artist is an effective martial artist, a better martial artist and if you only know how to do your stuff, do what you do wearing a gear Joe Bacher, some kind of martial arts uniforms and then you go to kick in your jeans and it feels different you're wearing sneakers, how's that going to go? This is why a lot of, let's say self-defense focused arts, having people trained in street clothes. It's one of the things that I actually wear, I would say I agree with. I'm not. Having uniforms at all but I will say that training in street clothes periodically is really boring, really makes it less effective. You got that Gabe? Richard striving it about what they're doing? God. We had nights where we wore street clothes and trained in the concrete hallway connecting the back of the shops. We were careful but it was different from being the normal clothes and setting. I, yes, if you think your… Here's the thing, if you think that you're going to use what you know, you're going to use your training in sneakers and jeans, okay, street clothes and you've never trained in street clothes, you never sparred in street clothes. maybe some. There are so many variables that we can't control, why not control the ones that we can. Right.

Okay we've got the top kind of total effect going through all that. Can we throw up a trivia question or something? We have, so we can do, we can give like a 30 second timer, while I go grab a glass of water. I don't know if they want to see comments. I feel like the comments are without some kind of narration. No, it's not that. Okay, that's right, you did have that. Okay, I'll tell you what we're going to do. I'm tempted to do Saturday Night Live. The Coffee talk and the host offer clamps. I'll give you a topic talk amongst yourselves, right. any of you will get those who remember that one. all right. so, here's what I want. I want you to think about this question. If you watch the First Cup, you're going to get it. What is a famous martial artist's birthday today? [00:08:36-00:08:40] today was his birthday and I conducted an interview today with a sugar black belt. And I managed to work that in the conversation. And I think he thinks I'm the biggest martial artist. Never. I'm not the biggest but I'm certainly pretty nerdy. All right now that I'm back and I'm prepared as I should have been.

Gabe, what's next? All right if you could go back to your most difficult time in your training what would you tell yourself? I think. So, I've had a few moments but the one that I'm thinking about right now, I was probably 12 maybe 13, fairly small, you know probably 115 pounds and probably the highest ranked kid in the kid's class. So, it's like a green belt. Maybe not quite but I was really struggling with being smaller than everyone and what being higher ranks mandates at a time when I was just getting picked on at school constantly like I couldn't reconcile all of those things together. Here I was in theory. I had some skill but I didn't quite know how and when to apply it and life was already chaotic and difficult because you know you're 12. And it was a rough time and there were some people quitting. My instructors were really patient with me and helped me get through it. So, now we try to do this last time it didn't work so well but it should work better this time. We've got some people who are going to come through on zoom today so I want to welcome Andrew. Andrew Adams to the show. What's going on with that mask buddy?

Andrew Adams:

Oh, wait a minute I have my mask on? Hang on. I can take this off. You know why I can take this off?

Jeremy Lesniak:

Because you're at home by yourself and there's no…

Andrew Adams:

No, because my computer has a virus protection.

Jeremy Lesniak:

I thank you for the bonus humor segment. That wasn't even in the contract. Cheers. Is the audio... Hey, Matt says they can hear you all. Thank god. We did it right, I did it right this time. So, for the audience, I don't know why looking over here at the cameras here. For the audience the issue last time was in the audio settings so anybody doing anything with audio knows that. When you click on a speaker it disables. The speaker needs it. I mean you work with music and sound in, you know you click that little speaker thing and you get burnt. You know it goes away well in the software that we use. It goes from gray very small icon to gray very small icon with white line through it that is the same color as the background but yeah that's the little thing that shows what the level keeps going. Yep, that was it, let's all that we needed to do. So, but now we know. Welcome. We've already spent an hour together today.

Andrew Adams:

yeah, it was an hour.

Jeremy Lesniak:

We recorded a pretty cool episode this morning. I'm excited for everyone to hear that later. we're not going to... I like the way that you expressed it on Facebook with your bit of foreshadowing. Would you mind repeating that?

Andrew Adams:

yeah, we recorded what has the potential to be one of the most controversial topics discussed in a martial arts podcast. So, I may be being a little dramatic and it was not whether a [00:12:46-00:08:48] the most effective martial art because we all know that it is.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Andrew Adams:

But I'm excited to have it come out. I'm excited to hear people's feedback and thoughts on it as well. I don't remember when it's coming out. You would know that better than I.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Thursday.

Andrew Adams:

This week?

Jeremy Lesniak:

That's supposed to come out Thursday.

Andrew Adams:

Okay well there you go.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Hopefully the video will be ready in time. I emailed you last and said Hey we just recorded this one. Can this come out Thursday. So, do you want to know a fun fact about Master Ken?

Andrew Adams:

Hmmm I may already know it.

Jeremy Lesniak:

But do you listen to the Master Ken’s episodes?

Andrew Adams:

I have of course. I mean I got a private message from Master Ken this week.

Jeremy Lesniak:

You did? you did? And I was watching and you posted it. It was great, it was a lot of fun. For those of you who don't know Master Ken was on episode 20 something like it was way back. I was pretty lucky that he said yes and Master Ken and I had a crush on the same girl.

Andrew Adams:

No, I did not know that.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Yeah, yeah, we had a crush on the same girl. He dated her. I just admired from afar. Andrew Adams:

That's because [00:14:05-00:14:07] is far superior.

Jeremy Lesniak:

But I will guess and I can't say this first for sure but I'm pretty sure that she and I talked more than the 2 of them. She's married and has kids, a wonderful person. It's not like that but she's remained in main and of course Master Ken kind of aka Matt Page no longer lives in main and now lives in the south, southwest some. Well, that's all the side. What are we talking about?

Andrew Adams:

I don't know what you want to talk about?

Jeremy Lesniak:

Is there any plan? Gabe, is there a plan for this or were you just there? Gabe’s nodding says there was a plan. I'm assuming we don't just like to put you on and give you the deer in the headlight's treatment. Was there a topic? What we talking about?

Andrew Adams:

I don't know. I can roll with the punches but I just got out of class like I literally drove home and jumped right into my office.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Gabe’s about to give me notes. We're talking about being a co-host.

Andrew Adams:

Okay, okay. I'm a co-host. All right.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Well, thanks for being here. I appreciate it.

Andrew Adams:

No problem. I’m happy.

Jeremy Lesniak:

All right. So, that's right, that's what we wanted to talk about last time. You come on and help out in co-hosting with the Thursday episodes. and you want to talk about how that happened and what you thought about that and...

Andrew Adams:

Yeah, absolutely. So, I have been a listener of whistlekick for about 2 or 3 years. I think.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Is that long?

Andrew Adams:

Well, yeah, yeah, really. Yes.

Jeremy Lesniak:

It feels longer. When did we have coffee? It was 2 to 3 years ago because I've only been to one whistlekick free training day. So, it was a couple of years ago. I became a listener and a lover of which okay and when you Jeremy came out with your patreon. I immediately, in fact, I want to say, I was, if I wasn't the first patron subscriber, I was the second. Because you told me that happened to two people, right one after the other and it was important to me to be a subscriber and to help pay for the content because I spend so much time in my car and when I'm driving literally thousands of miles a month in my car. Podcasts are what keep me alive. I say that jokingly but it's true, I listen to podcasts.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Yeah, I get it.

Andrew Adams:

And to me that was a small price to pay for the content that you are providing so I became a patreon subscriber right away. And you got, you would send out a message to the patreon subscribers as one of our perks. The message that you were considering having a co-host on your episodes for a couple of Thursdays a month. And I sent an email saying I'm sure you have a ton of people that would be willing to do this and I strongly still believe that I bet there are a ton of people that would be willing to be your co-host and so I was asking you to consider having me as someone. If you thought I would be a good fit and we set up the phone call which you know we've done before but if we set up enough because I was already involved with it, was to click through the Facebook page. So, we had a phone call and chatted about what your thoughts were with this endeavor and how to move forward with it and I thought you said it absolutely best in your last patreon note. And if you're not a patreon subscriber, you're missing out on some really cool content but one of the things you said was having me on is like the difference between shadow boxing and actually sparring. Having someone to verbally throw ideas off of and have a back and forth is hugely different than just doing it by yourself. I've never done it by myself but I could totally see that being the case and I thought that was a great way to describe it.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Thank you. Yeah, I've spent the last 5 years on the Thursday episodes trying to imagine what it's like listening and being in creating a conversation. Right? because the thing that makes podcasting intriguing is that it allows you to feel like you are part of a conversation, that you wouldn't otherwise be part of, think about the shows that are…  Think of the number one rated show or the number one listen to shows Joe Rogan. You get to listen to Joe Rogan talk to other people and you get the sense that he's having that type of conversation with them that you might have if there were no cameras and audio equipment.

Andrew Adams:

Over a beer.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Exactly, yep. And I've tried to artificially construct that solo. And I'd say I've done an OK job people listen to them so I'm not doing a terrible job but having you as part of it makes it that much more interesting. I'm assuming for the listeners.

Andrew Adams:

Hopefully.

Jeremy Lesniak:

So, we get some comments coming in on the chat. People are saying yes, they like it. So, yey! Now, we could be, you know, could be a bad sample set. You know, we might watch numbers plummet but IT can.

Andrew Adams:

In which case I'll gladly step down and you can find someone better.

Jeremy Lesniak:

So, I'm going to share something quick with you before I let you go and we move on to the next thing. So, I got an email today. Now, nobody, one person and I don't think Leslie is on here. So, Leslie knows all the details because Leslie needs to know all the details. A former guest reached out to me today via email. Former guest is a prominent in non-martial arts. Very prominent. The person who emailed as a past guest. The person says I'm considering it. I think I'd like to do a podcast that intersects this other world of mine and martial arts. And talk to other people who also have that intersection. Some of these people would be names that would be household names. And they've invited me to be involved in this. We have a call that looks like we're gonna call on Friday. So this could be really big. This could be really big. So, breaking that news here in and to you and by extension everyone watching and listening.

Andrew Adams:

Cool. That's great.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Well, I'll let you know more about off air.

Andrew Adams:

All right. Great, Jeremy.

Jeremy Lesniak:

So, thanks for coming on and I will talk to you again soon and appreciate all that you do.

Absolutely. As I continue to say and will continue to say, I'm happy to help.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Thank you means a lot. All right.

Andrew Adams:

Cheers!

Jeremy Lesniak:

Cheers! Here's the piece. Okay Gabe, get them out.

Andrew Adams

I’m just going to stay here.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Oh, you closed it. You closed it. That's right. I'll fix it. Here we go, we're back on. All right. Now what are we doing now? So, we talked to Andrew. We're doing trivia. I'm being told there's a rapid-fire trivia that is happening. And I don't know if that's because now we're doing right now.

All right. Mr. [00:21:57-00:21:58] had wax on, wax off the floor soon, painted the fence and painted the house. Mr. Han, karate kid 2010, had a jacket on, jacket off. What drills have you seen or done that are like these? Trying to think if I'd been taught any of these. Most of the blocks have something that you can imagine and depending on the style of martial arts we're talking about, you know, it varies a little bit. If you want to type to me, use that. That's not what you're doing. Okay, never mind. You're a step ahead of me. See? At this point in the game, I really shouldn't be second guessing. Gabe knows what he's doing. But I'm trying to be helpful and just making it more complicated than it needs to be. We've got our, we've got a flow here. All right. So, I don't have anything. Great. But some of the other people have some stuff. Matt says serve the pizza. I assume that’s this. I assume that's what you might call it chicken Rester backrest block. Look at the mirror. Right, which is kind of an inside block, stern the pot. Are we stirring the pot? Matt, how're we stirring the pot? Matt, I want more context mats in the chat. It's been over 15 years I can't remember all the names that we used to name all the kids self-defense like that. Instead of by the ground to help them. Jason says, oh there are so many. My wife used pizza stop signs to teach guarding blocks with nice hands. Carting clock with a knife handle this. Something like this or maybe this. We [00:23:54-00:23:57] when it comes to mind that I often use was tap and chop for a wrist rub, counter and strike. That one I can't visualize. I recall we had a martial artist in residence from China. He started off his tour by teaching us an eagle claw form. Only teaching one of the eagle postures he said “be an eagle. don't be a chicken like that.” Andrew in the chat saying middle of the hands, cheerleader stance, hands on hips, feet together. In taekwondo, I learned that it is an arrogant man’s stamp.

If you could go back to your most, we did that one, if you can go back to the most difficult time in your training, what would you tell yourself? Well, sure my answer is what did others say. Matt says there's always a silver lining. Do you think you would have believed it or would have changed anything? That's a great question. Matt says I don't know probably I was always hopeful that I have a heart problem. Boss found out, lost my school, took me 2 years to get clear from the doctor, to train and teach again. That time I got to train in multiple other styles with different instructors and added it to what I teach. Now, I got to train amateur fighters. It built me so much as a martial artist. We tend to get so frustrated or sad or angry or whatever about things not going the way we want them to or the way we expect them to and we tend to think that. It's back. Until we get down the road. How many people do you talk to? Let's say, you know, I wish these big things in my past hadn't happened. Mostly timeless, when you talk to successful people, they've used those stones that were thrown at them to build the road. If you want to make an analogy out of it. I think there are some things that happen in my life that I've been utterly terrible things that I wanted to talk about publicly. Every one of them has served me in some way and made me a better person and if I could go back and change them, I would not because I would not be who I am and I'm proud and happy of who I am. Gabe’s response, go to a chiro. Jenny is saying go to a chiropractor. Training isn't supposed to hurt that much for long injuries. Don't always resolve and heal on their own as much as we wish they would. Yeah, there's a stubbornness that tends to happen in our teens and twenties with our training that you know just how tough it out. I'll get better. What it was last month. Gabe managed to dig up the you know your martial artist if the first 10 And I mentioned that there were 10 more than I did. These are kind of Jeff Foxworthy inspired. I want everyone to notice in the picture that we have done. We paid extra for the software to make this happen so you can see me read, you get to watch me read, I mean what's better than that? How great is that? You still know your martial artist if you've ever described something in your car by naming one of the ninja turtles. People have stopped asking you about the bruises on your arms and legs. Number 3 and by the way, these are all real for me. You can identify certain people by the smell of their sweat. Number 4, your friends get you to go to movies by telling you there's a great fight scene. You sort your laundry into light dark and training uniforms. For a while, for me it was just uniforms and none. Number 6, you've been asked to leave somewhere for not wearing shoes. That still happens to me. Number 7, you became best friends with someone after they intentionally kicked you in the head. every, make a friend in a tournament. Number 8, you've practiced kicking while walking with crutches. Number 9, your significant other always gives you the seat with your back to the wall. We talked about that today and today we talk about it in the First Cup. I think we talked about that today. I think it was in the First Cup. It could have also been really upset with Andrew; I don't remember. This is a problem doing so much content, as it starts to blur together. Well, by the way, I'm writing a book. A fiction books. Number 10, your wedding registry was Asian world martial arts. But I missed writing this stuff. These were fun. You know what started the first one? I think I mentioned last month. It was the punch should be one. You might be a martial artist if you've ever punched to be. Also, the only one the people of ever complained about where you would punch your being. Yes, gave that 100 percent. Can you show that? I totally thought that when you put that up, I had read the caption yet and my initial reaction was oh look, Gabe making tons of letter PVC. No, it's a door stopper. I mean that that handles a little long but I don't quite know the scale. So maybe, it's just a short term. I can still do some damage with that. Who works? That's all. We have fun. Martial arts is fun. You got to have fun doing it.

Story time with Matt. We got 2 stories today. I love that you do this Matt, thank you. Right, let's do them. When learning how to defend against a front double choke for self-defense, my instructor grabbed me and asked what do you think they should do? I said, I don't know, I'm assuming you said, I don't know we're not I. D. K. which is what's written here. Matt if you're talking in text speak, I'm going to slap your... I said IDK, so she put a little pressure. I started laughing. She swung her hand back and slapped me across the face. What is wrong with you? I replied but you let go. I am sure there are so many stories like that about me. As a kid. I just, yeah, I'm sure there are tons of them. That's a really good one. Hey whatever you've got to do to get people to let go, you know, what you know one of my favorite non-lethal self-defenses moves? Lick your hand and then try to touch somebody. Suddenly the person who is trying to cause you just going to pull back and say “ew”. Yeah, if you can out crazy the mugger, you got a good shot. All right, we got another one here. My son was learning to become an instructor. He's running self-defense, one of the parts included a kick to the groin the soonest. He asked “what’s the groin?” unprepared. I said I was not trained for this. One of the parents jumped in and helped explain it. That's amazing. That's the funniest thing I've heard all day. I love it. We could do an entire channel of ridiculous things kids say in martial arts classes.

Hello and welcome back Justin Lee Ford. He's in zoom. I got him where he is, there he is. Here's a guy, I've not talked to today. There he is.

Justin Lee Ford:

Hey!

Jeremy Lesniak:

Hey, what's going on? How are you?

Justin Lee Ford:

Pretty good, yourself?

Jeremy Lesniak:

Welcome! I'm great. Welcome back to the show. Welcome to the show for the first time with the audio.

Justin Lee Ford:

The audio is very nice that I was just going to say.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Thank you, thank you. Your camera's bouncing around men, are you holding it?

Justin Lee Ford:

 Well, I got to stabilize the table.

Jeremy Lesniak:

 What? Stabilized the cable? What do you do? Is your table missing a leg?

Justin Lee Ford:

Well, you know more or so, we snap and kick.

Jeremy Lesniak:

it's a good point to complete we got to get your table some metal legs that or some less destructive feet.

Justin Lee Ford:

Well, I’ll buy some nice.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Yeah, what's going on? How are things going down in Georgia?

Justin Lee Ford:

Right here in Georgia, it's going pretty well. You know we are and things are going incredible at school. thanks. we've grown up to almost 60 members that's been...

Jeremy Lesniak:

Six zero?

Justin Lee Ford:

Yeah, six zero right from opening up about 4.5 weeks ago with 0.

Jeremy Lesniak:

With 0?

Justin Lee Ford:

Yeah with 0.

Jeremy Lesniak:

This is literally 0 to 60 in a month, in a pandemic.

Justin Lee Ford:

Nonetheless it’s doing a massive amount of digital advertising, talking in businesses in the areas. We're located just below an apartment complex. We're going to have a lot of walking traffic.

Jeremy Lesniak: 

Nice location, location, location, location. The last time, when we sort of brought you in, my intent was to have you talk about some of this but Gabe told me that you have something that you wanted to talk about instead around culture. More or less yes so. You know I think we can all understand that every martial arts school has a culture unto its own. anybody who's traveled especially go from school to school within the same, not just style, that system, you know, maybe they've got the same overarching instructors and some of their students have schools and you go from one to the other with the same curriculum steam. Same lineage can be dramatically different. And it can be good or it can be bad but I would imagine that it can also be leveraged in a certain way to the benefit of the school and the students. So, what do you know about culture?

Justin Lee Ford:

I’d like to think that I'm a cultured young man.

Jeremy Lesniak:

You are a cultured young man. You hang out with us.

Justin Lee Ford:

This is true, this is true. No, you're absolutely spot on and talking about how important that can be right because having a culture can be a very good thing or a very bad thing.

Jeremy Lesniak:

I want to chime in because apparently, I'm steering you slightly in the wrong direction and you're probably “we're going to get there” but I want to make sure that I'm not steering a complete run. Gabe saying how to build a community of future black belts.

Justin Lee Ford:

Yes, thank you Gabe! Most definitely, well, yes. So, here's the thing about the culture of the school, the environment of the school, you know, it is very easy to quit a commitment. It's tough to quit a relationship, right? You think about how many people do...

Jeremy Lesniak:

 I love the way you put that.

Justin Lee Ford:

Right? That you think of how many people open up a gym membership on January 1 and think about how many gym memberships are actually being used come the end of January. Yeah right, yeah that'll work. That's a commitment but a relationship? That's a little different. It's a little bit tougher to quit so when I'm working with the Marshall school those 2 dynamics and I’m really focusing on. One is the staff to student dynamic understand that relationship. The other one is the student-to-student relationship and the dynamic. At first it might seem like we have nothing to do with the second one. Dude, there are some things we can do right. So, it was still in the process of building. We haven't talked about student, of course, that's not just a child or an adult. That's the entire family. Especially, this one child so yeah let's delve into that topic.

Jeremy Lesniak:

All right. All right. Tell me about it, how do you do or how does a school make an impact on the relationship with the student. The staff to student relationship. That's what you want to roam first?

Justin Lee Ford:

yeah.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Right. So, staff-student relationship.

Justin Lee Ford:

This is how I am going from 0 to 60 during the whole room. Right. So, the first thing is trust. Right? That sounds broad, that sounds almost in general but they need to know. Here's the key phrase, we're on the same team. Right? Because it's so easy, especially after the other students, it may be their first private lesson, where I may start talking about membership options and pricing for you. The students just seem like they're on different teams right. You're on the same thing. You won't, you're the person trying to sign up there the driver on the GPS, I'm just there helping guide the decision to what's going to help them best. So, communicating your honesty and communicating your values that's important on day one. You need to know that you can and they can trust you. Well, I build my background a little because oh man, this got me started in the martial arts as a teacher. My grandparents run a foster home and they took care of 150 kids.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Simultaneously?

Justin Lee Ford:

 Not simultaneously, at the Max, you have maybe like 15 to 20 kids for Christmas.

Jeremy Lesniak:

That’s still a lot of kids, man.

Justin Lee Ford:

So, I communicate that to a lot of people who come in as well because hey when I became a teacher this became my goal or I’m going to impact 150 lives to my grandparents. That's why I'm a friend of yours, an instructor trying to share these life lessons with you when you’re a child, right? And so it's about communicating that and making sure they comprehend it. The next thing is perceived indifference and getting rid of. It’s very easy to seem like the instructor that doesn't care. You communicate your values and help as honest you are but think of the instructor that just gets them signed up. When it comes to teaching the class and just yelling out numbers one, two, throw your kick.

Jeremy Lesniak:

They show up until 2 minutes before class starts and they end like immediately on time or as quickly as possible.

Justin Lee Ford:

Exactly. Right? and that doesn't communicate that you care for the students individually. You got to communicate that you actually comprehend. Yeah. I'll keep reading just touch on you. Well let's switch over to student-student dynamic. okay, so the biggest thing, it will use the biggest you, are the ones getting together. Finding the time for them to get some shared experiences and events that they can collect with.

Jeremy Lesniak:

I've been screaming this from the rooftops for years and I don't… and nobody seems to listen. I don't get it.

Justin Lee Ford:

Right? It's a powerful thing. It's an absolutely powerful thing. I can't tell you how many times, just going to dinner with some kung fu buddies and just chilling, would just change my whole day, right.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Have you ever had an experience where the training partner you would like, dislike the most, and you socialize with them? You're like now, I like this person and I'm conflicted/

Justin Lee Ford:

That's right now. Right? Yeah, exactly that. So, you got to give the update not for kids, it's a somewhat but you might not, yes, I gather all together for dinner but you can offer things like parents' night out. Right? I'm sure a lot of schools know that term but basically it occurs at the school, right. You keep the kids at the school then show a movie, well, some pizza or whatever else. Placing games have been trying to have fun together. Your friends meeting friends together and the other thing would be teams. That's an important thing to touch on. Having it put out there that there are people around you or similar to you or have interests similar to you, hey you're interested in becoming an instructor like me, run the instructor training team. Hey, you're interested in performing in demonstrating like me, go after the action team, the demonstration team.

Jeremy Lesniak:

Cool, it is a great way to generate a way of combating the leakage that pops out. I'm going to leave martial arts to go do soccer all come back when I'm done especially when you have that lesson because team dynamics and finding where you fit socially is so important to kids. So, you can use some of that within. You know I think we've got a whole episode here. And I think you got a book in there and I think we got to talk about both of them but before I let you go, what's the other thing that we're working on together?

Justin Lee Ford:

I have to talk about a few things. So, which one you want to touch on. That under one big project?

Jeremy Lesniak:

Yeah, the big project. Just give a little bit of the top down.

Justin Lee Ford:

I'm trying to look carefully at the details. You know I got this project. The written projects will bring in too many people. I think how specific you want to go into this.

Jeremy Lesniak:

We're working on a magazine, there we go. All right. I can say it. We're working on a magazine and I owe you an email, you emailed me. Yes, that is moving forward. So, stay tuned because we're going to crush this. Thanks for coming on. I guess I'll talk to you again soon. We got it, we got to move on to the next segment.

Justin Lee Ford:

Thank you, Jeremy, and have a wonderful day, all right?

Jeremy Lesniak:

Thank you too, bye. All right wow. This is so much fun. We've got like 10 minutes left but I'm curious what people think. Right? So just at some point, let me know what you guys think about what we're doing. Gave and I will talk. After each show what we do, what we change, what we add, how we will prove and one of the big things that we've been working on is bringing guests in. I want to give a big shout out to Matt. Matt for his contributions to whistlekick live. He submitted a couple of pics in addition to the stories that he gave us earlier. Gave us a couple pics of what his life looks like right now. That's a baby, that's a baby in a stick. That's adorable. That's a baby with a [00:43:39-00:43:40] also adorable. This too. I feel like I saw one of those come through and they just made my day. You know there's nothing cuter than a martial arts baby. All right.

So rapid fire trivia coming up. And Gabe’s giving me a note. Do you know? Okay, he's not giving me a note. Hold on. I have 60 seconds to answer as many of the 30 questions as possible, read the question out loud before giving my answer plus 2 seconds give me time to get to the sludge. All right. I'm going to read fast then okay let's do it. I can read pretty quickly. He's setting the timer. Do you want me to do it? I got it. All right, are you ready? Not yet. Okay we’ll move this right here to here.

As soon as you hit it, I'll hit it. You have to go in there and then I'll start the timer. Well, I am Rick, how old when you started training? Four. What’s the first car that was produced? Black.  [00:45:23-00:45:30] Which ninja turtle carries a bow? Donatello. What year was the karate kid released? 1983. What year did Bruce Lee die? 1970.  [00:45:45-00:45:47]. I don't know. In TMNT, who is the leader of the foot clan. Shredder. Which state has the most martial arts schools per capita? Florida. What was the first martial art in the ancient Olympics? Wrestling. What was the first martial art in modern Olympics? Wrestling. [00:46:13-00:46:15]. What was Bruce Lee's last movie as an actor? So, whether you're talking about when it was done or recorded or when it was released, I think Game of Death was the one that came out last. Bruce Lee’s first instructor Yip Man... [00:46:33-00:46:35]. What came first, Judo or Jiu jitsu. Jiu jitsu. Judo was a response because practitioners were dying in competition. Bruce Lee is the most famous form creating? Jeet Kune Do. We're out of time like a while ago. I don't know what it ended. I was watching. I was watching the questions over here. How many did I get? We don't know. We don't have how many I got? Richard says well done in the chat. That's right somebody can score it later that was fun. I got a little more through a little more than half of them but who knows how much time there was all right. Here’s the answer, so can you show that I want to see that. Okay hold on. If you ask me a question about my history and you have the answer on the answer key like I was going to get it wrong, okay. All right yes. Karate kid was... I didn't know that. Karate kid was 84, okay Iwas wrong. Bruce Lee died 73, I was wrong. Jackie Chan's a pro bowler. Already know about that. Rhode Island and the least is Mississippi. Someone told them to open schools in Mississippi. Let's go, wrestling, judo in the modern Olympics, Game of Death I got that right. Yip Man, Jiu jitsu, Jeet Kune Do, all right and that's where we ended to do 18. So, I'm seeing 19 and 20 so maybe we can do this next time. That was a lot of fun. That was fun, well done Gabe.

This is the experimentation; this is the playing around and the feedback coming through the chat is that people had a lot of fun with that as well. We will do that again, maybe. It’s up to Gabe. Gabe does all the work and I just show up. Maybe not all the work but the majority of it. He does a great job. All right, is this a good place for us to find out? Okay, I'm getting a yes, all right. So, reminder: the sweatpants, if you don't know what to get someone, buy the sweatpants. If you love them, buy them the sweat pants. If you love yourself, buy yourself this weapon on whistlekick.com it's a pre order we are not going to have extras. So, order if you need help with sizing, ask me. Black and dark and navy and then if you own pets, this gray or lighter gray, shows coffee stains. This is my preferred color, if you don't have pets, get the black. The navy's great too. The light gray is great as well but this is like the best balance. It's like all of your stains in a color. So, you don't notice them because if you're going to run the sweat pants, you're going to get coffee. Go to whistlekick.com, they're featured right on the home page and you can see them there.

In the chat, reminding everyone that subscribing to the patreon on is a good idea. We really try. So, let me just say this, I work really hard, we all worked really hard as a team to make sure that the content that we put out grossly exceeds what you pay for. So what are you paying for this? Nothing. You're spending your time on. Hopefully, you derive us enough value to warrant putting in the time. When you buy sweatpants or gear, whatever, hopefully you feel like you get more than your money's worth. The patreon is much more of the same. If you're willing to throw in money and it starts at 2$ a month, you get more stuff, you get behind the scenes, you get exclusive audio, video, book drafts, program passes. People in the $25 tier in the last 6 months have probably received at least $100 worth of books and programs. Because if you give me, I'm going to give you back. Because that's just how I was raised. This one came a week late, sort of, because of the election so we will be back in December with the first Tuesday of the month. When is that? December. We checked my calendar. It's December 1. I'll see you all, December 1. If you are listening to this please consider coming to watch 8:00 PM U. S. eastern time on Facebook. Look for the next episode event to come out soon. All right we do have a Facebook event. A lot of the questions that were asked, we give you answers for today that are the conversation topics that Gabe throws in there. So, if you want to be involved that's the best way to do it. The other things we got going on Martial Arts Radio, Marshall Journal, First Cup and I'm writing a book. And my goal is to have that book written for Christmas. And we're going to have to make new guests for the next episode. And we don't know who they are yet but we'll figure out. Because we do so thank you again everyone, I appreciate you being here. Well currently we do have them yeah. Well, we've confirmed those. All right, we've got Jarred and Richard coming on next time. So, Jarred Wilson, host of Marshall Thoughts, a longtime friend, great guy and Richard but look he's been on the show too and knows martial arts history like nobody else. Thank you to them. Thank you to you and I'll see you soon. Take care.

Previous
Previous

Episode 558 - Sensei Olivia Roney

Next
Next

Episode 556 - Mr. David Liban