Episode 585 - Career Options for Martial Artists
In this episode, Jeremy and co-host Andrew Adams talk about the Career Options for Martial Artists.
Career Options for Martial Artists - Episode 585
Every martial arts practitioner can have a career that is completely unrelated to martial arts. One can be a stock market broker, a car dealer, or even a musical instructor. However, there are plenty of career choices for martial artists that are an extension of their martial arts training. In this episode, Jeremy and co-host Andrew Adams talk about the Career Options for Martial Artists including being a school owner, stuntman, or martial arts instructor and so much more. Listen to learn more!
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hello! What is happening everybody? Welcome to whistlekick Martial Arts Radio episode 585. Yes, I said that way too fast. Today's episode. We're talking about career options for martial artists. It's going to be a lot more than just “hey, you could open the school. Goodbye.``. Andrew and I will unpack this story. I think you're going to like it. Stick around. You could probably hear Andrew’s voice, laughter in the background, filling out the sound. And while... I was going to say “the screen” but that's not really a kind thing to say but we are here in video as well as audio joined by Andrew Adams. I am Jeremy Lesniak and why are we here? We're here to talk about martial arts because we are martial artists. We’re traditional martial artists. You love training. We love the arts and we love all of you and that's why we do what we do. And you can see the whole list of what we do over at whistlekick.com and if you make a purchase in the store, PODCAST15 is going to give you 15 percent off and it's going to help us cover some of our expenses. Now, if you want to go deep on this or another episode go to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com, that's where you're going to find every episode we've ever done. As well as videos links, transcripts, and a bunch more stuff to go. Find that, check that out and it's all under the heading of connecting, educating, and entertaining the traditional workforce worldwide. We're passionate about now if you value that. Yes, you could buy something at the store. Already told you that but you could also share an episode. Tell a friend about what we're doing, leave a review somewhere, buy a book on Amazon or support our Patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick. 2 Bucks a month, you're going to find out what's going on behind the scenes. It was $5 a month, you get exclusive audio episodes, 10 Bucks you get to follow along with some of the Semi private video, training modules that I'm putting out, 25 Bucks you're getting access to the programs that we put out and books that we put out. Tons of stuff. In other words, the more you're willing to throw our weight, the more we're going to get back to you. It's all about value. So, thank you. Andrew, welcome. How are you?
Andrew Adams:
I'm great, Jeremy. What's going on today?
Jeremy Lesniak:
It's a bright sunny day.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah
Jeremy Lesniak:
We were just discussing. Listeners and viewers, we were just discussing the lighting situation here in my office and showing all the things that had to be done to reduce the glare off my forehead.
Andrew Adams:
I don't have that luxury. Sorry. Well, you... Sorry our viewers.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You are right. Do we need to get a curtain? You know, you can wear a hat if you want.
Andrew Adams:
I could. I suppose.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We're going to get you whistlekick hat. I think that... I think we need…
Andrew Adams:
I'll do the whole episode like this. Now, you podcast listeners, I'm not telling you what I'm doing. You have to watch it on YouTube but I'll just do the whole episode just like this.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Now, I want to know what's on the other side of that.
Andrew Adams:
It was drum music.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You just tell them what you're doing.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, but they don't know what it was.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It's true. It could have been risqué. That's totally the vibe of the show.
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey. Anyway, turning martial arts towards a new career and someone.
Andrew Adams:
I thought this would be a fun one to discuss.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I like it.
Andrew Adams:
And I think it's important to note that what we're going to discuss is a full career like your full-time job that you could do involving martial arts. We're not saying if you're a martial artist, you're not able to go get a job doing anything. You can do anything you want too. And we are also not talking about the school, the dojo or the instructor who has a full-time job doing X. Y. Z. and also owns the school. We're talking about you making your full time living doing X.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Your main source of income.
Andrew Adams:
Yes. Yeah, and I think that's an important distinction because you can do... I mean I teach drums for a living. You know how weird that is.
Jeremy Lesniak:
The skill sets that you develop in martial arts are applicable to a wide variety of things. Yes, find me an employer who doesn't want their employees to be more disciplined and more self-sufficient, better communicators. Any better in physical health, etc. Right? Those are things everybody wants but that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about, let's start with the most obvious example: starting a full-time martial arts school.
Andrew Adams:
Sure. Yeah, the obvious one being a school owner.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, go ahead.
Andrew Adams:
Being a school owner would... It's like obviously... If you're going to make your living, you know you have a unique skill set as a martial artist. How could you use that skill set? You could own your own school or tour the country teaching seminars that would be another one that you could theoretically do.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's a really hard one. There are a lot of people who would want to do that but that has a lot to happen before you can do that. You have to have something to teach that people want to learn. And I'm sorry to say, given the current climate, the saturation of the world with options of ways to spend your time. You have to carve out your own niche.
Andrew Adams:
Without a doubt. I mean, I think the careers that we're going to discuss, they're not just careers that everyone will be able to do who is a martial artist but they will, they are careers that will be easier if you are a martial artist. Like, you must be teaching seminars around the world. It is an incredibly difficult thing to do but if you're not a martial artist, you're going to have an even more incredible time.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It would be harder to teach martial arts seminars than martial arts.
Exactly. Absolutely true.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'll give you that.
Andrew Adams:
So, the 2 obvious ones I came up with on my list because as you know Jeremy, I'm a list guy. Under my list, under my obvious categories: school owner and seminar instructor. You would have an easier time doing those things because you're a martial artist.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. And I'd like to throw one more on there. And I think it might not be as obvious to some of us here because we tend to come from smaller population areas thus, a lot of the martial arts schools we have are smaller to those of you in larger metro areas. You may not realize that. For a lot of us a martial arts school that has 50 students enrolled month to month is actually larger than average. At least in the northern area. But that role is full time instructor because you can be a full-time instructor without owning the school. And there are schools especially again in larger metro areas where you will have multiple full-time staff because there are hundreds of students.
Andrew Adams:
Yep, and I think the last one is... Well, this one kind of blurs the line between obvious and fairly obvious. It would be about like a group training instructor for yoga or you could run classes at the local gym on cardio kickboxing or some sort of fitness instruction. I think you have, as a martial artist, a unique skill set that would help you do that type of job.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, okay. And I can speak to that personally. I spent years of you know, kind of often off and on, currently off, teaching fitness, gymnastics, etc. Once you know how to manage a class, you don't need a lot else to get it done.
Andrew Adams:
Exactly
Jeremy Lesniak:
You need to know a little bit more than the people who are training. And you need to be able to most importantly identify where they can improve.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And I think that is a skill set that martial artists have far beyond most people. When it comes to physical discipline, is the ability to dial in, nitpick, find new ones. There's our favorite word. To find those little areas where they could improve and this is the thing that I went back to. Time and again with the things that I taught in the physical space. Because after decades of martial arts, one of my best able to do, identify with the patterns.
Andrew Adams:
Yep. Yeah absolutely. I have a good friend of mine who is a gym owner but taught gymnastics for a long time, who also is a martial artist. And so, you're right. they very much can go hand in hand.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. I agree. Yeah. What's next?
Andrew Adams:
Yup, so within the fairly obvious category, I had a couple of others that “okay, makes sense”, being a bouncer at a bar or a bodyguard for a specific person. You know doing some security, some type of that detail oriented being mindfully aware of what's going on around you. I think.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, and we've had a number of people on our short video who have worked in security in some respect. And what I find interesting is for people who have never worked in security, and I worked security a couple times. By security. I mean in college, I stood with a shirt that said “staff”. In front of people, yeah, I worked security by nature.
Andrew Adams:
Wow.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, I stood, there was somebody else standing 6 feet from me. That's how intimidating I was. They put people on either side of me close by but I mean I'm making light but what is the most important part about security, it's observing and identifying problems...
Andrew Adams:
Being aware.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And being aware and making sure those problems don’t fully transpire. You know, avoiding the situation, squashing the situation before it happens and that's something that most martial arts schools talk about hopefully. [00:09:54-00:09:55] when it comes to the self-defense curriculum. Yep, if you look into personal security, there are a number of programs teaching this specifically to martial artists. You open a martial arts magazine, you're probably going to see at least one ad saying, “hey, do you want to get into the high paying exciting world of celebrity security? Come to our long weekend course and we're going to teach you.” Yes, there are times where you want a 6’9, 340-pound monster protecting someone. Well, that person can also escalate situations by their mere presence.
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So, if you look at celebrities, you look at the secret service, you look at people who do this for a living, they tend to be much more incognito.
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely. Yep, I would agree. So, the next one, again, anybody can do these jobs but martial artists have a skill set that would make it may be easier. Would be a stunt man or an actor because you're going to be able to move your body in a way. In terms of stunt stuff, you're going to have a fall better. Are you going to know how to move your body in that way and as an actor, you're just going to have a skill set that other actors might not have?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Right. We’ve had a number of stunt people on Martial Arts radio. They've talked about that journey. And it doesn't mean that in order to really go far in the stunt world, you don't need additional training, you absolutely do but there is a lot to be said for that weird stunts come in. It's a TV movie and it tends to be in some kind of dramatic sense. There are people who get set on fire, go to car crashes, in-jump, off-things but there's also a lot of combat if you look at most TV movies. there's a fight in there at some point. Quite often, there will be someone doing that stunt work.
Andrew Adams:
Yep, or choreographing that stunt work.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Or the choreography. Absolutely. It's something that I think is really fun. I've done some choreography. I've been on both sides of that. Not anything professional but I think it's a ton of fun.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Make sure things look good on camera.
Andrew Adams:
Yep, and the last 2, I have been my fairly obvious category. Our police and military. And again, there's more training you would need but I think the discipline you received from your training will help you if you decide to be a police officer or join the military. Any branch.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And I would say that a lot of that comes from the fact that martial arts. At least in the way that we teach it and practice it today does have some military tradition instilled in it. The regimented aspect, the lining up. I mean you can swap out the uniform for a different kind of uniform. And you know it looks pretty darn similar.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, absolutely. So, those ones I had that were fairly obvious.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You know, people are probably with us up till now. Yeah, yeah. So, we were going to take a hard left now?
Andrew Adams:
I'm not hard left, just a slight. We're going to bare left. We're going to be bare left at the fork in the road. Okay, I could make a fuzzy bear joke right now but I won’t.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Wow,
Andrew Adams:
So semi obvious. When I say at first you might need… You Jeremy might be “okay” but others may be like “I don't quite get that”. Being an EMT or firefighter, anything where stress or high stresses are involved or you need to be able to quickly keep your composure and be able to make decisions, I think martial arts have a skill set that help them with making choices.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Making decisions under pressure. Absolutely, yep. I will completely agree with that and that's something that is inherent to self-defense training but a lot of martial arts schools have a high stress address, adrenaline response, fake altercation, 211, whatever. Hopefully, you've been through some of that. If you haven't, you might be lacking a bit if you are presented with a high stress situation. But all agree. I've never been an EMT. I don't do gross. I've never been a firefighter but honestly, I've thought about it for similar reasons on what you're talking about. It would be interesting to me. To be involved in that.
Andrew Adams:
I mean any paramilitary organization; I think would benefit from the skill set that a martial artist would have.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Absolutely
Andrew Adams:
And so, I think that you know that when she realized that there is a direct correlation there, I think you see that okay, yeah. That does make sense. And then my last list is jobs that are not obvious. Until you…
Jeremy Lesniak:
Is this the hard left?
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, this is a hard left.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay.
Andrew Adams:
A job like a pawn shop owner.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay. I'm not saying, no but I'm not seeing it.
Andrew Adams:
So, my friend Angela who had mentioned on the show in the past brought this up to me. She is a vintage reseller. And she often has found herself being comfortable being in the situation because of martial arts and not being in situations that she goes by a couple because she's been mindful. Essentially, any interaction where there is one on one interaction with the person where the money is involved, she has felt safer because of her training. Being in a situation happening to handle money with another person. And I think that thought and punch up would be along the same lines as when a person comes into the shop, you're haggling over money. You know, I think having the wherewithal in mindfulness to look at your surroundings can actually help you in that type of environment.
Jeremy Lesniak:
There is any kind of security aspect there too. If we follow the cliche. Right? There's money, pawn shops, to any kind of environment where you are buying your goods from, people coming in off the street
Andrew Adams:
Yep.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Tend to deal in cash. Thus, if there's a lot of cash around it can be higher stress. These are, you know, in some areas. Well, actually, even in our small area, the places I know like these have bars on windows.
Andrew Adams:
Yep, right.
Jeremy Lesniak:
This is a place where you've got to be aware. You've got to be secure; you have to have a certain defensive mindset that is not exclusive to martial artists but is more common among martial arts.
Andrew Adams:
Correct. Yep. You will have the mindfulness to notice things in that situation.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm with you. Okay, change my mind.
Andrew Adams:
All right, good. That's what I had, that was on my list. So, I'm interested if you have other ideas.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, yes. I think if we stay on the track of stress. I think there are a lot of things that are high stress that qualify... That prepares people for certain roles. Any time you were up in front of a group. So, I have known a number of martial artists who were successful DJs.
Andrew Adams:
Interesting. Yeah, okay.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I was one of them, the ability to read a crowd and work the energy of the crowd to speak when appropriate to let things happen when appropriate. Shout out to [00:17:43-17:47] He's been on the show it was early on to throw it back there. He is a wonderful DJ and that is the job he has done for years. What else happened? What else? People get up in front of crowds. You know, just kind of your master of ceremonies. Presenter. Well, we've got a number of people who we've given Ted talks and lectured, presented information in that way. There are a lot of martial artists who are teachers because for similar reasons, their ability to manage a group and their ability to convey information unlock it bogged down in stress. I don't know why I didn't put that on my list because that's super obvious. Yeah. And what was the other one I had? We have had a bizarre number of people involved in technology and I. T. come on martial arts. And my thought there is that it may not be that they are more qualified to do I. T. because of their martial arts stuff but it could be depending on the situation. If anybody's worked what I would call brick fix I. T., it can get really stressful especially when you have a client breathing down your neck, “when is this going to be fixed?”. But there's a certain... If there's a problem-solving mindset and if some of us approach our martial arts from a problem-solving mindset. How do I spar with this person who always gets me with this movement and what do I do to surpass that to overcome that challenge? Does that bring anything to light for you any other professions that might have sparked?
Andrew Adams:
I mean the other thing that I have seen a lot of these musicians. Who are musicians, who are martial artists that come up a lot? I don't know that. It's tougher to see the correlation there. Other than as a musician, you often have to be detail oriented. Whether you're playing guitar to get chords, just the right way. Or, you know, like the practicing regime to be a musician but a professional musician is incredibly difficult to do. But, then again as a seminar instructor. So, I mean I think musicians are up there as well.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I think the last one that I'm going to throw out. If you can't tell listeners, viewers, I'm kind of doing a mental check through of people who've been on martial arts radio. And thinking about what they have in common. We have had a large number of people who write and not just martial arts. People who write novels. People who write history. People who write all sorts of things. Why I'm guessing it's because writing requires a tremendous amount of discipline.
Andrew Adams:
Yep, yep. And there's a lot of thinking involved when you write. And I think if you're a martial artist, you're often using your brain to think of things as well. So, I can see a correlation there.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And then I think the last one I'm going to throw out is consultant. Which is really broad and requires an additional skill set but I believe all of us know something. We know things really well and the ability… If you spend a lot of time in martial arts, you've probably spent some time instructing martial arts even part time. Even to a small group. What do you learn as an instructor: the ability to convey information in different ways. Yep. As a consultant, that's one of the things you usually have to do because you not only have to come up with solutions but you have to get by from the people paying the bills that this solution makes sense. You are constantly working for your own job. You have to convince people that your job is worthwhile on a daily basis unlike more conventional jobs. So that coupled with whatever your other skill sets are. I think I could make a lot of sense. Now, my main take away from this is “hey, getting good at martial arts and learning martial arts skill sets help you in just about everything.”
Andrew Adams:
Absolutely
Jeremy Lesniak:
But that wasn't the point were. it was okay. I'm a martial artist, I spent a bunch of time. I want to make martial arts more of my profession but maybe I don't want to open my own school because it is not an easy way to make a living.
Andrew Adams:
Very true and my take away as well as this is not what you should do. This is what you could do. You know, chase your bliss. I still am all the time. Chase your bliss. You know, do what you want to do.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. And I'm sure that we missed some things. So, this is a great opportunity to remind people that we have a Facebook page whistlekick Martial Arts Radio behind the scenes that you can join and we post about these episodes. And sometimes we get some good conversation. You can also pop over to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com and leave a comment under the episode because that's an option. Are you cool? If you don't want to share publicly, you can just search with the engine, you can email me jeremy@whistlekick.com and any feedback on this for topic suggestions, anything like that. We want to hear. Right. Is there more should we do? Should we roll out here?
Andrew Adams:
No. I think that's good. You got a pretty extensive list and would love to hear more from others if they have ideas.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Sure, all right. Well. Check out the show, check out the transcripts and all that other stuff set up for the newsletter. Support the patreon and make a purchase. Follow us on YouTube and Instagram and Facebook and Twitter. And that's all that's relevant. Oh, we are on Pinterest. I don’t get to talk about that but we're over there. We look at my notes.
Andrew Adams:
We need to use Snapchat.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I haven't figured out a good way to do staff [00:23:52-00:22-53]. I got some stuff brewing for TikTok. Right. As an aside, completely unrelated, if you enjoy silly animal videos. TikTok is the most efficient way to consume silly animal videos. I love it. Hi, how can you support us. Share an episode, review and buy a book, patreon, make a purchase. If you see somebody out there wearing a whistlekick on or something, say hi. I told you how to get a hold of us Jeremy@whistlekick.com and that's it. So, Andrew, with me.
Jeremy Lesniak and Andrew Adams:
Until next time, train hard, smile and have a great day.