Josh George: My Martial Arts Journey

If there is one thing that is for sure, all Martial Art Masters come from different backgrounds. They seek this art for their own reason and become masters of it because of their desire to learn more and push harder. Dedication and desire are two of the most important aspects of Martial arts and if there is anything I learned along the way; it is to never give up. To push myself to the limit and beyond. This is the story of my Martial Arts journey.

How It Began

I began learning Martial arts when I was 10. I didn’t have much talent, but I had the desire. This desire has carried through all of these years and continues. Bruce Lee once said that talent can create opportunities, but desire will create opportunities and talent as well.

I wanted to become an expert so bad because of the self-respect it presented. I wanted something more than what I was gaining in all the books I was devouring. I struggle with flat feet, which messes with my balance. In addition, I never had too much speed and my knees are bad. These aspects all led to me struggling through the beginning parts of my training. I could not kick as fast as others.

I wasn’t built, in the traditional sense to be a martial artist. The different belt tests that I went through were the scariest and yet the greatest experiences that I had ever gone through, and are in major part the contributors to who I am today.

The tests were designed to take you past the brink of physical and mental exhaustion. Every test had a moment where I told myself that I simply couldn’t go on. At some points, I mentally and physically had nothing left to give.

This is the point where I learned of the strength of the human spirit. A force that has no measure, dwarfs the extent of the mental capacity, and by a very high degree the physical capacity. The human spirit is the fuel that allows us to be what we want to be. It is what enables us to get through our darkest hours and face what we are most afraid of.

An Inward Journey

The term Martial Arts has such a varied effect on people. True, martial arts, in its many forms, has to some degree been shrouded in its own mysticism. That mysticism has intrigued many, has driven away many, and has fostered ambivalence in the majority. If we strip away the mysticism, martial arts, if taught correctly, is a journey inward.

It is a method for any of us to understand ourselves physically, mentally, and spiritually. It is a path that is unique to every one of us. However, like any journey, it is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. There is no voodoo or magic, other than the magic of what we can unlock within ourselves.

Martial arts taught me so many lessons on the limitless ability of the human spirit. It also taught me that EVERY person has something equal to contribute. We are all wired for something beautiful that could be meaningful to someone else.

I was lucky enough to experience on a pure level how martial arts developed my self-confidence, helped further define my character, and been a rock for me to lean against whenever I was down. The great part was, it never let me down.

I learned this through the fact that I physically and on paper was never a good martial artist.

My balance was always the worst in the class. Because of my feet, I could never structurally maintain the balance to do multiple kicks on the same leg without falling over, something that is expected with some degree of competency at a fairly early stage of training.

My asthma limited me from having any appreciable amount of endurance, and because I never did anything physical when I was younger, my coordination wasn’t anything to be proud of either. My knees and hips constantly gave me so many problems that I could never kick fast or high.

The one thing I did have plenty of was, heart. I had the humility to do whatever I could to become a black belt.

Understanding Other People

As it turned out, I learned that heart and humility are all that you need. 10 times out of 10 it will win over talent or aptitude. I became one of the youngest black belts in our company, at the time. United Studios was the biggest martial arts company in America, and still is today. Despite all of my physical disabilities, I became the youngest Master ever in United Studios.

This was due in every way to having senior people above me constantly showing me that there is no mold. Being a master is coming to grips with your strengths and weaknesses, and then forging your own path to achieve success. My path to success was learning to read and understand people better than they understood themselves.

At least in the sparring realm, I became so in touch with who I was as a fighter, that I was able to understand my opponent better than they understood themselves. I became sought after to teach the intricacies of the art, even though physically, I never was anything to write home about.

As an academic, I excelled in school and enjoyed it. My interest was placed in people. I was an honorary or accepted member of many groups at school. I wasn’t a member of any particular fraternity, but somehow, I was always welcomed to the houses as if I was one. I genuinely had an interest in people, who they are, where they have been, and where they are going.

I never was judgmental, but I had a genuine interest in understanding people. Ironically this probably was the single greatest contributor in becoming a good fighter, and successfully defending myself in several harrowing situations. Understanding people helped me better understand myself. Understanding myself helped me better understand other people.

After college, I opted out of going to medical school and going into corporate America, much to the disappointment of my parents. I became the manager over various studios within the United Studios family. This presented the opportunity to help others in the way that I was helped. It was one of the best decisions of my life. I looked forward to every day working with children helping

them achieve their goals. I loved working with adults helping them to find their own inner strength and their own inner being.

Lost Sight

As a result, I loved what I was doing. I started making money, more money than I was used to. Enough money for me to lose some of the qualities that I had developed before, and to lose sight of what was important to me. I fell into the trap and became motivated primarily by money.

Of course, as always, I am the last one to know that I had become different. The harder and faster I tried to make money, the faster I lost it.

I would get frustrated by the feeling I took several steps back financially. I would resort to taking more aggressive steps to make the money I lost and then some. This led to me gambling irresponsibly, and I become a wheeler and dealer.

I quickly lost myself without even knowing it. I knew I was feeling more depressed and emptier, and erroneously I would attribute it to money and financial security. The downward spiral picked up speed, and I never once got to what the problem was.

I isolated myself from the people that cared about me. I then started associating more with the people that made me feel okay about who I was becoming. Everything I had developed as a martial artist in terms of peeling back the layers, was now lost by money and materialism. Integrity and objective introspection were replaced by hedonism and blame.

Ironically, one of the luckiest moments of my life was a near-fatal car accident on July 4, 2007. I had just come off of a 6-day trip from Las Vegas where I had gambled every single dollar that I had. I came home, estranged from everyone close to me. Difficult to admit, but I spent most of the afternoon and evening wallowing in self-pity and wondering how I was going to get out of the hole I had dug.

Driving home led me to one of the most dangerous roads in Southern California. This road was known for claiming hundreds of lives every year. Its dangerous curves were met with a lack of guard rails and deep ravines. Without realization, I drove off the road at its highest point. The speed at which I was driving met my car was airborne for a longer period of time then Evil Knievel himself.

A Dose Of Reality

My memory was gone for over 24 hours. The only thing I do recall is climbing up a steep ravine with multiple broken ribs, a punctured lung, a torn knee, a major concussion, and a shoulder broken in two places. Some how I managed the strength to get myself out of that deep ravine and hitchhiked to get help. I looked a state, but was fortunate enough that a good Samaritan picked me up and drove me to the nearest restaurant.

I couldn’t even recall my own name, but I did somehow remember my girlfriend’s cell phone number. She was notorious for not answering her cell, so I was not even sure I would be able to reach her. However, luck was on myside and she located me just before I passed out.

I woke up later in the emergency room with a shocking number of tubes in me. It was during this time that I was able to see who my friends were. The ones who truly cared about me and not what I represented.

I saw the world of money, prestige, and power disintegrate before me like the fragile illusion that it was. Laying in a hospital bed immobile, I had much time to reflect and see my life for what it had become.

I was able to take a step back and look at myself. I was lucky enough to have had the most brilliant martial arts instructors who showed me the wonderment and the fulfillment of an examined life and soul.

I lost myself in society. Material things become important to me and I was trying to keep up with the “Joneses”. I remember both lives very clearly, and I know where both roads could lead.

I am lucky enough to not only be alive, but also be able to remember how wonderful and awe-inspiring the human spirit is. When you have the humility and the courage to look at who you are, this same spirit can help you become who you want to be no matter where you are in life.

Mental, Physical, and Spiritual

I guess what I am trying to say is that we all have three aspects to us. We have our physical, our mental, and our spiritual. When I talk about spiritual, I am not specifically referring to religion. Our spirit is that inner voice that pulls us to our higher calling. People are always trying to conceptualize this thought… this feeling.

It is the “X” factor that makes us greater than the sum of our parts. Too often, society tries to quiet this voice. It just seems that we as a people fall into the trap of prioritizing our aspects backward.

We spend so much time focusing on the physical. We judge and are apprehensive of being judged. Most all media out there play to physical fulfillment. It’s all about the right body, the right clothes, the right look, and the right crowd. What is it about this level that keeps our attention so intently? It is at this level that feedback about us is both instantaneous and excessively scrutinizing.

The next level up in the hierarchy is mental, and if asked, everyone would say how the mind is so much greater than the physical. This is the taught-in-school cookie cutter answer. We as a society do little to extol the virtues of the intellect. Academics has gone down. Even those who are on the high side of the bell curve in academics don’t have a fraction of the “street smarts” that previous generations have had, and that is necessary to survive and prosper on their own.

The highest level (which ironically is placed on the bottom in awareness and time consumption) is the spiritual level. This level dwarfs the mental aspect even more than the mental beats the physical. The only fuel out there that people use for their spirit is religion, and for the majority of people, that is a once or twice a week thing for a couple of hours.

Religion isn’t the only medium for this spiritual development. People are passionate about their businesses, about their hobbies, about people. They are also fueling their spirit, but this can be a slippery slope. The intention must be right. Fueling the spirit is about making a difference in this world, about breaking through unconscious self-imposed bounds, BUT NOT for your glory or your physical gain.

Be The Change

Climb Everest, not to get your name in the paper, but do so solely to remind you that your spirit can simultaneously conquer and be in harmony with nature. Bill Gates did not create Microsoft to become the richest guy in the world. He wanted to change the world.

J.K. Rowling did not create the Harry Potter series to become the richest author who has ever existed. She had something to share with the world. What she wanted to share was greater than her, and through her unflinching spirit, she changed the world. She helped bring life back into reading for children of all ages.

We must chase after our passions, our cries of the spirit, and we must do so with the fire that exists within all of us. While doing that, we must constantly feed our minds. We are all intellectually stimulated by something… something beyond the superficial. It is different for all of us, so don’t be influenced or feel pressure from others.

Our lives can be a solitary journey. Looking into your mirror and truly understanding the person who is looking back is a personal, sometimes lonely, often scary experience. However, such is necessary to be fulfilled.

During the journey, many people will join you for part of the way, learn from them. Whether they know it or not, they all will in some way help you navigate your own path. The most important thing to learn is not to become enamored with another person’s path. ESPECIALLY because of the physical spoils that you may see.

I learned this lesson the hard way… half-dead on the bottom of a ravine. Search inside. We all have what we are called or wired to do. Have the courage and discipline to follow that.

I can promise you that following the path of your spirit is more eternally rewarding than any other path.

By most standards, I made a lot of money at a younger age, and I had all kinds of material “toys”. My greatest joys to date are the kids that I helped achieve their black belt. I still dwell in the joy of looking into someone’s eyes and knowing to the core of my soul that I had made a difference. That I was a part in helping someone else get in touch with their own spirit. Just as our life is a sailboat sailing the Pacific, our spirit is the wind in our sails, and our mind is the rudder.

No matter how much wind we have, it won’t do us much good unless we are directing the ship somewhere, much like in our lives. But using the same example, no amount of expertise in the steering is going to get us anywhere against the wind. We may even find ourselves lost at some point. Our physical aspect is the boat itself. It must be cared for and maintained if we are to ever get to our destination, but replacing the mast with one made of gold or having decks of the finest

marble are not going to get us there any faster, and it won’t add meaning to the journey.

Rather, we are more likely to slip on the marble or be blinded by the sun reflecting off of the gold. Our life must be a constant quest to broaden our minds. We must constantly demonstrate the courage to step out of our comfort zones, and mentally embrace others… their thoughts, their passions, their history, their dreams.

We must challenge our minds to look inward. We must embrace not only what resonates deep within us, but also what doesn’t.

Sometimes the best way to find out who we are is to understand who we aren’t. The pitfall that we must be careful of is to not judge what we aren’t.

It is a common activity that society and the physical realm nurture. Everyone has a story. Everyone has the path that they had walked up until that point. Their story will enrich us if we allow it to. In return, where they have been, will help us on the path that we are on.

By no means am I the man on the pulpit preaching how great I am, or that I have found enlightenment. I have fallen short of what I am saying many times, and I will probably be guilty of falling short in the future. Even as a martial arts master, I have been hit… several times. I fall short in my ability to spar from time to time, but I do understand what I do wrong, and what I need to improve on.

It’s the journey that’s significant, not the destination. I have done some great things in terms of helping people, and I have done some of the worst, most selfish things. I had fallen off my path completely, but I was given another chance in life to find and accomplish what I was wired for. My days as I write this are filled at the same time with peace and apprehension, with simple happiness and an intense fear of failure.

I am alive so that I may share my successes and my failures. The Art has taught me much about defending myself, and I am good at it, but my life experience taught me that self-defense was just the icing.

The art taught me that you can be what you were wired to be. There is greatness in all of us. We must find greatness in what we are wired for. There is the common saying that “You can be anything you want to be,” and “Dare to Dream.”

Not everyone can be the greatest golfer or the most sought-after actor. At one time, I wanted to be a professional basketball player, and even later in life, I wanted to be a CEO of a major company. I realized, eventually, that those were dreams from the physical, maybe in a small part from the mental realm. It’s that realm that falls in love with the allure and prestige of those dreams that I had, but only the spirit can take on and overcome the dark side of all of these “prestigious” dreams.

During my sophomore year in college, I lived next door to Steve Nash. Steve currently does play in the NBA, is considered one of the best basketball players in the league, and incidentally won the MVP back-to-back seasons.

I had the pleasure of getting to know Steve that year as well as my last couple of years of college. He was one of the most humble, down to Earth guys that I have known. I also realized another thing; his spirit drove him to excel at basketball. He had a fire that I could only envy.

He was not caught up in the glory and fame of being an athlete. Rather, he pushed and practiced out of love for basketball, out of that internal desire to always push our physical boundaries of achievement. He shot baskets almost every night on the outdoor courts between the dorms. The weather in Santa Clara during the winter months always got down to the low 50’s, but Steve never missed a day.

He has achieved an amazing amount, and I wish him continued success. I would say that I am glad all of his hard work paid off, but I know he would tell me it was never work. It was his spiritual duty. We can achieve anything that we want to, but we need to be truthful with ourselves and find what our spirit wants, and then go after that. That is sailing our boat with the wind in our sails. That way even the largest waves are not deterrents, but instead, they are welcome challenges.

My life has been extraordinary in that I have experienced fulfilling joy, empty happiness, constructive sadness, despair. I have lived a life where I have been too smart for my own good and at the same time too dumb to figure out the simple things. Throughout all of this, I was blessed with the ability to look at my life dispassionately, and see through the happiness, the success, the failures, and the hypocrisy.

I was promoted to Master in an art where you can’t hide. I had to battle my way through fighters of all shapes and sizes, and in all types of environments. I had to successfully defend myself from all types of weapons and the people with the intent to use them. You simply can’t do that until you can come to grips with who you are and using that knowledge to control the situation.

Some of us get lucky enough to come close to death where you take a real stock of your life. Where what truly is important to us floats to the top. Where, for me, many of the things that I thought were importantly melted away in their own superficiality. Unfortunately, few of us go through the near-death experience that naturally leads to our “Moment of Clarity,” and lives. The problem is, everyone should go through the introspective “Moment,” but being close to death or some other tragedy shouldn’t be what is necessary to get us there.

Being close to death has a unique way of clarifying one’s purpose in life. That purpose became demystifying the Martial Arts and showing the general public all the widespread and life-affirming benefits that it provides.

In its truest form, Martial Arts develops a foundation of “Heart & Humility.” Two concepts that when utilized correctly allows all of us to reach fulfillment. I define these terms as such:

• Heart – The indefatigable pursuit of goals, specifically in the realm of self-improvement. Frustration with failure is overcome, while clarity of ideals is constantly sharpened.
• Humility – The commitment to introspective transparency with the purpose to elevate society… not your ego.

I have found that having a well-developed grounding in these concepts and incorporating them into daily life encourages the development of true personal authority… something we must all strive for.