Knowledge means nothing unless you use it to help others. This is something I emphatically believe which drives my desire to learn and my desire to teach. This year was off to a tremendous start and as I look back at the first two months, they were prepping me for this moment. Had this moment come any earlier my psyche may have been in shambles. I feel blessed in that manner. I also feel blessed that the teachers I’ve spent time with this year have been open to teach like it was their duty. During these workshops, a theme kept creeping up, over and over again. The theme was education and balance. A theme I had been searching for the answers to. Look and you will find they say, and I think I have begun to uncover it.
The first notion of education that came up was the idea that education is to be done within three pillars. A pillar consisting of educating the mind, a pillar consisting of educating the body, and a pillar consisting of educating the emotions. Failing to educate one leaves us out of balance. Leaves us open to “enemies” as Mark Cheng said. These enemies are not the external ones that you may think about, rather they are internal enemies such as mental/spiritual distractions, disease, injuries. Often times these enemies are brought to life by our own actions or inactions. This is the importance of educating ourselves in the three pillars, choosing to ignore one will leave you susceptible. Educating the mind is what school is supposed to do. Teach us how to be critical thinkers, teach us about the world, give us knowledge that helps us progress society. Educating our emotions is what therapy and meditation are supposed to teach us, how to notice our emotions and not allow them to drive the machine. Educating our body is what physical education is supposed to teach us, how to move, how to fall, how to not be an alien in our own body. We have all of these tools in place; however, our education is not supposed to end when school ends and relying only on school information will automatically leave us out of balance.
Educating the body can go a long way towards educating the self within balance. This is because physical education can also be divided into three pillars. A pillar for martial, a pillar for restorative and a pillar for pedagogical.
Martial is combat training but not in violence per se but in awareness. There are many forms of martial arts in which they all teach you how to be present in your body and present in your mind, a lapse in one would be a lapse in your awareness. This is a huge benefit to martial arts, to be able to train the mind, body and did I mention emotions, all at once. Anytime you have true awareness you are aware of your emotions, you can see them and know that if you let them take over you will lose the awareness in your mind and body and your emotions are now driving the machine.
Restorative is meant to bring our body back into balance, this can be yoga, this can be strength training, this can be Indian clubs. A lot of tools that can be used to build or break can also be used to restore. Often times people don’t think of something like a goblet squat as anything other than a strength movement. However, the goblet squat is one of the most restorative movements someone can do since the ability to squat is a huge part of being human. Though we have lost the ability to fully squat as a culture the ability can be restored. Most of the harm we have done to our bodies can be restored if we actively try to improve them. Find the tool for the job and restore yourself, bring yourself back into balance.
Pedagogical means relating to teaching. In relation to movement, it is any form of movement that teaches you how to move your body. For example, gymnastics, dance, games and physical education are all a form of pedagogy. You can think of this as play with a purpose. Playing is one of the most powerful tools we have to learn and as we get older, it is an often-underutilized form of learning. Play allows us to get over the fear of failure or of being perfect which allows us to improve at a much faster rate. When you remove expectations and do the work, results will come much faster than when you try to watch the pot boil.
A lot of times people think simply exercising is enough. I was guilty of this train of thought and thought all I had to do was lift weights, I always felt like something was missing however even though people would say you exercise that is enough. I do not believe that simply moving is enough, I believe it is better than nothing, yet it still leaves us susceptible to some of the preventable parts of life. In order to be in balance we have to do a little bit of everything. Some things check off more boxes than others but there will usually be a place where we can improve.
I will cover the other forms of education in more detail in the coming weeks, for now I have left you with plenty to digest and put into action. Get creative and find ways to practice each of these different aspects of physical education.