The UBBT Ends with The Current Testers. Alabama 2013 Will Be Final Event

The Ultimate Black Belt Test as a yearly project where XX amount of people join, then go through their tests together is finished. This 9 year (or so) project is coming to an end in its current form, as I've come to a place where I can no longer adequately manage the participants to a degree that enhances and/or improves the program. 

What is left behind the current testers and all those who have participated is, I think, a good number of useful ideas, a 1000 good memories, and a million or so words on what black belt testing could and should be, might be, and/or is becoming. 

I think part of the end of the program stems from my own disillusion with the martial arts world, in general, specifically the world of business, school management that is, where I've been a longtime fixture. I think the UBBT has served its purpose, which looking back now, has been to open up dialogue about ways we might improve the process and the outcome of testing.

The UBBT has evolved into a similar program, www.The100.us, where we're also working on the fabric of our efforts as martial arts teachers, but where rank and/or the attainment of rank is not a factor. The 100. is where we are continuing the discussion of expanding the teachers role in his/her community --and in the world.  

I initially set out to make the UBBT a part of my 7th dan test, as I've been a 6th dan for more than a decade and was looking for something I could contribute to the martial arts world that would represent the skill level I envisioned a 7th dan should have (that is, not just the physical skills, but managerial and organizing skills as well). But in the years I've been running the UBBT I have lost the desire to attain new rank, partly due to the fact, I think, that I've been looking so hard and long at what rank is, what it means (or doesn't mean), and what my peers do --or don't do --as high ranking black belts. 

I'm currently involved in learning and becoming proficient at judo and jiu-jitsu, partly due to my interest in the arts, and partly due to close proximity to competent teachers. I'm also not very talented in either art, not for lack of trying and/or of length of time trying to gain more skill, so rather than the less-than-enthusiastic practice of skills I'm well versed in, I am pursuing more skill in grappling, as I thoroughly enjoy the struggle of the grappling game. I'm not going to be testing for 7th dan anytime soon, if ever, although I am going to try to achieve a brown belt level of skill in BJJ. I've had a gradual and now rather abrupt disconnection with my longtime martial arts master teacher, after 30 years, --and at my/our age, I don't see an opening for either of us returning to the teacher/student relationship we once enjoyed. And frankly, to earn rank from anyone else would, to me, be meaningless --and I've no interested in advancing myself, so I am finishing my own testing process, as a black belt in TKD / eclectic martial arts.

Not advancing beyond the rank of 6th dan might, I think, in itself serve as a tool for other teachers. I was recently told that Shotokan karate's founder Gichin Funakoshi passed away as a 5th dan. That, and the fact that with some exceptions, I am in general, disappointed with the number of 7th and 8th dans I've been meeting, as it seems the rank is, more or less, a fairly meaningless (to the world, not to the individual) accouterment. To continue to run a testing program that helps people gain new rank no longer interests me, although the discussion of what the martial arts are, in today's world --and what purpose they might serve beyond the obvious, is something I'm still interested in discussing and exploring. 

I am, however, open to the idea that exemplary effort from martial arts teachers who are my students might be awarded with new rank, if their work serves as a model for an ideal of performance and contribution I think is worthy of recognition. Several of my longtime students are doing work in the world, on behalf of the martial arts and at the highest levels, that is so important I am compelled to encourage them and have them advance in status, if only to point the way for those that might follow them. So while I will still offer rank to my own, truly dedicated, students, I will not advance anyone beyond my own rank, nor will I continue this effort to serve as a grading source for all styles of black belts, as I had originally set out to do. 

Not to take anything away from anyone I have ever awarded rank to, as every black belt I have given others has been heartfelt and hard-earned, but during the UBBT it has occurred to me that "the ultimate" experience, as a serious student of this Way, is to work so very hard for something, to dedicate one's life to being worthy of advancement, and then to let go of it.

This idea is, for me, right now, a statement about the true nature of the work, as best I can currently express it. 

April 10-14, 2013 I will be hosting our yearly build-vention in Greensboro, Alabama --and this will be the final event and graduation of all past and current UBBT members seeking rank and/or who are participating in the program. 

Tom Callos

Aug. 15, 2012

Martial Arts Business: Things I Practice That Affect My Black Belt Test, My School, and My Life

In The Ultimate Black Belt Test, I / we address the preperation for and the taking of a kind of black belt test that is transforming --as in life-changing. Not because a black belt test has to be --or should be, but because it could be.

And the truth be told, waking up, making food, caring for loved ones, walking to the store, taking a swim, reading, and just about any act we engage in could be life-changing, if only we decided we were going to make it that way.

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Martial Arts Business: A Black Belt Test Meant to Recreate The Process

Facts About the Ultimate Black Belt Test:

Cost: $1200 for the UBBT 2012, Plus $500 in an escrow account with Member’s Solutions.

Complete the test, get the $500 back. Quit without completion, lose it.

Length of UBBT 2012 Test: From the moment you enroll until you graduate --final graduation ceremony to be conducted in Greensboro, Alabama April of 2013 at our yearly House Build for Charity there. Last date to enroll, Jan.

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Martial Arts Business: The ULTIMATE Martial Arts School Marketing Strategy

If you invent and/or discover or create something new and wonderful and needed, like Jonas Salk's discovery of a vaccine for polio for example, there's no denying the beauty of it. 

There's no question of its value.

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Sensei Chris Feldt, a Testimonial for His Ultimate Black Belt Test Experience

"Tom, the test has had a dramatic change on me, my school, my family and friends....yes, the tentacles of the UBBT reach into all of my relationships......I believe I am a better school owner, teacher, father, husband, brother and son for being a part of these tests.  I may not have reached the financial success that I want to be at the moment, but the foundation has been laid and with hard work and dedication, I feel certain I will get there!
 
While I completed nearly all of my test requirements on team 6 and I am on track for most on team 8, I realize I have the POTENTIAL to do so much better.  That is one of the discoveries I have made about the UBBT....the quest for mastery is an evolutionary process, that does not stop with a new year.  It is a life quest and one that I  plan to be engaged in for the rest of my life!  Thank you for showing me the way!"

Read Chris' blog here.

How to Have Martial Arts School "Success," Using Your Black Belt Test

The Ultimate Black Belt Test (UBBT) is a personal improvement program (explained in a previous post), but it’s also a business development program.
 
Here’s why: When it comes to long term “business” success in a martial arts school, there are details involved --and then there’s the SPIRIT of the thing. The details are the shoes, socks, underwear,

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How to Begin the Ultimate Black Belt Test (UBBT 2012)

It takes me a good deal of concentration, these days, to write about “How to Start and Do” The Ultimate Black Belt Test (UBBT), as it’s not an easy thing to describe and explain.

First, the UBBT is a self-improvement program --and it’s almost entirely up to the participants in the program to decide what kind of “self-improvement” their efforts will encompass. I’m open-minded about it; but I’m looking for honesty, integrity, and an extraordinary --sustained --effort.

What I’m looking for is an effort, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and socially that defines the process of black belt test preparation and testing for anyone and everyone in the international martial arts community --and beyond.

That means we (any and all instructors, of any style and system, any where in the world) should be able to look at you and your “test,” and say something like, “Now here is a fine example of someone who took their black belt testing process to an entirely new place. If you could do even half of what this person did, you would have one landmark, stellar, extraordinary black belt test.”

Now I understand that you might not, yet, know how to design a black belt test like the one I’m describing, but I do know that part of your “test” is to learn what this means, to learn how to design black belt tests that transcend the mundane and the expected. I don’t know how long it will take you to “get” what I’m suggesting here, but I do know that it’s a major part of what I want you to get out of the project.

I also know that when you really challenge yourself with living as a role model for the entire international martial arts community, you will be forced to do things, for yourself and others, that will forever alter and improve who you are as a person, as a teacher, and as a martial artist. There’s no way to get around it; if you go deep, if you really live it, if you genuinely embrace the philosophy, not superficially, but with heart and soul, YOU are going to benefit --and so will everyone around you.

And, honestly, from a teacher’s perspective, I can’t say whether this process will ever be over (I think not), but it’s everything I have learned, that I know, and that I am, myself, working on. It’s the only real gift and/or instruction I can give you that I really know has value. Everything else we discuss after this is just some part of the foundation used to support the concept of living as an example.

The best way, I think, to “get started” with this is to compare it to something like a birth or a death. Nothing is ever the same for parents when a child is born  --and nothing is ever the same when someone you love is no longer physically present; at least that’s been my own experience. From that day on (marked by a birth or death), I have changed --and/or been changed.

If you could decide at a level somewhere close to a birth or death experience that you were going to use your next black belt test to do some of the deepest, most genuine, most needed “life-work” on yourself that you’ve ever done, well...that would be “the ultimate,” yes?

So, decide. Decide to ignore this note. Decide to go it alone. Decide to make it your new strategy and practice. But DECIDE. And when you really decide, when you’re at the end of the diving board and you’ve bent your knees, leaned forward, and there is absolutely no turning back; THAT is when you know what commitment is. If and when you wake up and decide to dedicate a year + to designing and living a black belt test that changes your own life, the lives of your family members, the lives of your friends, the lives of your students, their families, your community, and quite possibly thousands of people you will never meet ---well, then you will be engaged in the kind of test I am putting myself through. That’s what I envision as “The Ultimate Black Belt Test.”

You may, if you’re ready, begin now.

Martial Arts Business: The Ultimate Black Belt Test 2012

The Ultimate Black Belt Test (UBBT) is one of many projects I’ve initiated to inspire martial arts school owners and instructors to re-think and re-design their work, their business goals (what they want to achieve as business people), their curriculum, and their lifestyle --in ways that dramatically improve the quality of their lives and the lives of the people in their sphere of influence.

It’s re-thinking who we are, what we’re here for, and how we’re going about the work, that empowers us to make change in our own lives --and thus can inspire others to make changes too. If they see us (martial arts teachers) benefiting from our personal changes, students might believe that they too can change, alter, and improve their own lives. In fact, the goal is to actually SHOW them how it’s done.

The UBBT is like a big tree. One of the UBBT’s branches include The Environmental Self-Defense Movement, a rather formal name to an informal process we’re all working to implement where we tie environmental issues to personal and social self-defense. For me and many of the team, that’s a no-brainer. How we go about this, perfectly, is still in development, but whatever the process I personally like the kind of thinking that says self-defense is more (far more) than the block, kick, or punch. My friend Julia Butterfly Hill, a legendary environmental activist, calls one-use plastic bottles (like store bought water bottles) “Weapons of mass destruction.” I believe that to be true --and feel that we can’t intelligently talk about self-defense in this day and age without addressing what we consume and what it means for the world.

Another branch of the UBBT movement is The 100. Well, The 100 is actually a tree of it’s own, with 100 plus branches all growing in different directions, including projects like Projabi (experiential community-based leadership training for young people), The Dietary Self-Defense Project, a movement to bring diabetes and heart disease education into standard martial arts training, bully education and community activism, The Teen Suicide Education Project, and all sorts of other smart --and very different --martial arts education programs executed by a special team of my “students” and peers who have taken it upon themselves to be a huge part of the solution to what is, today, ailing and near-crippling the “martial arts industry” (what’s hurting the “industry” is high pressure health club sales tactics, an emphasis on lots of sizzle, but very little educational “steak,” and an incessant push to mega-monetize every program into some kind of millionaire making money-machine).

While all of this is wonderfully overwhelming and incredibly (I think) ambitious and noble, the trunk of the UBBT tree is made up of personal, family, school, and community SIMPLICITY and CHANGE. The UBBT is about adding more to your life, by doing less and being more focused, and making what you do more meaningful. The voluntary simplicity movement has this great saying that describes the spirit of the movement (I paraphrase): To live a life that is outwardly simple, but inwardly rich. That’s the UBBT.

The UBBT is about daily actions, intent, mission and purpose --and it’s ALL ABOUT living as an example of what it is to pursue mastery through the practice of the martial arts lifestyle --if mastery is the deep spiritual quest for meaning beyond consuming, what we own, how we look, what watch we wear, what car we drive, or how much money our schools can rake through the front door.

The UBBT is actually my “business plan” for martial arts school owners. The plan is to get your own stuff together, in a big, big way. That’s what drives your business. Being master teachers who can take the work out of the dojo and into the world, that’s what we sell. The rest is just technique, fighting, sport, and the things that can be aped by just about anyone. Show me the teacher on a quest to look deeply at how he or she lives, who is engaged in his or her community, and who lives each day like it’s their black belt test --and I’ll show you a teacher worth studying with. This is our business.

The UBBT 2012 is accepting participants. It’s not for the mild or faint of heart or the opportunist. The UBBT is hard, deep, difficult work, which pursued with self-discipline and commitment, has the makings in it of one wonderful, empowering, brilliant, educational, value-enhancing experience. What makes the UBBT, like anything, is the participant and his or her willingness to step out of the comfort zone.

New UBBT (Ultimate Black Belt Test) 2012 Requirements and Curriculum

To The UBBT 2012 Team:

When I talk, think, or implement around the UBBT, I'm working on your black belt test too. 

 You do, after all, want your test to be a big deal, Yes?

You do want better-than-average, if not spectacular results from your efforts, yes?

 You would like it if your test made you and your students and your school a legendary force in your community, yes?

Then I'm working on your test --while I work on mine. 

NEW CURRICULUM for The UBBT 2012

I want every tester to come out of the project in the best shape of his or her life (which requires careful attention to intensity of training -and rest/recoup time, diet, habits, and attitude). That's a given.

I want every participant to have above average, if not masterful, martial arts skills (consistent, intentional, mindful practice). Skill is a given.

I want every tester to come out of the project with a very practical education, absorbed experientially, in what a black belt test could (and should) be. That your experience would cause you to look deeply at the experiences you help craft for others, is a given.

 What I want that's new, is I want every participant to take personal responsibility for planning, executing, and maintaining a bully education website/information/resource center in his or her community --and an outreach-education program. You've 16 months, give or take, to create something that's an exact reflection of your knowledge, your ability to manage, your understanding of the issues, and your ability to work with others -----oh, yeah --and your ability to create something that genuinely SERVES your community now --and for the future. 

I want every participant to plan, launch, and maintain a Dietary Self-Defense program, using filmed "diet chronicles" as a base for an educational program (and collective base of food-workers, educators, and activists in each member's community --as well as what we're cultivating in the international martial arts community). I want XX amount of UBBT participants / graduates who live as living examples of a smarter, more sustainable, healthier diet. 

I want every participant to assemble a PROJECT PORTFOLIO (using the activities of students) of 16 Environemental Self-Defense Projects --and to use this work as a basis for an intelligent ENVIRONMENTAL SELF-DEFENSE program in each member's community. Members should OWN this verbiage by test end. 

And in the end, I want the members of the UBBT 2012, to rally the most comprehensive group effort to bring smart, relevant, cohesive, intelligent, and useful new curriculum to the martial arts world since Kano's introduction of "judo."

This will require individual effort, group effort, and martial arts community effort --in and out of the membership of the UBBT/100. 

...and now, finally, we are crafting black belt goals and curriculum worth its weight in salt. 

Tom Callos

The Ultimate Black Belt Test 2012. For Immediate Release

The ninth version of The Ultimate Black Belt Test, called the UBBT 2012, will be officially beginning January 1, 2012. The project will be limited to 40 participants, each training and testing for new black belt rank from second-degree to seventh-degree black belt over a minimum time period of 16 months.

Each member of the UBBT 2012 will plan and execute a custom designed training program meant to produce extraordinary fitness, cultivate a career breakthrough in education and curriculum design, and initiate an aggressive community involvement program in each of their own communities. Martial arts business and curriculum consultant Tom Callos will acts as the team’s coordinator and coach.

“The new black belt test isn’t one of individual physical or technical skill only,” says Callos, “it’s a test of how much one can positively affect the people in his or her sphere of influence. Can a high ranking black belt, through the process she goes through during black belt test training, dramatically affect the quality of life of her family, coworkers, and classmates? Can a tester affect his community through his personal journey? The UBBT 2012 is an experiment in how --and how much --a tester can take his or her martial arts out of the dojo and put it to work in the world.”

UBBT 2012 members will, as a part of their training, complete 50,000 push-ups, 50,000 crunches, 1000 repetitions of a single martial arts kata, 1000 rounds of sparring, and walk, run, swim, and/or bike 1000 miles during the duration of the test. Participants will carry a personal video camera for the year and will record every meal they eat as a part of the UBBT’s Mindful Eating Self-Defense Project.

Returning UBBT member Gary Engels of Woodruff, WI, who will be using the UBBT 2012 to test for his fourth degree black belt, says the testing process has, literally, changed his life. “The UBBT has, experientially, taught me how to practice my martial arts in a way that has strengthened my relationship, made me a better father, teacher, leader, and citizen. It takes a lot of self-discipline to do the program right, but like most things, you get back what you put in.”

For more information on the UBBT 2012, visit www.UltimateBlackBeltTest.com. The UBBT 2012 is a project of www.The100.us.

The Alabama Project 2011 Wrap-Up

Alabama Project Update / Wrap Up
 
In 2002 I read about a teacher, Samuel Mockbee, who was doing extraordinary things with --and through --his students. This interested me, as I too wanted to be a teacher who could do extraordinary things with --and through --his students.

Click to read more ...

The Ultimate Black Belt Test's Stacia Kelly has her new book, a collaboration; NINE MONTHS IN, NINE MONTHS OUT coming out shortly! Yeah Stacia! 

See Stacia Kelly here: http://www.mindbodyspiritworks.com/about

See the book here: www.9monthsin9monthsout.com 

The Anger Cam Video Project, Dan and Kim Rominski Take Black Belt Action

This is a video diary project about ANGER and ANGER MANAGEMENT. It's spear headed by Dan and Kim Rominski, both members of The One Hundred and graduates of The Ultimate Black Belt Test. 

See the project here. 

This is what's known as a WOW.

The Year of The Maestro and Michael Lipkin: Black Belt Test Thinking and Mastery WOW

 Wow to Michael Lipkin! Thank you, Michael, for sitting in front of a camera and putting your thoughts about mastery down for all of us to marvel at, to listen to, and to learn from. I've been looking for, talking about, living around, and exploring "what is mastery?" for most of my life --and so I believe I can recognize a masterpiece when I see one. Bravo! 

Meet Michel Lipkin, who I didn't know before seeing this video, but who is now a giant bleep on the radar screen of my attention. 

Julia Butterfly Hill, an Environmentalist with a Black Belt Spirit

Tom Callos, Julia Butterfly Hill

I pay attention to what Julia Butterfly Hill is doing, because I consider her a remarkable spirit --and a Sensei worth listening to. She speaks from the heart --and she has a kind of courage and conviction that inspires me. As a martial arts teacher I have to pay attention to balance, as without it there is no worthwhile defense. That's balance as in both feet on the ground, and balance between martial and art, between hard and soft, and between internal and external. 

What Julia brings to the table is the opposite of what I might find in the ring, as she's not a fighter like, Oh say, BJ Penn, but she is definitely a fighter. She fights injustice -she speaks her mind without fear, and she represents an awareness that I recognize as an essential element to mastery. 

I'm grateful, no, make that lucky, to call Julia a friend, even though what she actually is --is a hero. She's someone who I look to when I need a reminder of what it is to be a black belt, a great one. Julia reminds me how to speak, how to stand tall, how to appreciate and give value, and how to use mission to make a difference. 

I'm a better martial artist, and a better human being, because of the example she sets. 

In 2011, I intend to convince Julia to spend a little time helping me craft an environmental self-defense program for the martial arts world. It will be something that we can introduce our young students to --and let them hear, straight from the author of One Makes a Difference, how to do just that.

Read an interview with Julia in E-Magazine here. 

A Black Belt Birthday Present to Me: My Friend Zdenek Mlika

My friend, Zdenek Mlika, took the shot above a week or so ago. It's of the last living student of the great judo master, the founder of judo, Jigoro Kano. Her name is Sensei Kieko Fukuda, see a film trailer (being made) about her, here. Pitch in a few dollars to help the filmmaker finish the film, info here. 

Zdenek is a photographer, a professional. I first met him when I lived in California and he lived in Reno. I'd stopped in Reno to visit some friends and family and I saw some of Zdenek's photos in a small cafe. Something about his work, even then, attracted me --and since then we've had the pleasure to work together on a number of occasions. 

He shot this picture of me on my 48th birthday (today is my 51st).

He also shot this one of BJ Penn:

I simply wanted to say THANK YOU to a great friend and photographer ---someone who is always ready for a new adventure --and who helps, no matter what, whenever anybody asks.

What a Gift! Thank you Zdenek.

See his website here: http://www.mlika.us

Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful. The Last Living Student of Jigaro Kano

Tomorrow I ask that you would please take a pause, turn towards the east, stand tall and then offer a deep bow of gratitude for the life and work of judo's founder, Jigoro Kano.

Kano died in 1938, 72 years ago; but judo, obviously, did not die with him.

Stop then, if you will, and turn west, towards San Francisco, and offer a deep bow of respect for the very last living student of Jigoro Kano, 97 year old Sensei Keiko Fukuda. 

Sensei Fukuda is the first woman ever awarded more than a 5th dan in judo by the Kodokan. Dr. Shelley Fernandez, one of Sensei's first students in the US fought against the Kodokan's sexist ranking system --and it resulted in Sensei being awarded her 9th dan. 

She is THE LAST living student of one of the greatest martial arts leaders or our time --or any time. 

A filmmaker, a friend of mine, is working to finish a film about Sensei --a film with a title you may never forget: BE STRONG, BE GENTLE, BE BEAUTIFUL. 

The filmmaker, Yuriko Gamo Romer needs our help. She needs funding to finish the project --and I think that the project should be finished before Sensei Fukuda takes her last bow (she still teaches in her dojo in SF). 

How much help does she need? You would have to go without two or three visits to Starbucks --or forego some small luxury. If you could do that, and do it with me, you might also be able to meet me in San Fransisco for the opening of the film. You might be able say thank you to Sensei, in person. 

The story and a button to donate are located here http://documentaries.org/cid-films/be-strong/

How about we make Sensei Fukuda's 98th birthday one heck of a celebration. You can, for just a few dollars, be a part of martial arts history. You can help Yuriko pay tribute the last living student of someone we might all have liked to know ourselves. 

When you're 97, all of your childhood friends, everyone you knew, all of your brothers and sisters, have gone. We are now, in a way, Sensei's friends. For the price of some coffee and a snack, you can help Yuriko finish her film --and know that you played a part in its making.

See Yuriko's website here: http://www.flyingcarp.net/

Please -- step up and lets make this happen. 

Tom Callos

Exactly How to Proceed, if Black Belt Test Reform is on Your Agenda

This morning I wrote this post, entitled "Raising the Standards for the Rank of Black Belt." This note is a follow-up to it. 

If you want to raise the standards of your own black belts, if you want to help change the entire international martial arts community's ideas/practices about black belt testing (and training), and if you want to help reform the way the general public perceives and understands just what a black belt is ---I offer you these EXACT and specific instructions:

Step Number 1

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Raising the Standards for The Rank of Black Belt. Thoughts from Tom Callos

The white belt starts here    ----------------------------------------   and here is 1st degree black belt.

The time between those two ranks, in my opinion, should be 4 to 8 years. 

I don’t believe there is a valid reason to award students a black belt until they’ve been seasoned with enough repetition and experience to do the rank justice. While there are many fine black belts in the world, there’s also an army of students who have earned that rank that hardly represent the technical, attitudinal, emotional, or educational standards the martial arts community has the capability to pass on.

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Black Belt Expectations, Wants, and Skills. Curriculum Thinking.

The One Hundred / UBBT is a dojo, like your dojo.

You’ve got a leader, like me --who doesn’t necessarily want to command (but will if and when I must), but wants to develop the students in the dojo to share the responsibility of it, to cultivate the potential of it, as what can be done by a team of people is, potentially, so much grander and important than what can be accomplished by an individual.

See, this is you, yes?

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