Instructions for the UBBT 3 and 4 (and more)

About The Ultimate Black Belt Test

How
The UBBT is about accomplishing the gigantic, by breaking it down into little, bite-sized pieces. This is how one of your students becomes a black belt, becomes a doctor, becomes an engineer, becomes a great mother, father, friend, inventor –or what-have-you.

This is how YOU become a “master of the martial arts” ---which, in this day and age, seems like an impossible feat (Where are our role models? What are the standards?). By engaging in the DAILY training/learning requirements of the UBBT, you demonstrate to your students, and to yourself, exactly how one works on himself ---how one creates transformation, in any form, in one’s life.

All you have to do is get up and TRAIN; keep track of what you do; THINK “out of the dojo” ---and ACT like the teammate and student you want your students to be –your children to be –your mate to be --your friends to be –your employees to be. All you have to do is LIVE with passion and purpose and vision and SELF-DISCIPLINE.

And, most of all, two things:

1. Work on your attitude –by studying THE MASTERS and the work of masters.
2. No matter how hard it is, no matter how many times you drop the ball ---you get back on track and never, ever, ever quit. You don’t fail when you try –you fail when you fail to try.


Why You Do the UBBT

We’re doing the UBBT because there is something wrong with the martial arts “world.” We, collectively, are not reaching our potential. We are not fulfilling the promise of all the training –and the philosophy of the martial arts. We are living, for lack of a better term, a lie.

We are doing the UBBT because there is something wrong in the world. We, collectively, are not reaching our potential as human beings. We are not fulfilling the promise of all the abundance and philosophy in the world –we have become mired in life, so much so that we have nearly forgotten how to live.

The training is our car. The martial arts is our vehicle. The journey is for meaning, method, purpose, passion, and most of all –for clarity and enlightenment. Can we transcend the mundane? Can we wade through the advertising, the sex appeal, the trivial, the gossip, the ignorance, the misunderstandings, the mis-information, the anger, the FEAR, the aggression, the apathy, and see the simple? Can we find our center? Can we be Buddha? Christ? The Dalai Lama? Mother Theresa? Albert Einstein? Rosa Parks? Or anyone that holds the image and the ideals that move us? Can we make a difference in the world? Are we connected –or disconnected? Are we one? Is it our job to live as an example for others? What is The Way?

In the UBBT, in a perfect world, each participant would, literally, be “on a quest to be her best” ---a slogan we’ve all uttered, which is utterly meaningless unless embraced on a “cellular” level. But forget the UBBT –it’s not this program’s objectives you/we strive for, it’s LIFE’S objectives –it’s striving to be a fully conscious, aware, evolved, compassionate human being; that’s all we’re trying to be. To connect, through study and self-discipline, and ritual, and effort, and focus –to those things that keep us learning, asking, contributing, and growing.

In the UBBT, as in life, as in your school, as in your business, as in your thinking, whatever is difficult is your teacher. All the reasons you can’t –are why you must. All of your obstacles are your opportunities. All of your excuses are your enemies –is your thinking –is your downfall –is your education.

The UBBT has given you a very public forum with which to live out the drama of YOU trying to find purpose and clarity ---and most of all, to prove yourself as both student and teacher and man or woman –but that’s no difference than “life” –is it?

To succeed at the UBBT you train. You study. You learn. You get up off your ass, no matter how many times you get knocked on it. You learn from the masters. You don’t give in to excuses, you make solutions. You contribute. And TEACHER…You teach (thru your actions).

For the next year: There is a curriculum, which is very flexible. Get on it. Break it down into bite-sized pieces. Make everything a lesson (for yourself, your students, your community). Be one of the FEW who actually get up and DO something. DO the curriculum. Do the activities. DO the projects. Do the acts of kindness. DO the diet. Do the training.

BE the teammate that you want your students to emulate. BE the student you want your students, children, friends, to be. BE the man or woman you want to be. BE the “master teacher” in training? Be the ULTIMATE STUDENT. Be the ULTIMATE BLACK BELT.

That’s all you have to do.

Tom Callos