I remember watching my very first black belt exam after I’d had my introductory karate class. I was with a friend who had begun a few months prior, and she explained all of the moves they were doing throughout the session. It was exciting to watch, very energetic and technical and almost spiritual, and I was beginning to think that maybe I wouldn’t be able to do it. It was very graceful, very choreographed, and, typically, I wasn’t known for my grace or choreography. Suddenly, however, I was riveted.
The black belt candidates lined up side by side, with their legs bent and slightly spread apart and their fists tucked against their ribs: the traditional “horse stance.” There was total silence in the gym. As I watched, transfixed, the upper-degree black belts lined up facing the candidates and started making their way down the line and, one by one, punching them in the stomach as hard as they could. The air was now punctuated by shouts and grunts and “ay- yah!’s,” and I finally asked my friend, “What the hell are they doing?”
She replied, “It’s called body punishment. When you’re training for your black belt, you learn how to concentrate and breathe in such a way that you can absorb a blow to the stomach.”
“Do you mean they’re lining up to see how many hits they can take?” I asked, incredulous.
“Well, yes, in a way,” she said. “It’s basically to test your focus but also, I guess, to see how much you can take.”
“Okay,” I said. “Just so I understand, the goal is to get as hurt as you can without showing that you’re hurt?”
My friend looked at me curiously. “Well, yes, I guess,” she said.
I thought about all of the ways I’d hurt myself throughout the years that I hid in shame, and the ways I’d hurt myself that couldn’t be hidden and were, therefore, a source of even greater shame. I thought about the years I’d spent silently wondering what was wrong with me that compelled me, from childhood, to do these things to myself no matter how hard I tried to stop. I thought about the parts of my life that I’d lost to alcohol because self-medicating was my only escape from the mental torture with which I’d suffered privately since I was old enough to step over a crack.
I watched those black belt candidates lined up on the floor, waiting to get punched in the stomach by fifteen other people, hoping to be congratulated and promoted to black belt when it was over.
I said, “Oh, yes. This is the sport for me.”