Kicking Butt in Kung Fu and in Life!

Chapter 4 - Don't be defined by your age, or anything else the world says

I am writing this at 53 years old. How many people do you know who got their black belt at 53? I ask you not to brag about myself. Far from it. I ask you to let you imagine how many people assumed I wouldn't do it?

I cannot tell you how many negative things I have heard on the path to my black belt based on my age alone. I actually was shocked some days to hear what people tried to dump on me. I say tried because to get to a place of greatness in any area of life, I had to learn not to listen, and you do too.

I don't know why this is so common, but this crazy world and our culture, generalize all day long about what age means. I for one am not having it, but join in if you want. I am choosing to allow my life to be defined by God, and his plans for me, and this means shutting the world's opinions of me out.

Have you ever said things like, "at our age" or worse, "at your age" to someone? I know I am as guilty as everyone else and have dumped age-based bias on people too. I am ashamed of those times where I have been lazy and allowed myself to go along with my worldly programming. I say lazy because that really is what happens to us. Instead of constantly being on guard for what we allow into our minds and hearts, we just go along with the tide and the majority of people and let these generalizations in.

But I don't do this much anymore. I would love to say I never do it, or better yet, that I never think it. But on occasion, mostly in thought, these things can come. Getting a black belt in mid-life has been my best teacher in this area. While the world has sought to define me by my age, I have had to fight hard not to define myself. This is where the true challenge is.

When I was testing for my black belt, I was testing with three young people, all who were almost 40 years younger than me. Do you know how many times I was tempted to say to our instructor or to the black belts who were pushing me, "do you know how old I am?" "Do you know how much harder this is at my age?" Those thoughts came often when it was hard. Those thoughts came often when I wanted to use them inside myself as a way to justify what was really hard for me and what I was struggling to do.

What I realized though was that I had allowed the world's limiting programming to sink in, and almost without thought, I wanted to regurgitate all that I had been taught. But luckily for me, I saw it for what it was. Having spent almost 30 years in Information Technology finally came in handy as I recognized fully the bad code I had taken in.

My drive, my inner strength, my persistence, and determination were running straight into the world's definitions about age. And once I understood, I loved it! Now I had the chance to defy what the world says about me, and you do too!

I want to also highlight something often done to young people that is equally unfair. I have three children who God has blessed me with. They are 25, 17 and 15 and I have to tell you because of this understanding God has given me of the unique greatness that each and every person on this planet possesses, these three amazing people are my greatest teachers in life. I know plenty of people who treat their children as if they don't know much, and to me that is shameful. It also says more about the adults than it will ever say about the children.

Every person on this planet has gifts. Every single person has greatness, and every single person can be our teacher if we let them. I have allowed my children to be my teacher for more years than I can remember, and we all have grown because of it. The lessons I would have missed if I hadn't been ready to learn.

My son at 25 has taught me more about being an entrepreneur than anyone else that I know. My middle daughter has taught me how to recover from hardships at record speed by her amazing example and how to laugh more too. And my youngest daughter has taught me that genius comes at any age God chooses.

Don't miss life's greatest lessons by allowing the world's negative programming about age to intrude on your goals, or your thinking, or your journey through life. Don't pass on any negative programming you have had on others either. Remember you don't know what any other person on this planet is capable of. If you think you do, then check your programming.

Having programmed large mainframe computers I know all too well that they will do exactly what the code tells them to do. Even artificial intelligence must rely on coding, no matter how advanced it is. If you understand computers at the most basic level it comes down to zeroes and ones. Power present or not. It is so simple yet it is amazing where man has taken it.

Our programming is the same. The results are exactly in line with the programming. If things aren't working, check who your programmer is. Is it the world and what the world says you can or cannot do? Or are you allowing God to be your programmer, and choosing your path to greatness?