How Time Flies

 

It’s never too late

 

Starting anything, whether it’s a new hobby, a new job, a new career, a martial art or even a new direction in the style you’re already training already (Wing Chun), may seem daunting at first and perhaps even too big of a task.

 

I remember feeling this myself back around 1979/80 when I had my first encounter with Wing Chun, starting my training in Leeds but then turning down the idea of further classes as I was progressing so well in my Karate (having reached yellow belt. Yeah!)

 

To be fair, if I had followed Wing Chun at that time, it would have been under the umbrella of a different instructor and very likely not see me now as a disciple of Grandmaster Ip Chun.

 

And this is a confession I have heard many times over the years from new students, upset with themselves that they had not started “Training with me sooner”, believing that they had wasted all those years training their previous style, but I tell them that this is not necessarily the case.

 

Of course for them to have such an attitude toward their past, we need to assume that the encounter they just had with Wing Chun had completely blown their mind and got them excited for their future.

 

Now there are two trains of thought we need to appreciate here:

 

Firstly, whatever training you had done in the past was worth something, regardless of how you feel about it at this moment.

 

Look at it this way, if you had studied Kick Boxing or Judo and now feel it is not for you, whether you were good at it or not, at least you will understand the mindset used in such a style, and THAT is a very valuable tool to have.

To know what that kind of a guard may look like could give a few tells as to what they may do next.

 

Secondly it is worth thinking that, if you are happy right now, even if there is just one thing that you appreciate and would not change, then whatever you have done in the past, right or wrong, drove you to this very point in time, right here and right now.

 

‘A one-degree change in the journey of a thousand miles leads to a different destination’

 

So do not be put off by a new start or a new attitude to your Wing Chun, because the journey is only long at the start of it.

 

“To move a mountain we must start by moving pebbles”

Buddha

 

Before you know it you’ll be looking over your shoulder in disbelief of how much you’ve learned already and how the weeks, months and even years have flown by.

 

So try to embrace change and not fear it.