When Sensei's eight year old daughter is "done" with class she only gives the very least in effort. I can't imagine what she's like at home, but I imagine they feel more free to address her behavior. Unfortunately, when I have to teach the young folks she is often an issue because I have to devote so much attention to her. That means the group suffers. I imagine I should just ignore her, but when she is partnered with another person they both get less done.
Last night I had four girls of varying ages and experience trying to get through two exercises. Each having less and less interest in the work as time went on. On a good night everyone is pretty much on the same page, but as the time stretched on I seemed plagued by several issues. The daughter and her partner started giggling which is a sure sign things are going down hill. Then they started shoving each other. In the other pair, one girl asked a question about every move; plainly thinking none of it made sense.
We are told to take questions about martial arts seriously and she waits until we are done the move, but at one point I was thinking, "just shut it and do the move." Years of training helped me keep my internal dialog inside, but I was tired from juggling both teams.
After I got home I realized that day of dealing with personal issues was pushing into class time. Normally, I seek refuge in the process, but my fuse was short last night.
That morning my Mom informed me that my Father had cancelled some care that took me a lot of effort to set up. I didn't think about it in the morning, but I sat down and processed a bit with my wife before I left for class and that was my error. I was a bit angry with no outlet. Kata practice was fine, because I didn't have to interact with anyone, but then their seems to be a murphy's rule for this kind of thing.
"An area of failure will be exploited at the exact time where the impact will be greatest."
Although in my case nothing happened, but my internal exasperation was at a 100.
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