Luis Guerra
My journey to Black Belt is obviously a challenge that can’t be overcome without putting in the hard work. I started as a White Belt, you know, like everyone else, and advanced to the next belt by proving my worth during testing. Obviously, like the champ that I am, I passed with ease… for now.
Sadly, when we just started, COVID hit, and everyone had to quarantine and stay inside their houses for quite a while. When I first started as a White Belt, I wasn’t very enthusiastic about doing Taekwondo and kind of didn’t want to do it. But that is in the past. I was pretty unsure if I was having fun in Taekwondo or not, but over time, it became clearer that I was indeed enjoying it. Especially as sparring improved—not just that I got better, but that the arsenal of techniques got bigger. The more you progressed, the more new kicks and combinations you learned. The forms got cooler too, a bit harder, but nothing too challenging for this champ.
At the beginning of Taekwondo, I was lazy and didn’t want to participate in anything. I also didn’t talk much, but that later changed. I’m pretty sure it was during Orange Belt when I realized I was very lacking in sparring and had much to improve. But that’s to be expected. I sparred thinking I was gonna win, but that was where I was wrong because I was thinking about winning instead of improving. I was also scared of hitting people, so that was another reality check for me.
Orange Belt was the start of me realizing who I could be in the future. We were among Mr. Lacy’s first students, along with others who started before or around the same time as us, and he already had other higher belts above Senior Orange. I remember three higher belts in our class: Garrison, Bella, and Corrin. We mostly sparred with them. I forgot that we started sparring during Senior Orange Belt, but after sparring with people who were above me, it opened a different world for me because I realized, as I’ve said before, that I could get better.
Sparring Mr. Lacy for the first time hit hard. I was outclassed, outdone, and it’s still like that to this day, but not as much as before. There’s always room for improvement. Doing my forms got cooler and made me want to make sure I did them right. I enjoyed making it look cool because doing my form felt pretty exciting with the new steps and unique things that got added.
From the start of being a White Belt, it should be your goal to reach Black Belt. At first, I didn’t have a reason, but over time it became clear that I was set on reaching Black Belt. It wasn’t to show off but to prove to myself that I could do it, that I reached a very important milestone that I never would have reached if I kept that lazy mentality I had before. I would’ve been in bad physical shape.
The reason I want to become a Black Belt is to prove to myself that I could become stronger instead of wasting time. And when I go to help you teach class, it will feel cool to have a Black Belt while teaching others to reach Black Belt. But, you know, people would expect that from me because I’m the champ, but I still have to reach First Degree Black Belt, so I still have a long way to go.