Ch. Master Greg Moody, Ph.D.

P.S. The Transcript: WWKBD – What Would KarateBuilt Do? with Chief Master Greg Moody and Senior Master Laura Sanborn

Chief Master Greg Moody:

Hey, everybody. Thanks a lot for being here. I’m really excited about our success seminar today. And in our podcast, I’m here with Senior Master Laura Sanborn. Thank you for being here, ma’am.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

Oh, thank you for having me, sir.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

All right. We’re excited because we’ve just got for our students this wristband and this idea. It says, “What Would KarateBuilt Do?” So we’re both showing you those wristbands, and they’re for our students to wear both in and out of the school. And it’s all about reminding us to live by the charter at KarateBuilt, both inside, again, and outside of the school. So again, I’m here with Senior Master Sanborn. We’re excited to get started about this.

So WWKBD, What Would KarateBuilt do? It’s based on our charter, which is these three sentences. “We’re a highly disciplined martial arts school. We measure results not based on who we exclude, but on our students’ constant growth from the day they start to black belt and beyond.” And then, the last one, “KarateBuilt black belts take responsibility to learn with integrity.”

So let’s go through each of these. And the idea is, for each of these, that if you’re wearing this, it’s just a reminder. Sometimes people have a reminder. They just put a rubber band on their wrist to remind them of something. This is more of a constant reminder and gives you exactly what to think about in different situations.

And one of them would be being disciplined, reminding yourself to be doing things every day that are consistent with the goals and things you want to achieve. Senior Master, what would you add onto that for a highly disciplined, if we’re out of the school, what highly discipline means, and when we’re in the school, what highly discipline means?

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

Well, to start with in both cases, I think it’s the choice, making the choice to do the event that’s going to be in consistency with that. So that if I have the choice between the pastry that looks luscious over here or eating a little healthier, or at least starting with the healthier food, if I make that choice, then I’m being disciplined. And if I’m being reminded of that all the time just by wearing the bracelet or just the thought, oh, I go to KarateBuilt and we always talk about discipline, which one is the better choice right now? So it’s about making good choices based on having the discipline to do what is right for you.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And I think one of the things that’s important to point out is our definition of discipline, which is learning to push yourself even when it’s hard. So if it’s easy, it’s not really a big deal to be disciplined. I mean, eating ice cream out of the fridge is pretty easy. You don’t have to be disciplined for that or the pastry, like you just mentioned. But eating something that’s going to be positive for you and better for you, does require some discipline because sometimes that’s hard until you get in and develop habits.

So all the hard things and all the things that are on the edges of growth are the things that make us better in the future, or at least most of them. I mean, I’m sure there’s some things we can think of that are difficult or hard that don’t actually have a positive benefit, but the things that we’re doing in terms of training people in martial arts and then thinking about how that applies outside of the school is what we’re talking about. The discipline is learning to push yourself even when it’s hard.

And for parents, I think this is an important thing to talk about because, as parents, sometimes we hear or we think about, well, how hard should I push my kid? Should I push my kid? Should I push my kid? And see, that’s not really the right question. The goal is to teach your kid to push themselves even when it’s hard. The goal would be when your child says, “Oh man, I’m really tired. I don’t want to do that.” Or, “Oh, I don’t want to make my bed. Oh, I don’t want to do that,” we’ve got to be the ones to help them learn to push themselves so they do these things independently.

One end of the spectrum is a parent yells at their kid all the time to get stuff done. Another end of the spectrum is they just let their kid do whatever they want, and they don’t learn anything. In this end of the spectrum, your kids still didn’t learn discipline. They still didn’t learn to do stuff independently, to behave independently.

On the other end of the spectrum, if you don’t give them any rules or boundaries, then they’re not going to learn that there are rules and boundaries. And when they grow up and they’re an adult, they’re going to feel really upset and oppressed because they have to go to work at 8:00 in the morning, they get one week vacation a year instead of three months off in the summer. They’re going to feel like life is really, really hard. So the idea is get them somewhere in the middle where we’re teaching them to push themselves so they get more out of life, so they get more out of what they’re doing even at the moment and then in the future. So that’s highly disciplined.

The next piece of the charter is we measure results not based on who we exclude, but on our constant growth from when we start the black belt and beyond. So that means that you might come in, and I’m almost 60 years old, if I started martial arts today, I probably wouldn’t be able to do the, I couldn’t do what I did when I was 25 when I started or 21 when I started martial arts. So that’s a different place to be. If I came into the school today and started and started training, I wouldn’t have the same expectation of where I started.

But what I would still have a high expectation for is where I could get to, that I would notice the growth. So if you start here, you get to here. If you start here, you get to here. Wherever you’re at, once you learn to push yourself, then we’re going to push you and help you achieve more. But we’re not going to measure it based on whether you had a disability, whether you’re older, whether you’re younger, whether you’re a highly trained athlete, whether you’re not a highly trained athlete. That’s not what’s important. What’s important is that you constantly grow. So that’s the idea with the wristband as you’re out and about in the world is how do I choose things that help me grow?

Master Sanborn, what are your thoughts on that for inside and outside the school?

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

Well, inside the school I see it pretty much every day where we have a student who is just exceptionally athletic. They come in that way, they’re developing that way, and that’s just their natural way to be. And they’re in the same class with somebody who is not that way. Maybe they’re on the spectrum, maybe they have physical disabilities, but they are in the same class. And a lot of times, they’ll take the time to help each other in both directions as in, “I already know that. Let me show it to you.” Or, “Hey, kick a little higher. I’m going to hold the target higher for you today because yesterday you didn’t kick as high as I know you can.”

So in the school, we see it among the students, among the staff and everybody else, that we’re helping each other no matter which end of the spectrum of athleticism we’re on, we’re helping each other and not going, “Well, you’re not as good as I am, so I don’t want to work with you because you’re not going to be able to hold the target for me as good,” or, “You’re not going to be as fast as I am and it’s going to slow down the whole…,”. It’s everybody’s inclusive in terms of just working with other people, and I see that every single day in class.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And that gives, especially for our kid students, that gives a perspective on life that other people are valuable. And some people might be more talented, less talented, older, younger, different, different, different. They’re all different, but there’s some value.

And that’s not just like a flighty thing like we’re all trying to be nice to everybody. It really is true that I find value. And we could go through the list of students that both on the super high-level athletes to the ones that had some challenges when they started. And the idea to keep on pushing, it makes it the same for everybody. I may be able to kick higher than you or you might be able to kick higher than me, but we can still work on getting better together, and that’s what grows about. And that’s how we continue to not just get better, but for our adult students that are maybe older, how we continue to grow even as we’re older.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

And a lot of times they don’t even realize that they’re growing in that way. About being empathetic with people, they’re not seeing that in themselves. They don’t know that that’s growth. But we see it and can tell that maybe when they first came in, it was like, in their eyes, karate man, everybody’s got to be super fast, everybody’s got to be super good. And now they’re working with somebody who’s not, and guess what? That person is just getting better all the time because I talked to them and helped.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And I was thinking of something as you said that, that inclusivity, including people and working with everybody so they can grow, is it’s a gift for me. It’s not because I’m being nice.

One thing I thought about is one of my, the person who started before for me, he was a second-degree black belt when I was a white belt, a guy named Mel Spradlin. I don’t know if you ever met him, but he had a school in Lake Havasu, and he passed away not that long ago. But I remember seeing him when I was an orange belt, that’s this first belt after white belt, and he looked like… I was afraid of him. I was afraid of him because he looked like he was in a motorcycle gang, and he looked just like that. And he was doing his thing and everything, and I’m like, oh man, that guy’s kind of scary.

And it turned out I was right. He loved motorcycles, and he wasn’t really in a gang, but I mean, that was like his style and he rode motorcycles. But because I came into martial arts from, I was an engineer, and I was in a narrow world. And what this did was expand my world and realize that Mel Spradlin was a wonderful guy. He was a super nice guy. I became a good friend with him, and he was a wonderful person to have in my life because I got to hear about his perspective, not just mine.

And so this is something when you’re wearing the wristband to think about, not who you personally exclude. You might think of excluding somebody because they may not fit the model that you think might be a nice person or might be somebody who you’d like. And then it’s a gift for me because I get to have more people in my life and more experiences and better perspectives about things. So I love that this is part of our charter.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

[inaudible 00:10:25].

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And let’s… Go ahead, ma’am. Do you have something else?

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

No, I was just going to agree. Yes.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And the last thing, and as we’re wearing the wristband, is to take responsibility to lead with integrity. That means even outside of the school. Even if you’re not, you could be one of our white belts, our brand new students, and we want you to have the perspective that if there’s something that needs to get done or something that needs to happen, I’m going to take the charge to make it happen. I’m going to take charge to do something or at least a little bit more than you did before.

It doesn’t mean you have to be the person that’s the captain of your team or be the boss of everybody. What it means is just a little bit more. You’re noticing if something’s going to happen, I’m going to go maybe do that or I might help do that, rather than sit passively back and let other people take action that may be fine, but maybe it’s something you can contribute to.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

And the words that came to my mind is, are you going to step up in what you were saying? Am I the one that’s going to step up and step in when something needs to be done? Even if it’s something as silly or seemingly so as pick up that piece of trash on the ground that’s right next to the trash can. It takes zero effort to bend over, pick it up, put it in the trash can, really, in the scheme of things. But did you step up and do that because it does make a difference?

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And it can make a difference in you being a better person. Even if you’re completely selfish and you just want to get better for yourself, which I hope that’s not the idea, but it helps you become a better person. It helps you grow. And that’s a great example.

The other example I like to use is when you’re leaving a hotel room or you’re leaving a room, did you turn the lights off? Now that light is not going to cost billions of dollars. It’s not going to make the world all run out of energy just because you didn’t turn one light out, but it’s about whether you were responsible as you left the room. It was a small move. It took you a few seconds of time. Are we taking those few seconds of time to be more responsible? It’s better for you. It helps you grow.

And for us as parents, and for the parents that are watching this, these are things that you can ask your kids to do. I can ask my kid, “Hey, when we leave a hotel room or we leave a room, you turn the light out,” and just make sure they do that. And then they become somebody that people can trust, that are reliable and do things a little … Even though that seems small, for a lot of people, that’s a little bit above and beyond what they normally do. And you said step up but to a little higher degree than what you did before, which ends up eventually being a large degree higher than what is expected out of everybody in the world.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

And it’s modeling the behavior that would make that difference. And you don’t know who might be watching you and says, “Oh, hey, that guy wasn’t even related to that piece of trash. I saw three people before him dump that piece of trash. He stopped and picked it up. I could do that. Why wouldn’t I do that?” So it helps other people grow just by seeing you be somebody who takes responsibility.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

And I think that, and the idea of having our wristband is so that we remember, it’s just a reminder to do these things. And if you do them long enough, they become a habit and they become ingrained, and then we can get the next good habit on top of that and the next good habit on top of that. And pretty soon people are a lot more capable, our students are a lot more capable. And we’re not only doing that, but with this last thing, we’re spreading that capability to the rest of the world. We’re helping them, just as a little reminder.

So I’m really proud to wear the wristband. Our students, I feel like it’s fun to have something like this, but it’s also something to be really proud of because even if you do just a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more, it’s going to help you and in the end help people around you.

Anything else to add, Master Sanborn? I thought that was really good.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

It ties into the charter. It ties into our life skills. It’s something that we talk about every single day in class in one way or another, and it’s nice to have that. We say it, we say it, we say it. We know they hear it, we know they can answer the questions on it, but now they can take it with them in a more physical sense to, “Oh, we talked about whether or not I should clean my room. Oh, look, what’d I do for KarateBuilt? Oh yeah, I should clean my room because we talked about it. And my parents said, yes, they want me to clean my room. And I said, yes, I would clean my room. Oh, yeah, I did.”

And so that physical reminder just I think is going to make a big difference for, especially kids, but I think for everybody. That simple little, “oh yeah, I said I could do that. I said I would do that because I heard it. I talked about it in KarateBuilt. I talked about it in class. Okay, I can do it.”

Chief Master Greg Moody:

So that’s a great way to wrap up it. The two things we have are, one is your wristband so that it’s a reminder. You can’t wear your uniform all the time. You got to have pockets sometime, and you got to wear other clothes to school. But instead of wearing your uniform, you’ve got this. This is like wearing your uniform.

And then for our black belts, when you get to the level of black belt, then they get this, which is a special pin that says black belt. And this, again, is to wear all the time. You wear it when you’re… I have it on my suit jacket, so whenever I’m doing something professional, I’m wearing this, whether or not if it’s related to martial arts or not, and being proud of being a black belt. This isn’t showing off, and this isn’t showing off. This is saying that I’m going to do things a little bit above and beyond what is expected of everybody else, and that’s pretty special for you and for the students.

So I didn’t have anything else to add, Master Sanborn. Anything else to wrap up with?

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

No, sir. I think this is going to be impactful for everybody. I hope that everybody that gets one and gets access to one shares one because it’s an invitation for other people to do the same thing, to have responsibility and be a leader and hopefully come in for karate lessons, but really to be a leader and be reminded that they can do that.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

Well, and that’s something I’m glad you brought up. So everybody that has one, if you give one away to a friend, we’ll give you a new one. They don’t have to be a student. Of course, we’d love it if they come in and they become a student, but they don’t have to be a student to have that. So if I give this away to somebody, then next time I come into the school, we’ll give you a new one because this is something to share with other people.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

And another way they can use it, sir, is if they see somebody who’s already stepping up to do something nice or do something with responsibility. Give it to them and say, “Hey, I noticed you did something really great. I’d like to share my KarateBuilt wristband with you because you already show that off, and I think you’d be-”

Chief Master Greg Moody:

You’re already showing some of the characteristics I learned as I’m training to black belt.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

Yeah, and so they can use it in that way as a recognition to somebody else that they see doing the right thing.

Chief Master Greg Moody:

Good example. That’s perfect. All right. Well, thanks everybody. Thanks for being here today for our KarateBuilt podcast and success seminar on What Would KarateBuilt Do. Get your wristband, come in the school, and we look forward to seeing you and seeing you embody some of these characteristics that we’re talking about.

Thanks, ma’am.

Senior Master Laura Sanborn:

Thank you, sir.

P.P.S. Get Dr. Moody’s Book on Bullying – Click Here

KarateBuilt.com and KarateBuilt Martial Arts have been selected as the nation’s #1 martial arts schools for EIGHT YEARS IN A ROW!

KarateBuilt L.L.C. was founded in 1995 by Dr. Greg Moody, an 8th-degree Black Belt and Chief Master Instructor, KarateBuilt Martial Arts and Karate for Kids offer lessons for pre-school children ages 3-6 and elementary age kids ages 7 and up are designed to develop critical building blocks kids need – specialized for their age group – for school excellence and later success in life.

KarateBuilt Martial Arts Adult Karate training is a complete adult fitness and conditioning program for adults who want to lose weight, get (and stay in shape), or learn self-defense in a supportive environment.

Instructors can answer questions or be contacted 24 hours of the day, 7 days a week at 866-311-1032 for one of our nationwide locations. You can also visit our website at KarateBuilt.com.

About Dr. Greg Moody:  Dr. Moody is an eighth-degree black belt and chief master instructor.  He has a Ph.D. in Special Education from Arizona State University (along with a Master’s Degree in Counseling and a Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering – he actually is a rocket scientist). He has been teaching martial arts for over 25 years and has owned eight martial arts schools in Arizona and California. Chief Master Moody is a motivational speaker and educator and teaches seminars in bullying, business, and martial arts training, around the world. See more at DrGregMoody.com.

The KarateBuilt Martial Arts Headquarters at KarateBuilt LLC is in Cave Creek, Arizona at 29850 N. Tatum Blvd., Suite 105, Cave Creek AZ 85331. You can locate the Chief Instructor, Master Laura Sanborn there directly at ‭(480) 575-8171‬. KarateBuilt Martial Arts serves Cave Creek, Carefree, Scottsdale, and Paradise Valley Arizona as well as Grand Rapids, MI.

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Here is Dr. Moody’s Amazon Author Page with over 16 of his Amazon Bestselling books: Click HERE

P.P.P.S. From a parent:

“Since joining this program, my son Herman is more disciplined, motivated, and unstoppable in every challenge he faces!” – Emily Green