Pentecoast Seminar 2018
Yet Another Tough and Wonderful Trip
Wow.
Writing this, I am sitting in my home, thinking back on the pfingstlehrgang and everything that has happened around it. As usual, I am exhausted, both physically and mentally – but in a very good way. I am full of the many impressions that I can still vividly recall: the utterly beautiful sight of the community flowing among each other in gemeinschaft training, and the almost musical sound of laughter and kihap. All of it under a completely clear sky that makes you feel like you can see everything and far into yourself. I learned a lot this weekend, in terms of techniques and German language (I get better on every camp I attend), but also about myself.
The pfingstlehrgang coincided with a lot of challenges in my own life. But it is often like that – Shinson Hapkido and the rest of my life cannot really be separated, they affect each other. I felt on the camp how a full head can change my trainings, but also how I now feel calmer, stronger and clearer after the trainings, the talks and the atmosphere.
It is an intense and exhausting weekend, partly because the pauses are short and few – it can be tough, but it also helps me just follow the flow of the program. This year was also a special camp for me – the dantest is underway, and I had stayed in Darmstadt for a week before the pfingst. I avoided having to travel to Denmark just to take the trip back to Darmstadt a week later, and it was a wonderful experience living in the dojang, joining trainings and helping out as much as possible. There is an energy in the central dojang that gets into your skin, amazing teachers, and so many students! I heartily recommend to anyone taking the same trip to Darmstadt if possible, for exactly the same reasons I’d recommend the pfingslehrgang.
Sonsanim Ko Myong thanked the Danes for taking the long trip to Darmstadt – for supporting the community. I really think this is one of the most important reasons for going to the many different Shinson Hapkido camps. We have a lot to learn from each other, and the feeling of being a family – the strong and open community that I think is among the greatest of virtues of Shinson Hapkido – is worth supporting. Especially as a Dane, it can be easy to feel that the rest of Shinson Hapkido is very far away, and the interactions that have happened both on the pfingstlehrgang and during the week I stayed in Darmstadt have really helped connect me more to the rest of the community. Especially have I gotten to know my coming Ki-siblings, the people who will do the dantest with me in a month. We made a show together for the pfingstlehrgang, and for the first time I realized that it is a tradition that exists because it is a wonderful way to get to know and trust each other. The show went well, and my heart glows at the thought of meeting the dantest side by side with them – these are really good people, and I am proud to call them family.
It is good to be home. I went through a lot while in Germany, but it was a safe place to face my challenges, full of support. I fell sick on the lehrgang, and within hours I had been given both herbal tea, two homeopathic treatments, pills of herbal medicine (I think), tiger balsam and two packs of throat droplets, and then finally took some time preparing the barbecue with Rufus while listening to reggae and rock. Thank you to everyone for that. I’ve also had a lot of personal talks and challenges on this trip to Germany, about humility and courage and what I can and cannot do, which I am now slowly letting sink in. Ko Myong said that pfingsten is a time for spiritual revelation – for understanding oneself and moving towards the light. And this, I think, is a wonderful goal to have for a camp, or for a martial art – and indeed in the end it is the main reason that I practice Shinson Hapkido. I hope that, for anyone else in the community (or anyone else in the world), the pfingsten has also brought with it some light and some clarity.
All my best wishes to anyone who reads this. You have my hopes that there will be light wherever you walk, also in the shadows. The heart can be its own sun.
Warmest regards,
Peter Thestrup Waade, 32. Ki, Dojang Aarhus/ Denmark.
