It’s funny when you think about it:  the word “leading.”  It can either mean you are leading or someone is leading you.  In martial arts I see both; the push and the pull; the yin and the yang.  On this day my little one lead the class in stretching exercises; the only girl in a sea of boys.  She is so tiny and most of them looked so tall.  Of course she is a student so the Master was leading her from the back.  Such a fascinating study in contrast.  She is 5; he is 45.  In Native culture we believe in the circle of life, and as I gazed up at the South Korean flag I could not help but note the circular pattern contained within.  My mother spent so much of her time watching me; now I watch my little girl.  I pray one day she will be lucky enough to watch hers, and that I will be around to enjoy it.  I observed the kids push and pull each other to lower themselves eventually into splits.  One would go up and it pulled the other downward.  Next the one who was down came up and the one who was upward went down.  The English poet William Cowper wrote, “They whom truth and wisdom lead, can gather honey from a weed.”  This is what I strive for and wish for my daughter as well … to gather honey from a weed.