A reflection on the Hall of Fame Banquet at
AWMAI 2024 Conference: Teaching the Teacher in Columbus, Ohio.
It was an honor just to be in the room at the Association of Women Martial Arts Instructors Hall of Fame Banquet. The dinner punctuated a very full weekend of professional development workshops. The awards ceremony inducting this year’s 30, 40, 50, and 60 year career honorees activated a sense of meaning, gratitude, and respect for the work we do. Amelia conducted the room so gracefully, a true Master of Ceremony, pulling on my heartstrings to lead me down the long and winding path to mastery. Honoring the careers of women martial arts instructors, complete with triumphs and challenges, injuries and healing, the Hall of Fame reminded me that I am really only at the beginning of my journey. To each person who in their way encouraged me to stay the course and be patient, thank you.
As a first time attendee reaching the halfway point in the weekend, I was only just getting used to the general temperature of the water as I splashed around, checking my diving mask and snorkel, meanwhile rare, exquisite, giant creatures were floating past the whole time! Who knew I had been rubbing elbows with Olympians!
Meeting Sunny Graff and Helen Yee for the first time was a highlight for me- here are women who won their first championships in the year I was born. They could relate to my experience having mostly trained with men. In no time we were troubleshooting how to get our students to meditate. I appreciated that here are masters who after all of their accomplishments clearly love to teach and continue to dedicate themselves to start over again and again. Kore Grate’s true love for her students, as young as four, made a very strong imprint is in my mind with a smile and a sparkle, feeding my fire to find focus in the chaos and creativity of early learning.
I heard a few seasoned members called this annual gathering a Nirvana, or a safe haven, free of judgement and competition. Personally, heaven for me would be a gathering where hundreds of women from different martial disciplines will get to play push hands together. Last week was World Tai Chi Day. At the New York City event, I’d say that roughly, out of about 70 people playing push hands, I saw four other women participating. Two were there for the first time, and quite surprised by this gap in representation, feeling a little disappointed and confused, and relieved that we found each other. I just share this to reflect that, while women in martial arts now have more role models than we might have 40 years ago, there is still need for AWMAI, still work to be done.
I wasn’t sure I was going to attend the Hall of Fame Ceremony on Saturday Night, but I am so glad that I did, and I realized that night that my first conference experience would have been incomplete without it. Sure, I could read the illustrious bios of the honorees in the conference book– a good substitute for those who could not be there in person. This was my first year joining AWMAI, and I didn’t think I had a personal connection with the honorees, or that the banquet was really for me, but I was wrong. Of course, it is for the honorees, but in a larger sense, it is for them to inspire and uplift other women martial arts instructors, so everyone in the room with their different, but overlapping experiences, played an important role that evening.
The medicine you want is not always the medicine you need. While what I most wanted was to practice with other martial artists like myself, what I most needed was to step back and gain perspective from those who have led the way. I was so surprised about how fired up I got about what I expected to be the ‘boring’ parts, like a workshop on business models. Hearing honestly from Wasentha Young, Nancy Lanoue, and the active participants in the discussion made me feel excited about growth, adaptation, and mutual support.
This ceremony as well as the wisdom shared in workshops served to deepen my gratitude to my own teachers back home, both women and men who have not only given me the opportunity to learn and train for which I am thankful everyday, but have also had to don many hats and navigate the stormy seas to lead schools in NYC.
Other highlights included the demos- which were unlike any I’ve seen at tournaments- sincere presentations carrying a message, from Jay Spiro’s call for ceasefire, to Lisa Santi’s heartwarming celebration of three generations’ shared practice. I returned home feeling prepared with a few new games to celebrate skill, safety, and the art of play, and reconnected to the joy and creativity at the center of my teaching. I want to add to my gratitude that my participation this year was made possible by the organization’s scholarship fund, as well as my family’s support with childcare responsibilities. My time to socialize was limited, but I look forward to being in the network and meeting again soon.
With Gratitude,
Ilona
https://awmai.org/Hall-of-Fame
“…a vehicle to recognize leadership and accomplishment within the world of women martial arts instructors.”
Push Hands Now 