TAEKWONDO WOMAN 

My name is Sang Mee and if you've every watched Shaolin Soccer, the final scene pretty much sums up my goal in life - to use martial arts to improve people's lives.

 

I originally planned on becoming a doctor, but that dream faded when I fell in love with Environmental Science at the University of Virginia. However, I began to realize that I could make a bigger impact on the world through something I'd been doing my whole life, since I was three years old - Taekwondo.

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I suppose it also helps that it is my family's business, so I had already seen what the structured environment could do for our students. Parents constantly thanked my family for giving their children life skills like focus and discipline. My father, the grand master, was like a local celebrity - every time we went out, there were old students who greeted him with great enthusiasm.

 

Still, it was not until I saw the difference I made for my fellow ladies in Taekwondo club in college that I really considered martial arts as a career. I caught myself in the locker room one day, fervently wishing for a strong female role model I could consult in dealing with the frustration I felt at times being not as strong or as fast as the boys, and then it struck me that I was already that person for others.

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I embraced that idea and have used it to motivate myself to strive for more. It is an amazingly fulfilling cycle where being my best inspires others, and they, in turn, inspire me.

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Representation matters so much, and I love what I can do for my students just by being there, living a full life and showing especially my younger students the importance of cultivating a body that does not just cater to society's arbitrary standards of beauty, but makes them feel strong and healthy.

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Taekwondo Woman is a space for me to share my experiences through snapshots (short snippets) and longer posts of my roles as a teacher, a secretary, a diplomat, a coach, a janitor, a nurse, a counselor, a chef, a student, a manager, an emergency hotline, and a public speaker. Because you see, a martial arts master is all of these things and more.

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In case you were wondering, the Wonder Woman movie did inspire the logo for this website. Patty Jenkins and Gal Gadot did an incredible job of showing what women are capable of, and I hope that this blog can also do a bit of that.

 

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