Episode 407 - I am a Martial Artist
On this episode, Jeremy is joined by Sensei Amanda Cass and they talk about the I am a Martial Artist project.
I am a Martial Artist - Episode 407
The #IamaMartialArtist Project aims to unify martial artist around the world through creating videos about what you do as a martial artist. It is to celebrate each martial artist, their background and where they are coming from. On this episode, Jeremy and Sensei Amanda Cass talks about the I am a Martial Artist project. Listen to Learn more!
Show Notes
You can check out Sensei Amanda Cass' episode here.
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below or download here.Jeremy Lesniak:Hello everyone, welcome this is whistlekick martial arts radio episode 407 and today I'm joined by returning guest Sensei Amanda Cass and we're going to talk about a new project that we're launching today, something that I think you really enjoy so hang on a second. I'll bring her on, we're gonna talk about this. If you want to find out more about what's going on with this, with other episodes, with anything head on over to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com that's where you're gonna find all the links to everything that we're talking about today so if you're driving, you're on a bike somewhere no need to crash or try to scribble things on your arm just whistlekickmartialartsradio.com and you'll see what we've got going on. So Sensei Cass welcome back.Amanda Cass:Hey, how are you doing Jeremy?Jeremy Lesniak:I'm doing great. It's great to have you back and I'm excited about what we're talking about today. I've really been looking forward to you know, fleshing out this conversation for the listeners.Amanda Cass:I am so excited about this project that we have for everyone that's coming at the end of the month.Jeremy Lesniak:Yeah yeah so as we're recording this, we're recording this a couple weeks ahead of when it's going to release and if you are listening to this now this project, this thing that we're working on, its already live we've timed it that way and the whole goal here as everyone knows, the goal here at whistlekick is to give people ways to express themselves as martial artist to empower them as martial artist to give you the tools whether those be physical things or you know, this podcast or Martial Journal, everything that we do is about supporting you as a martial artist. But there are a lot of different ways that people can be martial artist right?Amanda Cass:Oh absolutely and as you know from talking to multiple martial artists, everyone has a way that martial arts has helped them and different style that they're studying so that's kind of where were going with the I am a martial artist project.Jeremy Lesniak:Because at the end of the day it doesn't matter whether you're a karate practitioner, a tae kwon do practitioner. Whether your martial arts is tricking or Filipino or historical European or you do stunt work or any of these things, at the end they we're all martial artists. So to say I am a martial artist is a very collecting, unifying statement.Amanda Cass:Absolutely that really captures what everyone does and the cool thing about this project is where doing it visually so people can really see the style you study but you don't have to talk about exactly what you're studying. We just really want to see what martial arts is to you.Jeremy Lesniak:So if you're listening to this now, the very first video in the I am a martial artist project is out, it's up and that's a video that you've already put together.Amanda Cass:Oh yeah absolutely. I had an awesome cameraman come out, a friend of mine Douglas Graves and we shot a really cool video you can catch it on YouTube.Jeremy Lesniak:And of course we're gonna link it in the show notes and we're gonna start to see videos spread out because as soon as we're done here, I'm going to record one and we've got others that were reaching out to that I can't confirm yet because we're recording this ahead of that but if you use the #Iamamartialartist you're going to find these videos and our hope is that this spreads.Amanda Cass:Yeah, we want this to spread they want this to be a really cool event for the martial arts community that's why it's about martial artist and not about a specific style.Jeremy Lesniak:It's really easy to get bogged down in what separates us as martial artist in fact among martial arts discussion groups it's cliché for people to assume that if they post something, it's going to be criticized so one of the things that I appreciated about sensei Cass from our conversation before was how positive she is. So I reached out to her and said you know there's got to be a way we can continue to work together and after some batting around of some ideas, we came up with this. And what I love about this is its collective, it's saying that we are all martial artists and it gives us the opportunity to showcase yeah, what makes us different but in a celebratory way.Amanda Cass:Yes and that's what we're doing, we're celebrating each individual person as a martial artist, where they're coming from their background and that's what we want to see when you guys create these videos.Jeremy Lesniak:And they don't have to be special. They don't have to be dramatic you don't have to have a cameraman, you don't even have to do anything in fact if you check out the video that I'm gonna have out which will release a little bit after this feed, we release martial arts radio episodes pretty darn really want to make sure that they're for people when they drive to work and everything but mine's gonna air later this morning. Of course if you're listening to this after June 20, it's already out there. I don't have a cameraman, I'm gonna be using a tripod. I'm going to be doing what I do which is to sit and talk to you. Your videos can be on your phone, they can be fancy, they can be action shots, they can be talking, right? I mean they can be anything.Amanda Cass:Oh It be anything I mean everyone has a different experience in martial arts maybe the biggest thing you do in the martial arts community is to teach and you get somebody recording you teaching a classJeremy Lesniak:Yeah and it doesn't have to be long it does not to be complicated. You know one of the things we all know about video these days is most of us have a pretty short attention span. You know so we're thinking 30 seconds a minute something like that andAmanda Cass:Oh yeah absolutely.Jeremy Lesniak:Let's expose each other to what we're doing as martial artist, there are people out there doing things so different than what you do but there are also people doing things pretty darn similar if not almost the same. And it's fun to connect with others in that way.Amanda Cass:Yes it's gonna be fun to explore everyone's experience.Jeremy Lesniak:So of course were going to be following that #Iamamartialartist of course on Instagram, on Facebook, and were looking forward to getting tagged, you're welcome to tag @whistlekick on anything that you do and remind everyone your social media handles.Amanda Cass:Tag me @kickitlikecass on Instagram and FacebookJeremy Lesniak:There you go right. That's the framework that's the structure of everything that we've got going on and so at this point if you're feeling really excited, go ahead turn off this episode go record your video and get it uploaded but let's talk a little bit more because I don't want people to look at the length of this episode and not tune in. I don't want people to think so this is something short and silly, so were to talk for a little bit longer more about martial arts and what we’re hoping to see coming out of this project from the people participating. Sensei Cass, if you take a look at what you've seen others do online you know, what is the stuff that you look at that makes you say yes, I love watching this I could watch this all day.Amanda Cass:I Just love different like the visual when I'm watching something. There's several Instagramers and YouTubers that I watch and I love when people are able to be creative that's one of my favorite things.Jeremy Lesniak:There's something really special about a martial artist who's willing to tap into their creative side whether that's them making up their own form or just doing really weird kind of almost silly things in their sparring that somehow work. I love seeing that.Amanda Cass:Yeah yeah I love watching people's sparring games tooJeremy Lesniak:It's good stuff or creative drills or remembers when the mannequin challenge was big? My favorite ones were the martial arts ones.Amanda Cass:Yeah yeah we did a couple of those in our school when that was big a few years ago and it was really fun because there's so much you can do with it as a martial artist you know, working the cameras in the roomJeremy Lesniak:Absolutely yeah. No I'm planning too and I don't know that people have to you'll probably do this too, but when I post my video I'm gonna challenge others to do the same, I'm gonna call them out by name, not in a negative way, certainly a positive way to say I want to see a video from you. What is your I am a martial artist video?Amanda Cass:I would love to see that. I would all sell on my account love to share whatever else does this so if you you know, tag me in your video, @kickitlikeass I want to put you guys all on my story so people can see and we can really make a big impact on thisJeremy Lesniak:Totally. And we're gonna do the same thing. In fact the more we can get this rolling, the bigger it's going to get. You know it's like a snowball coming down a hill it doesn't start from much but the more time, the more momentum it gets, the bigger it gets and how cool would it be for this to become something that actually doesn't end.Amanda Cass:That would be amazing. I mean there's millions of us that do martial arts in this country and even more throughout the world and so I don't want to just stop locally I want it to spread you know. Even if we don't speak the same language, if you kinda seen the hashtag and figure out what we’re doing, I would love to see people from other countries doing this too, it would be very cool.Jeremy Lesniak:And of course there's a lot that can come off of this whether its connections with other martial artist or learning about something that's out there that you didn't know existed or maybe simply you felt like you were the only one who looked at your martial arts style or martial arts in general or the world in the way that you do and then you look through some of these videos and say oh I'm not alone. Because I think quite often as martial artist, we feel like we're alone. Because we're surrounded by people who play basketball and do soccer and do other things that are not martial arts related. We have half the participation in martial arts in the US that we do globally.Amanda Cass:Yeah I really like that you said that because I mean especially growing up doing martial arts, everyone was on the softball team or playing football so I was like who else does this I don't really know, you know. So, it's gonna be really cool to connect everyone through this projectJeremy Lesniak:Yeah, so of course that's really all there is for our framework. If you want to make your video 20 minutes, go for it. We're not telling you you can't. If you want to make your video you know, if it's vertical or horizontal, if it's on a camera or on the phone or on a you know a webcam on the laptop you know, these are all perfectly acceptable. We're trying to share this, we're trying to move something forward, we are not trying to be the overlords of what this is, what it can and cannot be. We truly want people right, we want them to express who they are through these videos. It's open.Amanda Cass:And when I sat down to kind of think of what I wanted to do for mine and we were talking, one of the big things that you had said you know about whistlekick and being a martial artist and you said that line and I was like that's it. That's what we're going with you know so whatever you guys choose to show us is up to you because I am a martial artist can mean anything.Jeremy Lesniak:It's right don't let anyone tell you what, what it means to be a martial artist you have to define that for yourself and this is your opportunity to tell the world how you define it for yourself because we're all different.Amanda Cass:And our journey changes you know as we get older and we grow, maybe you’re a tricker before but now you're really into teaching you can even tell us you know how that happened.Jeremy Lesniak:Now of course I been lucky enough, I’ve seen your video. It's super cool. I wish I had a videographer and a cool concept and we're gonna make sure that we link this so people are going to be able to see it in the show notes but you said it's on your YouTube channel.Amanda Cass:Yes that will be on the kickitlikecass YouTube channelJeremy Lesniak:And I'm sure it's gonna get shared around you know, you'll be able to find it. But I want people to check it out, I want you to look at it and then I want you to go look at mine and see the contrast see the difference because mines not gonna nearly as good or as cool but it's who I am as a martial artist and I think that that's important for everyone to recognize that contrast is not only tolerable or okay it's important.Amanda Cass:Yeah it is so important as all of our journeys are separate and different and when I was doing my video I want to showcase I love performing, I always have love have to be a performer so that's what I wanted to show when I did the video. I also wanted to show my style without talking about it.Jeremy Lesniak:Absolutely, well I think we've given them enough. I think we’re were at a good point now. So let's just remind everyone where they can go to find more. So why don't you start with the YouTube and social media and that stuff for you.Amanda Cass:Yes all my social media is @kickitlikecass that's Instagram YouTube and Facebook so you can find me on any of those platforms.Jeremy Lesniak:And of course we're gonna link to all of that stuff from whistlekickmartialartsradio.com, this is episode 407 so it's easier for you to remember that although kick it like Cass is a pretty pretty simple Instagram social media handleAmanda Cass:Cass with the CJeremy Lesniak:CASS. Well I hope everyone's willing to participate does this this is gonna be a lot of fun. Don't be scared. Don't be nervous and I don't I don't care what your lighting is like I don't care how how your skins looking that day, just do it.Amanda Cass:Yeah absolutely like you said don't be scared, don't be nervous because if you are a martial artist, and you've been doing it and it's what you love to do, there is no need to be nervous. You know what you love.Jeremy Lesniak:This is this is entirely a positive project and you're gonna start to see some really interesting stuff from some interesting people. So help us move this forward and we'll all grow from it. So Sensei Cass thanks so much for your time in coming back.Amanda Cass:Thanks so much Jeremy, had a blast talking to you today.