“The Belt Around Your Waist: What the Years Have Taught Me.” Wow. Another chapter finished—just over 3,300 words—and this one took me somewhere I wasn't expecting. I started out wanting to explore the history of the martial arts belt: where the ranking system came from, the evolution of the colors, the traditions of the Moo Duk Kwan, and what those colors were intended to represent. But somewhere along the way, the chapter became much more personal. At nine years old in the South Bronx, I started martial arts without a uniform or a belt. At seventeen, I received my first white belt. Today, at 65, after 56 years in the martial arts, I tie a sixth-degree Master's Dan belt around my waist. And I found myself asking a different question: What does that belt actually represent now? This chapter became a reflection on rank, responsibility, maturity, efficiency, evolution—and time. The nine-year-old Peter had something the 65-year-old Peter doesn't have: all those years ahead of him. The 65-year-old Peter has something that little boy didn't have: 56 years behind him and everything those years have taught me. That realization hit me. And once again, I'm grateful I took the time to sit down, research, remember, question, and write this. Chapter 13 is complete. 🥋 And there is still training to do.

This one became much more meaningful to me than I expected. Chapter 12 is called “The Dobok: Wearing the Way.” For most of my martial arts life, the uniform was simply something I put on before training. I tied my belt, stepped onto the floor, trained, taught, and moved on. But while researching and writing this book, I began looking at the dobok differently—not simply as a uniform, but as the clothing of the Way. That opened the door to a much deeper reflection on the white uniform, midnight blue, the belt, the knot, balance, the relationship between teacher and student, and the responsibility we have to receive knowledge, live it, and eventually pass it forward. One thought from the chapter keeps staying with me: “The dobok comes off. The Way does not.” Because eventually we leave the training floor. The belt comes off. The uniform comes off. What matters is whether what we've practiced can be seen in how we live. And with Chapter 12 complete, I’m also excited to share the newly updated cover for Living Strong Through Tang Soo Do Moo Duk Kwan: A Lifetime Journey of Martial Virtue. The knot you see on the cover now carries an even deeper meaning for me—and Chapter 12 explains why. Another chapter finished. Another piece of this journey preserved. And we keep moving forward. 🙏 To learn more about the book and follow the journey, go here

What an experience writing this chapter. I began Chapter 11 thinking I was going to write about the dojang—the martial arts training space. I finished it realizing I was writing about something much bigger. For me, the dojang has never really been about the building. My first training floor was hard tile in a community center in the South Bronx. I trained in basements, on wooden floors, in gymnasiums, in Germany, in commercial martial arts schools, and now on Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu mats. Different places. Different seasons of my life. But the purpose of the arena remained. A place set apart to do the work. As I wrote this chapter, I also researched some of what was happening around me as a child in the Bronx during the late 1960s and early 1970s—the gangs, the violence, the community programs, the emerging influence of martial arts, and the different ways young people were finding identity, discipline, belonging, and respect. That research gave me some real aha moments. Things I experienced as a nine-year-old boy suddenly looked different through the eyes of the 65-year-old man writing about them. And that may be one of my favorite parts of writing this book. The lesson was there. I just wasn't ready to understand all of it yet. Chapter 11 also caused me to wrestle with some concerns I have today as a 65-year-old martial artist and lifelong teacher. I share some thoughts about where martial arts may be heading, how we use the dojang today, and what happens when the training floor—the arena—begins to be used differently. I don't pretend to have all the answers. And I certainly don't believe the next generation should simply do everything the way my generation did it. But I do believe there are things worth protecting. The floor matters. The training matters. The time matters. And the opportunity for concepts, principles, and core values to become living and active through actual experience matters.

A Book More Than 50 Years in the Making 🥋 WHY I AM WRITING THIS BOOK I have been practicing martial arts for more than five decades. When I first walked into martial arts as a nine-year-old boy growing up in the South Bronx, I could never have imagined where this journey would take me. I certainly couldn't have imagined that more than fifty years later, at 65 years old, I would be sitting down each morning trying to put that journey into words. But that is exactly what I am doing. My upcoming book, Living Strong Through Tang Soo Do Moo Duk Kwan: A Lifetime Journey of Martial Virtue, is becoming one of the most personal projects I have ever undertaken. And I want the people who have known me over the years to understand something important: This is not a book about kicks and punches. Yes, it is a martial arts book. Yes, Tang Soo Do Moo Duk Kwan is the road running through it. But underneath all of that, this is a book about life. It is about what more than fifty years of training, teaching, falling down, getting back up, making mistakes, growing older, raising a family, losing people I love, learning from teachers, teaching students, and continuing to be a student myself have taught me about becoming a human being. That is the real story I am trying to tell. 📖 WHERE THE BOOK IS RIGHT NOW As I write this, I have completed Chapter 10 of what I expect will be a 31-chapter book. And something unexpected has been happening. The deeper I get into the book, the deeper the book takes me. I began thinking I was going to document my Tang Soo Do Moo Duk Kwan journey—its history, philosophy, traditions, forms, principles, concepts, teachers, and lineage. And I am doing that. But every time I begin exploring one of those subjects, I find myself asking a bigger question: What has this taught me about living? That question has taken me into places I didn't necessarily expect to go.