Challenge Spotlight: Transforming mindset through martial arts with Jason Reed
Can you share a bit about yourself?
My name is Jason Reed. I'm a seventh degree black belt in Taekwondo. I’ve been teaching martial arts since 2001, and we're all about transforming lives. I like to challenge our students in both martial arts and other ways outside of the martial arts arena. I can help them with focus, listening, discipline, attitude. I try to help them with their mindset using daily living training. Martial arts—most people think it's kicking and punching and being better than somebody else, which is a part of it—but truly it’s about transforming people’s lives.
What inspired you to start teaching martial arts?
In 1996 I got a DWI. I was 20 years old at the time, I had life figured out, and it punched me in the face. And it was great, because it was the thing I needed in life—it helped me grow. I hit a bottom spot right there. I read a book called Awaken the Giant Within by Tony Robbins. Read other personal power books. So it changed my life. From then on, I realized I was in charge in my own life.
Three years later, I started training in martial arts. I got into a relationship with the woman I'm married to now. I got in better shape. I quit some of the bad things I was doing back then. 1999 rolls around, and I think I'm ready to start doing martial arts. Eventually my instructor asked me, “You want to be an instructor?” and tells me the best martial artists are instructors. And I realized I could transform people's lives—younger kids, older kids, by helping them through martial arts training in the right way.
I like making people's lives better through martial arts training. I'm here to inspire you to take action, realize that you're much bigger than you think you are. And just by putting them through a punch, a kick, a board break, I can get anybody to make them feel stronger about themselves feel better about themselves, so that way they have less fear of failure in regular life, which also helps them improve their focus and discipline. That's really what it is—I can change the world this way by just helping kids in martial arts.
What appeals to you about challenges? And why did you get set up on Framework?
My students asked me about it! I have to keep them engaged, and not just kicking and punching. People came back to classes, people like, "Hey, we would love some other challenge to do on the side." And then having somebody hold them accountable. That's huge. Plus they like to compete with other students. So my adult students asked for it, my kids asked for it, so I just did it.
When people are challenged, they're more likely to take action. When there’s something that people go through together, you build camaraderie, real passion, a culture. So that's the real reason I like challenges, because I think that's how we grow. And people are scared of challenges. They go away from challenges, and it hurts them in the long term. If you're not growing, you're dying. So having a challenge in front of you is a way to live. And if I can inspire people to do that, I think I'm inspiring them to live stronger. So, I got set up in Framework to get my students to take action and compete with their friends. Most people are scared of taking that next step. And they need something in their face that says, “Take this challenge on now, make your life better through these challenges.” Plus, they're free.
As for what makes Framework different—and I've looked through three or four different options—the personal help is the number one differentiator. I usually get a response within 24 hours. So that says a lot. I will be happy with any company that does that.
And number two: the Forms that you guys have where I can track what's going on. I can track their attitude, their focus, I can say, “Hey, John, I see that you had a bad day this week, what happened on that day?” And I care about my students. That's what makes me the most different. I believe I care more than any other teacher does. You can argue with me how much I know about martial arts mindset and everything else, but I care more. So when I show the students that I care, that I'm watching what are they learning, and I'm asking about it in class, it builds a strong bond between us and it allows me to grow as a teacher too.
What specifically are you trying to help your members achieve on Framework?
The challenge is technically for my martial arts students, but it's really for anybody. It’s where I start teaching my attitude. So for kids, just letting them know that they're in charge of their own attitude. And I teach them how to do that by changing their focus and the way they move their body. We don't expect perfection, we're just trying to get a little bit better.
What’s been your favorite part of running your challenge on Framework?
My dad died in 2013, and as many deaths do in people's life, it had a significant impact on how I think and feel about the world. And one thing I think about a lot since then is ripples—that we all have these ripples in life that we don't know about. You throw a rock in a river or ocean or whatever, and it ripples down. So if you can make one person's life better with one action, that doesn't just make their life better. It makes every person they know’s life better too. So I like knowing I have more of a ripple influence on other people through challenges.
Are there any goals that you have that you're hoping to reach this year?
Yes, massive goals. Next year, we have this massive world testing event where I'm planning to tell everyone what I've learned with my students. So, first, I want to get other martial arts instructors to do the same thing with their students. They're brilliant. They have concepts and ideas and I think they'll majorly help out their students in other challenges.
And, second, every two months, I plan to have a new challenge. So a month of a challenge, then we have a week to reward the students, and then a week just to promote the next challenge. Plus we'll have upsells, if you want, to personal coaching, and other stuff.
In the long term—next July—I'm building up a long term course where you build yourself up for testing and world competition, because this is the event people would go for. But that's gonna be a high dollar ticket item—$3,000+, where you just meet with me one-on-one.
For now we just start building out social media, and just getting it out there. Make it wide.
If someone out there is curious about starting to make an impact on Framework but are not sure how to get started or whether or not to take the leap, what advice would you give them?
Try for 14 days and play with it. That's I think what I did. Mess around with it. I looked at it and I compared it to three or four other things, and decided it's a better value for what you're getting. I also found that if your customer relationship is important, which I believe it is, Framework will do a better job. You're gonna be able find out what they're doing, you're gonna be able to communicate with them, ask questions, get feedback, and learn from other people too. That's it in a nutshell—it's better than the competition and the customer service is huge at Framework.
Do you have any final thoughts that you'd want to share?
I'll just go over the reason I think Framework is a good idea for most people that don't think about Challenges. If you have customers who you care about, if you'd like to make money, if you want to improve your business bottom line, anything—it's all about networking. Your network is basically going to be your net worth. So people, people, people is the most important asset in the entire world. It's not your widget, it's not what you think it is, it's your people—your customers—you need to treat them better than everybody else, period. You give your customers more love, you help them with their problems more, and they're gonna want to come back to you over and over again. How do you do that? Well, you need to get them to take action and transform their lives and be at their best, have a significant meaning in their life. And challenges is one of the best ways to do this. Most people don't understand how important challenges are, and I think they're gonna be a staple in our daily life in the future. So why wait? Start now.