Category: television

Anatomy of a Scene – ‘How you been, ya know, besides work?’ (True Detective)

“However, they both are excellent detectives, dedicated to solving crimes, and are each other’s yin and yang by keeping the other one honest.”

True Detective, Season 1 on HBO aired over ten years ago but it’s still regarded as one of the best TV drama seasons of all time. Part of its lore lies in its storyline and direction, but a lot of credit also should go to the lead actors, Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson. The two actors who play Rustin ‘Rust’ Cohle and Martin ‘Marty Hart’ respectively do an excellent job of showing these actors at different periods in their lives and careers as detectives with the Louisiana State Police. Both men appear to be opposites at the start and the friction(s) that they have intensify over the year. However, they both are excellent detectives, dedicated to solving crimes, and are each other’s yin and yang by keeping the other one honest.

Few shows since that season of True Detective or the seasons of the popular anthology series since the 1st season with Rust and Marty have achieved the same level of on-screen chemistry and presence. It helps that off-screen both actors are close friends and have known each other for decades. They’ve been quoted as almost being like ‘brothers’ sharing the same sense of humor, profession, and having different hobbies in common. While True Detective with Marty and Rust happened over ten years ago, there are rumors swirling around that both characters could come back in the future for another story by showrunner Nic Pizzolatto.

One scene on the show that really sums up their rocky relationship and occurs later in their troubled careers. Not only do they have unfinished business with each other in terms of reconnecting and perhaps getting over their troubled past but also to attend to possibly solving a murder mystery central to the season’s plot. At this point in the season, they are older, not on the force anymore as detectives, and life has both affected them in different ways including estranging them from their former family and friends.

Marty Hart, for example, is balding, lives alone after separating from his now ex-wife, and doesn’t have sole custody of his daughters anymore. He doesn’t cook much (it’s implied), likes to fish for a hobby, has trouble finding purpose in his current job, and has resorted to online dating (unsuccessfully so far) even though he insists it’s ‘casual’, but likely wants to have a new relationship via Match.com. Rust Cohle, has grown his hair and beard out, looks a bit older due to his smoking and drinking habit, owns a bar in rural Louisiana, is isolated but does seem to enjoy the quiet of living by himself and spending time watching the sunset each night while drinking a beer.

You can tell by the montage of this scene in the show that as the years gone by, they’ve lost connection not only to their purpose and to each other, but also to what made truly worth living. They may have other jobs and maybe some other things keeping them going, but they miss the work they did, the past relationships they squandered, and even each other begrudgingly.

While the montage showing them settling into middle age monotony may be unsettling, the short scene does give them a chance to reconnect again, get to know each other on a personal level outside of detective work, and work together to find a purpose again. In this case, there’s a murder mystery to solve and they cannot do it by themselves. Since they both are single, one divorced and the other non-committal to it, seemingly estranged from their current work and lacking purpose, they need each other ten years later more than they could ever know.

Life can get lonely without friends or family but especially if there’s no one around to help you find your purpose. I think that’s why this scene is so key within the show is that it shows Marty and Rust may feel like they’re alone, but they do have each other despite their past differences. Sometimes, you must go through some solitary times in life to find out what you really want to do or who you really want to spend your time with. Rust knows he is alone as the scene makes clear, but he has made peace with the loneliness even if he might wish for a girlfriend or a friend to drop by the bar after it closes. Marty had a marriage and a good relationship with his children but unfortunately, he was not able to balance it with his work life and his infidelity.

The scene’s montage shows the years have been a bit hard on Marty as he tries to rekindle what he once had but being unsuccessful at doing so. The montage shows you just how precious our situation can be with work, with love, and with family, and that you can’t go back and change the past. As much as you might wish to catch lightning in the bottle twice as is the case with Marty in terms of finding love or companionship, sometimes, those second chances never come around. The fact that they each have each other in their lives again, even with their storied pasts, is a good thing and shows that they still have an innate purpose regarding their work as detectives and that they are better off working together than being apart. In time, they will get back their skillset, work to solve the case, and even become friends again, which can help put their loneliness at bay.

While this scene of them living isolated lives may be looked on as depressing, I think it is a realistic look at how life can get as you get older. You may have to deal with periods of loneliness or getting swept up in a routine that grows stale. However, it’s important to remember for all of us watching is that life throws us curveballs sometimes and you never know who will appear in your life again or what kind of purpose and worth you can find in the most unlikely of places. For Marty, it was seeing Rust’s trust again on the road after ten years as they drove on the same road, and there was more to their story together, and they think they were both happy to find each other again and work towards getting their sense of purpose back together.

Anatomy of a Scene – Bourdain’s ‘Parts Unknown’ in Congo and NYC Contrast

“One of Anthony Bourdain’s ‘Parts Unknown’ episodes in the Congo has one of the show’s best scenes where it has a vivid description of Bourdain gazing over New York City from his high-rise apartment in the closing moments, set up against the backdrop of his first and only foray to the Democratic Republic of Congo.”

If you had to pick opposites in the world, you couldn’t do much worse to contrast the journey through the thick Congolese jungles and down the Congo River with the urban sprawl of New York City. One of Anthony Bourdain’s ‘Parts Unknown’ episodes in the Congo has one of the show’s best scenes where it has a vivid description of Bourdain gazing over New York City from his high-rise apartment in the closing moments, set up against the backdrop of his first and only foray to the Democratic Republic of Congo.

There are multiple themes to take away from the significance of Bourdain’s perilous journey in the Congo throughout the episode and with the contrasting solitude and isolation he likely had felt back in his NYC apartment after such a harrowing trip. There is a burden that he must have felt in witnessing such a contrast between the Congo and New York City that leaves the contrasting scenes up for our interpretation as fans of his ‘Parts Unknown’ show. How easy it can be to feel lonely amongst millions of people after traveling to such a distinct place, the burden of making it through a perilous journey and putting your life on the line, and how traveling to such extreme places can change your sense of place in a complicated and often troubling world.

Before his passing in 2018, Anthony Bourdain was the preeminent travel host for over 15 years and his last show, Parts Unknown, from 2013-2018 was the deepest dive in his own mission of uncovering people’s stories through food and culture. In terms of looking at human nature and the human condition, few shows, if any, were better than Parts Unknown. More than anything, many of the Parts Unknown episodes had Bourdain providing needed historical context regarding the complex and difficult history of the country or place he would be visiting. This was especially the case during the Congo episode where he spends part of the episode looking at the colonial exploitation, civil conflict, and poverty that has gripped the country both before and after it became the nation state known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo today.

Bourdain was a huge fan of the Joseph Conrad book, ‘Heart of Darkness’ and makes it known in the episode of how became obsessed with the Congo and the Congo River without trivializing the country or its people. His approach is sincere, and he looks to paint an accurate picture of what the Congo is like, why he sought to demystify and humanize the place, and how it was both similar and different to Conrad’s interpretation of it.

“When all is said and done, I wanted to go to the Congo, and I did.” Bourdain knew that this would be one of his most difficult journeys, but he also wanted to pay homage to Conrad’s novel by following a similar exploration to the authors with a boat trip down the Congo river. However, this kind of journey as shown in the episode was not simply a leisurely trip down the river without witnessing the history, culture, or food of the Congolese. Bourdain and his film crew interacted with different villagers, aid workers, and other locals to hear their stories despite how difficult the journey had been especially losing power on the boat and being surrounded by mosquitoes and other insects at one point.

It takes a toll on a person to look at the dark history of a place’s past as well as its uncertain present and not be affected by it. Bourdain has a visible weariness and introspection upon the conclusion of the journey given how hearing about the history of violence, dealing with the security issues involved, the lack of infrastructure to make the journey work, and to hear about the sheer resilience and fortitude of the Congolese people under extremely difficult circumstances.

The hardest part for Bourdain in my view maybe wasn’t the actual trip down the Congo river with all the bureaucracy, bribery, and lack of infrastructure involved to make it finally happen. I think the final scene of this Parts Unknown episode sums up the ‘lost’ feeling and the isolation to have witnessed all that and come back to a New York City that is abundant, thriving yet inequal, and with a completely different set of circumstances than one would encounter in the Congo. There’s ‘culture shock’ and then there is experiencing a bit of a totally different reality that few Americans and fewer New Yorkers would ever see for themselves. This contrast in realities and the stark scene transition from leaving the Congo River to being back at his high-rise apartment in Manhattan is perhaps the greatest scene ever shot for Parts Unknown or in any of his travel shows.

To break down this excellent scene and contrast further, Bourdain is in one of the world’s most crowded cities, but he is alone and isolated in his apartment like being isolated from most people’s lived experiences of the world, which pales in comparison to his own having had been to over 100 countries in his travels. He is filmed sitting behind his apartment windows, which acts as a barrier between Anthony and the rest of the world, seeing everything for himself but finding it difficult to connect with his immediate surroundings in NYC after witnessing such a contrasting reality in the Congo.

I think this final scene of the Congo episode really encapsulates Bourdain’s struggle as a travel host and writer to search for meaning and purpose in a world that often feels indifferent or alienates the struggles of other people who live in a different place or country. Bourdain’s gaze through the window symbolizes the distance between the world he witnessed and the world he felt disconnected from. It reflected the existential tension that marked his life: the constant search for meaning, tempered by the knowledge that some things, no matter how deeply we travel, remain elusive.

In his life, Antony Bourdain likely felt a sense of solitude and isolation having witnessed the worst of humanity at times, which could be hard to relate to other people or even travelers who had not been to the same places. He was brave, kind, and let other people to tell their stories without judgment but it must have been lonely especially after a return from the Congo and returning home where he may have felt the most alone rather than out on the road with others in his crew or amongst people he had met. There is a loneliness in the familiar as any traveler can attest and the novelty of new places, people, and experiences make the routine feel mundane and trite. Bourdain’s entire journey, in this case, from the Congo back to his home in New York, shows that it can be hard to come full circle after visiting one of the least known places in the world.

The final shot of Anthony Bourdain in his New York City apartment, looking out over the vast, bustling city, yet consumed by solitude, serves as a poignant culmination of his journey as a seasoned traveler. After traveling the world, exploring the darkest corners of humanity in places like the Congo, Bourdain returns home, not with answers, but with a profound sense of isolation. The Congo episode, with its harrowing depictions of suffering and resilience, reflects the complexity of human nature that Bourdain grappled with throughout his career. The contrast between the vibrant, chaotic cityscape of NYC and Bourdain’s contemplative stillness in his apartment alone emphasizes a universal paradox: despite all the human connections made in the world, the traveler often finds themselves confronted with a loneliness that cannot be filled as a result.

Bourdain’s Parts Unknown was not merely about exploring food and culture, but it was also an exploration of the man himself. His travels were a quest for greater understanding, but they also unearthed the difficult truth that knowing the world does not necessarily mean knowing oneself at the same time. In the end, Bourdain’s legacy lies in the raw, honest portrayal of this duality, the external world and the internal battles that shape who we are. His life story continues to remind us that, no matter where we go or how much we learn, we all face the same fundamental challenge in life: to find a true connection in a world that often seems vast, indifferent, and overwhelming.

“Got to, This is America, Man…” – Anatomy of a Scene

“‘The Wire’ is the greatest television show of all-time. Even as the show nears the 20th anniversary since when it first aired on American cable television network, HBO, it still rings as culturally relevant and as emotionally stirring as it was when it first debuted in the Summer of 2002. While technology may be different now, the characters would not be the same, the setting could be different from the show, the overall themes, and messages from ‘The Wire’ as well as the institutions that the show focused on for five great seasons have not changed that much.”

‘The Wire’ is the greatest television show of all-time. Even as the show nears the 20th anniversary since when it first aired on American cable television network, HBO, it still rings as culturally relevant and as emotionally stirring as it was when it first debuted in the Summer of 2002. While technology may be different now, the characters would not be the same, the setting could be different from the show, the overall themes, and messages from ‘The Wire’ as well as the institutions that the show focused on for five great seasons have not changed that much.

I could write a thesis on ‘The Wire’ and devote at least 10,000 words on the show in terms of an in-depth breakdown on how it’s the modern equivalent to a Shakespeare tragedy or drama. However, in this ‘Anatomy of a Scene’, I am going to focus on one of my favorite scenes in this classic television show. This scene is the opening one for the entire five-season series and discusses a core tenet of the show not just about what kind of ‘game’ that the characters play, but also the ‘game’ inherent to the setting of Baltimore, Maryland as well as America as a country.

The opening scene, more than any other scene, even if it is the 1st, one pinpoints exactly what ‘The Wire’ is about. In the first shots, you can see a young man lay face down dead on the ground on some dark city street with the police collecting evidence and a main character, who is a detective, questioning a potential witness. The associate of the victim talks about how they were involved with street gambling and how it was not fair that it was not right to kill the victim, non-ironically known as ‘snot boogie’ to the game’s players. The victim of the crime has a real name but is endeared to the rest of the game’s players by that nickname alone.

As the witness explains to Detective Jimmy McNulty of Baltimore Police, ‘Snot Boogie’ was the victim of the crime, but his associate did not expect him to be killed for stealing from the other players of the street game for playing craps. The associate tells McNulty that the victim is known for stealing and grabbing the money to run away but they never want beyond just ‘beating his ass’ up a bit.

While it is a grim description of the dangers of gambling illegally on the streets, the witness to McNulty’s murder case explains that there is an unwritten rule to the ‘game’ of street gambling and that ‘Snot Boogie’ should not have been murdered for stealing from the other players. Nobody ever tried to kill the victim even after he was found guilty of stealing money from the street game players even if they did often catch him and beat him for having done it multiple times.

The witness refuses to tell McNulty who killed his associate in this game and does not want to go to court even though he believes it was disgraceful how ‘Snot Boogie’ was killed because they always let him play even though he would always steal from them.
“I got to ask ya, if every time Snot Boogie would grab the money and run away…why’d you even let him in the game?”
“…What?”
“If Snot Boogie always stole the money, why did you always let him play?”
“Got to, This America, man.”

McNulty looks incredulously as the witness tells him this reasoning because at its face, it does not make much sense for a guy who steals from folks repeatedly to continue playing a dangerous and illegal craps street game. It’s clear to both characters that life itself, and life in America is far from being fair at the end of the day especially a man got killed, which was against to how the game was being played, according to the witness, even if he was stealing from them.

Even if the game is fair or is rigged to some degree, it occurs to the witness and then McNulty after he sees the guy’s reasoning that even if the game was not meant to be won and the result would always be the same, you still let the game play out. The game may not be fair like life itself in general or in America, but it must be played by everyone. It may not be a fair shot and there is no equal outcome, but there is equal opportunity out there for each player to be involved even if someone cheats, steals, and comes back to play again. The game exists for everyone to be given a shot at it and if they don’t, that’s against the principle of life itself and life in America.

There are tragic consequences to this craps game for Snot Boogie who loses his life senselessly as well as for the men who will go to jail for it or lose all their money, but the game goes on and it’s open to everyone. Like the witness explains, the game deserves to be played by everyone equally although the outcome may not be something everyone will like or even will cost some people dearly. This excellent opening scene opens with the most prominent themes of The Wire perfectly and almost seems like a graphic novel come to life. Its visuals are striking, the characters are who you can relate to on a human level, and there is a lot of foreshadowing about the rest of the show and its messages to the viewers from this tone-setting scene.

‘The Wire’ is a show about the early stages of 21st century America in its first decade of the 2000s but it is as still as relevant about 20 years later. The metaphor of this opening scene for not just a couple of guys in a craps game gone wrong in the street can pair directly too what can happen when capitalism can go off the rails when someone tries to beat the rules or try to gain an advantage when they are put at a disadvantage to begin with. If the game is rigged from the get-go even if you’re given a shot at it, what’s the point in playing by the rules? If you can beat the system even if there are dire consequences, is it not worth trying?

‘Snot Boogie’s associates knew he was a thief and a cheater because they believed that he still deserved a shot at winning like everyone else even though it was likely rigged so he would never make it after multiple tries. As the opening scene of the greatest television show of all-time shows the viewer, everybody can play the game even if they are a cheater in the sense of having equal opportunity, but what happens when no one is held accountable when the odds are stacked against them from the start of the game and there is no other way to win than by cheating the system and facing serious consequences?

The show may not be defined by its iconic opening scene but as you find as you watch the entire series, the metaphor for what that scene represents about the show and about the ethic that binds American society together long after you finish watching each of its five seasons.

Thoughts on ‘Roadrunner’

“If there’s any word in the English language that would sum up the life of Anthony Bourdain, a ‘Roadrunner’ would be quite fitting to remember the man by.”

If there’s any word in the English language that would sum up the life of Anthony Bourdain, a ‘Roadrunner’ would be quite fitting to remember the man by. He was also a husband, father, friend, chef, writer, television host, and a cultural ambassador who made the world his oyster after many years as a cook in hot, windowless, stressful New York City kitchens. For some people, travel is a birthright that they have from a young age but for Anthony Bourdain, it was an unexpected gift at middle age after writing the excellent ‘Kitchen Confidential’ book highlighting his years in the underbelly of those same kitchens, which became a New York Times bestseller, and helped lead him into fame, stardom, and notoriety.

Bourdain’s life would never be the same as he was offered other book deals, his first television contract for the show, ‘A Cook’s Tour’, and started to be recognized around the world from Tokyo to Los Angeles. While his life as a newly minted TV host traveling worldwide, tasting different cuisines, meeting different peoples, he opened the world to those of us who only knew what they had read, learned about in school, or heard from others. Those of us who watched his shows learned about the world through the medium of television, but it was Anthony’s narration, his willingness to listen and empathize with whom he shared a meal that made him stand out from others in the travel show business. Bourdain never sugarcoated things and didn’t mince words about what he saw in his travels especially as the focus became less on food and more on culture, politics, and the trajectory of humanity itself. All this time though, watching his shows and reading his books, we knew more about the man’s reflections on the world and then how the world reflected on him.

The shock of his loss still hurts those who were fans of his works over three years later, I included, among the millions of people who were touched by his words, his spirit, and his lust for life. It is hard even now to reconcile the fact that the man who appeared to have had it all still suffered and that there was no outreach, gesture, or love shown that could have prevented his tragic suicide. Feelings of anger, disbelief, regret, and sadness come to mind when you think of how anyone, especially Anthony Bourdain, could decide to let go of life itself especially when it had enveloped him in such a warm embrace especially after his 2nd life of fame, success, and travel had gone on for almost two decades.

What ‘Roadrunner’, the film documentary on Anthony Bourdain’s life tries to answer is not the ‘why?’ of his death but the ‘how?’ of his illustrious life and how it changed, evolved, shifted, swinged on its ups and downs, which the documentary is successful at achieving. Rather than the director, Morgan Neville, attempt to get all of the answers on an unknowable concept such as what makes a person decide to take their own life, which left his friends, family, and fans devastated and unable to make sense of it either, the ‘Roadrunner’ documentary looks at how his life was, which people changed Anthony for better or worse, how he changed as a person, and how did travel affect him over almost 18 years. As a fan of Anthony’s written and television work, you learn a lot about the world through him, but I never got a full sense of who the man was as a person and I’m sure others can relate to this feeling.

Although he gave his all in his craft and in his vision, he rarely liked to be the center of attention in any room and was a shy, slightly self-deprecating, yet also a kind and generous man that would give more to others than would receive himself in return, and who never seemed fully quite comfortable with the fame, success, and notoriety his works produced. Those who remember him in the documentary talk about how he would always reach out to them to see how they are doing and to be a real people-pleaser but not ask for much in return or would find it difficult to confide in others with problems that may have been affecting him, personal or otherwise. While the film does a great job of capturing what it was like for Bourdain as he went from a line cook to a chef to an author to a television host to a cultural icon, we don’t really get to see much about his personal life beyond bits and snippets of details.

The viewer knows Bourdain came from a stable childhood, summers spent in France, loving parents, and a younger brother who he got along with well. However, you can sense from the documentary that he never grasped what most people would want from a ‘normal life.’ Bourdain was a creative soul who was curious by nature, inquisitive, had a taste for linguistics, and had a big imagination given his literary and musical tastes. He was not a man as Mark Twain would rail against as “vegetating in one corner of the planet” for their whole lives. Once he had the opportunity to do so financially and professionally, he seized it and took full advantage of the gifts that he had been given from a young age.

What was missing from the documentary sadly is Bourdain’s own reflections beyond his travels and perhaps the family he built from scratch. We do not hear much about what his childhood was like, how he got introduced to drugs such as heroin, how did he succumb to his addiction to it, and what how his two marriages and past girlfriends affected his outlook on love and life. During the documentary, we are perhaps best informed about who Anthony was as a cook, as a traveler, as a friend, who he was as a father, but it is hard to know who we were behind closed doors when the cameras were not rolling.

There are some aspects of his personality that you can glean from the documentary such as his addictive habits whether it would be using heroin, drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes, learning Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, or wanting to hold on to his relationships even perhaps their natural end date. For better or worse, as the film portrays, Bourdain loved experiencing novelty and new things which led him to his legendary status as a globetrotter, but it also could backfire in terms of giving too much of himself to people without getting as much in return. It seemed from ‘Roadrunner’ that Bourdain would seek to please others before pleasing himself and that could have led to some deeper dissatisfaction with life. It can be hard to feel as if you’re giving more than receiving and I do believe that does play a role in depression.

You can also infer from ‘Roadrunner’ that Anthony’s romantic views on life, on love and on travel did not always meet reality. He could be very demanding in his professional career and rude or dismissive of his long-time camera crew and production team. It’s shown that he could make rash decisions about hiring and firing of personnel as well as set very high expectations for his television show, which could not always be met by those who worked with him. It’s also true that in his last romantic relationship with Ms. Argento, he would let his personal desires to please her or work with a famous director like Mr. Feng that led to him putting his crew’s creative input on the back burner. When he expressed his desire to quit traveling a few years before his death, his production team encouraged him to do it if he felt it was time to do so and they wouldn’t stop him, but it was as if Bourdain needed someone to validate his decisions to go through with them.

‘Roadrunner’ succeeds in telling the story of one of our young century’s great explorers and cultural ambassadors. In 2021, there are still some gaps in our knowledge of who Anthony Bourdain was and how he felt about his life. Sadly, we will never know the full story because of his tragic death by suicide and we can only infer on how such a bright life could be extinguished too soon when he had so much more to give to the world, to his family, and to his friends. Unfortunately, not all men make it to a ripe old age to be surrounded by those who matter most to them.

Names like Hemingway, London, and now Bourdain died at middle-aged by in their lives accomplished or saw or did as much as five men combined who lived longer than them. It is not the years in your life that matter but the life in your years and Anthony Bourdain made the most of his life as few could or will do again. Even more than three years after his death, he is sorely missed, and the world is not as well off without him and his impact. From the Congo to Iran to Antarctica to Libya, he was not afraid or reticent of sharing a meal with those who were different than him even when he had nothing personally in common with them.

I hope that the ‘Roadrunner’ documentary becomes part of Anthony Bourdain’s legacy and inspires both young and old people to see the world as it is and to hopefully mold it little by little through travels and meals to change the world bit by bit into the world that we would like it to be. That would be a fine way to honor his legacy and to make the world a little less unknown.

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If you or someone you know is having suicidal thoughts, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.

A Sense of Balance

“When the show talks about balance, it is not just about karate in terms of making sure you are able to work to anticipate your own movements as well as those of your own opponent but to be sure to not be balancing too much where your life suffers from imbalance.”

Recently, I have been watching the ‘Cobra Kai’ series on Netflix and while I was never really a huge fan of the Karate Kid movie series, I have really taken a liking to this TV series featuring the same characters with some new ones over 35 years later. There are a lot of great things about this particular popular series such as the 80s music and influence, the acting, the fight choreography among other positives that make you root for each character for different reasons. However, my favorite thing about the series is the life lesson that is not only applicable to the martial art of Karate but to someone’s life in general.

Without spoiling too much about the show, Mr. Miyagi’s philosophy of living life with a sense of balance is applicable not only to his protégé student, Daniel LaRusso, but also to the audience who is watching the show. When the show talks about balance, it is not just about karate in terms of making sure you are able to work to anticipate your own movements as well as those of your own opponent but to be sure to not be balancing too much where your life suffers from imbalance.

Imbalance can cause you to slip, fall, and end up in a fishpond as what happens to Daniel in the movie and to some of the characters for whom he teaches. When you balance on a plank or board, you have to balance your body but beyond karate as in regular life, you have to balance your mind in order to succeed in life. It’s important to be able to not lose sight of what is important in your life to what is trivial at best. When you don’t have balance, you can quickly lose sight of what’s important and what should not take up both your time and your mental capacity.

In the movie and the show too, Daniel, the protagonist of Karate Kid and a teacher in Cobra Kai, struggles to balance his responsibilities as an adult. He has a loving wife and two great kids but finds his life is out of balance. He loves Karate and misses Mr. Miyagi, his sensei or teacher, so when the show begins, his life is somewhat out of balance, which takes time for him to realize. He has a really successful car dealership business with multiple locations but even then, he uses Karate metaphors as a way of expressing how much he misses the martial art he had been practicing for years. In a way, while his life is successful on the surface, he has placed too much weight on his family and personal success but had forgotten the nurturing, passionate side of who he is as a person.

This sense of balance can be missing as it was for Daniel when we put too much weight on professional and personal success but forget what makes us passionate about life and to devote some time out of our busy lives to focus on that passion even if it doesn’t make us money. When it comes to balancing out responsibilities, duties, and habits, you should make time for each part of one’s life but not too much where one responsibility crowds out the rest.

With Daniel as an example, he has to balance it out, so he does not overwhelm himself with one part of his life when he is being pulled in three directions. He has to keep his marriage romantic and show love to his children while not neglecting his role as a business owner and making sure his customers are satisfied. If he spends too much time at work, he still has to be a present father and a loving husband, so he has to be extra cognizant of how much time he is spending on each responsibility.

When you add his love of Karate in the show to the mix, it makes that ‘sense of balance’ much harder to achieve. However, the love of Karate and spending time on his passion makes him as happy, if not more so, than when he is at his job or when he is with family. If you in your life find a passion that great where you want to mentor or help others develop that passion, you should try to add that to your life and do your best to maintain balance.

Karate, like life itself is about maintaining balance and anticipating what your opponent or what life will throw at you next. Part of having a sense of balance is to predict what is to come and adjusting your duties and responsibilities in terms of time spent on those commitments.

For example, if Daniel has a big meeting at work, hypothetically, when it comes to car sales, he may need someone to fill in at the Karate dojo for him such as a top student so that his business does not suffer. If he has to do so, he can move his training hours for the dojo to nights or weekends but that may conflict with his family obligations so maybe he has to ask his wife first to make sure he is spending enough time with them when he’s not managing the car dealership. He also has to be sure to not spend too many hours at the dealership so as to miss breakfast or dinner with his children who may be in school all day.

A good way Daniel can balance his love of Karate with his love of family and work is to incorporate an element of Karate in his work and with his family. He can add a line like ‘kicking the competition’ to his company logo or giving away Bonsai trees to customers who buy cars from them. He can also involve his wife in his dojo by showing her around the training center he set up for his students. Daniel can also encourage his children to join him and to show them how to use Karate in their lives when they are not busy with school.

Similar to Daniel in ‘Cobra Kai’ and ‘Karate Kid’, we must continue to maintain that sense of balance in our lives and to keep adjusting the balance when we become too top heavy in one part of our life which can crowd out our other responsibilities. Be sure to not lose your passion or your family or your livelihoods in the process but see first how much time and effort you can devote to each commitment you make to yourself.

Rather than totally give up something you love or are passionate about, try to do better with time management first, see if it really conflicts with your other daily or weekly tasks, and then determine if it brings enough joy in your life before getting rid of it to improve your internal balance. Balance is not just about time management but it’s also about being aware of other people’s feelings and emotions. You have to anticipate how they’ll react to what you choose to focus on. If you spend too much time at work, you should be aware of how your wife may feel about it. If you are working on a passion too much, your family may feel neglected. If you are focusing on family too much and your work suffers, you have to improve your concentration in order to be able to provide for them.

Balance involves analyzing how your life is going and being self-aware enough to know if change is needed in it. If you do nothing, your life balance is likely to suffer. When you can instead manage your time better, seek out input from others, and figure out what priorities come first, your life balance will be that much better, and your level of happiness will likely increase as a result.