The Taekwondo Coach Who Knows Everything about Falling and Standing Up Again

Habib Kazemi © Hanze Hogeschool

Habib Kazemi talks about helping each other, inspiration, difficult times, and holding on.

“I'm good. I can't complain. I've come through a difficult patch though, but step by step I’m starting to feel like myself again, fortunately,” Habib Kazemi says. 

“Did something happen then?” I ask. 

“Well, a divorce that wasn't my decision. And its influence on our lives, our children. It hurt me a lot.” 

Habib Kazemi is sitting calmly, but seriously, at the other end of the table in the dojo of the Kazemi Taekwondo Academy (KTA), Kazemi’s own taekwondo school in the Vinkhuizen quarter of Groningen. He's dressed casually in a warm Tommy Hilfiger hoodie, and answers every question as complete as possible, each time attaching some sort of moral life lesson to his answers. For example, his divorce a year ago was awful - but also an experience to learn from. "Life is full of surprises," he says. "Falling is a part of it, but standing up is as well.” 

“Falling is a part of it, but standing up as well”

The dojo is on the first floor of a local sports complex. It's a spacious hall covered with coloured mats with a small adjacent office where we're sitting. The room is filled with memorabilia - a row of big trophies that the KTA has won in national and international competitions, and lanyards with identity tags on which “coach” is written, all from the many tournaments Kazemi has attended (Kazemi was head coach of the Dutch national taekwondo team for several years).

He's owned the academy for 12 years. Here is where he offers training and coaching in taekwondo, but also resilience training, guidance for people with aggression issues, and even homework help for students. Added to that there's his work as a sports ambassador, as advisor and keynote speaker for businesses, and as chairman of Foundation Momentum, a charity offering support to oppressed women in Afghanistan, a nod to his native country which he was forced to flee more than twenty years ago.

In short, Kazemi is a busy man. 

So does he like to live like this? 

“Yes,” Kazemi says, “I've learned that being busy is really a relative thing. Some people who see me, say “how do you do all of this?”, but to me it’s rather normal. Sometimes it can be a bit of a struggle, but I’m not complaining, because I’m doing it myself.” 

He emphasises that the real success of the KTA exists in the connection and inspiration that the dojo offers, with taekwondo not a goal in itself, but a means to reach other things in life. "It's about personal leadership, about the fact that someone becomes more resilient in life, about the fact that someone reaches, experiences, and maintains good health, about the social cohesion that exists here, about the fraternisation that sports bring. We really have people from all layers of society here. People who are professors at the UG (University of Groningen), but also people who are struggling to make ends meet every month. But the thing that brings them together is their sport, their club, their association. And that was also my goal.” 

Habib Kazemi doing taekwondo © Sport050

There's a lot of attention given to social safety in his academy, and making sure that everyone can participate. Safety is the basis for the development of self-confidence and success, he says with total confidence. "First, you have to make sure that people feel good. Their self-esteem will increase because of sports. And by having a community, by belonging.” 

“Their self-esteem will increase because of sports” 

Kazemi was forced to flee Afghanistan due to a direct risk of persecution by the Taliban, and after a long and complicated journey, he arrived in the Netherlands in 2002. He's been spending all the time since trying to obtain a place in Dutch society. And this was not just about integration. “At crucial moments in my life, I had someone who supported me. And now I’m that person. As a teacher, to my students, as a coach of my athletes, when I’m somewhere to give a presentation.” 

“Are you inspired?” I ask. 

“I’m seeking inspiration daily,” Kazemi replies.

“Where do you find that inspiration then?”

“Really in everything. I can be inspired by you. By my children.” He also mentions Nelson Mandela. “I have complained about my life. Why do I have to go through all this shit? Then I look at him. 27 years in prison. And for nothing, literally nothing. And to then come out, and still talk about forgiveness and reconciliation.”

“I’m seeking inspiration daily” 

Kazemi’s traumatic experiences from Afghanistan now help him to put pain and sadness in perspective. He explains that those experiences enable him to understand very well that others are experiencing pain and sadness. 

“I think it’s easier to relativise when you have experienced things yourself. There is no gradation. However, if your pain helps you to better understand someone else, it has a function. But if your pain makes you expect more from others, based on your frame of reference, you’re not doing the right thing,” Kazemi says. 

During our conversation, Kazemi repeats several times that life is beautiful. Realising that life is beautiful is important to the taekwondo coach, and there seems to be a strong desire in him to show this to other people. 

Life brings both good things and bad things, he re-emphasizes. 

Standing, falling, and standing up again. 

He likes to compare life to taking care of flowers with thorns. “At times, your hand will touch a thorn. Are you then going to throw away all the flowers? No, you accept it. In life, it’s the same.”