A young black belt was awarded his Shodan, and his teacher told him to show up the next day for a special training. When he showed up there was a large tub in the middle of the dojo. His instructor then told the student to fill the tub with large rocks about 12 inches in diameter weighing about 20 lbs each it took the student about one hour to fill the tub as it was very large. The student told the teacher that he was finished the teacher asked if the tub was full the student replied yes it is full. The teacher came out of his ofice and inspected the tub and agreed that the tub was full and that his student was a true shodan full of skills and knowledge like the tub.
I'll let you comment on this post then I'll post the rest of the story.

My guess is that then he started pouring in sand or gravel--anything that was smaller than the first set of rocks to show that was lots more to learn.

ie that there was much more to "fit" into the tub.

Unless of course I took this inncorrectly---which would not be a new thing.

One ?, if he had a shodan test the day before,how in the world did he make it to the dojo the next day and lift rocks?

You're right next came pebbles, then sand then water. He picked up pebbles about 1cm in diameter then was sent to the beach for sand finally he was told to pour water over the pile untill the tub was filled to the top. But the moral was not that he had much more to learn.

In response you gojuwarrior, it is very possible for an individual to push himself beyond breaking then be active the next day. At the battle of marathon, the Athenians were forced to sprint 600meters in full 90lb armor, then fight an actual real battle against the Persians. Immediately after the battle they marched 110 miles to beat the Persian navy around grece and meet them in battle the next day 110 miles away. If your Black Belt test is more difficult than waging war in 90 lb armor that your teacher is recklessly risking students lives. There are countless tales of individuals doing extraordinary things and finding the will to endure, either you overestimate the black belt test or underestimate human beings.

Sounds like the usual parable nonsense so painfully associated with the martial arts.

G

Parable nonsense?

Its more of an Allegory, but now we're arguing semantics. Its a vital part of martial arts, not just to teach the forms but the concepts of responsibility and/or maturity.

But again, it is a form of traditional martial introspection, the ability to see something as more than what it appears to be. That particular story has been passed on in many ways, I'm not sure of the origin however.

The reason for allegorical stories is that matial arts is an experiential practice. What I mean is that a person must discover for themselves a teacher can only provide the tools for learning, but experience itself is the onle real way to learn. For example an excellent karate instructor can teach you techniques but you need to make sense of those techniques for them to have any real use for you. This story may have many morals as any good story does, the first one is that the first 90% of progress takes 10% of effort, the next 9% takes 20% of effort, the next .9% of effort takes 40% of effort and so on. So where progress is easy to see in the beginning with little effort the more you progress the more effort is required for progress. As comparing puttin lage rocks in a tub vs putting handfulls of sand hen handfulls of water in the tub. Another lesson is that it is easy to learn a technique but the mastery lies in exploring the technique, in the old times some students trained 10 years to explore the variations and uses of horse stance, with this lesso comes the lesson that there are no advanced techniques in karate. Some people just do the few basic techniques of karate better than others and understand variations and uses. The rocks in the tub represent one level of understanding of technique while there are many other levels. One person spotted a possible lesson that at shodan there is still much to learn, which is the simplest most basic level of understanding of this story. One lesson is that as rocks and pebbles and sand and water are poured into the tub they form a unique pattern and no two peope have the same karate depending on the unique variety of circumstances that accompanied them in their lives and training. Another lesson is that when the student finished he meditated and saw an island in the ocean, his teacher told him when you see rocks, pebbles, sand and water then you are ready for the next level of training. For the beginner karate is karate a kick is a kick and a punch is a punch, for an intermediate karate becomes something more it take son some kind of spiritual significance and a kick is more than a kick and a punch is more than a punch, but for the expert, karate is just karate and a kick is just a kick and a punch is just a punch. Here is another analogy a white belt trains to learn how to fight, soon he learns that karate can promote strong spirit and he trains to attain spiritual realization, the master trains to live a long life and keep his health, that's enough.

Here is the traditional moral of this particular story for those who want a straight answer but without thinking about and reaching this conclusion for yourself you may not understand it. "The most important goal of karate is for a person to know himself, not just with his mind but with his total being"