Jereme Sanders

1. How would you define your personal practice?
I’m enamored by efficiency and exploration. I like to find all the ways I’m utilizing my energy (physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual) and then find ways to unify these energies towards my goals. Through the exploration of myself, the communities I’m a part of ,and the environment around me I work to refine these energies.

2. What turning points have you encountered on your movement journey?
I feel like my general path has stayed true as far as practicing Parkour and aiming to reach my potential but what that has actually meant has changed with each person, environment and different modality I’ve been introduced to. Through each new interaction I find the depth of where I want to go with myself and with movement morphing into something that feels closer to me.

3. What role has injury played in cultivating your current niche?
I think every injury I’ve had has been a lesson in humility, research, creativity and problem solving. Rather than take something and let it hold you back see how it can still push you forward. In addition to this I think my awareness has deepened with each injury, in short I think it’s made me a better teacher and student.

4. Do you consider yourself a teacher? Why or why not?
I think we always have an opportunity to learn and teach in any given moment so I do what I can to always be a willing student and a ready teacher if the time arises. I feel like the more we can learn and share(teach) in this world the better off we will be. Too many times do we create these barriers to growth simply because we are unwilling to learn or teach in critical moments.

5. What has been your experience with physical education, both in the schooling system and sought out knowledge/ know-how elsewhere?
In formal education I haven’t had much luck but with key Parkour practitioners and my martial arts teachers they definitely got me on a path to search for the answers to my questions rather than expecting them to pop out of nowhere. Learning to research, question and test has been an important part of my journey in Parkour and I’m excited to keep trying to glean knowledge from any and all sources I may come across.

6. How do you involve your mind/ emotions into your physical routines?
I think in Parkour the mind and emotions must be taken into account because if you aren’t in the moment during your movement you open yourself up to potentially catastrophic injury. From the experience of this I try and carry this same level of focus in what I do. In practice it’s still far from perfect but I think if you take into account all the factors(emotions/thoughts/etc.) but don’t let them run your life you can make the best decisions in your training and your life.

7. What are your personal aspirations regarding movement? How do you hope to find purpose and use in the skills you have built?
I think there is still a lot for me to achieve. I’d like to work on my mobility goals and technical goals while still pursuing more confidence and commitment in my movement and life. For me the purpose is just to see what I’m capable of and hopefully inspire others to do the same. For a long time I believed myself powerless and I think this is a fairly common ailment amongst people, I’d like to help them see otherwise. My journey towards personal empowerment started with movement and challenge, I think it’s important to be reminded of this regularly.

8. How can people find/ contact you? Do you have a site or social media handle to share?Hopefully in the next year I’ll be putting exploreparkour.com online but until then social media is the best bet. Jereme Sanders on FB and @jeremesanders on instagram. Email is just my name @gmail.com as well.