Shaolin Wookie
10 years, 20 years...whatever. You mentioned earlier that you've embraced certain Buddhist and Taoist philosophies, so you should know that time is merely a linear measurement of series of events and shouldn't factor into your cma training, especially if you seek out what you said you are in the first place. Personally, I'm not upset or offended if you do decide to leave Shaolin Do. Hate to be brutally honest, but your leaving or staying has no impact on my training or life whatsoever. I'm only trying to give you some advice from my personal experiences. If you feel you should test other waters, then go ahead, it's a free country, but I want to impart to you what my Master told me when I left the North Austin kwoon and moved to Chicago: if you ever decide to come back, you're more than welcome to. You said you respect and admire your Master at your Shaolin Do kwoon, I advise, if you must leave, to do so on good terms with him, because he did, by your own admission, teach you some things of value, and who knows you may find out that all martial art schools are the same in how they're run and decide to return to the SD kwoon. One last bit of advise, be careful not to go from school to school every couple years or so, you know what they say: "Jack of all trades; Master of none".
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit.
- Aristotle
The only way of finding the limits of the possible is by going beyond them into the impossible.
- Arthur C. Clarke