The purpose of this article is to use self-study methodology to analyze critically the impact of 30 years of non-formal education on my development as a teacher educator. I begin within a particular conception of self-study research and make a case for situating martial arts as non-formal education. The data for this article are presented as a series of "episodes", in which I write a short paragraph about each phase in my development as a martial artist and comment on my approach to learning and teaching, where appropriate, during each episode. At the end of the article, I draw several links to self-study literature and to my own understanding of teacher education. In so doing, I demonstrate the value of examining the impact of non-formal education experiences as a teacher educator.