Shizentai

Louisiana Karate Association Headquarters of the Japan Karate Association American Federation (JKA/AF) Instructor: Takayuki Mikami, 9th dan New Orleans (well, technically 'Metairie'), Louisiana, USA http://www.lkakarate.com/ http://www.jkaaf.org/

Sorry to bring back a slightly old thread, but I just realized that you are speaking about my sensei in that quote, so I really wanted to comment too! Mikami sensei was the captain of the Hosei Karate club in 1955. He was also the first instructor training graduate from JKA in 1957. Upon graduation he was promptly sent out by Nakayama to other countries in order "to spread karate worldwide." By 1963 Mikami sensei had a few all-japan titles and had also made his way to the southern United States. Nowadays he teaches at his headquarters in New Orleans as the head of the JKA American Federation, and was awarded 9th dan from JKA headquarters last week (everyone in my dojo is brimming with excitement for him!!! Especially considering that his 8th dan was older than I am). What is your opinion on this type of training, or way of being taught? I can understand the repitition, but as for nothing being explained, I kind of waver a bit there. How would you feel about training this way? Sensei does often talk about his college days and that manner of training still today. However, I don't think that he intended to advocate using this type of training exclusively. To tell you the truth, I can't remember the last time Sensei had a class where he didn't elaborate on the purpose of techniques. He often spends a good deal of time explaining things as he sees them to help our understanding. However, there are times when the mind may understand something, but the body is still confused. 'Teaching through the body' is perfect for conquering this problem in my personal opinion. Some years ago I found myself preparing for my shodan exam. At this time I was struggling with a particular technique of a particular kata. Although people had shown me the application of the move, shown me the timing, shown me the speed... it still didn't work when I tried it somehow. My body was moving in my mind the same way as other people's and yet something was still, well, off. Sensei told me to go home, pick up ten-pound weights and do the technique over and over again by myself for at least an hour each day. "Then," he said, "you will start to understand." I did as I was told, but for the first few weeks, I couldn't do the technique for more than five or ten minutes without tiring out, but as I stubbornly pushed my body just past its limits again and again I began to develop more strength in the muscles that I used to do the technique. A month or two later, I could make it up to about half an hour before tiring out, but an hour still seemed impossible to me. Then I began to study my own minute wasted movements and eliminate them one by one. This simultaneously saved my energy and increased my speed. Then I was able to last about 40 minutes. Another month later, I realized that if I relaxed in between movements and put an explosive amount of force into just the instant in which I was executing my technique, I was able to apply my energy more efficiently. Then, as I began to touch the edge of understanding 'kime', only then was I able to last one hour each day. I passed my test, which didn't end up including that kata at all, hahaha, but by then I'm pretty sure I learned something that surpassed the usefulness of just one technique of one kata. This is just one example though. I can think of many cases when an explanation works best as well.

10/8 10 min kata with 5lb weights 10 min kihon with 5lb weights 4 mi bike ride 5 min stretching 30 min kata training 10 min conditioning training (kicking my favorite rock in the park basically ) 4 mi bike ride 10/10 15 min warm-up 40 min ukemi 20 min kumite training 10 min kihon 5 min kata 10 min partner work with kids (because I am kid-size and they were short 1 in the kids-class)

I play the flute (pretty much every kind of flute), the electric bass, a little piano and I sing. My family is very musical, so I learned to read music about the same time as words, though I'm the least talented in that department among my siblings. I also love to paint draw and sculpt. So in my spare time I illustrate and self-publish comic books, make posters for my karate club, draw figures for my friends' textbooks, make nerdy t-shirts and produce the occasional malaria life-cycle for the CDC. I also sometimes make flutes out of found wood. Gardening is also nice.

Well, I don't know how or when it happened exactly, but I'm pretty sure that the perfect little hole ripped in the abdominal wall of my solar plexus has something to do with the copious amounts of chudan strikes I've sustained during training with my senpai lately. My doctor was baffled, said he'd never seen anything like that before. LOL! It doesn't hurt though, just looks funny when I wear a bathing suit. Honestly, I was worried that tonight was going to be terrible. We did an hour-long demo for a local college. Being that I am among the best at falling in my dojo, I was selected at the last moment to fill-in as the primary assailant for a set of self defense drills. When we arrived at the place for the demo, I realized that it was a concrete floor. Fun times. Then I has holding some boards at head level (always terrifying), then I was asked to do a kumite demonstration, then another, and another. All in all not too bad though, just one bruise on my elbow. Truth be told, I've broken bones and torn ligaments, even had concussions, but never since I started training. I was just a clumsy kid. In fact, I feel safer in the dojo than I do in my own home!

Thanks for the tips everyone! I'm going to look into those places. Man! I can't wait for tomorrow!

So this week I will be traveling to Japan and Okinawa. Planning out everything has gotten me all excited. While on Honshu I'll be training in all of my old dojo I attended in College and high school. I can't wait to see the kids I used to train with! They're probably all adult advanced ranks now! Haha! My trip to Okinawa will be my first though. I've been reading up on it, and I'd like to see as many historic karate places as possible. Then I got to thinking... How many of you guys travel to train/teach in other countries? Being karateka, have you ever visited/considered visiting Okinawa?

Funny thing about this is that I've not YET meet a new student that didn't want a black belt one time or another. Whether they learn later that the belt isn't important or not, that very thought [wanting a black belt] has ran through their mind more than once!! I started when I was 7 years old, and I know for a fact that I thought about wanting a black belt; I even drooled many, many times. Haha! Personally, I was most partial to my orange belt... Yes, I was very sad when I had to wear a different one a few months later. Of course, if you knew me you'd understand my obsession with the color (it's a long story). But when I began, I really wasn't in it for any belt. I didn't even understand the order of belts for a while to tell you the truth. I just wanted to find out if I could become a strong person. I wanted to see how far I could go with nothing but guts, void of any talent or physical predisposition whatsoever. Haha! Soon after, I fell in love. Testing was just another training challenge in my mind after that. To tell you the truth, my black belt brought me more worry than anything else. When I saw so many great giant men who could float and glide like the wind itself, then crash down on the opponent with what seemed like the weight of the universe to me, I felt very unworthy.

That sounds like a terrible situation. I'm sorry that something that horrible happened to anyone, and I agree with your assessment that vehicular manslaughter is a terrible crime. Indeed, I have previously stated that I do believe the driver that hit me was at fault, so we are in agreeance here. There is therefore no need to argue. I apologize for defending my words in such a way that caused you upset. Had I realized that I was writing for a sensitive audience, I probably would have used some other word, however I'm pretty sure that most people knew what I was trying to say regardless. Besides, it doesn't really matter how hard either the law or I am on this particular person who caused me harm, because ultimately he got away. I have not absolved him of guilt, I have just simply let go of my anger about the situation since there is nothing that can be done. All I can do is make a point to wear contacts from now on while bike-riding and be thankful that it wasn't worse.

I wasn't trying to suggest that the driver was not responsible. I just meant to use "car accident" as an accepted colloquialism meaning a collision involving one or more moving motor vehicles. I would have used "collision" again, but it seemed too repetitive. I assure you that at the time I was quite upset with my assailant... mostly because I had just ridden 28 miles, I was hungry for lunch, I was 2 miles from my house and before I could get home I had to to sit on the pavement in the hot sun and unbend my front wheel and handlebars with my bare hands (since no one would stop to help me for some reason). In retrospect I'm thankful I was able to walk away though (which is oddly enough, exactly what I ended up doing). But what am I telling you this for? You live around here! I'm sure you know how people drive.

You know, I am a very clumsy person, so I unfortunately have more stories than most. One day after I had spent all of the previous night doing rolling drills I took my bike out for a ride and almost immediately collided with a car. My bike went under the car, but I rolled over and off the side of the hood, then began front rolls when I made contact with the ground. So many rolls! Eventually when I stopped, I realized that despite wearing no protective equipment or even shoes (typical stupid 14-year-old), I had nothing more than a skinned knee and elbow. My head hadn't even touched the ground. Since that day, I ALWAYS train rolling and falling on my own. This year, more than 10 years later, I was unfortunately in another bike/car accident. This time I was struck by a hit-and-run sports-car driver that ran a stop sign and hit me from the side. As I saw him go from slowing down to speeding up at the last moment, I tried to slam my breaks and turn my bike into the same direction he was traveling, then at the last moment I tossed my left leg over the top of the bike to avoid it scraping along between the two vehicles. As we made contact, I ended up doing a swift 360 then a nice gentle side-fall onto the curb. I got away with just a small scratch on my right leg from where the front wheel of my bicycle bent clean around and pinched me little, but the man in the car drove off with a nice well-dented side panel and possibly a smashed headlight. Sadly, my glasses fell off in the incident so I couldn't make out his plate number as he sped away... but probably the damage he did to his car has him feeling a little regretful.

karate ni sente nashi. "In karate there is no first attack." No technique takes place in a timeless instant. All techniques require a certain amount of time to execute. Therefore, a "first attack" doesn't really exist. Any technique has two points: a beginning and an end. It doesn't matter who starts first. It only matters who completes it first. Sometimes a person can begin an attack after his opponent and still hit him first. Sometimes a person can see what his opponent is about to do and stop him just as he is about to move. Who is to say who was first? My personal opinion is that it doesn't matter. If you are a responsible martial artist who can put a fight to a peaceful and swift end, then that is all that counts.

Like you I am just a student of the Japanese language. I've been learning bits and pieces off and on since high school. Although I'm trying to scan all of my old textbooks lately since in two weeks I am going to be going back to Japan to meet my boyfriend's family for the first time. @_@ I hope I don't mess up and say something weird. Not to leave the proper topic of this thread of course. Err... I think it's interesting that "Ossu" is sometimes spelled "Os," or "Oss" when written in western letters. It definitely makes more sense phonetically to leave off the silent "u," even if it's impossible to do that in Japanese.

Enpi's jump is quite difficult to learn, isn't it? It took me a long time to figure out how to land facing exactly the right way (a good 5 years to really make it solid). Ironically though I had the opposite problem. I kept turning an extra 45 degrees past where I was supposed to be, and I had a tendency to travel too far in my jump, which caused me to end up behind my finishing mark. As it turns out, my problem was caused by pushing off into the jump too hard with my right leg, and keeping my knees lifted for too long towards the end, which gave me excess rotation and distance. Perhaps if you are having trouble turning far enough, these are two things you could try to emphasize. But first, though I know it is counter intuitive, I find that many (like myself) learn well from repeated practice of doing the kata without the jump, at least initially. If you're worried about twisting an ankle in the landing, then practice the jump lifting only one leg off the ground at a time. Follow the same motion as you would in the jump, but instead of focusing on catching air, concentrate on making the last motion (setting your left leg into back stance) as smooth as possible. The more confidence you have in the landing and the less you stomp, the easier it should be on your ankles when you put the jump back in. Best of luck with this terrific kata! Ossu!

You know, being an ambidextrous person, I always did find the notion of having a preferred side rather interesting. I can value the advantage of putting your strongest side in front: setting up for an ippon strike might be improved, it puts a strong defense much closer to the opponent, you train your "weakness" to become strong, etc. I can also see the advantage of having your strongest side in the rear: there's more strength in the counter attack from that position, and it puts more strength in cross-blocking as well. However I am ambidextrous. I have no strong side. So I cannot base my choice of sides in kumite on my own body. Instead I tend to strategize based on my opponents. When I am fighting most right-handed people, I do usually step out at first with my right side front because in my style almost all righties stand with their left (weak) side front, and it throws them of a little bit. Then, if the match is not over by the time the novelty of that wears off, I sometimes switch back to shake up their routine again. However, I find fighting left-handed people is very complex. Not only are left-handed people better at initiating the match from right-front than I am (because they specialize on that side and I do not), but they are extremely accustomed to fighting people who stand the opposite way, because there are simply more of them. I feel like ambidexterity doesn't give me any advantage there.

hmm, that's funny, usually the Japanese brands I buy shrink up nicely. It could be that because you bought a higher-end brand that they pre-shrunk the fabric. In that case, aside from trying what luca61 said, there's not much you can do. On the brighter side, if you really need it that much smaller, a gi that is tailored smaller is going to look a lot better than a gi that has been shrunken and is bunching at the seams.

You know, when I first saw this topic I instantly thought of this video. I must have watched the whole thing four or five times myself. I'm glad that someone had already posted it! To be perfectly honest, I've never seen a JKA hachidan test. There are only a handful in the world that have that rank, and my sensei's 8dan is older than I am. The highest tests I've ever watched were 6dan. The testing process for 6th dan that I saw included kata, bunkai, kihon, kumite, self defense, written exams, cross examination, and a presentation of independent research into some aspect of karate. That said, I've seen the test four times, and never seen a single person pass. Although, in our handbook it says this about people who test for 8dan: 1. Must have spent a minimum of 7 years as a 7th dan. 2. Must have the recommendation of the Instructors Committee 3. Must test at headquarters in Tokyo 4. Must demonstrate total mastery of the secrets of karate, both physical and mental, and show an extraordinary level of spiritual development Number four... wow.

Oh my gosh! My internet crashes for three days and look what happens in the meantime! Thank you so much! I am honored!

The first time my sensei directly spoke to me in class I shouted incoherently and fell backwards off the floor... much to the endless amusement of my dojo.

Well wow, where do I begin!? My main sensei from age 16 onward is also the Chief Instructor of our JKA branch, so I have a lot of stories. I guess my favorite one for personal reasons is this one though: When I was a purple belt, age 16 or so, our senpai taught a difficult advanced class while Sensei watched (which was very unusual at the time). Being a less-than-coordinated youth, I struggled quite a bit with the different teaching style, and with memorizing seemingly random sequences of movements. During class Sensei said nothing, but after it was over for some reason he came up to me (the lowest-ranking student at the time) and struck up a conversation: Sensei: "What did you think of your senpai's class? Too hard or too easy?" Me: "Well, probably for most students it was good, but my mind is just a little slow sometimes so I had a hard time." Sensei: "Slow!? What do you mean!? You're mentally handicapped?" Me: "No! No, that wasn't what I meant! I- I'm just bad at-" Sensei: "Oh, so you have a brain that functions normally then?" Me: "Well, yes-" Sensei: "Ok, well if that's the case then I should expect no less from you than the capacity to do anything any man on earth can do." Me: "...uh?" Sensei: "If you are just as smart as everyone else, and you train your body and mind just as hard, then if it is possible for anyone in this world to do something, then it is possible for you to do it too. You need to think this way from now on." At that time in my life, no one had ever spoken of me with such confidence. Not even my own mother expected anything better from me than slightly sub-par. I was a smaller-than-average girl with a stutter, weak ankles and an a tendency to sleep through most of the school day. Yet here was a sage-like karate master telling me that he quite literally expected the world. The simple weight of it... To go from feeling worthless to feeling, even on a bad day, like I was worth the same as anyone else I encounter in life... To finally be pushed. At that moment I decided that I would never stop training. Since then I never have.

Why thank you gentlemen! My pleasure!

Basically, in witten Japanese there are no spaces between words, but in many western languages such as English there are. Therefore, when translation occurs, there is naturally some variation as to where to put spaces or hyphens (as they weren't in the original word). For instance, "I'm a practitioner of karate" in Japanese is "watashiwakaratekadesu" Now, that's really hard for someone to read in western characters, so usually people break it up like this when spelling Japanese phonetically: "watashi wa karateka desu" However, I've also seen these interpretations: "watashi wa karate-ka desu" "watashi wa karate ka desu" Any way you read it "karate" + "ka" = "karate practitioner" And everything sounds the same when spoken as well. So Isshin-ryu vs. Isshin ryu vs. Isshinryu are simply differences in romanization of Japanese words. The sound and the meaning is the same, but people just can't agree on a standard way to write Japanese words... that's all.

In my opinion the most practical use of lineage should be for a beginner looking for a dojo in which to train. A beginner cannot recognize good vs. bad form, nor can he discern good from bad teaching in a field where he has no experience. At least with a lineage chart, a beginner can somewhat grasp where the principles and techniques taught in the dojo are coming from. Sadly, I think many people (like myself) just choose a dojo at random and kind-of learn these things later on. I was lucky enough to have randomly chosen a good dojo it seems. I would say number one personally, but that's probably just because it has more people form my ryu on it though. I'm bad about learning lineages for other ryu. I bought a book and am reading a lot about it though. Still, my chart is pretty simple: Azato&Itosu - Funakoshi - Nakayama - my sensei - me

[edit: I misunderstood a previous post I think] I have to commend you for being so caring for your mother's well-being. However, I dare say that she'd probably also hope that you wouldn't sacrifice your own career goals on her behalf. The best way to prepare to teach martial arts is to train yourself. So I do wish you the best there. Do you know if the college you will be attending (this fall?) has a karate club? Just as a word of caution though, I have in my life only met one person that was able to pull off being a full-time martial arts instructor, and he did so with a lot of difficulty. It's a difficult thing to try to do. That being said, a good friend of mine is actually a private music teacher and teaches kids' karate too. So it's not impossible. Do your best! -Shizentai

My sensei was a child growing up in Japan during WWII. He never speaks of the hard times I'm sure he saw, but he often tells us that the reason he started training after the war was over, was to build up a strong spirit. He told us that he wanted to have confidence in himself. He also wanted people to be confident in his generation... that the future of Japan would move on to better more peaceful days.