CredoTe

We wear sparring gear for insurance purposes, first, but also so we can go at it with more than just light contact. All of our non-Adult students (those 15 yo and under) spar black belts only (which means adults). We black belts spar at their level with light to medium contact (light in any of the vital areas or face, medium in other areas, and "light to medium" is according to their power scale not ours). When they get hit, the level of contact lets them know that they missed something (block, body shift, evasion, etc). For our Adult students (non-black belts), when they spar black belts, we black belts spar at their level, and medium to full contact is allowed. Medium contact to face and / or vital areas, full contact to areas like chest / stomach / etc. Since they're sparring us black belts, we are conditioned to take shots to certain areas without incurring serious injury. When we strike them, our targeting and control is such that we rarely inflict serious injury (I can think of 2 in past 15 years of our dojo). For the Adults and older Youth, we allow grappling, takedowns, locks, etc. We encourage our students to purchase hand pads that allow use of fingers for this purpose. When the Adults spar each other (kyu vs kyu), light to medium contact is allowed to the same areas. No serious injuries yet, and most come away with some bumps and bruises. But, again, we ARE using pads/gear. We require men & boys to have groin protection in order to spar, and all students to have mouth pieces. If we did not use pads/gear, with the level of contact we allow, I presume we would have many more instances of injury (...duh ). We aren't trying to prepare them for full contact competition, but we want them to experience hard contact so they have an idea of what it's like on the street when they're struck. This will help them react positively to the "fight or flight" switch and deal with the adrenaline rush. Lastly, the way we do things in sparring means we black belts always go home with more bumps, bruises, blood, etc than our students!

That's....awful... Like losing an old friend, or favorite watch or something. On the bright side, somebody has a new bathrobe sash for her/himself...jk (too soon? Hoping to make light of a tough situation...)

And: Thank you both for your responses. They offer support and wisdom...

Nothing!! It would take a miracle to end the "give me now no matter what it may cost" campaign because that's what's the easiest way to learn the MA. No sweat, no blood, no tears; just "here you go sir/maam!!" Brand management isn't an easy issue because one has to understand just HOW to manage ones brand. It'll take more mistakes than Carter has liver pills before one 'masters' brand management. Just be HONEST in operating ones school of the MA, and don't try to find the shortcuts all of the time because they'll fall like a ton of bricks right on top of your head. Be honest across the board!! Sooo glad you posted that, sensei8... I'm taking notes because I know this advice will come in handy later. mal103's too...

That's pretty bold....and awesome As a smaller dojo, we don't have the liberty to be that hard / bold... I wish we had the student body to be that way. We're as hard as we possibly can be without pushing students away....it's frustrating sometimes, but we'll get there someday.

I would consider a "waiting room" if we had the room for it in our dojo...lol I hear you!! Not every school of the MA has a waiting room or the like. Where do you have them wait while class is in session? We have chairs lining the back and side perimeter walls, outside of our training deck. They know to keep things quiet...because if they don't, for instance, if cell phones go off, or tablets make noise, or anything, the instant it happens, students must drop and give us 20 pushups. Youth / kid students learn pretty quick to remind their parents to shut that stuff off. Adult students that leave that stuff on...quickly turn it off after their set of pushups...

Exactly God / Jesus knows what's in your / our heart. That's one reason why He reduced the Ten Commandments to Two: 1.) Love God / Jesus before anyone or anything else 2.) Love your neighbor as yourself

I know this is an old thread, but thought I'd throw my 2 cents at a few points here. I would normally agree with this statement. However, I have noticed that I do not have this problem when I spar or do self defense work. I always do a pretty good job of keeping my hands up at these times. Sometimes I have been able to use the pulling back actions of the arms in some applications. I also do decent jab/cross combinations while not pulling the opposite hand back to the ribs. I've never had a problem keeping my hands up in kumite (we don't train for point sparring), and I've never trained in boxing, MT, or the like. Full chamber punches aren't just for developing full-range motion muscle memory in beginners. You're right that full-range chamber punching isn't necessarily ideal in real fights. However, as bushido_man96 says, the retraction of a punch into full-chamber position has applications. One of which is it's used as a hiji-ate to an opponent behind you. When we do multiple opponent training drills in our dojo, that's one of the bunkai/oyo that we instill into our students to use. Absolutely...well said

No way, you're not over thinking it. The first sentence of my quote of you shows that you have profound respect for your students and yourself; that, if you abuse your authority / responsibility to your students, that it could have devastating effects. When we reach that way of thinking, that's when we're truly ready to be instructors / Senseis.

Since joining KF, I've read a handful of threads regarding experienced MAs donning a white belt when they visit other dojos. Well, yesterday evening I started down a new path in my MA journey, and it started in my own dojo with me donning a new white belt. For the past 6 years or more, I've been searching for the core of our Karate, the soul of our Karate, the root of our Karate; and I don't mean historical roots, per se. And, by "our Karate" I mean the Matsubayashi-Ryu that we practice in our dojo. I began this trek 6 years ago because something wasn't right with our then current Karate style (by this I mean the "style" in which we executed waza, kata, etc.) The way we were doing things just didn't make sense. My journey led closer to Osensei Nagamine's true way of Matsubayashi-Ryu, which led me to a distinct discovery of a tiny tip of treasure poking up through the ground. This tiny tip revealed to me that it (this buried treasure) was, in fact, what we were missing. Fast-forward to just over a year ago... An MA expert whom I knew from my past re-entered my life and became a part-time recurring instructor at my dojo. He's an expert (I would even call him a Master, but he would chuckle and brush it off) in many MAs and MA concepts, including the buried treasure I stumbled across. He gave a name to this buried treasure: he called it "Te (Ti)", and from his explanations, the tiny tip I stumbled across would turn out to be a vast store of buried treasure. I've read about Te before, about it being some indigenous / native art in Okinawa before To-te, before "karate", but at the time, I didn't really understand what it really is. Over the past year, this MA expert, indeed Te (Ti) expert, helped us synergize bits and pieces of Te (Ti) into our Karate. What a difference it made... When I was fortunate enough to have accidental private lessons with him (no one else could make it), he would show me larger chunks of Te (Ti)... but not too much, because he didn't want to step on the toes of my chief instructor. The other day, I received one of the best calls in my MA journey. This Te (Ti) expert personally invited me to train with him and his family (at my dojo), to be a personal student (no, I'm no deshi, not yet anyway). He is ranked in Matsubayashi-Ryu, and follows it to a Ti (sorry, couldn't resist that pun ), and honors Osensei & Soke, but he uses Matsubayashi more as a vehicle for teaching Te (Ti). His method of training / teaching is so different from what I've experienced in my ~25 years of MA, it's great. More importantly, though, is the fact that I truly began my journey of putting Te (Ti) into my Karate because of him, because he invited me to be his student. Because of that honor, because of my respect for him and the art of Te (Ti) / Matsubayashi-Ryu, because I truly want to preserve the art and do it right, I gladly, gratefully donned a new White Belt in my own dojo. And, I'll wear my White Belt when training with him until he tells me otherwise... (*Exhales long-winded dialog*)...

15 Aug 13: Core & strength: Jumping slap-downs, mobile and statue stance training, leg-lifts Te (Ti) training

Good post. Seeing others' strategy tips and experience is always a plus, be it sparring, grappling, kata, etc.

Hahahahaha..! Sneaky sneaky...

Great post Quick and to the point of training in dojo!

My Christian values / way of life go hand-in-hand with my Karate journey. I can't for the life of me imagine the two separated... If life were the roads, forest, mountains, terrain, etc I was traveling on or through, my Christianity would be a roadmap or gps with Christ as the voice saying "turn left here, turn right there, NO! don't turn that way". My Karate would be the vehicle I was driving to follow Christ's directions. But, I also don't use my authority in my dojo beat my students with a Bible. It goes back to the respect thing... A few points I'd like to hit on: The key phrase here is "bend to our own will"; because, IMHO, there is a force that ties us all together, and that is the Holy Spirit (ie God / Jesus)! I would say the vast majority of practicing Catholics would disagree with your assessment that they believe Mary to be a co-savior. The Church firmly teaches that the veneration / admiration of Mary is because she is the Mother of God / Jesus; that worshiping her as a savior / god / goddess is blasphemous. Essentially, veneration of Mary is not equal to worshiping her. I say "practicing Catholics" for a reason. There are plenty of people out there that claim to be Catholic or were raised Catholic that do not practice their faith and do not understand Catholicism. I agree with you: God / Jesus saves, not Mary To bring the discussion back to the article's points: Who's to say there shouldn't be a tick sheet for a dojo? If I run a dojo, with my rules set up, then you have to follow them. That's whats great about it being mine. If eveyone in the dojo bows, why should I let one person out of it? Regardless of how I feel about bowing itself, if its part of the dojo etiquette, then it is what it is. The great thing about this is that if you don't like it, they you don't have to attend. Why does an individual have a right to come in and attempt to make changes? Agreed. I don't think bowing is religious. Its cultural. Two different things. Whether it has a place in the dojo or not anymore is a different thread discussion altogether. Great posts mal103, JusticeZero, and bushido_man96, great points, as well. Bowing and handshaking are cultural, and like things that are cultural, they usually have roots in the "trust but verify" mentality. Westerners (European / Near East), in order to ensure they weren't going to get stabbed in the old days, would grasp each others' wrists in greeting to check for weapons. It became a handshake later in more "civilized" settings like royal courts or whatever. Easterners (Middle East and the Orient beyond), would keep a certain distance and bow to each other to basically ensure the same thing. If someone had a weapon and wanted to attack, they would have to cover a bit of distance to get to them.... which is why people in positions of authority in the East made those lower in station than them to bow lower (exposing their back, too), and never allowed them within certain distances (hello Forbidden City...) The religious aspects of bowing are related to the cultural reasons, but not necessarily the same. In addition to a respectful, cultural greeting, bowing can be seen as showing a certain reverence for the spirit / soul within someone else. In Eastern religions (someone here with more knowledge of Buddhism, Hindusim, etc can clarify this), they bow for certain spiritual aspects in addition to showing respect or deference or humility. In Christendom, look at monastic Christians (monks) that bow to each other in reverence for the Holy Spirit contained within each person. Original / Eucharistic Christians (Catholics, Orthodox Church, etc) bow / genuflect to the Consecrated Body & Blood of Christ (not to an empty host or to a cross or crucifix or statue as often misconceived by those who don't understand Catholicism / Orthodoxy). OK, my 2 cents are cast; I'll be quiet now...

Great post, mal103! The McDojos / Black Belt Factories will always be around. Their drive to water down MA in order to make money off unsuspecting students, and in turn to promote flashy, glamorous tournaments in the interest of trophies, will keep them in business. As you hit upon, I'm referring to the "real" Karate / traditional MA schools as being the MA schools in crisis and eventually dying off. This idea, of "real" Karate / traditional MA schools dying off, is a major premise of my soap box dialog in my thread-starter post...

Requiring good behavior outside of the dojo, like at grade school or home, is a good idea. We don't have the resources and rapport with the local schools, yet, to do this, but I wish we did. Also, requiring students to keep certain grade levels on their school report cards is also a good idea; again, something I wish we could do. The one thing we are able to do is we keep tabs on our youth students by talking with the parents when the kids aren't around. Are their kids behaving better if they were troublesome at home or school? Are their kids more helpful at home, or are they better at completing school work, if they were lazy before? How do their kids interact with them (their parents) and how do they interact with siblings and friends? Those kinds of things... If a troublesome student is still troublesome, we talk to them about it and explain that no matter how good they get with their training, they won't go anywhere in promotions without an attitude / behavior change in all areas of their lives.

Absolutely! There's a difference between being apologetic all the time (usually associated with self-esteem issues) and recognizing one's own faulty decision or action and apologizing for it (which is part of humbleness). BTW, mal103: Sometimes short and to the point is best...lol And, "shut up and train" is great advice when one's mind gets all jumbled and distracted... Shut it up and train... We sound like a broken record to our students with almost verbatim what you said: "you only get out what you put in." Rock solid!

Congrats!

Body conditioning: bag work (heavy), makiwara, forearm blocking drills Iri kumi (in-fighting) kihon and partner drills

Yes... One of the other purposes of the Naihanchi kata (yep, "Tekki" for Shotokan) is to develop Iri kumi (in-fighting), so many of the bunkai/oyo reflect this.

In Matsubayashi-Ryu (Shorin-ryu), the Naihanchi kata are supposed to be learned beginning around 4th - 3rd kyu. The Naihanchi kata were taught as beginner kata before the invention of the Pinan/Heian kata (and Fukyugata for our branch of Shorin-Ryu). Back when learning kata was a three-year process, the 3 Naihanchi kata (or one grand Naihanchi before it was broken into 3) would basically take a student from beginner (white belt) to Shodan. For our dojo, when a student begins the Naihanchi around 4th - 3rd kyu, s/he has from that point thru 1st kyu to prove to us her/his skill development in the kata. If s/he is able to execute the Naihanchi kata well (for 1st kyu), as well as understand the purpose and bunkai, then we'll teach her/him Ananku (which is our kata requirement for Shodan, but I digress). One of the main purposes of Naihanchi, as Wastelander alludes to, is development of gamaku. Power generation is more than just hips (koshi). Part of the point of the Naihanchi-dachi is developing a good root to the earth. With this root, we develop tanden (posture / controlling of center) and muscle control of our body. With our root and tanden, we learn to draw power from the earth, through our stance (legs), channel it with hip movement compounded with muscle control in our body extending from our thighs to mid-torso (like a centrifuge), and direct it through the waza being executed. This is gamaku. Part of the idea behind Naihanchi being done sideways, is that if you can develop gamaku using the odd angles of Naihanchi, then gamaku will be fairly easy to employ when in a normal fighting stance. Choki Motobu was famous for this kata, even saying that Naihanchi contains all the real-world concepts of fighting one ever needs to learn. As Wastelander suggests, there are way too many applications / analysis of Naihanchi to list, and, yes, many of them are grappling related.

I would consider a "waiting room" if we had the room for it in our dojo...lol

Good post DWx (I was in middle of writing mine when your post came through, didn't catch it until after I posted mine...lol)

Great posts Adam and sensei8 I'll throw my 2 cents here with some specific points: And from: Exactly, Adam.... See, pdbnb, self-esteem (IMHO) is code language for feelings of pride and shame. It's not your fault regarding "self-esteem"; the way our society has been taught to raise / teach people is to ensure we gratify everyone's self-esteem...I don't mean to turn this discussion into a "societal" discussion... To bring it inline with my point, we (society) have masked pride and shame with self-esteem. There's one crucial problem with this... Pride is not the opposite of shame. Pride is the source of shame. When we get prideful of something, for instance, our MA training, we become rash, defensive, and even a little selfish. When this prideful thing (MA training) encounters difficulty, whether natural hardships or self-created, and we falter and / or fail at a task, we become filled with shame and self-doubt. We get down on ourselves because we think we're not as good as others and can't do it... NO! Throw that off! That is a pitfall! See, the opposite of shame, indeed a neutralizer to shame, is humbleness / humility. One of the things I tell my students that have trouble with pride is "have an open mind and a humble heart". You will overcome this, and all tribulations down the road, by keeping an open mind and a humble heart. Also, as sensei8 says, keep your MA training about improvement of oneself, NOT about competing with others. Don't try to be better than anyone else, try to be better than you were yesterday.