MASIsshinryu

"Dear Master Villari, I have enclosed the requested photograph of me breaking the required 1" pine board. Per your instructions, I attempted to bake the board, but my toaster oven proved to be too small! As you can see from the darkened lines on the board, in the picture, I used my BBQ, instead. I have also included the still shots of me performing the "Super-Ultra-Scientific-Automatic-Kill" techniques that your video showed me. Please ignore the fact that I appear as an asian man in the board-break, and caucsian in the latter example. It was a problem with the lighting. Looking forward to my 35th degree Black Belt, Mr. Zippy" ... No, I don't see any problems with BB by distance learning...

"The way of the sword and the Way of Zen are identical, for they have the same purpose; that of killing the ego." - Yamada Jirokichi In my youth, I entered into my training for the wrong reasons, and have since come a long way in improving who I am as a person. The others I have seen who enter with the need to inflate their ego end up in one of three categories: 1) They learn to abandon that motivation; 2) They leave, or are asked to leave, the dojo because of their attitude; or, 3) They find a dojo or instructor who does not value a developed character and they end up neither liked nor respected by those who do place value on this. It has been my experience that those falling into the 3rd category tend towards trophy collection, elaborate gi decorations and other outward signs of "success." Please do not get me wrong, this is not the only motivation for decorating a gi or seeking trophies, but those seem to follow with the ego-driven mentatlity.

If you presently have a physial limitation which prevents you from drawing the toes up/back, look at some supplemental stretching which focuses on that issue. With (lots of) practice on a bag, progressing from low to full contact over time, most people who initially have this challenge will be able to work into the proper kicking form. Practice, practice, practice...

Possible scenario: Two heavily armed men enter a bank you are in, and separate all of the patrons present in a spaced out line along three walls so that you cannot talk to each other without being overheard. During the course of the robbery, they discover that they have botched the timing estimate on LE arrival, and find themselves now in a hostage situation. They move all furniture to a position in front of and blocking the lobby entrance. Both of them announce that they are two-time felons, and will not be taken alive as they would be guaranteed life sentences. They begin shooting the hostages, starting with the person opposite your position, as they have nothing left to lose, and hope to force LE to comply with their request for safe passage. You have one shooter walking along the line of hostages, while the other is in the center of the room. Both are facing away from you. IF you can take the closer one, you have a chance of getting one of his weapons. If successful, you have a chance of taking the second one out. You cannot take the time to strip the extra weapons off of the first perp, nor would any person realisticly want to move past a person who may regain consciousness, and resume thier intention of killing those around them. Your chances of success if you try? Slim. Your chances of survival if you do nothing? None. I would strongly consider breaking the first perps neck, to ensure that he does not wake up from a less-than-lethal strike, and to minimize the time spent on eliminating him. There are many people in this world who are in the "Two-strikes" position, who will not hesitate to choose to kill to avoid a guaranteed life sentence. I choose to take that decision away from them. In any event, I would take the option that allows me to see my family again, even if it is while defending my actions in court.

I am just curious as to the opinions out there. What have you heard, what have you been told by your instructor, or other sources?

In a well run dojo, with a good instructor, you should not see people fail upper belt tests, or any test for that matter, unless something happens which prevents them from completing the test at all. A good instructor will discourage testing until you are truly ready for it, perhaps even refuse to test an over anxious student who is not at the right level of skill. I have not studied under instructors who charged for belt tests, but I know exactly what type of dojo you are envisioning ("$150 a month, paid up front for a year, and you are Guaranteed a Black Belt!"). No, I do not hold those belts in any level of regard, much less high regard. However, I have also seen people claim competition titles which they did not earn, or which resulted from competitions which place so many rules and restrictions on the fighers that it almost loses its relationship to what is "Street Effective." In short, I would value a belt based on an understanding of the dedication, effort and skill that earned it, be it in "the ring" or in the Dojo, not simply by the nature of the belt.

It has been my experience that this is almost completely up to the instructor. Even within a given style or governing body, there is often variation.

In every jurisdiction I know of, from the moment , the other person became the aggressor, and lost any possible claim of self defense. Continuing the use of force after the previously immenant threat has ceased is an arrestable offense, just as the other persons initial aggression was. Further, the act described would easily be agrued as an unnecessary escalation of the level of force, and the civil suit which could follow would be extremely difficult to defend against, if not impossible. Good technique, wrong time.

Yes, teaching has to be a two-way street. One learns as much from teaching as fro mbeing taught, if they pay attention. A good instructor is obligated to both pace and screen the concepts they teach. This is one of the most critical burdens of teaching that I can think of. If a student is not ready for a given concept, they should not be taught it. That said, it should also be noted that the instructor should be encouraging emotional and spiritual growth in parellel to the technical instruction they give. At some point, most students will be ready for whatever the intructor is prepared to teach, if all goes well. Some people never reach a point at which they should be taught "everything." This is a fact of life. Some people are not capable of reaching a level of maturity which would enable them to properly respect the potential abilities which could be taught, or to value the life, health and peace of those around them. This does not mean that they cannot be taught, just that they might never be ready for the most advanced topics. This is why everyone's advancement is completely personal, and it is somewhat unfair to compare the speed with which any two people achieve certain levels of skill or proficiency.

To me, a good instructor is: 1) Always hungry to learn more, themselves; 2) Excited about sharing their own experiences with deserving students; 3) Patient; 4) Focused on developing the mind, body and spirit through setting an example and guiding the experiences of others; 5) Quick of mind; 6) Realistic and open to new ideas; 7) Not hung up on appearance, pretense or ego (although pride in excellence is not a bad thingi!) Luckily, I have had this kind of instructor, although I have also experienced some who still had some work to do.

The individual involved had (I do not know if the school even exists, still) such a poor reputation that there was a marked lack of interest in contacting them, for any reason. From what I had been told, some students from this school were even barred from entering some local tournaments, due to poor conduct in the past. The worst part of it was that the senior students / instructors who had been with them reportedly had egged them on. I'm tempted to say it was a "home grown" style, as I cannot even remember what they called it.

He named a local instructor, who did not have a great reputation, but we had no way of verifying if he was a student, of course. He refused an offer to stay with us, even with (if I recall) the first three months w/o fee. Yes, very sad.

Absolutely. Such wild claims give every art a bad name and endanger the students who believe in them. Clearly these are cases of the worst derelictions of Honor, on the part of the person who made such a claim. I cannot even bring myself to refer to them as instructors. We had a gentleman show up at the first dojo I studied at, claiming his instructor had given him "Masters Certification," and had imparted the deepest secrets of the style to him (I forget what style, it was many years ago). He was roughly 20-22 years old. He asked for a match with our instructor, but was told he would have to spar a mid-level student before he could be permitted this (much eye rolling ensued). An Ik-Kyu of good standing was taken aside, and asked if he wished to spar the gentleman, BUT NOT MAKE CONTACT, as a demonstration. After agreeing, and without telling the other that he did not intend to make contact with his strikes, he effectively countered the poor guy into submission. The gentleman's comments afterwards clearly demonstrated that his "Instructor" had filled his head with that same kind of misinformation, and he was heartbroken when he discovered that it was not true.

Not meaning to make assumptions about anothers intentions, but I would take "Train Hard," to imply a reasonable amount of contact training in involved. I do not know of any styles which exclusively train without contact, although there are certainly instructors who do advocate this. Do not write off any style, based on the approach of a few, or even many instructors who do not teach it with a "Warrior Mindset." Tai Chi can be taught in a justsu form... it just doesn't look like what the name calls to mind. One thing that I have always told students/seminar participants is "You will do under stress what you have trained to do while stressed." Push yourself in your training, making it both physically and emotionaly stressful, and you will usually find that your reactions later will mirror how you handled that experience.

In most states, persons of either 15 or 16 years of age are permitted to learn to drive cars. Persons younger than this are assumed to not have the level of maturity required to understand the responsibility associated with control of a device which could easily injure or kill people. Depending on the focus of the dojo, is the ability to injure or kills with your body (or weapons) any different? Dojos which are oriented more towards sport applications will tend towards allowing younger students. As one moves towards training for combat, and increasing levels of realism and "street application," the minimum age usually increases. That said, I absolutely recognize the benefits of MA training for youths. My son (almost 6) has benefitted greatly from my instruction, if even just in his confidence. Would I accept another person's 5-year-old for instruction? No, probably not. If for no other reason than because I do not fully know the values and behaviors being taught in the home. I have never taught anyone under the age of 16.

IMHO the rank of 10th Dan signifies, or should signify, an absolutely complete level of mastery. As such, only the founder of a style can realisticly hold such a title. It seems to me that when one formally creates a style, it is the product of not just a lifetime of training received from highly skilled instructors, but influeced by one's own life experiences. Given the fact that no two people could possibly share a lifetime of experiences (barring conjoined twins), I cannot imagine a situaiton where every single thought, intention, nuance and idea is completely communicated even to a chosen successor. In short, my feeling is that each style should have a single 10th Dan, and out of respect for that person no others should make claims above 9th. Even those should be unique and rare individuals.

To go back to the base post: From the book Living the Martial Way: The poet Berryman noted that '... the trouble with this country is that a man can live his entire life without knowing whether or not he is a coward.'" Many will never know, until they face a "defining moment" in thier life, and come to realize their own limitations through experience.

If your Sensei approves, of course it is fine. Learning through other means might be more of a hinderance than a benefit. If not given the verbal description of what a given technique / combination is intended to do, you will miss a lot of the subtle aspects which make the kata valuable. I would also suggest that if they are truely out of order, as in skipping "the next" and going after one beyond that, you might not have exposure to some of the underlying concepts, which also make that kata effective. Each kata in the progression should have some concept that it helps to build, which makes the next, and following, kata more effective. One might expand the concepts of grappling techniques, the next balance in near-simultaneous hand/foot strikes, the next in spinning techniques then the last makes use of all three previous concepts. If you miss one to move ahead, you will not have that extra focus on a topic which might be of critical importance. To some extent, each one builds off of the previous ones, as they become more complex.

It has been my experience that properly balanced weight training and stretching programs greatly magnify the benefits of my Karate training. I make much more dramatic progress when I can find the time to have all of these in my routine. When time begins to get short (all too often, unfortunately) I drop the weight training, then the stretching routines. Mind you, when I talk about a Stretching program, this is in reference to a program separate from those which I do prior to, during and following my MA training. These supplemental programs further improve overall health, body awarenss as well as the obvious strength and speed benefits, when properly balanced.

I think the question could be reworded as: Why develop a set of reflexive responses which you do not intend to use in "live" applications. I can see that in many cases, this could be a sort of driving a lesson home through exaggeration. If you want someone to use a medium stance in application, where they might otherwise tend to shorten up under stress, you teach them to start even lower. From this perspective, one might learn the mechanics of leverage, motion and execution under a less-than-ideal circumtance, so that an abbreviated version is more easily executed under stress. It has been a long time since I visited a Shotokan dojo, so I cannot say if this makes sense in this line of conversation. I know for me, and most students I have had contact with, it would more often serve to confuse the development of smooth and effective reflexes, to learn a given technique in such different applications. Just my humble opinion.

"I was almost a cop, but then they found out my parents weren't siblings."

The vast majority of what is now often termed "Martial Arts" do not, in fact, have their origins stemming from battlefield application. Odd, then, that we would even use such a term ("Martial" literally meaning "of, related to, or suited for war"), in it's current context. That said, arts such as Kenjutsu, Aikijujutsu, Kyujutsu... etc were developed for the Samurai, for use in warfare, and have a right to claim that heritage and title as Martial Arts. Although I am not as familiar with the origins of military arts of other cultures, I would say that most documentation suggests that most other arts were designed for self defense, rather than full-scale combat. Now... the dictionary definition of a "Warrior," on the other hand, includes "A person involved in some struggle or conflict." Given this definition, one can easily make the arguement that living and training with a "Warrior Mindset," is still applicable to what most of us do.

Outstanding. I am glad that states are choosing to share this information. Thank you for looking for it.

I have to say that I very much enjoy reading Dave Lowry's (sp?) more philosophical books. The mix of his personal insights into the traditional aspects of his art, and his sense of humor make for quite a good read. I also recommend "Living the Martial Way" to anyone interested in such material. Also a good read.

The goal: a sense of calm, peace and greater awareness and control of yourself.