You have two eyes, two ears and one mouth for a reason First of all you don’t have to like your coach to learn from him (could be ‘he’ or she’ but I’ll use ‘he’ in this instance).  If he has the information you need, suck up your personal opinion of him and absorb yourself into the information. He’s not there to be liked, or entertain, if he’s serious, he’s there to make you a good martial artist and through the process you will probably love and hate him – often in the same session. A good coach will be … Continue reading The Magic Key

  “Sifu/Sensei, why don’t pressure points and locks work on you? Don’t you feel pain?” The fact is that they hurt me just as much as they hurt you. The difference is that I choose not to yield to the pain. Pain and your reaction to it tells me a lot about you. The world is full of mentally weak people. The moment they get any discomfort they want to give up, run to their Mummy and want it kissed better and have a Mickey Mouse plaster put on it – and Im talking adults of all ages here. There … Continue reading Pain In The Martial Arts

Use Your Head! In the Tai Chi classics it states: Suspend the headtop – like a rope is attached to the crown of the head and pulling upwards. This is consistently taught in Tai Chi classes but the teaching is rarely understood.  This idea has to be active – in other words applied all of the time, not just periodically applied. When I’m teaching I constantly find myself saying, “head, head……. head….. head…. you’ve dropped your head, you’re sticking your chin out, now you’re tucking it in, don’t drop the head to look down, don’t lean the head to the … Continue reading Use Your Head!

The Martial Arts And Violence A good explanation of the Kanji for the Japanese word ‘Budo’, which is ‘Wu Shu’ in Chinese…. “The character bu is constructed from the characters meaning “arms of war” or “violence,” and “to stop, prohibit, or bring to an end.”  Therefore, bu is more accurately translated as “to stop violence,” or perhaps “to bring about peace.”  Thus  budo,  bujutsu and  bugei might more appropriately be  known as the “arts of the peacemaker.”  The warriors of China and Japan saw their skills as tools for maintaining the peace rather than indulgences in a love of war.  … Continue reading The Martial Arts And Violence

Sensitivity In The Martial Arts “Sifu, in my mate’s class they learn to harden and desensitise their arms by bashing them together with the blocking movements, why don’t we do that?”  Rod had lots of martial arts ‘mates’ who trained at different clubs and they would get together on a regular basis to ‘share’ their knowledge. “What purpose do you think our arms, hands and fingers serve Rod, why do you think we have them?”  Sifu answered the question with a question in his usual ‘Chan Buddhist’ way… “To hammer the crap out of our opponents?”  Rod was being mischievous, … Continue reading Sensitivity In The Martial Arts

Philosophy Is Important In Training A few of the guys had come in early because they didn’t want to go home from school/college/ work and come out again for training, some were doing their own training, some their homework and some just reading or playing portable computer games. Jake and his friends were working out on the punch bags and then trying out the techniques on each other, they were working up an enthusiastic sweat and had eventually bought a bag to the floor and were working on their best ‘ground and pound’ techniques rolling with the bag and then … Continue reading Philosophy Is Important In Training