Self-Protection

“In a real fight, one should seek to strike the head as this is the most effective.”

If your martial arts are studied in a similar way to its original form, a self-defense system, then targeting the most vulnerable body area when a physical confrontation is unavoidable, should be highly considered. . Perhaps a fit, young, athletic tournament or dojo fighter could survive a real life continuous, sport like encounter, but in […]

“In a real fight, one should seek to strike the head as this is the most effective.” Read More »

Self-defense or fighting? Do the research. Be aware of the differences, and be ever mindful of them.

Anyone claiming to teach self-defense has a moral obligation to do the research. . Sport training is created to ensure success in sport. It makes little sense to train to develop one set of skills when they are not the skills you wish to actually attain. If you want self-defense skills, then you should be

Self-defense or fighting? Do the research. Be aware of the differences, and be ever mindful of them. Read More »

Looking at movements as solely blocking could be missing the interpretation entirely.

Uke-waza (受け技), the Japanese term many practitioners translate as “blocking techniques”, by now practitioners should know that a better translation is “receiving techniques”. . When you think of uke-waza with the latter translation in mind, it can open up a lot of doors in your training. . It is often stated that there are no

Looking at movements as solely blocking could be missing the interpretation entirely. Read More »

What is the definition of self-defense?

What is the definition of self-defense? . The average person’s idea of what constitutes “self-defense training” is generally the furthest thing from the truth. . The question “what is real self-defense?”, prompts many to play their ego card. Some people become offended at the suggestion of anything outside their martial arts world that is not

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“There are no styles of karate-do, just varying interpretations of its principles.”

Talk to anyone about the martial arts and it is very likely that they will ask you, “what style do you practice?”. . How did all these various styles come into existence? Are they really that important? Should the existing styles be preserved? . It’s often stated that as you gain experience over the years

“There are no styles of karate-do, just varying interpretations of its principles.” Read More »

It begins at the beginning, with understanding “why” and not just “how” you are doing something.

If you’re an instructor in the martial arts then you will have a system that you use to instruct your class. It is more than probable that you learned this from observing your own instructor, in whatever style of the martial arts that you study and are now teaching. . As an instructor, it’s important

It begins at the beginning, with understanding “why” and not just “how” you are doing something. Read More »

Have you only been taught to fight? If your goal is competition, then you train differently than for self-defense.

It’s incredibly interesting to me how rules determine the efficacy of certain styles of fighting, we can also see rulesets for competition change a martial art entirely. Its one of the reasons why its actually difficult to determine which style of martial art is objectively better (people constantly argue their system is the best). .

Have you only been taught to fight? If your goal is competition, then you train differently than for self-defense. Read More »