A Real Reason for the Development of Classical Karate!

The very first move of Karate, as taken from the first Heian or Pinan form, is a step to the side with a low block. But Karate was not designed for blocking. Yes, there are blocks in the art, and it can be adapted to blocking and striking modes, but it was not designed for blocking except by the way.

Karate was designed for imperial bodyguards to guard the king of Okinawa. These bodyguards were supposed to use their art in a room filled with warriors from different countries. Warriors who would have different weapons and ways of fighting, while the Okinawans had to remain unarmed.

Thus, would you block a samurai sword? Would you try to deflect a bullet? Because these were the real weapons that the bodyguards had to face.

Consider also that the first command a general might give his troops, if they were to attempt to kidnap the king of Okinawa, would be to restrain the bodyguards. This means that samurai would step forward and grab arms, perhaps preparatory to tying the hands of the bodyguards, or merely herding them from the room, or otherwise controlling them. And this means that the first defense of the bodyguards, as described by the first technique in the first form, would be to step in, dropping the weight and arm, thus escaping from the technique, and possibly head butting those who tried to grab them.

That’s right, an escape from a grab, then a violent step forward to close with and punch and shove the samurai, or whoever the warriors were. This would cause chaos and confusion. This would allow the king to escape.

Now, examine the form, look at it. This is the only way it makes sense. This is the start of what the bodyguards who created the art had in mind.

If the samurai drew a sword, the bodyguard had to rush the samurai. This is the reason for the big steps in the form, to enable the bodyguards to get close enough to maim and destroy. This explains the moves of forms that, otherwise, don’t make sense.

If a samurai attempted to grab, charge into them, head butting, then push them. This is the secret of the first technique, and this is how the art was designed to work. Thinking about the techniques in this way reveals an art that is true beyond belief, but you are going to have to put aside the way you were taught, and take further steps down this path if you are going to find the true art of karate.

The Truth About the Failure of Classical Karate!

Karate, as it is done in modern times, is absolutely nothing like the Karate invented centuries ago. There are many reasons for this, cultural, historical, vested interest, and on and on. This article will pin point the exact reasons Karate has changed, and it is considered a failure in the eyes of many people.

Karate was developed to defend the king of Okinawa. The techniques gathered together were specific in their intent, and that intent was shaped by having to deal with a variety of soldiers and weaponry. Interestingly, Karate had very little to do with blocking and striking, though that can be considered as valid, and more to do with disarming and maiming.

The Japanese eventually commanded the King of Okinawa to come live in Japan, where he was treated like a guest, but still in prison. With the king gone, what reason did the bodyguards have to study their art? Thus, lessons were taught to children to make them strong, but the maiming and butchery of the pure art was left out.

Eventually, Karate was brought to Japan, where it proved not only adequate, but more than comparable to the arts of the Japanese. One must remember, however, that the Japanese had stolen the king of the Okinawans. Thus, it is doubted whether, if the teachers even knew the true art at this point, whether they would teach the people who had stolen their king.

The next step in the evolution of Karate came when the Americans conquered Japan. They did this by dropping an atomic bomb, and now we have the same scene as described in the last paragraph. One has to ask whether the Japanese, if they even knew the true art, would teach the people who had dropped an atomic bomb on them.

Now the art reaches America. It is commercialized, dumbed down for children, and geared around tournaments. People are more concerned about belts and the latest fight night than they are about the knowledge potential of the art.

Finally, the art starts to fail. People refer to MacDojo’s in disgust, and the brutality of MMA, at least workable, is held up to the light. Yet, I ask the question…what was the original art?

What is that art that was designed to maim and destroy in defense of honor and king? What is that art that plumbs the soul and reveals the depths of the man? I say it is still there, the true martial art is still there…you just have to be willing to look for it and work for it.

Which Art is Better, Karate or Aikido?

I know, the question is a bit bogus, as one should be comparing arts such as Karate and Aikido merely so as to make them compliment each other. Thus, with that statement made, let us discuss how the fist should wiggle into the glove. No pow and bam, just an honest, up front viewpoint for your edification and enlightenment.

Karate is supposed to be straight line, and Aikido is supposed to be the circle. Yet, if on looks at Karate, let alone the martial arts, one will see that perfection of geometric figure is loose, at best. If Karate could actually adhere to the perfect line, if one examines how the bones, joints, muscles and so on function, the body would probably explode, or, at least collapse upon itself.

And, on the other hand, if Aikido tried to adhere to the perfect circle, except in the most theoretical of classes, the art would not work. And, to be honest, aikido is not your best art for down and dirty combat. While Aikido is pure and wonderful, and can evolve the practitioner to high levels, one should use a martial art like Karate to enter the fight, then apply aikido.

Think about it this way, a fight is the collapse of distance. The length of the arm, and the circle being made, the lever of the extend arm is too long. However, if you want magic, use karate to kick, punch, find yourself on the inside as the distance collapses, and then use a shorter lever.

Instead of doing a two step and trying a three foot arm circle to a wrist twist, try a hard middle inward block, slide in, maybe with a short fist or elbow, then turn the waist. As you turn the waist, bring the arms up to a short position, lever the elbow, shove your shoulder in and pull. Go ahead, try this scenario with a friend, watch a little youtube to get the motions, and you are going to find an instant blend of karate, even the hardest of karate, like Shotokan, and with the purest of Aikido, even the soft of Morihei Uyeshiba.

Now, the above being detailed, the big weakness of Karate is that it is limited, in most modern formats, to destruction. It has been tailored for tournament, gloves put on for more violence, and given over to fighting for fighting sake. But while there is an art to destruction, the true art is in control.

Thus, a study of Aikido, with the advices I give you here, will enable you to confront the fiercest violence, and transmogrify that violence into the most magical and wondrous of techniques. You kick, you punch, maybe soften the fellow up, then you simply embrace the arms and learn how to go with the flow.

A last word about all this, don’t mistake the throws of judo or jujitsu for Aikido techniques. While techniques of the ju variety are wonderful, we want to move from hard to soft complete, and a certain amount of hard is still involved in ju techniques. That all said, I wish you the best with your new art, and a new art it is…karido…aikate…your choice.

The Secret of How Chi Awareness Works!

One of the biggest mysteries of the martial arts is internal energy. Wudan arts, like Tai Chi Chuan and Pa Kua Chang and Hsing i claim it. Supposedly it takes lifetimes to build, but when you get it you can defeat attackers with just a sigh and a brush of the palm.

Well, the truth of the matter is that internal energy is in many arts, and if it is not, it can be put into any art easily. The principles of internal energy, you see, are easy to understand. So if you study kenpo or tae kwon do, or even boxing, then the door is hereby opened for you, this article is going to lay out those principles and shove you through the door.

First, you have to have phenomenal basics, not just good, but phenomenal. What this means is that you must drop your weight when striking or blocking, and do so with such awareness that you actually create a beam of energy down your leg. You must align the parts of your body so that they form an unbroken line of intention, but are relaxed, very important that they are relaxed, because intention and energy will flow easier through a body that is relaxed.

Now, you must make sure that you move the parts of your body at the same time. Everything starts together, and everything stop together, this is called Coordinated Body Motion. Analyze your body so that when it swings into alignment all of the pieces are moving in harmony, and with consideration for their mass and size and shape and so on.

Now, you’ve got basics, and here comes the internal energy. Fill a pipe half with sand and cap it. Move that pipe in such a way that when you stop it all the sand strikes the inside of the pipe at the same time.

This is what internal energy is and does. It is energy swirled on the inside of your body in such a way that it hits the inside of the block, or strike, or foot, or whatever, at the same time. We used to develop this type of energy in karate all the time, but we didn’t call it internal because it didn’t have any undue significance, it was just the way you moved.

It is helpful if you move slowly, concentrating on feeling the motion of energy inside your body. And, to be truthful, the internal Wudan martial arts have arranged their forms so as to help the process. But you can feel it in Karate, or tae kwon do, or any striking art, if you just take the time to appreciate what you are doing.

The real key is that this method, and, to be truthful, all methods, rely on awareness. It is an idea that moves awareness, and the path of this awareness can be called Chi, or Ki, or Prana, or pneuma, or intention. Now, the real question here is whether you can take the time to invest your movements with chi, or intention, or whatever you want to call it, do you have the patience and the awareness to make something significant out of your martial art.

Three Steps to the Most Powerful Punch in the World!

I don’t care if you study Uechi ryu or shotokan or kenpo, or whatever, you’re going to need a powerful fist. I don’t care if it is boxing or Krav maga or tae kwon do, you’re going to need a fist that knocks them down the first time! Even if you’re in Aikido or Tai Chi, you’re going to need some kind of real power, or at least know what power is so you can properly handle it.

The funny thing is that a powerful punch is easily attained if you follow a couple of easy steps. You don’t have to bash your hands against a telephone pole. You don’t have to spear your fingers into boxes of sand.

As with most things in this world, once you know the knowledge behind something, that something is easy to understand and do. Thus, the first thing you need to know in developing a killer punch is simple. That one thing you need to understand is…weight.

This universe has only objects flying through space. When objects collide there is the sensation of weight. The more weight involved in the collision, the more effect there is going to be.

You hit somebody, and your fist flies through space and collides. Now, if the body your fist is colliding with weighs 200 pounds, then you are going to have to have a two hundred pound fist. Well, you could multiply the 20 pounds of your fist by ten times the velocity, but there is an easier way.

The easiest way is to get your body behind the punch. Your arm may weigh 20 pounds, but if you can add your legs and your torso and even your head to the equation, you can weigh, especially when you times your weight by velocity, 200 pounds. Heck, if you can get a hundred pounds of body weight into a punch, and then multiple it by a simple ten, you are going to have a thousand pound punch.

First, do lots of push ups, and when your arms get strong, start jumping your push ups into the air. Second, examine your form slowly, looking at the pieces of your body and how to assemble them into one intention. Three, set up a six foot tall box, make it weigh 200 pounds, pad it, and practice shoving it across the floor with your punch.

The funny things is that this method is so simple that everybody overlooks it. And, to be truthful, nobody really understands the importance of gauging weight in the martial arts. But, whether you do tai chi chuan, pa kua chang, Chinese Kenpo, tae kwon do, or any of the forms of classical karate, you need to understand weight, and you need to implement some form of the training method I have detailed here if you want The Most Powerful Punch in The World!

The Infinite and Golden Truth about Tai Chi Chuan

The truth of Tai Chi is inherent in a symbol that nobody understands. If you read to the end of this article you will understand that symbol, and it will enlighten your practice of the martial arts. I am speaking of that grand terminus, the yin yang symbol.

The Yin Yang symbol is two fishes swimming is night and day is good and evil is…poppycock. The Yin Yang symbol has nothing to do with those poetic but truncated observations possible to our short lived species. The Ying Yang symbol is actually a quite mechanistic approach and empirical observation to our universe.

Everything in the universe is a motor. A motor is defined as tension between two objects. Doesn’t matter whether the tension is push or pull, just that the tension is, and that is what holds our universe together and…keeps it apart.

An atom, with electron and proton, forever chasing and never catching, is a motor. A cell, with potassium and sodium bubbling their happy little lives away, is a motor. And this dichotomous viewpoint of the universe can be extended through all the combined motors, which are called machines, up to the attraction and repulsion of celestial bodies of the most intense and largest magnitude.

When you do Tai Chi Chuan you are pulsing energy up the legs, across the generator, and down the legs. Back and forth, alternating current, causing the generator, called the Tan Tien, to bubble its unique energy, called chi. Imagine the generator as a little cup of tea, being swirled, not to slosh, but to be mixed in yin yang motorific fashion, just enough to froth just a bit of steamy chi.

As you do Tai Chi Chuan you become aware of the space that your body occupies in space, and awareness hollows out the receptacle for this chi. Eventually the golden elixir, summoned far more efficiently and efficaciously than any ancient alchemist might believe, fills the body, becomes responsive to the wish and desire of the student/philosopher. Good health, strength and endurance, mental clarity, all are the product of a body made to function the way it was designed to be functioned.

Animals do Tai Chi, and wonder why we don’t. Babies are possessed of Tai Chi, and robbed of it through the cultural expectations which accompany the aging process. And, the space of yourself being attained, you know the answer…who you were before you were born, and who you are after you die.

I sell nothing with this article, I only search for friends, and give away my knowledge. Can you have it? Can you have yourself, the eternal you that all love and none see?

Immaculate and Perfect Martial Arts!

Happy happy!
It is just so gorgeous out there…
got to work out.
You know?

Here’s something to think about…
the reverse punch in karate
was designed to go through the lacquered armor
of the japanese samurai.
Not break it,
but go through it.
Leave a hole.
Interesting, eh?

It was pretty successful,
but the secrets have been pretty much lost.

The secret of that punch,
however,
was screwing the feet into the ground,
keeping the hips low,
and generating
power, power, power.

Snap the whole body like a fist.

I always chuckle
when I watch head hunters.
The head is bobbing and moving around.
The body is a bigger,
more fixed target.
And,
the old saying,
kill the body
and the head dies.

I usually call the body the life support system,
and the head the computer,
and,
the life support system is really nothing but a pond of water.
You can cause a big splash
if you think of it this way.

I don’t hit bodies,
I slap bodies of water,
and watch the waves tsunami
through the body.
Gets amusing.
I tell students to place their hands
on the back of a fellow,
then I strike the fellow on the front,
lightly,
but with the intent to move water,
and the students can feel the shock waves on the back.

Be real careful with this one.
It’s too easy to hurt people.
You get an organ between the slap on the front
and the shock on the back,
and you can mess a guy up
pretty easy.
Bodies are so-o-o-o fragile.

Here’s a win…

I found your ad in the dec 09 issue of inside kung fu and it was just what I was looking for!  I have always known that it didn’t take as long as 20 years to master a martial art.  otherwise in ancient china the arts wouldn’t have been passed on to future generations.   You have shown me what I was looking for!

I apologize,
I don’t have the name
of the guy who sent me this one,
but thanks.

And,
no,
it doesn’t take 20 years,
it just takes the right data,
and a little seriosity.
I mean,
give yourself up to the art,
and the art will overwhelm you,
with no delay.

Now,
if you want a good, solid punch,
an elephant squashing fist of dire import,
then go to Monster Martial Arts,

scroll to the bottom,

and  click on The Punch!

You know,
I keep forgetting about
The Kick.
but it is here

The Kick

I never wrote the ad for this,
but it is the companion book to The Punch!
You can order it separate,
I don’t know why it is so inexpensive,
but it is,
I should raise the price.
But,
heck,
I have a few extra copies.
Order The Punch! by Friday,
and I’ll throw The Kick in for free.
Three day window.
Take advantage.

Well,
that’s about it.
Except,
check the home page out for a good sale.
And…
here’s an article I wrote.
They are all over the web,
but this one is pretty Matrix,
just google…

The Three Necessary Stages to Immaculate and Perfect Martial Arts!

Should pop up pretty quick.
If it doesn’t,
let me know.

Thanks
guys and gals.
and have yourself a Work Out Day!

Al
=o)

Behind it all is surely an idea so simple, so beautiful, that when we grasp it – in a decade, a century, or a millennium – we will all say to each other, how could it have been otherwise? How could we have been so stupid?
John Archibald Wheeler

The Ancient Method for Creating an Iron Grip with Martial Arts!

Using Karate, are you able to crush a coconut just by squeezing it? With Kung Fu, can you take a shoot of bamboo and twist it until it breaks? With Shaolin, can you grab a man by the arm and, with a light squeeze, bring him to his knees?

If you can’t do the things I have just listed, and you study any of the martial arts I have mentioned, or other similar arts, then you should be wondering what is wrong with your martial art. After all, martial artists of other centuries could do these, and other tricks, and make them look simple. That said, let me introduce you to an Iron Grip…they way they used to train.

One would think that an Iron Grip depends upon fantastic muscle, but, there aren’t many muscles in the hands. Truth, the muscles that activate the hands are usually in the forearms. And, yes, you are going to need iron muscles in the forearms.

To begin this method, make sure that your body is in good shape. I would recommend doing Sanchin Kata the old way, with lots of dynamic tension and sinking the weight into the ground. The power of the imagination must be strengthened through this simple discipline.

Now, this exercise is incredibly simple, but must be done every single day, and for long, boring hours. If you want the Iron Grip, you’ve got to be willing to pay the price. So if you are one of these weak willies who think that going to a class makes you an expert, cease and desist.

You must schedule at least an hour a day for this exercise, and you must complete the hour without fail. Second, you must be able to find a certain fascination of intent during that hour. You must fall in love with the long, slow breaths, and you must trust your goal, and the method I am about to prescribe.

Stand in a Sanchin stance and hold two mason jars in front of you. Your arms should be slightly bent, and you should use only the fingertips for gripping. For the first month, hold empty jars, for the second month, add an inch of sand and hold a high horse stance. Add an inch every month after that, and lower the stance until you are in a low horse stance.

And, when you have filled the jar, start again with an empty jar, but in a deep stance, and grease the lip of the jar. Now, some of you think I am kidding, and you are the ones who are going to talk about the mysteries of the art, and never discover them, or fulfill your potential. For those of you who are willing to find the depths of The True Art, and through such simple vehicles as Karate or Kung Fu or Shaolin, I offer this profound article.

CBM, Matrixing and Mushin!

Monster Newsletter #247–CBM, Matrixing and Mushin!

Happy Halloweenie!
You can take off your mask now.
Heheheh!
Sniffle, snork, snarf!
Ain’t I funny?

I met one of my long time students in a bank.
It was halloween
and some guy was standing in line
with a mask on.
Hmmm.
Needless to say,
a guard came up and asked him to take off his mask.

Makes you think,
eh?

Makes me think that halloween
would be the best day in the world
for robbing banks.

Right?

Anyway,
there are actually three things
that happen in the martial arts.

First is the concept of CBM.
Coordinated Body Motion.
Classical artists say
‘Move the body as one unit,’
but they don’t tell you how,
except in the most general terms.

Done their way it takes three years.
Getting my data and it take a couple of months.

The concept is not hard,
you see.
I mention it often,
show people how to do it.
And,
it works.
A little practice,
and intention starts to move through the body.
Easy squeezy.
You know?

Begin all motion at the same time.
End all motion at the same time.
Figure out proportionate ranges of motions
and energy input for appropriate masses of body.

Sort of like a mathematical formula.
Probably could make one pretty easy.
And I’d do it,
except you can just trust yourself
and be intuitive
and CBM comes pretty fast.

Now,
the second thing is matrixing.
And,
virtually nobody in the history of the world has done matrixing.
Logic just wasn’t wide spread,
so people memorized routines,
tried to get the big picture.

Got a heck of a lot fine and big martial artists,
but it takes them so long,
and then they can’t get anybody to do what they did.
So the myth of DNA starts.
It’s in the blood, man.

Poop.

Intuition can be learned,
you just have to overcome the blank spots in your mind,
you have to matrix,
fill in the pieces of the puzzle,
make sense out of the thing,
then…
whamo bamo,
you have instant ability.

Now,
interestingly enough,
the third thing has been achieved,
but not by many,
almost by accident,
and
in spite of the fact
that they had no matrixing.

That,
alone,
is testament to the magnitude and quality
of the martial artists of planet earth.

The third thing is usually referred to Mushin no shin
in the japanese.

Mind of no mind.

Simply,
the fellow has jumped out of his mind,
is responding in the now,
with no distractions
or hesitations,
or mistakes.

I sometimes call it
Time of No Time.

Simply,
something happens in a combat situation
you sort of jump out of your body a little
and let’s say a fist is moving faster than the eye can see,
faster than the mind can register,
but…
you see it.
You see it,
and it can even be slow,
but there is no lapsing of perception,
no moments when you can’t see it,
and,
further,
you track it and handle it without effort.

Believe me,
if you efforted,
you aren’t in Mushin no shin
Time of no time
mind of no mind
and in the now.

Now,
matrixing opens the door instantly
to the potential of Mind of No Mind.
No blank spots
to interfere with your perception.

But,
it still takes discipline.

A guy with lots of martial arts
and lots of data aligns
and the picture that suddenly makes sense,
it quite large
and encompassing.
And,
he hits Mushin no shin
like a fng freight train,
absorbs it
and…
WOW!

Now,
a guy with little experience
lacks sufficient data,
and when the pieces are assembled
and the puzzle revealed
and the now presented
and the picture isn’t big enough.

Most of these fellows
don’t think badly of me,
and maybe they understand
deep down in their souls
how easy the martial arts are going to be
and how different they are going to be,
but they lack the data
and therefore the comprehension
of what has happened.

The really odd thing
is going to be when everybody in the world
is matrixing.

And,
believe me,
it will happen.
People learn by osmosis.
Enough people start matrixing,
and the others will pick up on it,
and then,
people will wonder what it was like
to have reaction time
and to be in mystery
as to what technique they are going to use,
and,
totally unappreciative
of how intuition protects them,
and how the art develops intuition and therefore
the art protects them.

Now,
one last thing,
how much matrixing does a fellow need
for it to blast off in his mind?
I find that an intriguing question.
Everybody is different
with different experiences
and the answer is going to be different
for everybody.

But,
maybe a fellow has a realization on Matrix Karate.
Another guy is going to have to
do every course I have,
and then ask for help.

Generally speaking
most people realize
in accordance with the amount
of accumulated martial knowledge they have.

Still,
it is a crap shoot.
Depends on your mind
and its willingness to accept
the fact that the ‘software’ I propose
is so smooth and easy to absorb.

Still,
I would guess that one to four courses
is the norm.

That sort of fits
with the data I get
from people who order the courses.
Still…
no guarantees,
except for one.

Matrixing has never been on this planet.
Not even the Boolean figurers
had an idea
where I would go with this stuff.

Anyway,
CBM,
Matrixing
Mind of No Mind…

Look at the price I charge
and know that it is a gift.

And,
know something else…
that I hope you have sufficient martial arts
that you can fend off the ghosts and goblins
you try to throw you down
and steal from your sack of sweets
this weekend.

Happy Halloween,
my friends.
Boo.

Al

BIG SALE!
GO TO HOME PAGE AND SEE!

=o)

Humor is reason gone mad.
Groucho Marx

It is Possible to Learn High Grade Kung Fu in Three Months.

While MMA is popular, there are problems with it. Let’s be honest, while some fellow is using Jujitsu, he is rolling around and vulnerable to an attack from his opponents friends. Not to mention that it is not always the most intelligent thing to roll around on the ground with some fellow who has a knife or broken bottle.

I know I have offended some stylists out there, but these are questions that you cannot run away from. After all, the ring looks ferocious, but biting is a problem on the street. And getting your fingers broken or your eyes gouged is always a possibility if you are trying to do some Brazilian Jujitsu on some fool.

No, it is better to keep a distance, be able to evade, manipulate, and even run. Yes, you have to watch what kind of a surface you are on, but mobility in warfare is extremely important. And talking mobility, we are talking something like Shotokan, or Shorin Ryu, or Kenpo.

The problem is that people have bought into the idea that it takes decades, a life time, to learn good Kung Fu, like Shaolin or Mantis. But it doesn’t. All you have to do is find a system which understands the most important principles and concentrates on those principles.

We are not talking Jeet Kune Do here, because we don’t want a grab bag of sample all and take what you need. What we want are the actual core concepts of the art. We want the truth of such arts as Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut.

The best way to do this is to learn how to Matrix your martial art. When you matrix your martial art, be it Wado or Krav Maga, it suddenly makes sense. And, making sense, it will suddenly be ten times easier to learn.

And here’s something most people don’t understand, logic leads to prediction to intuition. Those sixth sense abilities of the martial arts are hard to find, but they don’t need to be. Once you start matrixing your martial arts, and I don’t care if it is tae kwon do or one of the Korean Kwans, your sixth sense abilities, your ability to understand and produce such things as chi kung, sometimes called gi gong, will start to blossom.

Really, what we are talking about here is bringing the martial arts into modern times. We are talking about evolution when we are talking about matrix martial arts. So, you can flog that mule, or you can ride the race horse that is Matrixing.