Man, there’s gonna be a knock down! I can feel it in my bones! The question is, will Bruce knock down Mohammad, or will Mohammad knock down Bruce?

Okay, first things first, let’s talk about the physical measurements of the men. Bruce Lee was 5 foot seven, and Mohammad Ali was six foot three. The point goes to Mohammad on this one, though it really should only be a half a point, for Bruce’s legs made up for the discrepancy in reach.

Now, weight is going to be important in this match up, so let us take a look. Bruce Lee fluctuated a bit, but at his ripping best he was probably about 160 pounds, Mohammad fluctuated, also, but we can round it out to about 200 pounds. Edge goes to Mohammad in this area, for 200 pounds of flesh is going to have a sizable smackaroonie behind it.

One always has to consider speed in a contest, and here the edge goes to Bruce. Yes, Mohammad had an instant of invisible punch to his credit, but that was only once. Watch Bruce Lee, and even though he wasn’t wearing gloves or in a fight, his speed is a constant blur.

All around martial ability must be considered, and here, again, Bruce gets the edge. Yes, Mohammad was fluid, powerful, and unique, but he only used his arms. Honestly, though we are limited to one point here, I would like to give more to Bruce, for you would have to tie one of Bruces legs behind his back to get an even fight in this category.

One of the most important weapons in a fight is the mouth. Simply, if you talk the talk hard enough, you might not have to walk the walk. That said, in spite of Bruce’s movie inspired oratorical abilities, no one in the world could compete with Mohammad’s trash talk, why, you would have to tie one of Mohammads lips behind his back to get an even contest!

Now, Mohammad is slightly ahead, but the contest is about to be evened, for we are going to consider the most important question in the martial arts, what a person knows. Mohammad knew a lot, there is no doubt, but his was a natural talent, and limited by being able to use only his hands, knowing no grab arts, and so on. Bruce, on the other hand, not only knew an amazing amount of martial arts, he knew Mohammad Ali, he used to watch movies of Mohammad and study his technique.

In conclusion, I am not going to call a knock out, because these men were two fast to be knocked out. But I am going to give a decision to Bruce, this because he not only watched movies of Mohammad Ali, he used to watch them in a mirror so he could adapt Mohammads techniques to both sides! Now that is truly above and beyond, and it is for this reason I give the decision to Bruce Lee!

The problem with freestyle is that it has devolved into fighting. Sounds contradictory, I know, but I began learning martial arts back in the sixties, and I have seen a different face of freestyle. This was a freestyle that was actually more effective, easier to learn, and tempers the personality to grow a better human being.

Now, I have nothing against MMA, or UFC, or learning ground and pound and all the other modes of freestyle. Truth, I think some of this stuff would have been awfully useful back when I was beginning. That said, consider the following points.

Controlled freestyle in the martial arts effectively died when people started putting on pads and protective gear. Sure, we occasionally wore pads back then, but the purpose was for injuries that had occurred. The breaking point, however, was when school owners realized how much money there was to be made in selling protective gear, they pandered to mothers fears, which stopped little Johnny from learning about true control, and effectively stopped the personal growth stage of the martial arts.

Bruce Lee took a frightful toll on freestyle by introducing bouncing. He watched films of Mohammad Ali, realized that bouncing disrupted timing, and changed the world of freestyle. Unfortunately, the effect was also that people stopped learning about timing, and stopped observing a whole fact of life, for time, as you may not have known, keeps this universe going.

With a lack of reality and a lack of timing eating at the innards of budding students, a loss of control was quick to follow. I remember seeing a fellow with three karate lessons under his belt taken to a tournament and encouraged to fight, not to get a point, but to fight. He fought, there were injuries, and nobody showed any control. And control, control through timing and reality, is what the martial arts evolution is really all about.

The final straw behind the death of freestyle had to do with lack of respect. I was taught to bow when I entered the school, and to bow when I got on the mat, and to bow to my classmates and partners, and to bow to the instructor, and it all showed respect. Now there is a bully boy attitude of we’re tough and the hell with the other school, and this derails the art of freestyle, and the art of human compassion.

I know there will be those who disagree, and, let’s face it, my criticisms must be tempered by the real gains of the new arts, of the mixed martial arts and the ultimate fighting championships. There are things to be learned in the new arts, and, I am not opposed to many of the new training methods. When I see people fighting to hurt one another, showing no control and total lack of respect, I am on the other side, the old side, the side that shows compassion for their fellow man.

So, I ask you the question, what can you do to resurrect the old attitude of respect? Will getting rid of gloves and pads enable people to feel the reality of what they are doing, and get rid of harmful attitudes? And, can you do this and still make the art work?

Okay, I’ve been doing the martial arts for over forty years. I’ve lived through the arts of the decades, judo in the fifties, karate in the sixties, kung fu in the seventies, and so on, and I’ve analyzed durn near every art there is. I’ve made up a list of things which I wish people would have told me, or I somehow could have found out, when I first started.

The point here is that classes were where you worked out, and not where you talked. However, and it was years before I realized it, the reason a lot of people didn’t talk was because they didn’t know anything. So are you ready for things you should know before you start the martial arts.

I wish people would have told me about pain, pain hurts, and if I had known the truth about pain it wouldn’t have hurt so darn much. The pain of a block, for instance, can go either way, it can go into the blocker or into the striker, depending upon which one has more intention. It’s not a matter of tough, its a matter of which way you want the energy to go, and it goes following the direction of the more superior mind.

I wish somebody would have sat down and told me what all the body parts are for, or at least told me that learning would have been ten times easier if I had figured out the purposes of the body parts are. What does it matter how you turn the bones, and why does it matter which side of the bone the muscle is on. A very important point could have been made if somebody had just told me I had a head and I could think with it!

This matter of how a body works could have made the martial arts ten times easier if somebody had explained why and how all the parts had to work together. This is a thing called harmony, and when the body has harmony, then intention can flow through the body and make it ten times more efficient. How much does each part weigh, what is the ratio of muscle to body part, how far does each body part have to move to stay with the whole body, how much effort is required for each body part.

Speaking of harmony, if somebody had explained that it was not just harmony within your body, but harmony that was outside your body, then I would have had a ten times easier life. Heck, getting along with your fellow man takes all the tussle out of life. And the truth of love your enemy wold have made me a real martial artist of quality and magnitude.

Probably the most important thing somebody could have told me would have been to work harder. Heck, if I had worked harder I would have gotten to the end faster, maybe even gotten further, maybe even learned more! The point here is that I could have learned all the things that I eventually figured out faster, and then I wouldn’t be griping about all the things that I should have been told.

Ah, the things I didn’t know, they were so great, but, at last I know them. Even more important, you know them, so you don’t have to be slow or stupid or lazy or things like that! Unless, of course, you want to pretend that I didn’t say anything.

Matrixing, to put your fevered mind to rest, is the analysis and handling of force and direction. Everything in the universe has a direction, and everything in the universe has lots of potentials for collision. Thus, the study of Matrixing becomes crucial if one is going to understand things like Shaolin kung fu.

Now to be thoroughly clear, and to set up this article in the proper manner, let me say that the martial arts are taught through the memorizing of random strings of data. This is like somebody memorizing a few songs on the guitar, and thinking he is the next Segovia. Obviously, one has to break through the memorizing process and start finding the structure of music, and how to arrange an art before he can make claim to being a master artist.

So, let’s talk about Shaolin. Shaolin has a few thousand years of history, and this has resulted in every kung fu monk and his brother adding to the mix, and thus the logic and organization of the art has become thoroughly and totally mixed and muddled. There is a mountain of random data, you see, and there is no set of principles with which to define it.

If one studies Shaolin styles like Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut, one thinks that kung fu is deep stance, windmilling arms, and a hodge podge of concepts which pop out at you. One thinks there is a hierarchy of rank up to the head abbot, and one must meditate and beat his fists into heated iron pellets to get the real kung fu. Unfortunately, this is a small subset of principles, and while the true art is touched upon, it is not penetrated.

If one studies Wing Chun, one thinks that he has to stand squarely, achieve balance, and absorb attacks with the antennas of the forearms. Three forms, a wooden dummy, and never the idea that everything is just random strings of data, and not the whole. Thus, Wing Chun is phenomenal, yet it just touches upon the True Art, and never embraces it.

Then, of course, there is the Mantis, if we wish to speak of antenna arms, and circling motions that manipulate an opponent to his destruction, and so on. But, if you look at it, it is almost like Wing Chun and Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut have been combined. Thus, the principles wallow and intermingle and intermarry and interbreed into fresh bastards and the True Art is obscured in a fog of amazing ability and astounding art.

This all said, Shaolin would be easy to matrix, and come to the truth of, as would Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut or Wing Chun. But I chose Karate to present the principle of Matrixing, and to expose the world to the concept of analysis and handling as a logic. Simply, the mountain was smaller, the history was shorter, the cloud of obscuring fog more transparent, and it could be defined.

And here is the blessing, learn how to matrix karate, and you can use that matrixing as a template. All you have to do is plug the basics of Shaolin into the template provided by Matrix Karate, and you have true art. Too much mountain, too heavy a fog, and yet it can all be resolved into nice, tidy, little, easy to learn packages of True Art, and thus assembled into the whole of The True Art.

Here’s the latest newsletter, enjoy!

Monster Newsletter #255–Matrixing Music!

Look at you,
wallowing in that swivel chair,
turkey juice oozing out your pores
and the world expects you to go buy something.
HAH!

Now go the center of the room,
stand there in a pose,
and wait.
Just wait.
Pretty soon an artistic desire will come over you,
your body will shift slightly,
a second posture,
a third,
and,
zingo bingo…
the work out has begun!

Now that you’re awake…
let me say something.
There are a lot of newbies to the newsletter,
and some of them don’t know much about matrixing,
and a lot of times I wander off
talk about other stuff,
so,
today,
to start the Hanakwanmass season off right,
let me tell you something about Matrixing that you didn’t know.

Matrixing is nothing more than the application of logic.
People think it is going to be a deep secret,
but,
it is really a simple secret.

The problem is that the martial arts
are nothing but strings of random data.
Sequences of tricks,
with no regard for logic.

This,
in itself,
is a phenomenal testament
to the power of the martial arts,
and how powerful martial artists are.

That the arts work
though arranged so piecemeal…
wow!

But you knew that,
you have never been able to deny your own power,
or you wouldn’t have found the martial arts,
and you wouldn’t have found matrixing,
but that isn’t what I wanted to tell you.

What I wanted to tell you
was that when you matrix the martial arts,
when you see a logical bit of software
for your head,
then the head,
the hardware,
starts to straighten out.

The head likes logic,
it starts to matrix things on its own.

So I did the martial arts,
then I started in on math,
wrote a book on the subject.
And I attacked English,
grammar,
and the world started getting real easy and simple.

Almost black and white,
if you know what I mean.

And,
I matrixed music.
And here is what I want to tell you.

If you memorized the Moonlight Sonata
by Beethoven,
could you say that you were a master musician?

People might be in awe of your fingers…
but you would know that you weren’t really a master musician.

You’ve got a ways to go
before you’re a master musician.

The point here is that copying strings of random data
does not a master make.

Well,
if you memorize the strings of data long enough,
and have the kind of mind
that can penetrate through
to the structure beneath.

It is not until the person doing the memorizing
breaks through the memorization process
and starts to realize
that there is a whole structure of music
that he can use
to tap into his creative abilities.

Music is a structure of sound
that is mathematically separated into individual notes.
A master musician can rearrange these individual notes
into a variety of harmonies
through a variety of genres,
duplicating or not
other musicians.

This is a limiting definition,
in a way,
but,
once one understands the structure,
it is entirely unlimiting,
and the spirit does soar.

Without the structure,
it soars about as much as a five year old doing fingerpaints.

With structure…
hello moon, hello stars,
I see a quaint galaxy over that way.

Matrixing provides the structure.
It defines the individual arts.

The thing is,
without the structure defined by matrixing,
art is limited.
You can’t define what you know,
so you can’t know more,
and you’re just lost in a cloud of random thoughts.

With the structure defined by matrixing,
the fog dissipates,
shapes become recognizable,
arts become defined,
and,
you become unlimited.

Matrixing.
It limits
so as to unlimit.
It grounds you
so as to soar you.
It binds the body
in a fashion
that unlimits the spirit.

So,
listen…
get yourself a present.
You spend countless hours,
through the weeks and months and years,
working out.

But,
wouldn’t you like to have the hours you spend
be dedicated to the whole art,
and making your spirit soar,
right now?

Instead of
just memorizing strings of random data
and waiting for decades
for enlightenment to happen…

don’t you want it to happen now?

I tell you this,
I spent seven years to enlightenment,
then I spent another fifteen defining the art
and becoming a master,
and,
looking at my whole over forty year career
all I can do
is wish somebody had come up
and hit me with the matrixing two by four
right on the side of the head,
right in the beginning.

If I had only had the structure right from the beginning,
there is no telling where I’d be now.

Well,
maybe there is,
maybe I would be just sitting here,
turkey juice oozing out of my pores,
thinking about going to the center of the room,
and striking a pose…

Okey doke
friends and neighbors,
here’s a link for you…

Matrix Karate

Al
=o)

PS–If you want the latest article, try googling ‘ The Secret of the Three Essentials of the Martial Arts’

I got tired of playing other people’s songs.
Gregg Allman

El abad principal del Templo de Shaolin, Shi Yongxin, vuelve a estar salpicado por la polémica, ya que desconocidos piratearon la página web de la institución, colgando una carta en su nombre, en la que reconocía había transformado el monasterio en una “gran atracción turística”. La página, dedicada a promover mundialmente las actuaciones y los productos del histórico monasterio, ha aparecido con una carta a nombre de Shi Yongxin, en la que reconocía que “había hecho todo lo posible por convertir Shaolin de un pequeño santuario a una gran atracción turística”, informa el periódico Global Times.

Se especula que el abad del templo Shaolin ha sido blanco de los hackers y las críticas del público porque sus movimientos de internacionalizar Shaolin son considerados “una desviación de la tradición”. Nacido en 1965, con sólo 22 años se convirtió en el abad más joven en acceder a la dirección del Templo de Shaolin, además de ser uno de los pocos que posee un máster en dirección de empresas. La publicación Chinese News Weekly expuso que el templo recibe 1,5 millones de visitantes al año y tiene unos ingresos anuales de 60 millones de yuanes (5,8 millones euros). El monasterio de Shaolin, cuna del kung fu y centro de peregrinación de aficionados a las artes marciales de todo el mundo, anunció en 2008 que enviaría a sus monjes a enseñar sus habilidades a otros templos en el sur de China, creando así la primera “franquicia” de un templo. El dinero obtenido por los monjes en la enseñanza de kung fu en Yunnan y a través de donaciones de fieles fue reenviado a Shaolin, según el plan de Shi, a quien la prensa china apoda “el monje ejecutivo”. Desde la llegada de Shi al puesto de mayor responsabilidad en Shaolin, el monasterio ha llevado a cabo toda clase de actividades de promoción y publicidad, incluyendo shows de sus monjes por todo el mundo, producción de películas e incluso comercio por Internet. “El templo se ha degradado y es ahora una empresa”, señaló un internauta de la provincia de Henan -donde se encuentra Shaolin- en foros sobre el tema publicados en Internet.

Según la leyenda, el kung fu fue inventado por el monje indio Bodhidharma, quien en el año 527 fundó el Templo Shaolin, la cuna de este arte marcial y que se halla en las montañas Songshan, un bello paraje considerado por la UNESCO como Parque Geológico Mundial.

Fuente: ElPais

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.

In the martial arts, I don’t care if it is mma, Pa Kua Chang, Shotokan, or whatever, there are three key ingredients. These three ingredients are what makes an art an art, and they are why people study the arts. Oddly, one of the ingredients is almost totally ignored.

One of the ingredients is the pursuit of strength. Muscle mags are filled with strength advertisements, and everybody obsesses on strength. Oddly, strength is the least important of the three essential techniques of the martial arts.

Another ingredient is technique, and this is the most important of the three essentials. Technique is measured by how little effort you need to make a move work. If you need a lot of strength, then your technique is not very good.

The second most important essential to good martial arts, and the one most people ignore, is speed. Interestingly, at least in the beginning, speed is very necessary to make a technique work. Yet strength is what everybody chases.

Yes, people try to get fast, a little bit, but it is an individual effort, and usually put aside in the pursuit of strength. People believe that strength is going to make them faster, you see. Well, it will, but there are flexibility drawbacks, and the speed gained is not always enough.

Speed must be developed in a fashion which tailors it to the technique. As knowledge of technique rises, so should the escalation of speed. In my over 40 years of martial arts I have found only one technique which develops speed in the proper manner.

The Speed Drill is based on a simple slap and grab motion. It makes all techniques as easy to enter as it is to slap a fly. And every technique can be entered using this slap and grab Speed Drill.

So practice the strength of Uechi, and build the technique of Aikido. Work the sticky hands of Wing Chun and focus your concentration into the great nothingness through Tai Chi Chuan. But if you want sheer, raw, powerful speed…you need to practice The Speed Drill.

There is a tremendous amount of interest in Matrixing Technology. It is pretty obvious that Matrixing is going to be the next big thing in the martial arts. It is pretty obvious that Matrixing is going to sweep the world and transform the martial arts.

To explain this phenomena, let me say a couple of things. The first is that Matrixing does not invalidate any art, it makes every single art it touches better. The second is that the purpose of matrixing is to align the information of the martial arts, to make it more logical, and therefore easier and faster to learn.

Now the stated purpose of matrixing is to analyze and handle force and direction. To understand this is to understand that every object in the universe has a direction in which it is traveling. And, collision is the point at which trajectories intersect.

Thus, the point of matrixing is to control the paths of objects so that collision is avoided, or at least beneficial. In the martial arts it is easy to see how this could be extremely important. In fact, a little matrixing and you understand it is the underlying principle of not just the martial arts, but all life.

Joe Blow throws a fist at you, or a foot or a body or an elbow or a spear or whatever. You analyze the trajectory of the weapon accurately, and you can handle it. If you do not analyze the trajectory accurately, poor you.

How do you ascertain that you have the correct trajectory analyzed? By knowing what all the potential trajectories are. Only if you have assessed the trajectory by all the potential trajectories can you determine that you have selected the correct trajectory to handle.

So matrixing is a method by which you can analyze all the trajectories, and thus select the correct one to handle. And, by matrixing, you can analyze all of your potential responses, and be assured that the one you choose is the best one. And, here is the real key, matrixing enables to discover trajectories that you did not know existed.

That’s right, to discover what you don’t know, and this makes you the ultimate pioneer, the ultimate explorer. With matrixing you have the key to discover all the dark, secret mysteries that are obscured and hidden, no matter if you are studying uechi ryu or parker kenpo or that esoteric form of silat. Beginners in Tae Kwon Do will learn faster, wudan tai chi chuan students will uncover the ancient mysteries, and even the bash and trash experts of the ground and pound arts in MMA and UFC will find themselves enlightened and uplifted.

Here’s the latest newsletter, it’s about how Ilearned to kill a turkey, sort of. Happy Thanksgiving, and try not to laugh at me too hard.

Monster Newsletter #254–Happy Thanksgiving!

I give thanks that I get to work out!
Everyday.
Many times a day.
And I know you do, too.

I mean,
what else is there?
Eh?

Now,
I lived in Northern California.
place called Redwood Valley,
right outside of Ukiah.

And,
I had a couple of acres of grapes,
a bunch of chickens,
and considered myself
a gentleman farmer.

I should have considered myself
a grade A goof.

You know those fences with the thick wire and the squares?
The squares are smaller on the top of the fence than on the bottom.
Well,
the truth of the matter is
the small squares should be on the bottom.
Keeps the chickens in.
Hey!
I didn’t know that!
So I put up this fence to keep the chickens in,
and they walk out the big squares at the bottom.

My neighbor,
an old guy who really was a gentleman farmer
leaned against the fence and laughed until he cried.

Good for nothing gosh darn $%^$%^&*%^&!

And, then there was the time my wife told me to use the back driveway
when it was raining.
Well,
the back driveway was mud,
and my wife came out and observed
that I was stuck in the mud.
She said,
‘Mud spelled backwards is dum.’
Boy how she laughed.
And it was her that NAGGED me into using the back driveway.

My neighbor,
he was leaning against the upside down fence,
laughing till he cried.

God for nothing ^&*8 %^&*()!

But,
the topper was the rooster.
The rooster jumped on my youngest son,
big Fng rooster,
trying to get his foot claws
into my son’s face.

So I took a stick and,
using perfect form,
cut that rooster across the neck.

Man,
it was a perfect chop!

Rooster had to be dead.

Laid there like he was dead.

So I went and got the shovel,
and when I stuck it under his warm body,
he jumped up
ran around like a…
well..
like a rooster with his head (almost) cut off.

I had broken his neck,
but that didn’t stop him.
He jumped at me,
tried to claw me,
chased me right out of the
^%&*()*&^%&*()&^%&*(
henhouse!

Gosh darn rooster!

My wife asked why I came running out of the henhouse
looking like a zombie (rooster) was after me.

And my neighbor…
you know what that son of a $%^&*(OP was doing!

Leaning against the fng upside down fence laughing till he cried!

Now,
my neighbor wasn’t all bad,
and he was a gentleman.

After he stopped laughing,
he told me the truth about how you hang a fence.
And,
after he stopped laughing,
he got his tractor out and towed me out of the mud.
And,
after he stopped laughing,
he asked if he could have the rooster.
Said his wife knew how to cook tough old birds until they were the proper soft,
winked at me so I understood it was him that she had been cooking all these years.

And,
he told me all sorts of things about wine,
even brought a bottle of his own wine over,
and we toasted each other.

I toasted him and his generosity,
and he toasted how much laughter I had caused him over the year.

Yeah,
he had made the same mistakes I had made,
only fifty years sooner,
so he was not laughing at me,
he was laughing at himself,
and,
me given enough time,
(or, at least enough wine)
with me.

So,
how are you going to kill that turkey?

You have to kill it yourself,
you know?
You are a martial artist,
probably have a shiny sword hanging in your closet,
or at least some Cold Steel,
or maybe a Glock.

So,
how you gonna off the turkey?

You have to do it yourself,
or you aren’t really a martial artist,
right?
(grin, grin, grin)

I mean,
people shouldn’t eat hamburgers
unless they can confront slaughtering beef.

This vegetarian thing is silly.

Come on,
how you gonna kill the turkey?

Put it on a block and chop it?
Chase it down and skewer it with a sword?

Then pluck it and make a big hole in it
and reach your hand up in there and pull out all those gooey things?

Oh,
but don’t ask me to help.
I’m too busy over here,
leaning on this fence
and laughing until I cry…

HAH!

Here’s a link for you…

Blinding Steel
Happy Thanksgiving
all you turkeys,
I give thanks for your friendship
and all the work outs you’ve done over the years.

Al
=o)

PS–If you want the latest article, try googling ‘ The Secret Behind Real Karate Fighting!’

It makes me mad when someone kills snakes or dogs or cats or horses. I don’t even like to eat meat – that is how much I am against killing….

Charles Manson

I’m going to tell you something fascinating in this article. I am going to tell you how to make Karate into Kung fu. And, of course, you should be able to make Kung Fu into Karate.

The fact of the matter is that Karate developed from Kung fu. For hundreds of years Okinawa was the shipping center of the far east, and every art, soldier, ambassador, or whatever, came through the doors, and the arts gathered, were dissected, and reorganized to the extreme. Still, there are only so many things you can do with the body, and the main differences are stylistic.

A punch is a punch, a block is a block, a kick is a kick, and a technique is a technique. Uechi Ryu used to be Pan Gai Noon, Shotokan used to be Te, and so on. That said, let’s look at the exact stylistic differences and what to do about them.

First the stances of Kung Fu are lower, have more flourishing, and are badly altered by the desire for art. What I am saying is that somebody will get low on the back stance, put the ball of the foot forward, and tweak the hell out of the back stance just so they can feel, and put on the show, of having more power. Nothing wrong with more power, but this is the image of power, and not the real chi power that is available to a true student of the art.

The stances of karate are a bit higher, and they put more emphasis on keeping the hips low and turning them into the move being done. Nothing wrong with this, but in the case of the back stance, for instance, the back leg is usually turned out too far, gives more power, but immobilizes the stance. Now, proof, go look at pictures of classical stances in kung fu and karate and see if I haven’t described the phenomenas accurately.

Moving up to the arms, the kung fu people have smoother, more liquid motions, which motions are based upon swing the arms circularly. Karate people, on the other hand, turn tight and explode the power outward in a more linear fashion. So the motion, and the energy involved in the two arts, vary from swinging arcs to explosive lines.

So, if you want to change your karate to kung fu, simply align the turn of your stance with the turn of your hips and let the arms swing wider. If you want to change from kung fu into karate, push off the floor, snap the hips, and make the circle of the arms tighter and more efficient. Yes, I realize this is simplistic, but, done for a few weeks, and your eyes are going to open, you are going to tap into the power of a different art, and that power, karate if you are kung fu, kung fu if you are karate, is amazing.

Now, before the purists get ahold of me and raise a rant, let me make a point. There is ballet and there is jazz and there is ballroom and there is…and in the martial arts, scratch the surface of the styles, and you will find the fundamental principles that are heart and soul to the immense power and art the human being is capable of. So, whether you practice a style of karate like shotokan, or a kung fu like mantis, give yourself a chance, try what I’ve said here, and let your art flower.