Dojo - "The Place Of Enlightenment"

The most important thing that a student of Martial Arts must never forget is that a Dojo/Wushuguan/Dojang/Kwoon/(any other Martial Art Training Space/Hall/Place) is the "The Place of Enlightenment", Because It is:
# The Place where you Perfect your Character and Master the Divine Art of Peace.
# The Place where we learn to defend ourselves Physically, Mentally and Spiritually so that we could protect our Body, Mind & Spirit from any Harm.
# The Place where you transform from a Homo Sapien into a Human Being
# The Place where you come to realize, come face to face and connect with your True Self, your Inner Spirit
# The Place where you come to know the True Strengths, Potential and Weaknesses of your Body, Mind & Spirit
# The Place where you work, strive and dedicate your life to eliminate the weakness of your Body, Mind & Spirit
# The Place where you come to heal/fix your broken self Physically, Mentally and Spiritually.

Thus a Dojo is
> As pure and holy as a Church/Temple/Mosque
> A place of Sanctity
> A place that has to be Respected and Honoured
> A place that should be kept free from all the vices and evil in the world
> A place that needs to be protected from any and everything that could possibly destroy it

Unfortunately the Invasion of Gym culture has and is polluting most dojos we see today...

So next time you go to any dojo, go keeping all this in Mind, and you will never disrespect a dojo again...

How To Choose A Good Martial Art School ?

The endless blossoming of Fraudulent Martial Art Schools and the Intentional, Systematic and Unethical Perversion of Traditional and Mixed Martial Arts into Combat, Sport, Acrobatics/Tricking, PT, Breaking etc by people who practice them (Irrespective of the Art they claim to be teaching, be it Karate, Taekwondo, Aikido, or even Kung Fu) in the world today, is the reason why anyone who wants to Learn a Martial Art today has to think twice before joining anyone of them....

During my Dojo Hunting days, I used to visit every possible Dojo in my area and stand and spend hours and sometimes make many visits, always standing silently but observantly in a corner of the dojos, Observing :

• What the School was Focusing On? The importance it gave to Spiritual & Mental Training in addition to Physical Training?
  -> Since you are looking for a Martial Art School Its clear that the Focus Of the School must be 100% in sync with the Philosophies and Teachings of the Great Masters of the past which is to achieve "Perfection of Character" and "Mastering the Divine Art of Peace". Which is possible only if the school focuses Max on Spiritual and Mental Training. 
• What kind of techniques were being taught and how they were being taught. The Quality and Quantity of Verbal Explanations and Practical Demonstrations given by the instructor when some thing new was being taught.
  -> A Good school will be very systematic and will start with teaching Dojo Etiquette, Philosophy, History etc. and then will continue with Body Conditioning and preparing the body for Martial Art Training.
  -> A Good Teacher will start with teaching basics and will very very slowly progress to Intermediate and then to Advanced training and will never hurry no matter even if the students do not have patience.
  -> A Good Teacher will not rush teaching more and more... as a Good Teacher always focuses on Quality not Quantity.
  -> A Good Teacher will ensure that enough Description/Theory/Explanations are given in sync & relation with the Practical Training.
  -> A Good Responsible Teacher will be very responsible of who he teaches and what he teaches... He will never teach very violent Combative or Killing Techniques to any and everyone.
• Whether their focus was towards the Pure Art form or towards the Combat/Fighting, Sport Perspective of the Art.
  -> As the Philosophy of a Martial Art does NOT match/with any of these perversions, a school that teaches Excess/Only Combat/Fighting, Sport, Tricking etc generally will not and cannot teach the Pure Art form which is based on the philosophy of the Art Form....  
• The Care and Attention given to the students
  -> A Good Teacher will give ample attention to all of his students.
  -> But weakest students will always be given more attention.
• The Strength of the Class.
  -> A Good Teacher will only keep as many students as he can handle and give ample attention.
• The Discipline of the Class
  -> A good school will have strict Discipline and will ensure all students follow it by the letter.
• The Student-Teacher Relationship
  -> Avoid ones where its too Restricted, Difficult for students to Approach the Teacher OR where the Teacher is Over Friendly
  -> Many bad teachers have a habit of Exploiting their students in many ways, so be very careful.
  -> Many teachers are jealous of Students who do some things better than them.
• and finally the Ambiance of the dojo whether it was friendly or dangerously competitive etc.
  -> A good Martial Art dojo is a place where there is Love, Respect, Compassion and Brotherhood.

Another fact over the years that I have learnt is that Big Names/Brands/Labels may not guarantee that you will actually be taught Martial Art the way it is supposed to be and with proper focus on the core philosophy of Martial Art... Never forget Some or the most Authentic Teachers are almost unknown to public...

It is true that I had to do my Home work to be able to figure out what was good and what was not, but I am happy that, all the hard work finally paid off...

Note: These points are applicable for any Martial Art Style/School

Women in Martial Arts & the Male Chauvinists against Them...

This post is dedicated to all the Brave, Dedicated and Hardworking Women practicing Martial Arts all around the world...

Many martial art Internet forums / communities / groups generally have at least one anti-women post or topic like the ones mentioned below and other kind of biased nonsense.
“Boys are stronger than girls” http://www.orkut.com/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=706322&tid=2515435392517766993
“Karate 4 boys, Dance 4 girls” http://www.orkut.com/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=706322&tid=2531417622949608427

What these male chauvinists try to state is that women are weaker than most men so they (women) should not learn martial arts or that there is no use for them (women) to learn martial arts etc...

First of all, these posts just prove their ignorance and their “Frog in a well” level of knowledge and awareness and secondly it is meaningless trying to rationalize the facts with them.

So, let’s see the bare facts:
If it was really true that only a physically stronger person would always win... then there would be no form of martial arts existing today, because there would be no point in learning them, as one would anyway always loose to a physically stronger person....

Other than the Spiritual Aspects, the only other reason, Huge Strong Built, Americans, Europeans etc. pay respect to Asian Masters who are small built and not equally strong is because of the effectiveness of the Martial Art Techniques that these learned masters posses...
One Good Example: Sifu Bruce Lee (5ft 7 1/2 inches tall and weighing 128 pounds) and his student Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (7ft 2inches tall and weighing 225 pounds) and many of his other students.

Martial Arts were developed primarily to help the weaker person defend himself against a stronger person... as it is only the proper implementation of the techniques that can counter/defeat the strength of a stronger person...

So if a woman should not learn martial arts (even if she is really strong) because some people think she will always be weaker than some strong man, then the raw truth is that no man has the right to learn any martial art either as there will always be some man stronger than him and will surely loose to him. In fact there are many men learning Martial Arts who would be beaten up left, right and center by women practicing in their dojo or a bigger percentage of men learning Martial Arts who could be beaten to death by women like Cynthia Rothrock or Chloe Bruce, so I guess they should all stop learning Martial Arts.

Every knowledgeable Martial Artist knows the bitter truth of Life that: “There is always someone BETTER, STRONGER, FASTER and DEADLIER than him/her Somewhere” and so it is important for a Martial Artist to always be Humble and always respect everybody irrespective of age/sex/size/race/religion or creed...

Hope this puts an end to this meaningless debate...

I now take this humble opportunity to invite each and every woman reading this article to start learning any kind of Martial Art they can and if you are already doing so I request you to never get discouraged by anyone and stop learning it because of any kind of discrimination or bias...

Take Care... and Keep practicing...

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