Growth of To-Shin Do in clubs and dojos is always a good thing. More people have more of an opportunity to study our martial art in person in their own city. Here’s something that should be mentioned as we grow. You need to be sure that your teaching staff is up to date and teaching […]
What if martial arts training is really an interactive experience of order and chaos? When there is an imbalance, there is less than effective training. You need to have order — the discipline, respect, and intelligently paced learning. You also need the chaos — free testing, the “try it outs”, and “what ifs”. When you […]
A few advanced black belts are taking private Skype lessons with me, studying aspects of kuji no ho “nine syllables of aspects of power”. I warned them that we can explore kuji, but it will feel different from studying taijutsu together. With taijutsu instruction, I tell you what to change, you do it, and you […]
I am 70, and have seen so many cultural fads come and go over the decades. WWII vets got parades; Viet Nam vets got spat on; Iraq vets got applauded in airports. Black and white were segregated in the 1930s; black and white were integrated in the 1970s; blacks demanded black-only spaces on college campuses […]
On our final Saturday of our Vajrakilaya retreat at Pema Ts’al Monastery in the Nepalese Himalayas, Eric Gadol, Lauren Garst, and Geoff Garst went with Rigzin Wangdu and me into Pokhara city to do a guest teaching for my friend Fatta Gurung. Fatta is a karate teacher who teaches Nepalese police officers hand-to-hand survival, so […]
Do not get mad at conditions in your life. That is pointless. What a waste of time and energy. Get mad about your reluctance to do something about those conditions. If you are not just a little bit angry about your condition — the shape you are in, the way you look, how you fit […]
In a third possibility, Hi no Kata fire element dynamics are the energy of committed intensity and focus. You learn to recognize a problem as it builds. You intercept at just the right moment. Theme – Clinging becomes desire which leads to energy The fire influence shows up as the magnetic power of energy, artistry, […]
Let’s continue our review the five elements that form the base for To-Shin Do training from the inside out. In this issue of Ninja Now, we”ll look at the water element. Theme – Knowledge leads to power Sui no Kata water element dynamics are the tactics of power and knowledge, self-discovery, strategy, and individuality. This […]
Let’s review the five elements that form the base for To-Shin Do training from the inside out. In this issue of Ninja Now, we’ll look at the earth element. The ground-holding power-exertion of the earth element shows up as the opposite of the free-moving evasive wind element, which will be described later From the earth […]
Several years ago, Rumiko and I were invited as special guests to a showcase of Japanese karate instructors. These were the men who brought karate to the USA in the 1960s when I was just dreaming about studying the martial arts. All were in their late 60s and 70s. The senior master instructors performed their […]
I have a curriculum all my friends use in their To-Shin Do dojos, from white belt through 6th Degree. 7th and 8th Degree are somewhat special, worked out between each individual student and me. My current major project is a rework of 4th and 5th Degree. The old curriculum was designed in the late 1980s. […]
Martial arts masters who share the gift of inspiration with us radiate something we feel in their presence: We pick up a quality in them that resonates within ourselves. They are what we want to be. We recognize their high spiritual energy, which we long to have active in our life. When we meet a […]
In this course, An-shu Stephen K. Hayes takes students through several examples of how to successfully break the form in order to win. Unarmed taijutsu, knife combat, and hanbo cane fighting are offered as examples of the concept of how to employ the special mind set of kata yaburi.
The following comes from a 1981 issue of Kick Illustrated magazine. I had some pretty bold and controversial opinions 37 years ago. How does this read today? I think I am still saying the same thing! Another area that Hayes feels is sadly neglected in current martial arts training is contemporary weapons. He stresses that […]
To successfully pass a Third Degree Black Belt test in To-Shin Do, you want to be sure that you know and can perform the Third Degree training exercises. I am not being funny or cute here. I am being painfully direct. It seems that some teachers have their students test for Third Degree apparently without […]
