A Fist load is a Japanese term for a hand held martial arts weapon of the small variety. In this classification you would find brass knuckles, possibly saps, and definitely Kubotans.
And, you would definitely find Phil Ventrello’s handy, little keychain called a Munio. You can read about the Munio, and of my test of it, here, (https://alcase.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/munio-self-defense-is-great-martial-arts-equipment/)
What you don’t know is that at one time, a few years ago, I decided to make one of these key chain killer devices myself.
First, I went to the lumber store and bought a six inch dowel.
Then, I went to the hardware store and bought a handful of nasty and sharp, little nails.
Then I measured the spread of my finger in a fist, and pounded the nails through the stick at the measured points.
ZOWIE!
I was holding a gnarly stick that fit perfectly into my hand and projected the points of some very, sharp nails between my fingers.
I had a device that could be adapted to carry keys, would fit in my hands, could be used to pound like a hammer, or flail like a small mace, and I pitied the fool mugger who wanted my skinny, little wallet!
And, here is the thing, I could make these suckers and sell them!
I could see it in my mind’s eye, mass produced by some third world country, recommended by police officers and Navy SEALs everywhere, and people would buy them like hot cakes!
Hot cakes with nails in them, but still hotcakes!
Conjecturing over this massive sales bonanza, adding up zeros in my head, I slid my home made fist load into my pocket and—OW!
The nails ripped apart my pants and scored my skin! And when I tried to take it out of my pocket it hurt even more!
I stared at the nasty, little martial arts tool. It bled at me. Darn. It was so perfect, but you couldn’t carry it. Heck, it would defeat any kind of holster, rip apart clothes, and…and if I was caught carrying one of these I would be guilty of intent to maim and all sorts of other stupid laws!
So I tossed it in the trash.
And, several years later, I carry a Munio. And now you can understand why I was so excited when I came across the Munio.
Munio means ’I defend.’ It can be carried into an airport, it won’t zap some poor fool into a heart attack, it won’t spray you in the face, and the darned thing is really cool looking!
Yet you can flail the keys and use the butt of the thing to pound sense into some poor mugger’s face!
Heck, I showed mine to my wife, and though she has NEVER showed an interest in martial arts weapons, she said, “Can I have one?”
So, check it out here…http://www.munioselfdefense.com/munio-workshops/.
It’s the wind up, it’s the karate punch, it’s the…oops!
Good Lard is it a beeootifull day, especially for the ultimate karate punch..
Good day to work out, limber up the muskles, knock the fat off yer frame. Get healthy. Ya know? Are ya ready to talk martial arts?
Matrixing your horse stance training with Matrix Karate. Click on the pic.
Click on the book to find out about the man who killed Kenpo Karate.
One of the drills I hated the most, but got the most out of, was the simple horse stance. We would spread the legs, get the thighs down to where they were almost parallel to the floor, and put up one high block, and extend the other hand to the side in a chicken beak, and look at our finger tips. We called this position Kima Chasie. Horse Meditation.
And we meditated on the pain it would cause us.
Now, forget the pain, forget the stronger legs, forget everything but the real purpose of it. Get out of your body.
After a couple of years of dabbling with horse Meditation I decided to do it right. I decided that pain wouldn’t cause death (in this instance) and that I should just do the exercise until I got what it was all about.
So, I hit the stance, looked at my fingers, and concentrated on breathing. Time passed. Minutes seemed like hours. My mind began to still, the world slowed down. Seconds seemed like hours.
And, suddenly it all stopped hurting. No pain at all. The whole universe was one peaceful concept that i could live with forever.
How long did it take me to get there?
Five minutes.
That’s all.
Zingo bingo, instant enlightenment.
Doing the Horse Stance Form and techniques at 61.
Now came the problem. When I tried to move, I couldn’t. My whole body had locked up. Man, I was freaked. Tried to wiggle backwards, couldn’t move, couldn’t even rock. Tried forwards, ah, there we go, I could fall for…oh shit…ah! Landed on my face.
So, enlightenment is possible through the old training methods, but sometimes it can be weird, freaky, and even as significant as a karate punch on the nose.
Hey, any of youse guys feel like coming over to see me, I live on good old Monster Martial Arts. Brings your friends, the doors are open, leave your old life outside.
See ya.
Al
Here’s a great article on how to be Karate tough. If you can take it. Grrr.
This was forwarded to me by the erudite Tom Jackson. It backs up matrixing, and really says the truth about Parker and the many techniques of Kenpo, and in PArker’s own quote!
Analysis of 150 kenpo techniques.
You’ll have to search for The Kenpo Journal on your own, but it sounds like a good bet.
Here’s Tom’s email to me on this…
Interesting Quote I found in The Kenpo Journal:
Ed Parker on Techniques:
I teach Kenpo, not for the sake of teaching the techniques, but for the principles involved in them. And even then, these principles must be altered to fit the individual.
The reason I give my techniques names is because there are certain sequences associated with these terms. If I told a student tomorrow that I was going to teach him a counter version to a double hand grab, it’s not as meaningful as when I say I’m going to teach him ‘Parting Wings.’
You’ve got to know how to vary things. A lot of the techniques I’ve worked with, they’re ideas, they’re not rules. At any given time, any of my moves can change from defense to offense, of-fense to defense.
Martial artists, and Kenpo people especially, become so involved in doing the techniques exactly right in such and such amount of time, that they get caught in a pattern that they can’t break. That’s not what they’re for. Specific moves, specific techniques are based, like the ABC’s in the English language or standard football plays.
You have to have a point of reference and from there the combinations are endless and limited only by universal laws, laws that you can’t change.
With respect to the late Mr Parker, after watching those two videos of his “Sophisticated Basics”
his attempt at organizing his material is not easy to grasp. Your matrixing is much better!
He’s got the mandala of circles-inside-circles, which is interesting, and then he’s labels both
blocks and strikes A, B, C, D, E, etcetera, and his main point is that one of the letters can be
replaced with something else. It is kind of interesting to see how physical moves fit into that mandala.
Gotta run bye for now, hope you don’t mind me rambling on a bit.
End of email…and if this is rambling, we need more.
Thanks, Tom…
and to all,
Have you checked out the matrixing viewpoint of Kenpo? This is a complete analysis and matrixing of 150 kenpo techniques.
Do These Things to Get the Perfect Martial Arts Body
Some guy looks like an elephant, another guy looks like a twig, another guy is lifting weights like they are going out of style. Some guy is working on speed, another guy is working on power, and another guy is working on technique. And the question here is…what is the best type of body to have in the martial arts. What is the perfect martial arts body.
Yoga meditation can lead to a perfect martial arts body. Are you ready to go for it?
Do you want a body that is filled with muscle, and so strong that if it gets hit it doesn’t hurt? Do you want a body that is lean and lithe and able to be flexible out of any situation? What is the best kind of body to have in the martial arts?
The solution lies in comparing and contrasting types and attributes. A body with lots of muscle has fast strength, but it is usually short on endurance. Carrying those muscles around costs something in the length of energy.
A body that is too lean has flexibility and speed, but sometimes you need mass and weight to make a punch potent. A punch depends upon transferring weight, you see, and if the body doesn’t have the weight, the punch will suffer. The trade off here is that if your body is skinny you can increase your speed, which will increase weight, but that is not always reliable in a fighting situation.
So this is what I want you to do to solve the conundrum. First, give up all fast food and soda drinks. This stuff is pure killer, and that is easily proven if you just look at the people coming out of the doors of your local hamburgery.
Second, give up all pasta, bread, and that sort of thing. Your body doesn’t digest synthetic food easily, and the food tends to congest and make the body fat. Really, examine all the foods you eat, and avoid anything that is manufactured.
Okay, you’re saving truckloads of money by eating veggies with a bit of protein every day. The protein could be hamburger patties, portions of chicken, turkey, fish, and so on. Red meat should be rationed out gently.
What you are going to observe is the weight will drop off easily and smoothly. You’re body is going to become lean and muscled and last long and have tons of extra energy, and this will start happening almost overnight, at the least, you will notice differences within a week or two. Combine this with your martial arts work out and you will shortly find that your body begins to assume the perfect shape, bulk, mass, speed, and everything else, for you are now eating what nature designed for it.
To the beginner the martial arts, and this includes Karate, Kung Fu, Aikido, Tai Chi Chuan, and all other martial disciplines, can be less than simple. There is simply an overwhelm of information, a ‘disgruntlement’ of the mind at the massive influx of new materials.
Click on the cover!
The simple truth, however, is that the truth is simple.
Why these subjects, be they karate or jujitsu or whatever, would not be simple, once once absorbed, is merely the result of engaging the mind to try and describe what is ‘not mind.’
For instance, in the beginning one must wade through instructions concerning physics, anatomy, history, philosophy, and so on. This is made more complex as different arts propose different structure and on many levels, and then often disagree.
The harmony of Aikido is similar to the absorption of Tai Chi Chuan, but there is sufficient difference to argue the terminology.
The striking methods of Wing Chun and boxing, though at heart still just a strike, can be argued ad infinitum.
But in the end, proven by simple and direct experience, a human being is constructed of flesh (body), mind (memories), and spirit (awareness). Thus, all physics, which is the heart of all sciences, can be rendered to a fine simplicity.
The fact is that the discipline of the martial arts focuses on doing to the exclusion of the mind, and thus is achieved enlightenment. Enlightenment is considered, from the unique viewpoint of an accomplished martial arts discipline, to be aware of the self as awareness.
And, yes, the above statement, so simple, is the summation that can be applied on any and all levels of all martial arts.
To do a single act, a kata or technique, a kick or throw, until there is no thought (no interference from the mind), and is intuitive, opens the door to enlightenment.
For once one looks at a fist approaching the face in terms of simple survival, one will begin to look at the approach of the universe in the same way.
Not an overwhelm of factors to be adjusted through eternal tweakings of computations, but a simple ‘Is it going to hit me or not.’
Followed by a simple, ‘Do I block or get out of the way.’
Not complex at all.
The unfortunate truth, however, is that man insists on his own significance in the universe by creating endless paradigm for his actions.
Thus we have reasons of physics, disagreements of anatomy, descriptions of philosophy, and all filtered through the various misunderstandings inherent in unaccomplished and divergent martial arts.
And these are all justifications for one’s existence.
‘To be or not to be,’ placed in endless loop.
But the simple truth is if one practices the discipline, and this of widely varied arts such as Karate or Aikido,Tai Chi Chuan or Kenpo, then one is engaged in ignoring the mind; one is functioning in an emptiness of reason and a purity of awareness.
Survival blots out psychological ramifications, and puts an end to philosophical meanderings – and justifications – of the awareness trying to look at itself, but so very unable.
To sum, it is not all the reasons, but the source of reason, the ‘I am,’ that is responsible for conundrum, and the resolution therewith.
The easiest way to cut through the fog of the martial arts, to ignore the mind and to find the truth of the self, is through the logic of matrixing. To matrix the martial arts is to rid the art of silly significance, and to place all the elements and pieces in the correct and easily assimilate-able order.
Matrixing can be found at MonsterMartialArts.com. Further juxtapositions of martial arts philosophy, real as opposed to the justifications of students mired in the endless mirrors of their own minds, can be read at ChurchofMartialArts.com.
Speaking of martial arts protective gear, I was there when it was first introduced. This was about 1968, I was an instructor at a Chinese Kenpo school, and the school owner came out and placed several pieces of protective gear on the floor before freestyle class.
We stared at the martial arts padding, and listened as the owner told us we wouldn’t suffer any more injuries, that we could really refine our kenpo fighting techniques, and the sun was going to shine in Mudville.
We laced up body protectors, pulled on shin guards, fit out fingers into the gloves, obscured out vision with headmasks, and bowed to each other.
The first few minutes were undoubtedly laughable. We were all uncoordinated under the sports padding, but it wasn’t long before we began to realize our rock ‘em sock ‘em potential.
Pow! Ooof! Punch! Kiai! Ow!
Ow?
That’s right, we quickly realized that protective gear didn’t protect. What it did was make us hit harder. After all, it wasn’t supposed to hurt, right?
So we punched harder and kicked harder, and, suddenly, somebody’s laying on the floor. Hurt.
That wasn’t supposed to happen!
But it did, and you know what the solution was?
More freestyle protective gear. Mouthpieces. Harder shielding. Bigger helmets.
And here’s the funny thing, before we got protective gear we didn’t have many injuries. Sure, a mouse under the eye, a cut lip. But nothing serious.
Afterwards? Well, I broke a toe. And then, a few months after that, I broke a finger.
Ouch!
But we kept using those pads, and for a simple reason: they cost money.
Yep. We paid good bucks for that stuff that didn’t work, and the school owner was quite happy about that.
Fortunately, not long after my injuries, I went to a karate school that didn’t use protective gear. Thank goodness. i was tired of getting hurt.
Tired of getting hurt? Matrix your martial art and you will cut down on injuries. Go to MonsterMartialArts.com.
Newsletter 703
The Secret of Speed in the Martial Arts
Let’s talk about speed in the martial arts.
We used to have this exercise
back at the Kang Duk Won
it was called ‘Speed of speed.’
And,
it was brutal.
You faced your partner,
and there was only one attack:
a chop to the neck,
you turn the hand
so the flat of the hand strikes the shoulder.
What made it brutal was the times
when you collided with your partner.
Neither of you was faster,
and you both ended up hurting.
speed kick in karate
Believe me,
as stupid as it sounds,
you won’t see this exercise
anywhere in the martial arts.
It just hurts too much.
Yet,
here’s the thing,
after a few months of doing this,
of suffering bone bruises to the forearms
you found that you were faster.
Some lower belt would come in
and he’d just start to twitch
and…WHAM!
you were hitting his shoulder so hard
his head near fell off!
Now,
I tried teaching that,
and people didn’t want to learn it.
Man,the groans and moans.
So I persisted,
and had small classes
of REALLY tough martial artists,
but I kept thinking about speed.
I thought about the kenpo
circularity of motion theories and drills,
but hitting somebody ten times in a second
didn’t allow one to get the body behind any of the strikes.
Hmmm.
So you have to be fast in the intuitive sense,
in the sense that Speed of Speed built up,
of seeing when somebody was starting to move,
and moving before him.
THAT was when you could get the whole body behind the strike.
So,
have you ever watched the Magnificent Seven?
The scene where Yul Brynner claps his hands?
I started out with the hands apart,
standing in a back stance,
and the partner has to close the distance
and punch the chest before the hands clap.
Worked like a charm.
Easy to do,
not so brutal,
and directly applied to increasing power through weight.
And,
there were variations I tried,
one of them,
of unusual interest,
is standing to the side with a stop watch.
Tell somebody to punch when they hear the stop watch click,
and click the stop watch a second time when the punch touches the target.
Interestingly,
times were being measured in a full second.
Yes.
That long.
No chance at all
of the punch being fast enough to work.
But what turned the trick
was to stand behind the person being punched,
and let the person watch you click the stop watch.
Man,
then they sped up,
and that was because you got rid of all reaction time,
and the puncher could see and anticipate.
But isn’t that what it is all about?
When somebody is about to punch
you don’t wait for the punch,
you look,
you examine,
you analyze,
you predict when it is coming.
Usually it starts with some kind of emotional set up,
but with the stop watch there was no emotion
and guys could get past the idea of emotion,
get past fooling each other with twitches and tells,
and directly view the factors of the strike.
People got fast real fast,
and we could tailor the strikes,
increase speed in everything
from blocks to kicks to whatever.
Now,
you can use this data,
do the exercises,
make your own exercises,
have some real fun,
and get past a lot of stuff,
and increase speed in the one area
that really matters,
putting weight behind a real strike.
And,
if you have a little extra hair on your chest,
you can always try speed of speed.
To this day
I know that that exercise,
as crude and brutal as it was,
was the one that made the real difference in me.
Okay,
if you want to increase speed
because you have perfect alignment in your body,
and perfect alignment WILL increase your speed,
then check out the Master Instructor Course.
AND,
BTW,
I’ve been fooling around
making a few sites just for grins and giggles,
so try this one…
http://combatselfdefence.wordpress.com
It’s aimed at explaining things about matrixing and neutronics,
and how they apply to the martial arts.
It’s not for everybody,
and I’m not done with it,
I’ll be working on it as time goes by,
but it’s at a point where
I thought people would appreciate it,
maybe even have some insight as to what they would like on it.
Feel free to leave comments on the site,
what you think,
any advice,
whatever.
It actually gets to me
faster than an email.
Okay,
it’s the middle of summer
so act like it!
Work out till you sweat COPIOUSLY,
and enjoy an occasional beverage.
Most people, especially the ones who don’t study the martial arts, and really especially the ones who really like to watch people beat each other up, think the term gung fu means how to fight, or killing made easy, or I can beat your daddy. And your mommy and your sister, too.
Gung Fu refers to a skill attained over time and through hard work.
Bruce Lee Gung Fu Fighting was the Best!
A good cook can have good gung fu.
Any craftsman can have good gung fu.
The proper term, if you want to describe war arts, or martial arts, is wu shu.
This brings us to an interesting point: why the difference?
Because anybody can fight, can pick up a weapon and bash away.
But an artist has the means to analyze his motions, to polish his movements, to create artistic motion out of the simple motion.
And what does it take to become an artist?
Well, that is a skill attained over time, and through hard work, and, mostly, through the application of oneself. Which is to say that it takes time and effort to invest sufficient awareness to make one’s martial arts moves polished.
Mind, you, there are quick studies, but even these talented folks need to invest time and awareness to improve, to find there own true potential.
Anybody can become better, faster, stronger, smarter…and more polished, but it takes invested awareness, it takes hard work over time to create a polished ski, it takes…good gung fu.
Here is a phenomenal way to increase speed,learn fighting moves, and get good gung fu!
Gunfighters Take Second Place to Martial Arts Fighter!
I get all sorts of emags, having to do with martial arts, of course, and prepping, and that includes a lot of knife and gun mags.
Hey, guns ARE (regardless of what I am about to say) Martial Arts weapons.
But, the point I read in the latest emag I received was that most people, during frantic panic, will miss the target if that target is over 10 or 12 feet away.
Now, jump up and run across the room as fast as you can. That’s the distance you have to worry about in a gunfight, and you covered it in a second and a half, and now the weapon is somewhat negated and you are into the down and dirty, close combat, kill with your bare hands before he kills you!
Now, don’t go crazy on me, I know there are all sorts of what ifs right here, but this scenario does have enough truth to it that it should be considered. And, considered, I come up with one definite truth: a person, regardless of all factors, needs fast reactions, strength, and a mad ‘alpha’ dog attitude towards life and fighting.
Here’s the sad truth, most guys who preach guns do not spend time on the mat, do not hone their reflexes and reactions so they are razor sharp, are not in the best shape of their lives.
They will lose hand to hand.
But, they believe in guns.
And, before anybody goes mad ‘alpha’ dog on me, my compliments to you if you have seen to your physical shape and shoot guns.
But I see too many fellows at the gun shows who have large bellies and start wheezing if they have to do more than turn a wrench.
So, there is a basic unfairness here, it seems like I am attacking gunsters, and just because I love martial arts, but the truth is that I just believe that if you are going to hold a hunk of metal that is going to pop out a life ending punch with the twitch of a trigger finger, you should also make sure that you have your muscles lean and mean.
So ease up on the beer and pretzels, head down to the Karate dojo or the Taekwondo dojang.
Get a course on the internet for tai chi chuan, if you are in really bad shape. Or just start doing some squats and push ups, even if you need to hold on to something or do them from your knees. Heck, go take a darned Yoga class if you have to!
The point here is that guns are great, but you need fast reactions, if you are going to use them efficiently, and you need to be in good shape for that.
This has been an article about what would happen if you took a gun to a martial arts fight.
It has been presented by MonsterMartialArts.com, where you can split the difference between martial arts and guns by ordering the BEST knife fighting course on the planet.
I had an email today,
in it was a question about pressure points,
and I get this question every once in a while,
when am I going to do a book/course on pressure points.
Heck,
why write a whole book
when I can explain pressure points right here?
Can you earn a black belt in one year?
To understand pressure points
think electricity.
Points are like wall sockets,
for instance,
there is a pressure point
on the elbow.
It is called the funny bone,
but it’s not a bone,
its just where the nerves pass close to the surface,
and you can strike that point,
or grip it,
and cause some pain.
Then there are nerve clusters,
like switchboards.
For instance,
there is a cluster of nerves right near the armpit.
Stick a finger in there,
and you cause a severe reaction.
Now,
we could get into energy,
electricity is an analogy for electricity,
and where the lines of energy run,
and which way they go,
and so on and so on.
But you don’t need all that stuff.
And,
if you think about energy the way I am describing it here,
and what I am going to tell you to do,
then you will learn about pressure points faster
and with better result
than if you spent twenty years
examining how the meridians effect the kidney
if you strike the second toe
of your left foot
twice at midnight.
You must learn to look with your hands.
I spent about three years at the Kang Duk Won,
and during that time I hit people,
and I got hit.
Nice,
perfectly controlled strikes.
A few bruises,
a cut lip or a mouse,
but,
generally speaking,
we were practicing pretty darned fine control.
And,
we were learning to look through our fists.
Listen,
if somebody gave you a box
and asked what was in it,
you might shake it.
You could tell if what is inside is hard or soft,
liquid or solid,
and,
if you shook it long enough,
swear to god,
you could probably tell the color
of whatever is inside the box.
I know,
sounds weird.
But I kept hitting people,
and,
like most,
I could tell when I was hitting bones or muscle,
soft tissue or hard,
and I could gauge the reaction of people to these strikes.
And I could tell by my reaction
when people struck me
what was inside the body.
It’s like radar.
consider this analogy…
You come up to a house and knock on the door,
you listen.
You can hear the echo of your knock
resounding through the house.
Now,
knock so that you get the best echo,
you get that really hollow pitch
that reaches all-l-l-l the way
through the house.
Now,
knock on your partner’s chest.
Listen.
Listen to the reverberations.
Listen to the changes as you knock
on different parts of the body.
What does it sound like
listen to your fist
when you knock on a bone?
What do the lungs sound like?
Heck,
it’s like a doctor’s stethoscope,
except that you are using your own enhanced senses.
And you can tell what is in the other person’s body.
Now,
it is just a quick jump to pressure points.
Take a look at this…
I am working a pressure point.
Now I don’t know where this point came from.
I’ve never studied pressure points,
but I find that I can feel the body
and the points are ALL over the place.
Almost anywhere you touch the body
you can cause a reaction.
So let me explain something.
I just touch the body,
using the ‘listening’ I learned to do with the fist.
I listen with my fingertips,
extend my senses inside his body,
touch with authority,
and,
zingo bingo
we have a pressure point.
Is it a real pressure point?
I don’t know.
Doesn’t matter.
All that matters is this…
practice your techniques and listen with your fists.
Feel the effects as you strike your partner.
Be gentle,
for you can hear more if you are gentle
than if you are distracting yourself with a loud yell
or a huge force of radiating energy.
It’s a matter of focused awareness,
that is all…and nothing more.
But how do you focus your awareness?
Through control.
Through learning control.
and,
sorry to say,
sorry if i step on toes here,
but not through boxing or MMA,
for the purpose in those sports
is to smash and destroy.
Look,
I love to watch MMA,
and there are instances of high control in some of those games
but they are the gladiatorial games of Rome
brought to modern times,
and they don’t teach pressure points
or how to increase your awareness.
Only the classical martial arts teach that,
and those only rarely,
because most of the stuff taught today
is not aligned.
Doesn’t make sense.
Are random sequences of techniques,
and not a step by step journey
to increased awareness.
And with increased awareness
comes a knowledge of pressure points.
So my advice
to anybody who wants to learn pressure points
is this.
Work out.
Do the classical.
Align the classical with matrixing,
so that you actually understand what you are doing
and are on a step by step procedure to awareness.
Do your forms and techniques,
do them with sincerity,
do them with lots of energy,
and do them silently,
learn to listen with your fists.
Do that
and you need no further instruction.
The secret isn’t a secret,
it is just a matter of your learning to focus awareness
in a rather unique manner.
And,
if you are interested,
the video clip was from
Five Army Tai Chi Chuan.
http://monstermartialarts.com/martial-arts/five-army-tai-chi-chuan/
but it doesn’t matter which course
you start your matrixing journey on,
all that matters is that you start,
and that you persist,
and that you learn to focus
the precise and exact awareness
that you are.
And, you would definitely find Phil Ventrello’s handy, little keychain called a Munio. You can read about the Munio, and of my test of it, here, (https://alcase.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/munio-self-defense-is-great-martial-arts-equipment/)
