HIS Karate-Do

The topic of this note is “Fellowship”, but let me begin by saying that among all people, some are more blessed with individual self-motivation than others. This may be at work, at home projects, in academics, in daily exercise, in eating a balanced diet, in avoiding excess of any kind, and so forth. For folks such as this (Sempai James comes to mind), coming to training whenever possible is a no-brainer. James is a retired supervisor of social workers, but at 70 years old his retired life is anything but relaxed. He is up and doing his daily five mile walk long before the sun comes up. Each day, he meditates, stretches, lifts weights, punches the heavy bag and does work around the house. Later in the day, he does a second walk (this time with his wife) of three miles. And until recently, he spent much of his day helping care for his father-in-law (nearly 100 years old), who passed on earlier this year. And he still finds time to come faithfully to karate training and pitching in where ever he can help and training as hard as anyone. We’ll miss his presence for three weeks in August, when [...]

We’ve all been blessed with a blog for our karate ministry since January 2006. The site is all the work of kohai Donna, who in real-life, is a very talented webmaster. Donna and her husband, sempai Wes, have training with us for several years and it was she who approached me with her idea of creating a blog as a unique way of helping the ministry. Since she created it over a year ago, she has used it to collect and archive the various email notes I send out (both the good and bad, haha), capture moments in the ministry via photos and videos, not to mention being a great place for our members and friends to visit and keep in touch when they can’t come to training. Most recently, she (with much help from her better half, sempai Wes) expanded the site to include a Resources Section, something our members have always wished for; easy to access videos of Shotokan Karate katas, along with recommended books for reading. When you access the Resources Section, simply click on the desired kata and Presto!, the video appears, ready to play. Recently, Sempai James generously donated to the ministry, part of his [...]

Information on Karate can be found all over the Internet and sometimes it’s hard to find what you need to supplement your training. We’ve compiled a Resources page with links to kata and bunkai videos to help you as you prepare for your next exam! We have also put together a list of recommended books, if you’re interested in adding to your library. We hope that this will be a helpful training tool for you!