What is Karate:

Karate and Martial Arts have been around for centuries. Originally developed for self defense and self preservation. Over the years karate training has grown for a more mainstream use. Many people use martial arts to help develop social skills, discipline and focus. There are hundreds of thousands of martial arts schools across the world. Each one is sure to focus on one or all of the aspects below. 

Respect - We begin by teaching our students respect. Respect for yourself and respect for others. Bowing like a handshake is a form of respect. A quick bow or just shaking someones hand quickly and with out eye contact shows disrespect. This could be one of two things, first you just don't know any better or you simply do not respect that person.  Respect can be a funny thing in everyday life, which many people do not understand. In our school it starts with respect for yourself by showing respect to our students and parents. There is no value to respect, it cannot be bought it must be earned. So our students must focus on respect and understand how to show respect to parents, teachers and peers.

Discipline - training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character.

In order to build self discipline you must train it, the more you train the stronger your discipline becomes. We start by focusing on our students attitudes and goals. As students reach there goals their confidence will develop and their attitude will change. Students will be more likely to train on their own and work independently to reach new goals.

You also must train your body. The more you train the body the stronger it becomes, and the more endurance you will build. You are not just building your muscles you are training them to do what you want them to do. You must understand, you will get tired and sore. That is when you must push through to make yourself stronger. Soon 10 reps will not be enough you will need to increase your reps and push yourself.

Finally, you must train your mind. You do this by continuing to increase your knowledge. You will need to learn new things and broaden your mind. It starts with general knowledge about karate and kata. Learning this will help develop confidence and spark an interest in wanting to learn. As you advance you will learn how your training applies to everyday life and safety. The mind will play tricks on you, it will tell you that you cannot continue, or you are not getting better. It will make you want to quit and do something easier. Quitting is a hard habit to break. It is easy to give up when things get hard. This is when you must train your mind and make it stronger by continuing your training.

These are not just Karate lessons. These are lessons for everyday life and everyone must learn them. If everyone gave up when things got hard we would not have the freedoms or technology that we have today. So make sure you keep training and ask for help when you need it. Remember there are always people who care and want to help you, like your parents and instructors.