[Rivertontalk] Bujinkan Martial arts update - thoughts on instructors, and more.

[Hannes Stueckler]

Hello,

If you are interested in training with us, check out the web site below for
more info and details or feel free to contact me.

As always, we are a great training opportunity for an unbeatable price.

Special thanks to Kidz Inc. for donating training space to us for the winter
again!  They are terrific people, and it is a very nice facility.


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Over the years, I have known many martial arts instructors, and recently I
was in a discussion with another martial artist about some of his previous
experiences.  The conversation really brought home the balancing act that
must be performed by a good teacher.

In the past, I have had teachers (in other arts) who were overly rigid about
the curriculum.  That is to say that the techniques will be practiced
exactly as defined, with no room for variation.  This is mostly done due to
an overactive reverence for tradition.  Other instructors are brutal with
their students, and injure them in training by pushing them too far beyond
their ability in the hopes of making them "tough".  Others are just plain
dishonest.  (I had one instructor steal from a student to get money to leave
town.)   Martial arts attract a wide variety of personalities.

I have found that beginning students need to have the material made easy to
understand, but if you keep it easy, they do not progress to becoming
proficient.  If I try too hard to "keep it real" with lots of knife, gun and
other weapon scenarios, it is too difficult for the beginner to learn the
fundamentals of the movement, because the presence of a weapon can be
mentally overwhelming.  So I like to think of teaching as an upward spiral.
We teach a movement, study it historically with a technique, apply it
realistically and then we "test" it until it fails (the situation becomes so
intense that the student can no longer apply the technique).  Once we reach
this point, we go back to the beginning of teaching the movement and start
over, but now at a higher level.  You could say we have come full circle,
but we have actually elevated ourselves and are starting a new circle...
Just like a spiral.  This process should continue for as many years as we
study the art.  As far as I know, there is no top of the spiral.

If this is done right, nobody get hurt, and everybody has an enjoyable time.

So this is what we are doing now:

We are back at the beginning of the cycle.  Over the last month or two, we
drifted off the basics pursuing interesting scenarios, since we didn't have
any brand new students.  Now we are going back to the eight basic techniques
of the art for another in depth look.

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We are a non-profit martial arts training group.  All money goes to
improving our equipment /  training.  Cost is $25/month.

Sincerely,

Hannes Stueckler

Bujinkan Buyu Lander Dojo
Traditional and Modern Self Defense.
(307) 463-4522
Youth and Adult training.
https://sites.google.com/site/bujinkanlanderdojo/Home