Month: August 2022

After my publication regarding teaching Baduanjin in a youth detention facility, I’ve received inquiries about the general subject of teaching  martial arts to young people in either detention facilities, or group-home type settings. Some, aikidoka, are interested in providing training to help these kids in reconciling conflict; some, taijiquan teachers, see a potential for moving meditation/mindfulness/centering, in their practice; some, BJJ practitioners, see their training as potentially teaching controlled self-defense (with rules), to help kids channel their natural aggressive drives in a sports context.. Teaching such kids, though, is not easy. As Geoff Thompson wrote to me after reviewing a 1st draft of this piece: “I have only worked a little with kids in youth detention, but I concur with everything you have said here.  I found it easier to work with murderers and drug barons in Cat 1 high-security prisons than with kids in detention.”

What follows are a list of ideas and criteria, things to think about if you intend to do such work. If you ignore any of these, at “best,” you will be of little help, and very likely, the kids will chew you up and spit you out.

Read More

I was recently afforded an opportunity to talk to a collected group of specialists about my experiences adapting classical martial principles, training, and even technique to modern policing applications. The audience included a few others who have a foot in both classical training and modern policing, and I am very thankful to Ellis Amdur, my koryu instructor, and to Mr. Liam Keeley for that opportunity.

 Ellis’ teacher demanded that budo be applicable not simply in everyday life, but in “moving the world” in ways of consequence, and Ellis feels the same. As do I. Picture the tiger in the wild, not in a cage, and certainly not stuffed and displayed as a museum piece. This approach may be regarded as somewhat outside the norm in the larger koryu community. Some might ask how archaic martial arts, with whatever small bits any particular tradition may preserve of an actual combative curricula, could apply in any practical sense in today’s world, particularly when many practitioners themselves don’t see things that way.

 One word: Uvalde.

Read More