What if I have an injury?  Can I still learn martial arts?

One must be realistic about one's physical condition when he or she considers entering a martial arts school. The practice regimens and technical requirements of some programs may be inappropriate for a given injury or type of physical idiosyncrasy.

A person with a torn anterior cruciate ligament should not do flying kicks; nor should a person with a severe rotator cuff tear engage in intense grappling. I mention those particular conditions and their restrictions on certain presentations of martial arts because I have had both injuries myself, and I am a fully functioning martial artist able to do everything I want and need to do to attain a superior level of skill and any other attribute I wish through the training.

I should also mention that the first injury was sustained in a basketball game, and the second was in a Frisbee football game; both have been rehabilitated through special rehabilitative sets that we teach here at the school. Now I practice intelligent and effective kicking techniques, and I also practice jiujitsu-style grappling twice a week.

If you have a pre-existing injury or a physical anomaly about which you have concern, a highly qualified instructor can assist in various ways. First, the instructor should have enough knowledge about such topics that he knows whether you need to consult with your doctor before you begin a martial arts training program.

However, the problem in consulting with most physicians is that they may have a preconceived notion about what "all" martial arts training entails, so they often will give opinions, albeit well-intended, from a position of relative ignorance. Their own experience or their inferences from media presentations of martial arts can influence them to either approve of a possibly dangerous training protocol or prohibit one which might prove very beneficial to the prospective student.

Therefore, it becomes of paramount importance, especially if the existing injury or physical anomaly could be significantly, either positively or negatively, affected by the training, for the physician, the instructor, and the student to discuss the expectations of the curriculum, its possible ramifications for the student, and the goals the student has in undertaking the training.

If the experience and knowledge of the instructor do not include a way for the student to protect and, hopefully, rehabilitate the injury in the context of attaining his goals in the curriculum; or to circumvent by individual design the impingement of the training on the injury or anomaly; then training in that environment increases the risk of injury or failure.

In our opinion, the training exists only to serve the student's goals, and as such, must be adaptable for the special needs and aspirations of the student. A rigid set of criteria for practice or advancement, which cannot help all people, indicates only that the instructor has not truly mastered the art himself and can, therefore, never be expected to be able to guide the student to mastery.

There is no simple answer to this question since the goals and experiences of every person in the training hall are unique to themselves.

I think that it is important for anyone interested to avail themselves of all the possible benefits achievable in a good martial arts curriculum, and one of those benefits is most certainly an enhancement of fitness.

The archaic pictures painted in martial arts stories about the punishing and dangerous methods and regimens which damaged and scarred people's bodies and, supposedly, instilled superior fighting skills and indomitable spirit, harbor some of the greatest dangers and are some of the most misleading directives in martial arts lore.

Certainly training methods have been and continue to be concerned with establishing a level of physical rigor in the development of the individual. However, those schools, current or historical, which take pride in the badges of injury and physical discomfort worn and related by their students; and those students and teachers who subject themselves and their classmates to such a juvenile and outdated approach will do more, and possibly permanent, damage to their bodies and spirits than the negligible benefit they may accrue from such a sophomoric perspective.

Many of those people simply don't know any better, not having used an intelligent set of criteria in the first place for selecting a school. They are often just doing what they are told or what they saw someone else do, and they have no data with which to make a comparison. After a while, even if they are exposed to a track which achieves superior results safely, both in physical conditioning and defensive skills, their own cognitive dissonance may prevent a logical conclusion for them. It is important to train properly from the outset and to reduce or eliminate the probability of acute, traumatic and of chronic overuse injuries.

An intelligent approach to increasing physical rigor is assured by first assessing the initial physical condition of the student and then moving him appropriately through various levels of physical intensity over a long period of time.

In the earliest stages of training, it is important to listen to the alarm signals the body is giving us about what is an acceptable level of challenge, so the student must be actively involved in the ongoing assessment process and give the instructor accurate feedback about fatigue and, generally, about how the body feels during the training.

If the beginning student has not been involved recently or ever in regular exercise, or if the beginning student is a current professional athlete, the student is entering a new activity with new requirements for the body. The student and the instructor must work together and pay close attention to how the student's body is responding to the practice. Each student is unique and each student must be guided by the professional teacher to involve himself at a safe intensity and to build that intensity over weeks or months to the required level for the goals of the student.

Most of us are such goal-seeking animals that our tendency is to push too hard rather than to do too little, especially when we are in an environment where the mere presence of others motivates us to push beyond our normal bounds. It becomes the obligation of the staff to monitor and suggest when we should rest and recover so that we can make steady progress instead of self-inflicting nagging little strains or excessive soreness which detour us from our goals.

A superior martial arts training program will guarantee better and more comprehensive fitness and health adaptations than virtually any other discipline, but it can only exist if the instructors have the knowledge and the attitudes that assure it. Safe and enjoyable physical challenge is an essential part of the training experience, and will guarantee the health and fitness of the physical body as well as the continuing blossoming of impeccable martial spirit. The trials and challenges of the true path of the legendary martial arts masters has always been one of accessing the greatest heights of achievement through walking the steady path of development.

Although in the Orient martial arts has been practiced by Taoists and Buddhists and has become linked with those religions in the minds of some people, martial arts practice is completely independent of any direct connection to a given faith or set of religious beliefs.

One aspect that traditional martial arts shares with virtually all of the great faiths in the world is a creed of behavior which reveres life and peace; fosters harmonious interactions among people; acknowledges our connection to all things on the planet; and tries to instill in its practitioners a strength of character and a reservoir of will which will help the martial artist have courage and compassion as he walks through life.

One might assume, therefore, that an individual’s personal spiritual beliefs and aspirations, regardless of what you call them, will be fortified and embellished through the training.

Our participation as a sport organization ended many years ago. We sent students to tournament-type competitions for the first few years our school existed, partially out of curiosity and partially because it was appropriate because of our membership in a national organization.

The students always performed exceedingly well, but the general conclusion we reached was that we wanted to concentrate our practice for two specific purposes, neither of which accommodated martial arts as a sport.

Our orientation is to teach martial arts as a tool for improving one’s life in whatever way the student can conceive to apply it, and we believe that martial art must be taught to create the most realistic and pragmatic self-defense system possible. While one could tune their practice in the sport environment to address these goals, we felt that it was somewhat inefficient for us to have the “distraction” and “game” of the tournament venue. We are a martial arts school – not a sport.

Therefore, our “competition” occurs within the structure of the class itself; with scores of instructors and hundreds of students training, our training environment rivals the competitive environment we might find outside the school, with the added benefit that you are always certain that your training partners will be impeccably concerned for your safety and that the competition is geared so that each person is helping the other person to push themselves to improve.

We are not immovably adamant that a student may not compete in sports events outside the school, but it will never be required, and it will be considered, determined, and effected on an individual basis.

The most important point we can make about competition, however, is that the true opponent – the one who is most likely to confuse, distract, or defeat you and the one about which our training is clearly concentrated to master - is yourself.

Students progress at their individual pace. We realize that people have busy lives: work, school, relationships, hobbies, travel. We encourage our students to lead balanced and rich lives, maintaining their priorities and keeping all their commitments.

Therefore, people come to view their advancement differently. A given student may attend class very regularly for years and progress rapidly. Another may want or be required, because of lifestyle requirements, to adopt a schedule that is less rigorous; they will be content with advancement over a slightly longer time.

We consider the rank of black belt to indicate an expert-rated martial artist, and, since our system is very comprehensive and our requirements of technical excellence are high, one should expect to take from four to several years to advance to the level of first-degree black belt.

We frequently have guests visit the school who have been awarded, in a couple of years, a black belt or multiple black belts in other styles. Although they have a different level of technical expertise and often a different repertoire of skills from our own students, their black belt is valid in that it accurately represents the requirement of the curriculum in which they have trained. The term “black belt” varies from system to system and from school to school.

So the length of time it takes to get a black belt depends on how good a black belt you want to be, and it depends on what system is awarding the rank.

Most of our guests and students, and you, of course, since you are looking for information on this site, are academically oriented. It is very normal, as you pursue a new interest, to seek out as much information as possible on the subject.

For some period of time I read everything possible about martial arts, from all the newsstand periodicals to every text published. I thought that increasing the breadth of my knowledge of martial arts would make me better and give me the benefit of many perspectives.

As a beginner, I exposed myself to a variety of training methods and tactical approaches, read all the curious myths and legends of martial arts, and learned about the training paths of the great historical personages. All of this fed my curiosity and gave me doses of inspiration from time to time.

I found for myself, and I have observed it in thousands of my students, that while this approach is not necessarily detrimental, it is probably not the way to give yourself the “right” foundation for the training.

In my opinion, it would be better to simply immerse yourself in the training without creating expectations, competing ideas, or a collection of junk from which you will eventually have to sort out the few simple and elegant concepts and discard the baggage that you have taken on from the reading.

Many instructors will claim that a given system or style will enable you to defend yourself in some determinable length of time. In my opinion, whether an instructor claims that the ability is achievable in six weeks or six years, the instructor who makes such a claim is doing a great disservice to the student. The instructor may not even be intentionally misleading his students; he may truly believe the not provable claims he makes. In our opinion, however, any instructor who makes the unqualified claim that he can teach you to defend yourself in a specific length of time, regardless of how long that period, is being untruthful.

First, when you consider self-defense, you must decide what set of skills or attributes that you desire to acquire as your repertoire of self-defense functions. After thirty years of teaching, we have observed that most people, instructors included, have a very limited definition of what type of training is actually necessary to prepare someone to be able to defend himself.

Skill set acquisition should be designed in stages so that a simple but effective set of physical techniques is acquired quickly and easily. Conditioning and other practice benefits must be pyramided intelligently so that more demanding and more complex skills can be added over time. Attitudinal and emotional adjustments need to be instilled in conformation with the ethics and other personal beliefs of the student. The student should acquire the ability to analyze situations quickly; to make good “use of environment” choices; and to generalize tactical information to specific circumstances. The instructor has the obligation to educate the student to comprehensively broaden the scope of the student’s definition of self-defense.

It is much more important, for example, that the student learn behaviors and functions which will greatly reduce the probability of being attacked than to concentrate exclusively on a repertoire of physical skills. The techniques contained in every martial art and self-defense system have some pragmatic benefit, but simply acquiring mechanical ability to execute movements has very little to do with one’s ultimate ability to protect himself.

One can also presume that some individuals, whose mindset and reactions need only the addition of “what to do” technically, may be highly qualified to defend themselves with very limited exposure to training. However, the vast majority of us need frequent rehearsal and practice to safely simulate the physical requirements and emotional intensity of an actual encounter, so that we are prepared and willing to meet the physical, mental, and emotional demands of a life-threatening situation in as effective a way as possible. We improve our abilities optimally with equal attention to all the variables that reduce the probability of attack and increase the probability that we will resolve it according to our personal definition of ideal outcome.

The process of learning and changing behaviors takes time. Our possible attackers are usually experienced (professional), unpredictable, and highly aggressive; they may have accomplices and weapons; and they are highly motivated to find the way to achieve their objectives. How long does it take to learn to defend against them? Our curriculum is designed to optimize progress in every aspect of the self-defense function; it will make you better prepared every day.