EELITE KARATE ACADEMY NEWSLETTER JANUARY 2020
Welcome to our New Year Newsletter for what will be a special year for our Academy which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.
This email newsletter will hopefully keep you up to date with all you need to know about what’s going on in Elite Karate Academy over the coming months of 2020. Please feel free to share this newsletter with family and friends, I hope you find it informative. Feel free to comment on our Facebook page with comments and be sure to like our page while you’re there. Or follow us in Instagram here.
News – Updates – Events At A Glance
- Elite Karate Academy Expo on Sunday April 5th, 2-6pm, Clayton Hotel, Liffey Valley. All students including beginners will be taking part on the day, with either/both gradings and demonstrations. See below for more details.
- Sparring Competition in March more details next month
- St Patricks Day Parade. Come walk with us. Find out more below.
- Raffle & Cake Bake Sale. Can you donate a prize? Bake something?
- Academy 10th Birthday Party in September
Elite Karate Academy Expo
Our 10th Elite Karate Academy Expo will take place on Sunday 5th of April between 2pm-6pm, in the Clayton Hotel. Liffey Valley. Doors open at 1.30pm. All students will be taking part, those not grading will be involved in demonstrations. All students must wear their karate uniform. The aim of the Expo, as always, is to allowing students demonstrate their skills and abilities to their family and friends, whilst educating parents about the aims and ethos of Elite Karate Academy, in a relaxed fun environment. This event is open to anyone, so extended family and friends are welcome, this year’s Expo will include;
- Grading (students will be informed closer to the date)
- Club Sparring Competition (semi-finals and finals only)
- Demonstrations (Instructor & Students)
- Award Ceremony (Grading, Competition, and Special Awards, including Student of the Year)
- Unveiling of Elite Karate Academy’s 1st Junior Black Belt?
- Bake & Cake Sale. Why not bake something to bring on the day?
- Raffle (asking parents to donate a price if they can, donations can be brought to the dojo)
Grading
For those few students who were unwell and missed their Christmas Grading or those that are eligible to Grade. The next grading will take place within class the week of 27th January 2020.
Finn Murphy, Amelia O’Reilly, Sean Power, Courtey Gorman, Niko Popardowski, Gloria & Adonai Vey, Marco Li, Eva Kelly, Aleksander Samatyja, Fares Okasha, Douglas & Zack Martin, Amberleigh Dowman, Oscar McNeive, Alberto Cimpoesu, Ronan Beech, Markas \Koskus. If your child’s name is not and the list and you think they are eligible, please contact Sensei.
Sparring Competition
The early rounds of this non-contact 3 points-wins tournament will take places within your child’s normal classes and is completely voluntary. With the semi-finals and finals taking place at this year’s Expo. All students must have their own sparring gloves & boots, which can be bought in the dojo, this is for your child’s safety. Only students who have graded Yellow belt or higher, may take part in this tournament. All details will be given out in February
St Patrick’s Day Parade
Once again this year the Academy will be walking in this year’s Clondalkin Parade. Students, families, and their friends are all invited to join us on the day. So put it in your
Character Education Program
Once again, we are running our Word of the Week program in class. Our specially designed word of the week program teaches 14 core values to your child in a 5 minute ‘mat chat’ within their normal class. Your child will grow as people not just stronger and fitter. No other club offers this type of program.
Our 14 words are: Courtesy, Growth, Honesty, Obedience, Courage, Sincerity, Humility, Perseverance, Honour, Loyalty, Self-Control, Knowledge, Respect, Integrity.
Each week these lessons will be posted on our Facebook page or the full course can be viewed here in our blog section of our website. I strongly urge parents to get involved with their child’s learning by reading these posts or discussing after each class what they learnt.
Website
Check out our blogs on our website. Click the link to read about them
Dojo Kun Programme – Most club’s dojo rules consist of no shouting, no chewing gum etc. Our Dojo Kun program teaches your child 25 rules of life. These rules teach your child how to follow and make their dreams come true, through hard work, passion, and dedication.
Elite Mental Training – This program teaches students the mental strategy of fighting, topics introduced can be used in all areas of life, reducing stress, and increasing mental wellbeing. Read some lessons covered in our blog section below.
Anti-Bullying Programme – We teach your child how to deal with bullying in a non-aggressive way without having to resort to violence. A great program for boosting confidence and self-belief.
Online Self-Defence Course – Information on realistic self-defence, mentally, tactically, psychologically.
Newer material will be shared weekly on our Facebook page, much will be of interest even to those who don’t train.
Coming later in the Year
Other events coming up this year after the Expo, will be our 10th anniversary Summer Birthday Party in September.
Testimonials Request
That so many of you praise our Academy is huge source of pride to me. Please write a review/testimonial here. They will then be added to our website. Student / parents or both may write a review and you may write a new one if you wrote one before.
Zen Tip
Thoughts Are Not Facts
You are walking down the road. When you see your friend on the other side. Unable to cross the road, you wave and call their name. Your friend continues to walk on. How do you react? Many people have different reactions when told this story. Some accept that their friend simple did not see them and thus continue their day. And if they remember they may mention to their friend that they saw them, the next time they speak. Other people feel slighted and ignored. Wondering what they did to their friend to deserve being ignored.
Convinced their friend is not talking to them. They race off upset, determined to phone their friend and find out what they did. Thoughts are not facts. That you think something does not make it true or real. Put emotions, feeling, rationale, and assigning motivations to people without the full facts, makes you react to situations that are not happening. Recognize that thoughts are not facts and learn to respond rather than react for a calmer heathier life
Self Defence is an open system. In a closed system there are known factors and there are right and wrong answers based on these factors. In an open system there are many ways to be right and wrong .
The difference between self defence tarining and martial arts training is that self defence teaches students and martial arts teaches subject matter. 2 simple examples are; self defence teaches power generation, martial arts teaches multiple different strikes or self defence will teach a 20stone man differently then a 8 stone female, martial arts teaches everybody the same syllabus. The reason for this is a 20 stone man doesn’t need to worry about being draged into the back of a van and raped, a 8 stone female will not need advice with how to deal with a monkey dance.
Self defence training must give each student the tools and freedom to solve their problems in their own way.
To understand and defend yourself correctly on the street you must understand the difference between social and asocial violence, and the tactics that must be used to deal with each.
Social violence = the monkey dance, the interview, sparring/dueling, sorting it outside, have a knockabout. Social violence is violence used for social status, dominance or to teach a lesson. Examples Dave’s mad he took on that huge bouncer last Friday, or how dare he do that, I’ll teach him.
All predatory animals have social violence or some sort of play fighting. Think dogs, foxes, lions or tigers wrestling and playing. This is how they learn to fight, hunt and display dominance. It is never lethal Humans social violence is designed not to be lethal and when it is it is usually from falling and banging their head. With social violence it is for dominance/status or to teach a lesson, ie punching someone to teach them to show you respect. The mindset for this has to be justified. You will subconsciously be hitting to communicate, not to eliminate,
Asocial violence = the group monkey dance, violent crime, a predator. If you go to kill an insect do you need to get worked up or get angry? Do you need to convince yourself that this is a bad insect? Do you need to justify it like its justice? Do you give the insect a chance and fight it or just kill it. This is asocial violence. This can be lethal. Experienced violent crimals have gotten past this and treat people like animals, which gives them a huge advantage. Most people defending themselves cannot. Unless you train to flip the switch.
The things that can prevent or de-escalate social violence can invite asocial violence and vice versa. In a predatory approach you must be able to distingush between a crime motivated by cash from one motivated by cruelty.
Bad guys don’t fight, they’re not in this to lose. They use surprise or bitz attacks. Martial arts work well in social violence where you have time and choices. Asocial violence comes as a surprise and you will be surprised, don’t kid yourself that you wont be surprised.
Self defence is not a physical skill its an emotional skill, it is all about how fast you can recover when injured or surprised. What to do is almost never the problem. Actually acting or beating the freeze is the issue.
See other articles on the monkey dance, the group monkey dance
