By Sifu Lloyd Fridenburg

Editorial

First I want to sincerely thank Sifu Sarah for her contributions to the WKFA newsletter over the past couple of years and welcome Sifu Anne who will be taking over the Youth Student’s column. I also want to thank Sifu Lorna for writing the parents column and keeping our WKFA parents informed and to welcome Sifu Patti who will take over the Parent’s Column starting in December.

Distinguishing Characteristics of the Tiger

I like tigers; I admire tigers; but I’m cautious sparring tigers. Why? A true tiger personality may be predictable, but don’t let your guard down. Even before you enter the ring you know what to expect. The tiger will try to draw you into their style of direct action where, unless you are also a tiger, you may be easily intimidated by their direct aggressive techniques. You always need to be wary of the tiger and never become complacent or you will be overcome by power and aggressiveness.

If you are a tiger you need to work to control your aggressive tendencies so that newer or less skillful partners don’t feel overwhelmed. As an instructor I always keep my eyes on the tigers, especially when two of them come head to head. Neither one will back down; power and aggressiveness can often escalate quickly. The strength of the tiger can also be its greatest weakness. Often the tiger becomes frustrated with more calculating styles and can be forced into making critical errors, or evasive techniques can be used to attack the tiger’s endurance.

The characteristics that distinguish the tiger are:

• Power – The tiger uses its strength and energy to maximum potential, always preferring a direct fight with a clear outcome.
• Direct – The tiger has little patience and wants to end a fight quickly by taking its adversary, or prey, head on. The tiger is only comfortable when it is moving forward. That is where it feels comfortable and in control of the situation.
• Determined – The tiger is seldom willing to change its method of attack. It is committed to both the attack and perceived outcome. This can be seen as both strength and weakness.
• Aggressive – Once the tiger goes on the attack it only knows one direction – forward. It is usually on the offensive, viewing retreat or subtle tactics as a sign of weakness.
• Strong – The tiger wants to completely dominate and overpower its opponent. Endurance may not be one of the tigers strengths but it will attempt to dominate through physical strength and intimidation.

All of these elements combine to form the personality and techniques of the tiger. When you spar are you a tiger? Do you recognize those that are, and use a strategy that will neutralize their aggressive tendencies? Just like yin and yang, hard can be counterbalanced by soft; hard brute force can be offset by soft subtlety.

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By Sifu David Moylan, Owner, Waterloo Kung-Fu Academy

Sifu’s Corner

Typically, I dedicate a portion of my column to provide a written recap of the prior three months. With a picture being worth a thousand words, let’s take this to the next level – I am very excited to announce the release of WKFA’s first annual yearbook! One of our families gave me the idea late last year and put me in touch with Kevin McCord of Picaboo Yearbooks. Having been a yearbook editor in my high school years, I was impressed with the simplicity of the process. Clearly yearbook technology has improved over the last 20 years! I polled our Leadership Team for volunteers and put together the team of Shihan Miskin, Cristina Prudencio- Brunello and Sarah Rank. Although we don’t really have “seasons” in kung-fu, we opted to have the yearbook run from July 2014 – June 2015.

Our team worked really well together and had a lot fun capturing and documenting the year. The enthusiastic response from the student body was great with over 80 orders being placed! There is no doubt the book will evolve year-to-year, but we hope you enjoy this first edition! We obviously have a lot of happening at the Academy, so this project is a great way to archive and organize all the resulting events, awards and photos. Plans are already underway for the next book. I would like to extend my gratitude to the editorial team this year for the many hours committed to making the book a success!

On the topic of thanks, I would like to pass mine on to Sifu Daryl for once again hosting a great Board/Cement Beaking Seminar on June 15th. The atmosphere that evening was electric and it was terrific to see everyone experiencing success. The night ended with an epic display of cement destruction with several students reaching milestone achievements!

I would also like to thank Sifus Anne, Lorna and Sarah for leading our Demonstration and Performance Teams through another stellar season. This year they selected the team using a try-out process. Practices were held regularly on Saturday mornings and Sunday afternoons, which resulted in disciplined performances: June 21, July 18 and August 16 at Open Streets and Aug.13 at DQ on Westmount. Their next one will be on Sept.20 at Open Streets. Thank you Sihing Gunther for co-ordinating the team, events and cement all while working through knee surgery and rehabilitation.

The upcoming grading schedule has been set for a while, with our next Youth/Junior grading on Sept.26 and the Adult Novice II/Intermediate’s on Oct.3. Everyone should have their calendars marked for Sept.12, as this will mark the largest Advanced Adult grading in our 28 year history with four testing for Black and nine for Brown!

Sifu Sarah Gawley

Fall is a time of transition. Sifu Sarah is continuing her studies in Kingston and I wish her the best! Have no fear, as our Youth students are still in great hands, as Sifu Anne will be taking over her Friday class.

I welcome back all of our returning and new students!

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Sifu Anne Vandrus

Youth Student’s Corner

We start every Kung Fu class by sitting down, closing our eyes, and breathing. Why is meditation so important? What are we actually getting out of it?

If you’ve had a busy or exciting day, you could be thinking about a lot of things when you come to class – and that’s ok! But in order to be a good listener and do your best in class, you need to be able to focus both your mind and body on the task at hand. Just like a messy room, a busy brain can be distracting.

That’s where meditation can help! When you take a moment to clear your mind of distractions, you’re then ready to pay better attention to the instructors leading the class and be more focused on your training. A few minutes of meditation can go a long way in improving your focus.

So if the goal of meditation is to clear your mind, what should you be thinking about? Ideally you’d be thinking about nothing, but that’s very hard to do! So here are some ideas of what you can try to picture in your mind during meditation:

1. Breathing. While your eyes are closed, try to imagine a giant glowing ball of energy inside of you. Every time you breathe in through your nose, see the ball of energy grow bigger. Then when you exhale through your mouth, watch it get smaller again.
2. Kung Fu. You don’t always have to physically be doing the moves in order to practice. While your eyes are closed, imagine yourself going through your forms or sequences. If you’ve been having trouble with a tricky move, or just got a correction, picture yourself doing that move correctly, and it will help you when you actually do it in class.
3. Wiping away your thoughts! It’s hard to get rid of all your thoughts sometimes, so what I like to do is think of a giant whiteboard in my mind that has everything I’m thinking of on it. Then, as you take deep breaths in and out, slowly wipe off all those thoughts from the whiteboard until it’s clean again.

While meditation is a great companion to Kung Fu, it can also help out with school or at home. If you’re having trouble focusing on a hard math problem, or you keep getting distracted while cleaning your room, take a minute and meditate. Breathing slowly with your eyes closed could help you concentrate on what needs to be done and help you do it.

Also, if you’re ever angry or stressed out, try taking a moment by yourself to focus on your breathing and calm down. It’s easier to handle a situation smartly once you’ve had a chance to cool down.

It doesn’t take long to meditate – just a minute or two – so I challenge everyone to try meditating at least one time every day. As with anything, you’ll get better with practice!

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Sifu Greg Weir

Junior Student’s Corner

Hopefully as Junior students at the WKFA you’ve come to realize there are benefits to training Kung Fu beyond learning fun new things like Forms, kicking sequences and blocks. You should also have noticed an increase in your cardio-vascular fitness, flexibility and strength. While we encourage you to train all aspects of Kung Fu outside of class, it’s important to be careful—especially when it comes to strength training.

Back when I was young (many years ago), the conventional wisdom was that adolescents shouldn’t do a lot of strength conditioning. It was fine if you got stronger as a result of whatever sport you were playing, but to try specifically to build muscles was considered a bad idea. The fear was that muscles and tendons that still have growing to do are more likely to get injured—and that you could possibly stunt your growth by straining them too much.

Nowadays those beliefs have mostly fallen by the wayside. In fact a lot of current studies suggest that strength training can be valuable for people who haven’t reached physical maturity yet. Aside from the obvious benefit of improving your overall health,
strength conditioning also increases bone density, making you less prone to certain injuries.

That said, there are some things to be aware of. The articles I read suggested that rather than lifting free weights (like dumbbells) or using fitness machines, kids your age should stick to exercises in which your own body weight provides the resistance. Examples of such exercises include push-ups, crunches, bicycles, squats and lunges—in other words, exactly the kinds of things we do in class.

If you’d like to supplement your strength training at home, it’s important to start slow. To develop upper body strength, for example, try doing 10 good push-ups, three times (with a break in between). As you get stronger, increase the number of push-ups and the amount of times you do them—building up to, say, 15 push-ups, four times.

Always remember to warm-up before starting strength training (stride jumps are a good way to get the blood pumping). Also make sure to take a day off every three or four days to give your muscles a chance to recover. If at any point you feel pain or think maybe you’ve strained a muscle, stop right away and tell your mother or father.

Also be aware that kids your age should not use exercise equipment meant for adults. While it may be tempting to try out your parents’ elliptical or Bowflex, or some of the intriguing contraptions in the WKFA weight room, those machines are designed specifically for the needs and strength levels of adults. Younger athletes who use them risk the chance of injury.

Again, hopefully you’re getting stronger just as a result of what you do in class. But if you’d like to develop your strength further, stick with exercises you know and always remember to be careful.

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By Sifu Rebecca Knapp

Adult Student’s Corner

The mental theme in August was Motivation. It’s timely given that the lazy hazy days of summer are wrapping up and we are heading into the action-packed season of autumn with the usual higher levels of activity associated with back to school, and a return to a more stringent routine. I think it’s safe to say that most people experience a slow down or some absences in their training over the summer months, given vacation time and the opportunity to take advantage of other seasonal activities in lieu of time in class.

So, how do we regain and maintain our pre-summer momentum as the summer comes to a close? Here are some thoughts:

1. Revisit the WHY. There is an underlying motivator behind everything we do. You started Kung Fu for a compelling reason – it is what motivated you to come here in the first place, train rigorously, and stick with it. Sometimes we forget what motivated us to do something, and revisiting that allows us to rekindle the fire that got us moving in the first place. It’s also good to confirm whether or not those reasons are still valid. Sometimes they no longer apply, which is ok, and a good piece of information to help you decide how you will move forward.
2. Set a goal for yourself. Nothing motivates a person like a well thought out goal. Write it down on paper and post it somewhere where you can easily see it. Maybe it’s a grading, or maybe it’s smaller, such as “I will know my tiger form, facing four directions, by the end of October”. Maybe the goal is simply “I will commit to three classes and 3 hours of outside training a week – no matter what.”
3. Develop an action plan to meet that goal. This is your goal broken down into steps, or mini goals – in other words, it’s the path that will get you to your larger goal. Again, put it down on paper. Look at it everyday, and ensure you have something to action every day to keep the momentum going.
4. Make sure you incorporate milestones into your action plan that you can celebrate along the way. Celebrating is a great way to maintain momentum!
5. Find a partner in crime. This is someone who will train with you, and help you to stay on track. Make a pact with this person so that when one of you is feeling unmotivated, the other will encourage you to stick with it.
6. Recognize no one is perfect and we will have to alter our plans and goals sometimes. Cut yourself some slack, but think ahead of time about what you can do to increase your motivation when you find your energy depleting, you are distracted, or procrastinating.

Finally, acknowledge when you are staying motivated and sticking to your action plan, and reward yourself – this is part of an on-going process of self-reflection that allows us to continue to grow as individuals!

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By Sifu Greg Meinzinger

Adult Student’s Corner

With the summer heat waning, now is the perfect opportunity to change up your training routine by stepping out to the great outdoors. Whether it be simply in your own back yard or a larger open space, outdoor training has numerous benefits.

The most obvious is that you have unlimited space to truly open up your forms, travelling longer distances then you could in the kwoon, allowing you to explore variations in your forms you would not otherwise be able to do. Think about how you could execute your staff form, unencumbered with physical barriers… imagine the “swoosh” you could get!

Forms training outdoors also provides you with feedback in terms of how well you actually know your
forms. Often students get confused when we have you change the direction you are facing when you start your form, the mirrors are a familiar and almost comforting starting point. Now imagine performing your forms without any physical landmarks… trust me, it provides you with some very interesting feedback.

While I strongly encourage you to find an outdoor space with relatively even ground, training on grass is very different then the tatami mats. Whether you’re are training your stance sequences or more complex movements, grass training requires you to activate different muscles to stabilize and execute. Although we hope you would never need to use your training in a real life situation, if you did, there is a good chance it won’t be on tatami mats.

And finally, the most important aspect of outdoor training is simply…. fresh air!!!

I do however leave you with a word of warning….

Choosing your location for training, especially if you are planning on weapons training is very important. I recall a number of years ago where a individual (not from WKFA) decided to train swords in a open field in sight of a local elementary school. The school went into lock-down, the police were called and the individual was charged. I do believe the charges were eventually dropped, but it certainly it is something to take into consideration when you choose a location. And watch out for LIONS!

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By Sifu Lorna Jones

Parent’s Corner

One of the most wonderful things about Waterloo Kung Fu Academy is that we try very hard to adhere to old traditions and values. Sometimes, learning the proper protocol can be slightly frightening for the parents as well as for the children. Most parents tell us that they bring their children to us to help them to learn respect and discipline. At WKFA, we firmly believe that everyone can help teach these principles. Here are some things to help everyone to understand some of the guidelines and expectations at the school.

1. Cellphones are not to be used in the common areas of the academy. If you need to make or receive a call, please go outside. If you need to text, bbm or email, please do so respectfully in either the waiting room or the bathroom. This is out of respect for everyone. Please put phones on silent before entering the academy
2. Students should carry their own equipment into the school. Unless there is a situation with broken limbs, or the student is already on the floor assisting, students are responsible for their own equipment. This includes labeling it and making sure it is in good working order
3. Please wait for your children in the parents’ waiting room, or downstairs lobby. The railing is not an appropriate place to watch class, as it distracts the children and is hazardous to others. Please make sure the door remains shut to the parents’ waiting room to keep the noise distraction down. It also keeps the cool air in during the summer and warm air during the winter.
4. Being on time is one of the greatest demonstrations of respect. On the other side, being consistently late for class is disruptive and disrespectful. If there is a specific reason your child may be late, this should be communicated in advance. Your child will be given pushups for joining class late, and any student that is late by over 15 minutes will not be allowed to participate in class. If your child is dropped off over 15 minutes late and no one is there to take them home, they will stay in the kwoon and sit to watch the class, but they will not participate
5. Please read the grading letters carefully. There are certain pieces of protocol that we expect the students to adhere to in a grading. The letter clearly outlines the expectations. If part of the grading requirement is not met, the grading results will be withheld and not given on grading day. This might be an essay, an active student card or the grading fee. If your child does not meet the requirements in that letter, they will not get their new belt or sash on that day. This also applies to the adult students.
6. The washroom on the main floor is private. It also serves as a first aid room. Please use the upstairs washrooms, and never, never leave dirty diapers in the garbage cans.

We do have a lot of traditions and expectations at Waterloo Kung Fu Academy. This is an amazing link to our lineage and to the days of respect and honour! I hope this helps to clarify some of the points, but if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to discuss them with Sifu or any instructor. We will all be happy to explain the protocols.

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“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” ~ Michael Jordan

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