Sigung David Moylan, Owner, WKFA

Sigung’s Corner

The martial arts have a rich history. I encourage you to research the origins of what you have chosen to study to get a better appreciation of how truly special this way of life is and the individuals that dedicate themselves to evolving and preserving the discipline.

There are many books and articles detailing the history of the martial artists (my office library is filled with them!). The more recent history (say the last 50 years) lives on in the memories and stories of long-time practitioners. During my relatively short 31 years in Kung Fu, I’ve invested time into learning our local history from these long-time practitioners. I encourage you to read “Our History” included in the Student Handbook and watch our WKFA “30-Years of Kung-Fu” Documentary video below.

I still regularly converse and train with Master Gee Wong, Sifu Robin Young and Jimmy Fields. Each of them started their martial arts journey before my teacher (Sigung Bob Schneider) and continue to practice and share stories. All of us have a common history with Kitchener Kicks (originally the Scarlet Dragon Society) founded by Master Ron Day in the 70s. He and my teacher had a great mutual respect that continues today between Sigung Dave (their Head Instructor) and me.

I’m writing having just attended an instructor meeting for Kitchener Kicks, where I had the opportunity to read a black sash essay by one of their Siboks (senior black sash). Written on a typewriter in 1989, it details the history of their school. Fresh off a knee replacement, the author of that essay was at the meeting along with many others, much more senior to me. All of them continue to dedicate themselves to the art in their own way. I love connecting with these mentors and I am always humbled by their long-term dedication to their club.

Learning our history gives me perspective and a vision for our own Academy’s path. The word that keeps coming to mind is dependability. Our own Siboks (Lloyd and Eric) have devoted so much to the Academy and continue to do so. One of our junior students recently moved to the Adult Program and he was proudly telling me about how he rode his bike to Sibok Eric’s Wednesday noon class—it brought a big smile to my face, as this was something I was doing too (back in 1994!).

I watch as new traditions become part of our history. Sifu Anne and Sifu Sarah just finished their 5^th year of running a very well-planned and engaging summer camp. I wish there was something similar back when I was of camp age! Although, in my mind they still are “younger sifus,” they have already been with the Academy over 17 years each. It is also great to see them taking the time to mentor one of our newest Sifus, Sifu D’Arcy. This is how traditions continue.

I could go on about any one of the Sifus involved with the Academy. Each brings their own flavour and focus. Inspired by those senior to us, we all share a common passion for Kung Fu. I feel ever grateful for the dependable mentors in my martial arts journey and the consistent dependability of our instructor team—a true source of hope for the future of the Academy and the art!

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Sibok Lloyd Fridenburg

Editorial

by Sibok Lloyd Fridenburg

I recently took a trip down memory lane through the pages of old newsletters, meeting minutes, and photos. They provide a window into of the evolution of WKFA. It took a while to research and analyze everything, and I only have first-hand information beginning in 1989, but I was able to glean some interesting facts. Did you know?

1. Sigung Bob Schneider founded WKFA in 1987 and worked delivering pizza to make ends meet as he was laying the foundation for the school that we have today.
2. Seven students earned their Black Sash prior to 2000 and four are still actively training and teaching at WKFA:
   • 1995: Sibok Lloyd and Sibok Eric
   • 1999: Sifu Rikin and Sigung Dave
3. Three students earned their Black Sash prior to 1995:
   • Sifu Scott Weiler was our first Black Sash; he graded in 1992.
   • Sibok Eric and Sibok Lloyd graded for their Blue sash in that same grading. If you think your grading was tough, watch the video of this grading sometime.
   • Then we had Sifu Beverly Burtwell in 1993, and
   • Sifu Ti Seng Lo (who did the frying bacon dance in his grading) in 1994.
4. Between 1992 and 2020, 56 WKFA students attained the rank of Black Sash. We currently have 29 BS instructors that are still active in the school. Most teach and train regularly.
5. The last Black Sash meeting conducted by Sifu Bob was held on June 1, 2006. In attendance were Sibok Lloyd, Sifu Judy, Sifu Sydney, Sifu Evan, Sifu George, Sifu Laurie M., Sifu Neel, Sifu Jim, and Sifu Laina. Of those 9 instructors, 3 are still actively involved with WKFA.
6. The first BS meeting under Sigung Dave was conducted on September 7, 2006. In attendance were Sibok Lloyd, Sifu Jim, Sifu Laina, Sifu Laurie M., Sifu Laurie Skantzos (with a note that she was late 😊), Sifu Sydney, Sifu Ken N., Sifu Evan, Sifu Kevin, Sifu Judy, and Sifu Neel. What a ride it’s been since then.
7. Did you know that Sifu Bob, Sibok Eric and Sibok Lloyd “starred” in the movie blockbuster, Talons of the Eagle in 1991? Sibok Eric never did get paid for his outstanding performance; perhaps because he threw a heavy bag onto Sifu Bob causing him to whack his head on the cement floor.
8. You’ve often heard of our association with Grand Master Pan Qing Fu and his profound influence on our school. Did you know that he actually lived with Sifu Bob for two years between 1990 and 1992? What a time that was!
9. Besides Master Ron Day and Sifu Bob, can you find 6 WKFA Black Sash instructors in this photo?

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Sifu Michael Prudencio-Brunello

Youth Student’s Corner

by Sifu Michael Prudencio-Brunello

Welcome back to our ongoing segment about our Five Kung Fu animals! So far, we’ve talked about the Tiger and, last month, we had a double feature: the Leopard and the Snake.

We continue our journey through the Kung Fu animals, with one of my favourites: the crane!

Crane at a glance…

• Rank: Green Stripe/Green Belt
• Techniques: crane hook, crane neck strike, crane kick, crane beak, crane head, crane wing
• Skill: grace and fluidity
• Form: tiger crane (at Adult Brown)

We have talked about strength, power, and speed with our past animals. However, the crane is not as large as the big cats, and not as fast as the snake. Instead, it uses its grace and fluidity. To catch fish, it relies on patience—waiting for the right moment to strike. It is a master of balance, standing tall in the water on its thin legs. That’s why we practice our crane stance—to make our balance stronger! It has very good control as well, striking at the right spot in the water to catch its dinner. It is a defensive animal that is very aware of its surroundings.

Where else do cranes use these skills? When they are flying, and when they dance. That’s right—cranes dance, just like you and me! We can channel this flying and dancing in our Kung Fu by demonstrating fluidity and grace. This is super important in sparring. Our follow-step footwork allows us to move around, but the key is to do it gracefully, staying nice and light on your feet to “fly around” your opponent. Then, go in for the strike! The control of the crane is like the accuracy of the snake—without it, the strikes will not land. Outside of sparring, there are many other areas using our inner crane can be useful. Try out some of these practice tips and see if you can become more like a crane!

Practice tips to be like a crane:

• Patience: Kung Fu is a long journey, and developing patience is the key to enjoying it every step of the way. In fact, patience makes other things in life more enjoyable too!
• Fluidity: when working on your forms, try to make the moves flow together, with strong strikes, like the crane catching a fish!
• Control: make sure your strikes go exactly where you want them! If a crane misses the fish, even by a little, he misses his dinner. And eating a nice dinner is so important!
• Relax! This is the most important. Whenever you feel stressed or worried, take some deep breaths like in our meditation. This has helped me feel better so many times, and I am sure it will help you too.

Also, do you know Sifu Anne? She made up her own crane form! It’s super cool!

Enjoy practicing, and next time we will meet our final animal, the dragon!

The post Embodying the Five Kung Fu Animals: Feathers appeared first on Waterloo Kung-Fu Academy.

Sifu Jeremy Norris

Junior Student’s Corner

by Sifu Jeremy Norris

Throughout our lives, we will witness and endure many moments of failure, but for some reason, we always get past it. Let’s look at what can be learned from our failures in order for us to grow to succeed.

Failure can be described as a lack of success, or not being able to perform to the expectations. In Kung Fu there are many types of failures, some may see failure as not being able to perform a certain technique, not being as flexible as classmates, not being able to break that board, or even a feeling that you are not as good as your classmates. The importance here is that no matter how small or large the failure there is always a lesson to be learned.

One way we can learn from our failures is by examining what elements need to change to succeed. Let’s take an example of breaking a board. If you fail at punching through a board on your first try, it is most likely you need to examine your technique. Look at every element of your punch, note what can be done to make it better, then work to improve your technique. The simple process of improving your technique will lead to success. From this, we can conclude analyzing your failures and implementing change, will lead to success.

The next element to changing our failures into successes is related to our mental state. Many times, when faced with failure and adversity it is easy to be doubtful of the situation. This makes it easy to fail and just move on without understanding why we failed and what we need to do to succeed. To succeed we must have a good mental spirit. Spirit is the one aspect in Kung Fu that can be a deciding factor between failure and success. Think about a grading, if your response to making a mistake was giving up, you would never pass your grading. To succeed in a grading, you must have good spirit to not let your mistakes weigh you down. Not letting our mistakes limit us is what defines us as martial artists.

One compelling quote that relates to this mindset is, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” ~ Winston Churchill. From this, we can conclude that we need to be able to move on from our failures, if we spend the time and energy focused on our failures there will be no potential to succeed.

When you run into a time of failure during your Kung Fu journey let your spirit help you to move past the obstacle and succeed. Remember no instructor or student before you have succeeded without failure, the only difference is that they have learned to turn their failures into success.

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by Sifu D’arcy Langois

Walls occur in many forms, and whether they are physical, mental, or emotional they represent obstacles in our lives. Over the past 18 months I’m sure everyone has become intimately familiar with all sorts of walls. The COVID-19 pandemic created many challenges: job losses, online learning, masking, distancing, and so much more. It has completely altered our world. The good news is that we all have a tool in our kit to help get through those barriers and take down the walls, and that tool is persistence.

This past year and a half has been rough, for a wide variety of reasons. Under these circumstances how do you muster the strength to keep going after you crash into a wall? This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while now, and I’d like to share a few tricks that I used to keep moving myself forward.

1. Always keep your goal in mind. Remind yourself what you are after, and keep it fixed in your brain (this is true for Kung Fu, work, or anything else you can think of). Knowing where you’re going will help you focus and stay on task.
2. Make a list of what you want to accomplish, and then track it! Break your goal down into its component parts and make that list (daily if necessary). Checking items off a list is rewarding so don’t forget to cross things off as you do them.
3. Never plan to start tomorrow when you could start today.
4. Recognize that you don’t need to go straight to 100%. Start your journey slow and ramp up. Give yourself time to grow and recover, the journey will be smoother.
5. Most importantly, don’t be too hard on yourself. Everyone stumbles, and everyone falls; it’s what you do after that counts. Pick yourself up, re-center yourself and keep moving forward.

Obviously, this is not an all-encompassing list but they are things that have helped me stay on my feet during this challenging time. Everyone has their methods of wall-busting, but one thing unites them all: persistence. If these points don’t speak to your “persistence strategy”, take a moment and consider how you can break your own walls down. Your goals will thank you!

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by Sifu Laurent Bernardin

Kung Fu is over two thousand years old and is deeply rooted in tradition. The art is passed on from generation to generation and from master to student. By design, change is slow and deliberate. However, just like in biological evolution, change does happen and can be accelerated when the system experiences a shock. We have all seen an example of such an event over the past eighteen months. However, this is not meant to be yet another article about the pandemic.

That said, as Kung Fu parents and students, we certainly have had to deal with our share of change, and I stopped counting how many times we updated the schedule that is posted in our kitchen. In-person classes are available again and even the kwoon is open for training on rainy days. If you choose to take advantage of these options for your children, you might, like me, experience both a sense of relief but also a share of anxiety. Relief, that they are again able to interact directly with fellow students and instructors, without the intermediary of a screen. Anxiety, lingering after a long period of time, trying our best to keep at a distance from other human beings.

For a good number of students, additional change has come from moving up in the age programs. A move from the Youth to the Juniors means switching classes, meeting new students, and getting acquainted with a new Sifu. Expectations also tend to rise both in terms of physical endurance and ability to focus. Moving from the Juniors into the Adult program can be even more intimidating as students may now find themselves training alongside Sifus that they’ve known as teachers for many years.

As we deal with change, however, Kung Fu also provides us with “rocks” that remain constant. The structure of a Kung Fu class remains largely unchanged independent of delivery mechanism and age level. Our curriculum is another (near) constant that students can rely upon; what they learn in a class will remain relevant for years to come. And then there is what may be the essence of Kung Fu and has been since its inception: students see improvements that relate to the effort they put in.

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by Sifu (Dr.) Rikin Patel MD

In this edition, we continue with the 7 C model of building resilience in children and teens and how the training at WFKA partners in this cause. You may also enjoy reviewing Part I.

The third principle is Connection. It is well established that children with close ties to family, friends and community are more likely to have a solid sense of security that produces strong values and prevents them from seeking destructive alternatives. The WFKA strives to build a sense of physical safety and emotional security at the school, while challenging everyone to strive to their individual potential. An important question for parents to ask is if this safety and security are also being fostered at home? It is also important for parents to allow their children to express all types of emotions rather than suppress unpleasant feelings. Giving them the space to connect with you and others to seek support is critical.

Character is fundamental sense of right and wrong. Children with character enjoy a strong sense of self-worth and confidence. A fundamental sense of boundaries allows children and teens to be more comfortable in sticking to their values. At WFKA character development is at the core of Kung fu training. Discipline, respect, hard work, honesty, commitment and caring for others and are some of the core character traits that are encouraged for success in Kung fu. In turn these qualities ripple into every aspect of martial artists life. As parents, modeling these character traits is not only one of the best ways to boost yours and your child’s resilience but in turn also all the people they will positively impact.

The fifth principle is Contribution. Children who understand the importance of personal contribution gain a sense of purpose that can motivate them. The opportunity to contribute in turn also enhances their own competence, character and sense of connection. The entire lineage of Kung fu as a martial art has sustained itself on the principle of contribution and giving back to others what has been given to you. Regardless of rank, training at WFKA provides ample opportunities to contribute both inside the kwoon and outside. If you are unsure please ask the instructors. For parents and all students, it’s important to model generosity and the value of serving others.

Coping is the attempt to overcome problems and difficulties. When coping is learned by children, they can more effectively handle stress and overcome life’s inevitable challenges. The environment at WFKA provides a safe environment for positive coping strategies to be rigorously developed through sparring, competitive performance, teaching, and public speaking. The center of all coping strategies will be patience and guided self-reflection.

The seventh principle is Control. When children realize they can control the outcomes of their decision and actions, they are more likely to know that they can do what it takes to bounce back. A resilient child knows that she has internal control and that her choices and actions can shape the results. The emphasis on taking personal responsibility for one’s development of Kung Fu knowledge and skills is fostered immediately upon starting one’s training at WFKA and is continually stressed for continued development and progression. However, as parents and students, it important to understand and teach that not all circumstances can be controlled but being adaptable and choosing positive behaviours can shift our odds towards success.

To conclude, it’s important to emphasize how interrelated these 7 ingredients of resilience are. Taking the time to reflect on how each of these can be developed through Kung Fu training will tremendously improve our lives and all whom we influence.

The 7 Cs Model

This model of 7 Cs has been taken from Dr. Kenneth Ginsburg book “Building Resilience in Children and Teens.” A common language about resilience will allow us, as a Kung Fu community, to collaborate better and help one another grow as individuals and as a community.

These 7 interrelated principles are:

1. competence
2. confidence
3. connection
4. character
5. contribution
6. coping
7. control

The post Building Resilience in Your Child: Part II appeared first on Waterloo Kung-Fu Academy.

The WKFA Black Sash degree system evolved to reward commitment, dedication, and loyalty of our instructors. It gives me great pleasure to congratulate:

Sifu Sydney on earning her 4^th Degree Black Sash

Sifu Lorna on earning her 3^rd Degree Black Sash

Sifu Rebecca on earning her 3^rd Degree Black Sash

Sifu Cristina on earning her 2^nd Degree Black Sash

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