Here are a lot of my senior Black Belt students and SKH Quest licensed school leaders. Several folks came in before for my 9-9-’09 60th birthday party at the Dayton dojo and then we all got together for some high-level practice the Friday afternoon before our 29th annual Festival. Some of these Black Belts have […]

I wrote a blog about relics being revitalized to provide new benefits to a new generation without damaging or destroying the essence of the relic itself. And of course I sometimes believe relics should be preserved as relics; museums inspire us with past triumphs in creative development. Anyway, one commenter quite bluntly wrote in that […]

The To-Shin Do self development 8-Step Personal Perfection Plan is all about personal transformation from the inside out. Pay attention every moment of your day and seek the most ideal way to experience, embody, and express who you are. Focus on the 8 guidelines to determine and achieve your own definition of an ideal life […]

Here is my red suit photo. My teacher chose a red tux for his 60th in Japan to make a statement unique to the needs of the Japanese martial arts world of the early 1990s – more creativity, freshness, aliveness, and startling thinking. At my 60th birthday party thrown by the students at the Dayton […]

Last week my martial arts teacher Masaaki Hatsumi mailed me birthday greetings for my 60th. In his letter, he enclosed a photo of himself at his own 60th birthday bash in 1991. In his kanreki red suit – a western tuxedo no less – he salutes his past and future. His red tux is significant, […]

Are you upgrading when you take a small obscure military specialty from a bygone age and give it a new role improving the lives of a new century of beneficiaries? Or is it a desecration of the historic, an affront to the spirits of those who died fighting to hold their homeland free from invading […]

Here’s Rumiko on the beach south of Ancona, Italy, on the Adriatic coast. The young Italian couple in the water are collecting bags of mussels that they will sell to restaurants along the coast. Another Tuesday morning working for a living for them. Look where they have chosen to work. Look what they have chosen […]

Our To-Shin Do martial art was developed from the original combat methods of the Togakure ninja of Japan. One of our hallmarks is an educational process that incorporates an understanding of psycho-emotional influences described by a series of five element-nicknamed patterns. The water element describes a tendency to put distance between self and others in […]

Have you seen my niece Sabrina on the Tuesday night Fox network Hell’s Kitchen television reality competition hosted by London super chef Gordon Ramsey? Three episodes into the intensely high-pressure series, and Sabrina is holding her own. None of us – not even close family members like this loving uncle who blessed her vows in […]

I have seen people enroll in a martial arts course for the purpose of learning things that they want and need and do not yet know, and then display displeasure when they are given guidance as to how to learn what it is they want to learn. “Flex those knees deeply and see what that […]