Sacramento Martial Arts and Karate

All Journal Entries (393)

My Best Cure for Carsickness

Recently, I went on a long car trip. It was several hours of infamous German roads. Beautiful green landscape, 120+ kmph autoban, transportation trucks in spades, and me, being carsick, enjoying not a single moment. We still had a ways to go and needed to get the gymnastics in my stomach settled down. That's when I thought of it. Mr. Oliver talked about redirection some months ago.

When something is bothering you, redirect your attention to something more positive or productive. Kata… Continue

Added by Lisa Clark on August 7, 2010 at 8:30am — No Comments

Safe from Assault: Are you Oblivious or Aware?

In our classes last week we talked about awareness and how real self-defense happens long before violence actually occurs. The U.S. Marines have a system for coding and identifying the various mental states that one can be in. We can apply these same color codes to our own awareness levels so that we stay safe.

Condition White - Oblivious

In this mental state you are completely oblivious to your surroundings. This is the state that people are… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on August 4, 2010 at 12:24pm — No Comments

Karate Kids Practice Compassion

Compassion must be practiced. You see, our school is about much more

than kicking and punching. Kindness is self-defense. Helping others is

self-defense. This video shows just one of the many ways that our

Karate Kids PRACTICE compassion… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on July 27, 2010 at 1:32pm — No Comments

Sacramento Karate Kid 'Kick-Starts' Operation Backpack

Jack, a Sacramento 3rd Grader, organizes "Operation Backpack" at Zen

Martial Arts in order to earn his next belt rank. At Zen Martial Arts

students are required to choose a Community Leadership Project that

demonstrates compassion. Jack chose to collect Backpacks for homeless

children in the Sacramento area. This is the news coverage from… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on July 27, 2010 at 1:29pm — No Comments

Project Idea: 100 Acts of Kindness

The Project: 100 ACTS OF KINDNESS

Outline: Jane is a 10-year-old white belt. Her project is to get 10 of her friends and/or classmates at school to do 10 acts of kindness each; recording each act in log that she supplies them. Ten students doing 10 acts of kindness each, equals 100 acts of kindness! Jane and her mother will design their own kindness log--and Jane will have an experiential lesson in… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on July 27, 2010 at 10:30am — No Comments

Compassion is Everywhere

Today I realized how compassion truly is everywhere.

Sabrina and I are visiting her family in Germany. We are in a small rural town, similar to Nevada City or Grass Valley in both size and location. Her family is not well off. They live simply, eat well, work hard, and love life. They also are a model of compassion.

Her mother invited us to 'shop in the basement.' Sabrina got all excited. I had no idea why. Was this another mistranslation? Nope. The basement is like a store!… Continue

Added by Lisa Clark on July 24, 2010 at 5:49am — No Comments

Project Idea: Women Take Back the Night

Helping this group would make a for a great adult project for Green-Belt.

Women Take Back the Night is an international tradition with marches and rallies occurring around the world since 1976. That year, in Belgium, women attending the International Tribunal on Crimes Against

Women marched together in solidarity, holding candles to protest the ways in which violence permeates the lives of women worldwide.…

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Added by Mike Oliver on July 23, 2010 at 4:30pm — 1 Comment

Your Help is Needed with "Operation Backpack"

The Sacramento-area community was more than generous last year – Operation Backpack 2009 exceeded its goal and collected more than 3,000 backpacks. That more

than doubled 2008's figure and demonstrates that even in tough economic

times, children in need command attention.…

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Added by Mike Oliver on July 19, 2010 at 2:16pm — 1 Comment

Aaron's 10 Acts of Kindness

10 Acts of Kindness

Help my dad move his office
Helping make dinner, and set the table
Helping my sister drop off lunches at the mustard seed school
Respecting people in the dojo and outside of it…

Continue

Added by Susan Bitar on July 13, 2010 at 9:59pm — 2 Comments

Karate-Do: My Way of Life by Gichin Funakoshi

Master Gichin Funakoshi wrote Karate-Do: My Way of Life. His book is required reading for adult yellow belts, and rightly so as Master Funakoshi records his time in history. The narrative details how karate impacted him personally from a young age, how he brought karate-do to Japan from Okinawa, and his experiences along the way.

To me, the most poignant section of the book was Master Funakoshi's description of his wife's karate. There was no formal training as we might…

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Added by Lisa Clark on July 12, 2010 at 11:00am — 1 Comment

Becoming a martial artists... by accident

You may or may not know about a program called Ride To Walk. The organization is dear to my heart. Located in Lincoln off of Hwy 193, it is a nonprofit organization which enables children, teens and young adults with nuerological disabilities to participate in equine assisted therapy. In easy terms, children with autism, cerebral palsy and deep brain injuries ride horses for fun and therapy. Its amazing.

My experiences with the horses on site have been very educational.… Continue

Added by Lisa Clark on July 8, 2010 at 10:00pm — 1 Comment

Video: Calling a Bully a Bully

Every office has one - loud, rude, egotistical, two-faced, and sometimes even dangerous. Left to their own devices, an office bully can turn your livelihood into a living nightmare. Carrie Clark, co-founder of the California Healthy Workplace Advocates, who promotes anti-bullying policy throughout the country, defines what qualifies as bullying and how to stand up to a growing problem that she describes as a national "epidemic".…

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Added by Mike Oliver on July 1, 2010 at 10:00am — No Comments

Give Power and Passion to your Goals

Go to any corporate training program, seminar, or meeting and the topic of goal setting and time management is likely to be of primary concern. Goal setting is also a major part of your martial arts training as well. People that don't set goals are less likely to achieve success in their lives. I can't tell you how many martial artists I've seen fail to achieve the rank of black belt because they never set real goals.

Today though, I'm not going to tell you that the secret to goal… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on June 22, 2010 at 11:57pm — 1 Comment

Kindness is Self-Defense for the Soul

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Added by Mike Oliver on June 17, 2010 at 10:46am — No Comments

Listening

One of my first jobs was as a painter. The owner of the paint crew told me something that changed how I look at things. He said, "The most precious thing you can give anyone is your time." I didn't get it at first. My flippant thought was, *Well, I'm here.* Being physically in a place does not mean you are present.

What Marlin meant was being present with the person you are physically with. Look them in the eyes when they are talking to you and listen. Focus your body by…

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Added by Lisa Clark on June 7, 2010 at 9:00am — No Comments

Mushin: A New Way of Thinking

A while back, Mr. Oliver challenged us to keep our mushin in circumstances we normally lose it. I have long been of the opinion that commuting is not for me. I just don't like driving. There are any number of ligitmate and ridiculously silly reasons... pollution, car accidents, road rage, discourtesy, the shining blindness off of silver cars, ... You get my meaning.

Well, recently I moved and my commute tripled. In the mushin spirit, I tried to think of this as a…

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Added by Lisa Clark on May 14, 2010 at 1:16pm — 1 Comment

Is Mr. Oliver the 'Lone Nut'?

This Video is Brilliant and really speaks to me and my training/teaching as a teacher and leader in my community.

I'm sure you'll also see the that I could be viewed as a "Lone Nut" without all of your participation and support. Can you commit to writing a journal entry on this site today? Join in (For my own… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on May 13, 2010 at 2:12pm — No Comments

What Adults can Learn from Kids

This young lady is inspiring. Every adult here should watch this. If you are a parent, share this with your child. Kids are capable of amazing things despite their age. I encourage our Karate kids to think big when it comes to their community projects and this is why. Kids can change the world.…

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Added by Mike Oliver on May 12, 2010 at 10:17am — 2 Comments

Class demonstration and belt award ceremony posted

I always try to follow Sensei Oliver with the camera as well as the students. I thought I would use this post to highlight a few moments of his night.

#1 - The teacher at work

#2 - Giving congratulations and encouragement

#3 - Answering questions

#4 - Leading the session…

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Added by Chris Piper on May 6, 2010 at 11:18am — 1 Comment

New Schedule - Effective Tuesday, May 4

Wow! Our classes are really growing. I've been teaching the martial

arts for a long time and can honestly say that our school has some of

the best people in it. You make it a pleasure to come to class

everyday. Starting Tuesday, May 4th, I will be able to teach an additional set of classes on Thursdays!

As you can see on the schedule, we now have two… Continue

Added by Mike Oliver on April 25, 2010 at 11:31am — 1 Comment