Jon Keeling

26th annual "Shotokan Kata Review" on January 6 - with Zoom option available: https://www.svkarate.com/annual-shotokan-kata-review-january-6-2024/

teaching this evening in Santa Monica:

Santa Monica/Shotokan Karate/Los Angeles California Welcome to the International Shotokan Karate Federation Santa Monica. We are a fully accredited traditional martial arts dojo teaching Shotokan karate to men, women and children for over 35 years under Sensei James Field, a 7th degree black belt. Karate is a weaponless system of self-defense, which....

26th annual "Shotokan Kata Review" on January 6: https://www.svkarate.com/annual-shotokan-kata-review-january-6-2024/

kick-a-thon is this week!

Stanford courses (Self-Defense, Intro to Martial Arts) start today. Also starting today - wearing a pink belt for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It is also Bullying Awareness Month so working with www.challengeday.org volunteering with their wonderful program. New "Teen Leadership" program starts this Friday. And many special events are being planned...

Welcome to ChallengeDay Participants experience powerful love and belonging, connect across lines of difference and move toward creating the culture they want in their school.  

new program starting this October:

Leadership Program | Silicon Valley Shotokan Karate Traditional JKA-style Shotokan karate for adults, teens and kids.

Leading a session at this "Teen Wellness Retreat" for the 3rd consecutive year:

Calendar of Events | Mountain View, CA Registration opens Monday, August 7 at 8:30 a.m. and is limited to 150 teens. Don't miss this! Click here for the registration page.

April is "Sexual Assault Awareness Month." As a teacher of self-defense, I am used to talking about this subject often. Today in class at Stanford University, for example, I made sure my students knew that the majority of sexual assaults are perpetrated by someone known to the victim, rather than by a stranger.

https://www.nbclosangeles.com/california-live/easy-self-defense-tips/3121260/

Annual "Shotokan Kata Review" is coming up soon.

Annual Shotokan Kata Review, January 7, 2023 | Silicon Valley Shotokan Karate Traditional JKA-style Shotokan karate for adults, teens and kids.

Final preparations for today's webinar for Stanford University staff on the subject of self-defense. That is one of the courses I teach at the university. (note bookmark)

I have been overwhelmed with demand for my services. With another r**e on campus recently, many groups are reaching out to me for custom self-defense seminars at Stanford. I taught 8 hours yesterday (2 self-defense, 6 Karate). This is nothing new for me. I have taught 8+ hours in a day many, many times. But it's looking more consistent now. I am almost completely booked out through the end of January at this point and nothing but weekends are probably going to be available until a brief time in June/July.

https://www.svkarate.com/sensei-keeling-marks-40-years-doing-shotokan/

For anyone who would like to take part in the annual birthday workout, here is what our group did today:
*550 gyakuzuki *550 maegeri, *55 pushups *55 leg raises, drawing the numbers 1 through 55 with the feet *55 repetitions of Heian kata.

There have recently been more requests for me to publish one of the three books that I started writing in the 1990s. Which one do you think I should publish first?
* stories from Japan, written by a variety of people who lived/trained at the Hoitsugan dojo in Tokyo between its founding in 1972 through the late 1990s, supplemented with some articles on related history and interviews
*detailed technical manual of Shotokan techniques, movements and training methods
*a compilation of the 100+ articles I'd previously published on a wide range of Karate-related topics, supplemented by the additional 40 more articles I have written but not yet published

Teaching self-defense for approximately 18 hours this week. That is in addition to the regular 22 hours/week of Karate classes, for a total of 40 hours of teaching this week. I wonder how many other instructors have taught 40 hours in a single week... Just a couple years ago, I was teaching 30+ hours/week on a regular basis. But I believe this is the first time I've done 40. Lifetime total is over 15,000 hours. I started teaching 38 years ago and plan to keep teaching for at least another 30.

24th annual "Shotokan Kata Review" on January 8.

Our 24th annual "Shotokan Kata Review" will be on Saturday, January 8, 8-10am California time. Sensei Jon Keeling has been leading these special sessions since 1999, where he runs through a minimum of 27 kata, twice each, going over some history, technical details, application ideas and personal reflections in an energy-packed, informative and fun, one-of-a-kind 2 hour session. Info here: https://www.svkarate.com/annual-shotokan-kata-review-jan-8-2022/

9 years ago today, many innocent lives were taken during a school shooting. Silicon Valley Karate's annual charity kick-a-thon was held in their honor that year.
(first half of this video is about a teacher who wrote a song for the victims; second half is about the kick-a-thon):
https://news.yahoo.com/news/video/teacher-honors-sandy-hook-victims-021234008.html

Teacher honors Sandy Hook victims with song Bay Area residents aren't only attending memorials to remember the victims of Newtown, some are taking a more hands-on approach.

Who wants to get involved? If you think you can't do 2022 kicks and/or punches that day, how about donating to the charity? Thank you for your participation, whatever that may be!

Charity Kick-a-Thon 2021 | Silicon Valley Shotokan Karate Traditional JKA-style Shotokan karate for adults, teens and kids.

Entering my 40th year doing Karate and still loving it! Started Shotokan in early September, 1982, starting to teach two years later (37 years ago). 36 years ago (1985), I first moved to Japan, where I spent a total of 8 years. 15,000 hours of teaching thus far, including 1200+ over Zoom. And I'm still working on improving... Looking forward to many, many more years of this with people around the world.

Getting closer to pre-COVID conditions...wearing Karate uniform for 9 hours straight....taught three private lessons and four group classes today. One youth class had over 20 participants (11 at the dojo and 10+ more on Zoom). Finally having dinner at 10pm.

Something worth thinking about...And something I HAVE thought about. A lot. Which matters more - the original application of the technique in the kata, or how it could be useful in the future?

In 1993 I asked that question to a group of defensive tactics trainers at an ASLET conference. It inspired quite the conversation. Ever since that talk, I share this quote every time I give a talk.

Consider this:

When you win, it’s easy to think about what went right. You replay the victory in your mind. The people around you ask you about it.

When you lose, we tend to think about what went wrong, things we should’ve done in training, things we missed. We replay the fight over and over in our minds.

In both cases we are unintentionally thinking about the last fight.

My guidance to everyone I coach/train is to continuously “reinvent” themselves. Always show up a better/different fighter.

So tomorrow, in the gym, at the range, wherever you’re training (in your head) will you be training for your next fight or your last one?

To your safety

Coach B

📷

I found out it was "Character Counts week" yesterday while donating blood. I really do believe that character counts and that we should try our best to be the best person we can be.

CHARACTER COUNTS! Week First declared “National CHARACTER COUNTS! Week” in 1993, the U.S. President, U.S. Senate, state governors, and officials around the world proclaim the third week in October CHARACTER COUNTS! Week as a time to highlight character education and the importance of modeling good character. And every...

Instructor Life 2: Hmmm...which belt today? 4 out of 6 of my black belts. Can you tell which is the satin one? Of course there is a story with each of them.

Instructor Life 1: This is what laundry day looks like when you haven't been able to get to it for a few days. Note: This is just from Tuesday through Saturday.

For those who missed it and want to do today's workout individually, here is the list:
53 jumping jacks

53 push-ups

53 sit-ups

53 backward push-ups (triceps extension)

53 "flappy birds" (also known as Superman pulses)

53 reverse-punches on each side

total of 530 front kicks

Total of 53 repetitions of kata. For those who know all the Heian kata, 10 times each. And if you know all 3 Tekki kata, do those once each. If not, do some extra reps of a Heian kata.

And don't forget to SMILE! :-)

Some people think there is no value to kumite where there is no contact at all. On the contrary, with the right frame of mind, it can be VERY valuable. With no contact, we can do things that are potentially more dangerous than can be trained while touching our partner, such as eye pokes. I have been laughed at as I have taught no-touch kumite very many times over the years. I was pleasantly surprised, though, when one of the most highly-regarded self-defense instructors - Mr Rory Miller - was at my dojo and expressed his approval as I had students in my teens class on opposite sides of the room imagining they were closer, doing some fairly creative (dangerous) techniques. Whose laughing now? There are people all over the world right now trying to figure out how to do kumite remotely. I've been having my students do it for years! :-)

Yes, the rumors are true. There will be another amazing Hoitsugan Seminars camp taking place in northern California June 10-14. This will be the first one since 2014 and the 5th one since we started putting them on in 2004. It takes a lot of work gathering a dozen or more instructors to teach together at these camps: http://www.hoitsugan.com/camp5/

Hoitsugan Seminars (also known as “Shotokan Legacy Seminars”) Camp 5 | Hoitsugan