Hey everyone, i took a look at the forum and want to encourage all of you to help each other and also to get answers from the many experienced individuals from all over the world who are a part of this Tutorial. So instead of directing your questions to the “Ask Jin” section, try addressing it to everyone in the community by placing your post in the other categories.

If you do have a specific question for me, then of course go ahead and ask it. I just don’t want everyone to immediately post to “Ask Jin” when your questions can be answered by the community. there are many sharp cookies here and it’s great when i see other people answer posts to help each other out.

I moved several posts that were originally in the “Ask Jin” section to other categories that were more fitting. sorry if i messed up a post or two!

keep asking and keep helping each other out, it’s what this Chinese Boxing Tutorial is all about!

I get alot of messages about where i teach and about how people can train with me, so i thought i would just answer it here for everyone.

First, i don’t have a school, i only teach privately at a health club here in los angeles. I don’t promote the Chinese Boxing classes and only teach my good friends. I don’t charge them for training but i do expect them to be consistent and on time always. i also expect them to get together and train on the off days. i don’t allow flakes who don’t train seriously, and kick them out immediately if i feel they are taking advantage of my time and knowledge. my students are not allowed to invite anyone i don’t know without my consent. my classes are by invite only.

with that said, i don’t want to discourage you from coming to train if you live close by, or just visiting from out of town and want to train while you are in los angeles. for those of you that have been following the tutorial and training hard out there, i have no qualms with you coming to train with us. the gym may or may not charge you for the day to work out, which is about 10 dollars, but usually it’s not a problem since we train so late at night. also please understand that these classes are NOT part of the gyms schedule, so please don’t go asking the gym about the classes, they will not understand what you are talking about. if you do decide to come work out with us, please make sure to use the “contact” tab at the top and let me know in advance along with your martial arts experience and what you expect to gain from the training.

below is the gym address and the times/days we workout. take care and peace!

Meridian’s Bodies in Motion

1950 Century Park East
Los Angeles
CA – 90067
310-789-1111
Wing Chun :  tues, thurs  8:30pm-9:30pm

Submission Grappling :  saturday  11:30am-1pm

it’s been almost a year, since i started the Chinese Boxing Tutorial on youtube, can you believe it? =D it’s amazing how it went from putting up a few videos to help Jon, Bryan, Mike, Brook and the rest of the gang, so they can practice on their off days, to getting close to 100 videos!

we went from a youtube channel to our very own website, yay! i’ve pretty much squeezed every penny from my pocket and also your donations to create what you see now. oh, speaking of donations…so far, 17 have donated ranging from $2 – $100, to those 17 individuals, i want to thank you so very much for donating! what’s funny is that for several months donations were averaging about 1 per month and then BAM, this month there were 7 donations! =D this really shows me that you guys really do appreciate my efforts, and i appreciate it, and it helps immensely to help pay the site, and there’s still about $112 let that i set aside towards an HD camcorder, you guys are rockstars! i wanted to add a donation counter with the persons name on the site, but you guessed it, the add-on has a fee…sigh.

so what’s next?

man, there’s so much i want to do with the site, there’s still video conferencing that i want to include, which i think would be so much fun. there is also other avenues that i and pegasusmedia (the marketing company maintaining/handling the site) which would be the “next level”.

this will be a massive upgrade, think “facebook” on steroids, just for us! =D each of you would have your own “page” where you can IM, blog, get together to train, find others to train with, fast forums, chats, where YOU can also post videos, etc…i’m thinking of calling the community “Boxer Rebellion” where we get to be the rebels =D  it would be a place for all of us to share and grow! it’s a while off, as you can imagine but that’s where this site will be heading.

for now, i’m focusing on saving for the HD camcorder, which i think everyone will benefit from. And save enough extra to pay for a year of Vimeo Premium service to take advantage of the HD quality. also focusing on keeping those videos coming for everyone. at that time, i will also focus on starting the DVD series, and using the funds to help take the website to the “next level”.

how can you help me?

word of mouth, keep spreading the website to other folks who might be interested. click on those ads you see on my youtube videos once a day. it’s only a few dollars but every penny helps to get us there faster. keep practicing, keep improving and keep me posted on your progress because the better you get, the more it inspires me to keep going!

They say that “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” and that’s what this feels like, to me. a long journey ahead of us, but we’ve taken that first step.

take care and peace!

Jin

Do we as martial artists focus to much on the “martial” side of the coin and not the “artist” side?

i mean, think about it, we all train very hard and put in alot of effort, time and money for years to improve our fighting skills. but out of the millions of martial artists how many actually have to use it to defend their lives in the street or the life of someone else? i’m not talking about “defending your ego” fights over spilled beer. i’m talking about someone ready to kill you, literally. maybe less than 1% of all martial artists in the world will ever have to face that situation.

so why do we train so hard and spend so much money for? this is a question i keep asking myself. and i think it’s an important one.

so many people think that if you compete in the ring and do tons of sparring, you are “tough”. but you wanna know who IMO are tougher? the father trying to raise a good family in a tough economy, or the single mother that has to work three jobs to support her children. now these guys are tough! why do i say this? because ultimately, it’s “life” that will be our ultimate arena, it’s “ourselves” that will be our greatest opponent.

and that’s why i personally train so hard and spend lots of money on instruction and have been doing it for so long. to learn “how” to get through life without meeting force with force. so that when life comes at you hard, you have the training to get through it and continue on the journey.

this leads me to another question, why is it that every martial arts school has a “written” guide to the “martial” side of progressing from basic to high level or white belt to black belt as an example, but nobody has a “written” guide for the “artist” side? IMO this has to do with focusing too much on “technique” and the “if you do this, then i do that” mentality, which IMO is detrimental to a martial artist. but if you focus on the “concepts” and the “why” each and every movement works, then you are teaching yourself the “guide” to getting through life, such as “go straight”, if you meet an obstacle don’t meet it with force, go around it but always go straight, stay flexible but always go straight, this leads to traveling far on your journey.

i strive every day to be a “martial ARTIST” and not a “MARTIAL artist”, because eventually when all of us get to the “top of the mountain”, the view is the same for everyone.

take care and peace!

Jin

I get this question so much that i thought i would just answer it here. Where should someone who just joined my tutorial start?

start with the siu nim tau form and make sure to view all three parts of the video. this will give you a very basic idea of not only the movements but some of the core concepts.

you should do the form as slow as humanly possible, this will cause you to focus and control your mind from drifting off and also will begin your investigation of your body, where do you feel tension? how do i relax my shoulders? why do my knees hurt? etc…this will give you a place to start. in other words, you have to know the “question” before you seek the “answer”. yea, i know, i sound like a fortune cookie..lol.

once the movements start to become comfortable, now is when you should take a look at all the “concepts” category of the tutorial. this is the “heart” of what probably makes me different from many other instructors. so take advantage of it and grow.

take one concept video such as “turning off the shoulders” and then go back to the form and apply the concept. keep exploring your body with your mind, see if you can conquer that concept. then go back to the videos and pick another concept then return back to the form. if you keep doing this, you will build the “body structure” that is necessary for the wing chun method that i teach to work. this will also build a strong “foundation”.

this is how i teach my students, at the start of each class, we do the forms together, focusing on “one idea”, one concept. each time something different, this helps to build “quality” in the movements. and forces your learning to become “deep knowledge” and not “wide knowledge”.

the forms hold all the “keys” and it’s up to all of us to not expect our instructors to “spoon feed” them to us, but rather for us to be proactive and seek them out for ourselves.

Jin

Wanted to let anyone know who lives near Albuquerque, New Mexico and is looking for a great Wing Chun instructor to go visit Master Romero’s school. He’s a long time student of Hawkins Cheung. I highly recommend him. Not only is he a great teacher but also a great person!

You can visit his website at www.RomeroWingChun.com

for those that can’t see the “math equation” in order to post or reply in the “forum”, left click to the left of the box. The equation font is white for some reason which matches the background, that’s why it can’t be seen for many of you. We’ll get it fixed soon. But in the meantime just “highlight” to the left of the box and you will see the math problem. peace!

the old “contact” function at the top was not working properly and my “reply” to your questions were not properly sent.

the new “contact” function now works properly. so if you sent me a question feel free to resend them so i can address them. peace!

What do you feel is the most important concept or principle in Wing Chun? This is a tough question but if you could only pick one, which would it be and why?

Took me all week to build the forum, i encourage everyone to go and “introduce yourself” to everyone by clicking on the “forum” tag at the top of the website.   – Jin