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The Shukokai Tree Thank you for reading our very first of many blogs on Shukokai Karate, Its practices, history and philosophies and how to develop yourself. This blog section is for all of our members to use as a reference to help with their learning of Shukokai Karate and unlitmately to help their development on their Shukokai Karate journey. It’s wasn’t really a hard decision on what would be the best subject to start on for the first club blog. The following is something I have been reminded of in my training and my coaching over the years and it’s probably one of the most important philosophies to approach your Karate life with and everything else in life that you might work on to become the best version of yourself doing either Karate or something else possible. It’s quite easy for anyone to be stuck in their ways as far as Karate training goes. Some people love Kata and do nothing but that…. Others love Kumite (sparring) and do nothing but that…. Others will do combinations and do nothing but that… The list goes on and on. This is mainly down to one reason it’s what that individual feels is their best attribute of their Karate training but what happens is that the other parts of Karate which are just as important are forgotten about and makes the student become rusty or slow at certain techniques due to the lack or neglect of doing them in training. This is where the Shukokai tree analogy from Sensei Kimura comes in to play. Sensei Kimura once said to our clubs sensei to compare Karate to a tree with lots of branches. Karate itself as a whole is the base of the tree and every single branch from the base represents each element of Karate. Karate = BASE
As you can see each branch is more than capable of having branches within itself. An Example of this would be Branch = Sparring - Ippon Kumite - Sanbon Kumite - Jyu Kumite Now the problem as mentioned about above is that people like a particular branch and they stay within it. So for example if the branch they like is sparring then all of the other branches will be neglected or even worse forgotten about. To be the best Karate Ka (Karate practitioner) you can be you training by visiting a branch while always coming back to the base of the tree while never leaving yourself out on one branch and only doing that one particular thing while at the same time never coming back to the base of the tree to visit the other branches and develop that certain aspect of your Karate training. This is what leads to a lifetime of development in the Karate with an aim to always improve while be becoming a good all round Karate ka. It’s always important to look at the full picture of Karate to develop yourself. This is such an important point for everyone to remember when they are training is not to get stuck in a branch no matter what that branch is and how much you personally like it. Always go back to the base and visit another branch to keep sharp with technique, speed, power and control for that particular element of Shukokai Karate. This is a particular philosphy that we as a club do each week in classes or private training to make ourselves and all of our students the best and most complete they can be and to stick to values of what Shukokai Karate is about. So if you train in sparring one week practice Kata too. If you focus on Keri waza one week follow it up and combine it with self defence work. Personally the most important thing to remember with this is that as you grow in your Karate life and training and at the same time the tree grows with you and your development will never stop growing. If you like what you read feel free to share. Thanks for Reading. Sensei Steven Miller 5th Dan Shukokai Karate Club 
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