Training Gear Requirements for Students of The Four Gates

As you progress through the curriculum at the Four Gates School of Chinese Martial Arts, you will need to acquire several items in order to participate.  While borrowing a piece of training equipment on occasion is perfectly acceptable, the following items must be owned by the student in order to progress.

• To promote to White Sash you will need a full formal school uniform.
• To promote to Yellow Sash you will need a full set of approved sparring gear.
• To promote to High Yellow Sash you will need a Chinese waxwood staff.
• To promote to Orange Sash there are no new gear requirements.
• To promote to  Green Sash you will need a set of Butterfly Swords.
• To promote to High Green Sash there are no new gear requirements, although this is a good time to check the serviceability of gear you have had for a while, and repair or replace as necessary.
• To promote to Purple Sash you will need a broadsword.
• To promote to Red Sash you will need a spear.
• to promote to High Red Sash you will need a Pu Dao
• Requirements beyond Black Sash will be discussed with candidates for Black Sash testing.

All gear is to be purchased from the school or through specifically approved suppliers to ensure the uniformity of equipment and the safety of our students.  While a student will not be held back from promoting if they do not have the above listed items, they may not be able to participate in learning new material once they have earned their new sash if the do not have the proper items.  To purchase equipment, or to get more information on the required list of training supplies, please ask any staff member.

Tournament Participation

On Sunday, June 3rd, students of the Four Gates school will be participating in the East Coast Summer Open Karate Championship at the Freeport Recreation Center.   Tournaments serve as an important and exciting tool in the education of our up and coming warriors.  Participants learn how to defeat the stresses of performing under pressure, how to push themselves to higher levels of performance, and even how to deal with defeat with grace and positivity (remember, it is never about the trophy, and always about having fun while learning and building relationships).  In addition to all that a student gets out of participating in martial arts tournaments, the student also gives back to his school and instructor by representing them at the tournament.  A teacher is judged by his students, and when a student shows courage, determination, and good sportsmanship, the school is shown in a positive light amongst its peers.

For many of you, this will be your first tournament, and you may be wondering what to expect.  At this particular tournament, there are four main divisions in which you can compete.  Divisions are separated by age and experience, so the playing field is kept fairly even, allowing judges to better gauge a martial artist’s abilities against those of similar size, strength and maturity.  The first division is for forms demonstration, during which each competitor gets the chance to show off his or her moves for the judges.  The second division is for weapons demonstration, and is (obviously) for those students who have already begun training with traditional weapons (shotguns are discouraged).  Next, competitors may demonstrate their 3 favorite self defense techniques.  And finally, the point sparring division.

Each division has its own set of requirements.  To compete in forms, a student must have perfected their techniques, as well as practiced their opening speech. This speech can be as simple as wishing the judges a good day, announcing your name, the name of your school and instructor and asking for permission to begin.  To compete in a weapons division, the student must own whichever weapon they are demonstrating that day.  To compete in the self defense division, the competitor is required to bring a partner of similar size and age on whom to demonstrate.  Students competing in the point sparring division must have a full set of approved sparring gear.

While I always encourage students to attend as a spectator before joining as a competitor, I also believe that a student who truly wants to compete should be supported in the endeavor; so any of you beginners who feel ready, feel free to join in. I suggest that first timers participate in a forms division this time around, then watch closely everything that goes on around them.  After they have survived the first day, the sky is the limit; an avid martial arts competitor can easily find a tournament a week to attend, both locally and across the world.  Competitor ranking is available, meaning that each time you place in a tournament you gain points, which are compared against other local, regional and national competitors as a way to rank overall standings.  If you would like to enter this world of competitive martial arts, ask your instructor for more information, and don’t forget to visit www.NYTournamenst.com for the latest on our local tournament scene!

The Words We Use: Ping An

“Ping An.” Members of the Shaolin Kung Fu Studios lineage, of which we of the Four Gates school are a part, say it when we greet our Teacher, when we enter or exit the Guan, and when we begin a form.  What does this magical phrase mean?  The character for “Ping” represents exhalation combined with the character for separation.  Thus, we are using our exhalation (qi) to create a vibration (or word) designed to separate things from one another. The character for “An” represents a woman under a roof.  Many characters in Chinese can be broken into smaller parts that tell us stories which help us better understand the meaning of that character as a whole, and this one brings out the fact that a woman who has a home is a happy and peaceful woman (as opposed to a bitter spinster who was never married off and must remain under her parent’s roof rather than her own).  So, our intent and vibration (ping) must bring about peace and tranquility (an).

One of the great paradoxes of Shaolin martial arts is the seeming opposition of following the pacifist teachings of the Dharma while simultaneously training to potentially take a life through our kung fu skills.  In order to *separate* out the lessons of love from the violence of the training, we must always be mindful of what it is we are doing and why.  So when we use the phrase PING AN mindfully, we are submitting to the universe that we have separated the lesson (love) from the manner in which it was taught (violence).  We are, in essence, both acknowledging the peace for which we strive and ask forgiveness for breaking that same peace as we try to better understand it.  In addition, we must leave the training hall in a more peaceful state than when we arrived, so we wish peace upon the room as we exit that others will not be swayed by any violent energy left in the area.  So next time you meet one of your training brothers or sisters, greet them with a wish for peace and tranquility in their lives… greet them by saying (and meaning) “Ping An!”

Ping An

 

 

Alyssa Meets a Ninja

Today, my student Alyssa Evans, age 7, who has a Yellow Sash in Shaolin Lohan Kung Fu, had the chance to attend a birthday party at another martial arts school.  Alyssa’s friend Marissa B. studies the Japanese style of Ninjutsu at my friend Kyoshi Allie Alberigo’s L.I. Ninjutsu Centers.  Alyssa had a great time and was excited to meet some real Ninja, since we talk about them all the time in class (Read about our Ninja story HERE). Alyssa had this to say about her experience:

“One way that Ninjutsu is different from Kung Fu is that you stand a different way in horse stance.  The difference is that in Ninjutsu, your hands go by the sides of your chest and in Kung Fu we keep our hands up.

One thing we did in the Ninjutsu class that was the same as in Kung Fu was the punches and the kicks.

My favorite thing about the Ninjutsu party was spending time with my friends.”

In the old days, students and instructors from different schools did not always get along, and many stories were told of their rivalries.  In modern times, we have learned to all get along, and the martial arts has flourished because of it.  I would like to say thank you to Kyoshi Allie for the great experience his instructors provided for Alyssa, and I hope that our students both benefit from the relationships they form through such activities.

Sifu Mike with Alyssa

The Enlightenment of Hui Neng

One day the Fifth Patriarch assembled all his disciples and said to them, “Go and seek for Wisdom in your own mind and then write me a stanza about it. He who understands what the Essence of Mind is will be given the Robe and the Dharma, and I shall make him the Sixth Patriarch. Go away quickly. Delay not in writing the stanza, as deliberation is quite unnecessary and of no use. The man who has realized the Essence of Mind can speak of it at once.”

Having received this instruction, the disciples withdrew, but none dared to write a stanza, as they all deferred to the head instructor Shen Hsiu… At 12 o’clock that night Shen Hsiu went secretly with a lamp to write his stanza on the wall of the south corridor, so that the Patriarch might know what spiritual insight he had attained. The stanza read,

Our body is the Bodhi tree,
And our mind a mirror bright,
Carefully we wipe them hour by hour,
And let no dust alight.

…When the Patriarch saw the stanza the next morning, he instructed that it be read and recited by all the disciples, so that they might realize the Essence of Mind. At midnight he sent for Shen Hsiu to come to the hall, and asked him if the stanza was written by him or not. “It was, Sir,” replied Shen Hsiu. “I dare not be so vain as to expect to get the Patriarchate, but I wish Your Holiness would kindly tell me whether my stanza shows the least grain of wisdom.” “Your stanza,” replied the Patriarch, “shows that you have not yet realized the Essence of Mind. So far you have reached the ‘door of enlightenment,’ but you have not yet entered it. To seek for supreme enlightenment with such an understanding as yours can hardly be successful… You had better go back to think it over again for a couple of days, and submit to me another stanza.”

I [Hui Neng] was pounding rice when I heard a young boy reciting the stanza written by Shen Hsiu… I asked him to lead me to the hall and show me the stanza. A petty officer who happened to be there read it out to me. When he had finished reading, I told him that I had also composed a stanza, and asked him to write it on the wall. “Don’t despise a beginner,” I said. “You should know that the lowest class may have the sharpest wit, while the highest may be in want of intelligence. If you slight others, you commit a very great sin.” I dictated my stanza, which read,

There is no Bodhi tree,
Nor stand of a mirror bright.
Since all is void,
Where can the dust alight?

When he had written this, the crowd of disciples was overwhelmed with amazement, but the Patriarch rubbed off the stanza with his shoe, lest jealous ones should do me injury. The next night he invited me secretly to his room, and expounded the Diamond Sutra to me. When he came to the sentence, “One should use one’s mind in such a way that it will be free from any attachment,” I at once became thoroughly enlightened, and realized that all things in the universe are the Essence of Mind itself. “Who would have thought,” I said to the Patriarch, “that the Essence of Mind is intrinsically pure!…” Thus, to the knowledge of no one, the Dharma was transmitted to me at midnight, and I became the Sixth Patriarch.

~From the Platform Sutra of Hui Neng.  Hui Neng was a laborer, uneducated and illiterate, yet he rose to enlightenment and became the 6th Patriarch of Chan Buddhism.