The term
“Warrior” often arouses negative connotations here
in the West because of the root `war’. However, in the
eastern tradition a warrior represents ideals that are
opposed to war and violence.
It began in ancient
China where a “Chun Tze” (warrior) was a person who personified virtue,
protected the weak and innocent, and fought for justice. These goals were
accomplished through the use of intellect and leadership, and those who
resorted to violence were regarded to have failed the higher teachings.
Confucius adopted these ideals
and taught that everyone should aspire to become warriors. So benign was the
understanding of the word for warrior that it later became the word for
gentleman. Confucius taught that to become a gentleman/warrior one had to
practice one essential rule, “ As you wish others to treat you, so you must
treat others.”
A thousand years
after Confucius, the warrior ideal was adopted by the monks
at a Buddhist temple called ‘Little Forest’ on a
distant mountain in China. From that time until now the
“Way of the Warrior” was blended with the Buddhist
principle of non-violence, and surprisingly, medicine. Now a
warrior was required to be not only a master of martial
arts and a paragon of virtue, but also to practice humility, non-violence, and have a working knowledge of the body
and healing. Like Ancient Greece was the source of western
civilization, China’s cultural influence spread through
out Asia. The Japanese Samurai, the Korean Hwarang, and the
Okinawa Karate masters all adopted the traditions of the
gentleman/warrior.
It is thought
that by the age of six, a person’s key personality
traits have already been formed and these last into
adulthood. While many early childhood programs are aimed at
`downloading data’ into children, the Little Warrior
program draws upon the unique set of skills of the Eastern
warrior to teach kids to protect themselves from adult
predators, bullies, and gangs; to be alert, observant, and
cautious; to possess self-confidence, self-discipline and be
self-reliant, and to become both strong and kind. This is why
children should become warriors.
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“There are two basic instincts from
which we derive our survival concepts. These instincts
are present in information supplied by DNA and controlled
by the nucleotide sequences of our genes. They are most
certainly primordial, and predate even Cambrian life
forms. They are, simply, self-preservation and
reproductive. All living creatures as old as life itself
have these two instincts. They help keep us alive, make
us aware of predators or danger, and help us pass our
species adaptations to the next generation.”
From Primal Instinct, Speculation on the
five primal instincts and their effect on human behavior by
Mitch Bronston
Human children, like
animals, are born with certain survival instincts pre-wired.
The task is not to teach survival instincts (One cannot
‘teach’ an instinct) but to refine and enhance the
already existing survival instincts to reflect the dangers of
a modern urban society. How to accomplish this involves
another instinctive behavior, play.
- “Most sorts of
diversion in men, children and other animals, are
in imitation of fighting.”
- Jonathan Swift
Most of us are amused
watching the antics of kittens or puppies playing with each
other. The humorous chases and wrestling matches belie a more
sinister purpose. The playful antics are really a dress
rehearsal for the species survival instincts of stalking,
ambushing, and killing. In effect playing is practicing
survival. The kitten that chases the ball of yarn does not
make the connection between the ball of yarn and a mouse, nor
is it necessary for it to do so. Later, when more fully
grown, the movements of a mouse scurrying away will trigger
the instinct to chase, and having previously rehearsed the
physical movements through play, the cat increases its
chances of success, and thus survival.
Part of the solution
to teaching children street proofing was to design games that
mimic predatory behaviors to trigger survival skills. Games
that mimic the classic strategies of predators: stalking,
ambushing, and baiting (luring) and which molds instinctive
responses into a more practical survival behavior does not
require the child to understand the relationship between the
game and the sinister strategies of child predators. By
rehearsing predatory behaviors through game playing it is
hoped that a child’s survival response will be triggered
by similar behaviors encountered in real life and the
‘conditioned’ responses will increase the
child’s chances of survival.
This type of
instinctive rehearsal already occurs naturally in such games
as Hide and Seek. Hide and Seek is a reenactment of the
primordial instinct to avoid predators by running away and
hiding. Our goal is to refine such responses slightly into a
more urban-centric instinct such as run away and find safety
by looking for crowds of people, police officers, firemen, or
block parent homes.
The other benefit of
playing games to teach survival is that, like most skills,
repetition is the key to mastering them. Repeating a lesson
numerous times will cause habituation to the point where
further learning stops. But games can be played considerably
more often and maintain the same emotional involvement needed
to instill lessons and skills.
Also incorporated in
the Little Warrior program are lessons and activities that
teach such things as a code of honor, self-control, and an
understanding of anatomy and first aid. Although presented in
a way understandable to young children, these lessons provide
the important first steps into developing healthy,
well-balanced, and fully functional adults.
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Origins of the Little Warrior
I am a writer and martial arts
instructor. I had lived in China for four years studying martial arts
and when I returned to Canada I took a job as instructor for a large
martial arts school. They, like so many others, ran tot Karate
classes. Actually tot Karate classes are one of the schools biggest
moneymakers. I was not very impressed with the whole idea. I tend to
be a little conservative and I thought that teaching the noble art to
kids for money was wrong on two counts. Wrong because I believed one
needed a certain spiritual maturity to learn the martial arts and that
tots were just too young. And second they were charging parents good
money to basically spend an hour playing silly games that had nothing
to do with Karate.
Well then the crunch came. I
needed to make extra money, and the club was willing to pay me top
dollar to take over the tot class since the previous instructor quit.
Here was the classic dilemma, to sell out my ideals for money. Sure I
know, we all have to compromise our values now and then to earn a
living. But for me martial arts was the one area I thought was safe. I
would always teach and be true to the spirit and ideals of martial
arts even if the rest of the world is not so noble. Friends and fellow
instructors encouraged me to take it on but I refused. One said that I
was being a bit arrogant and I agreed, but I wasn’t going to be `Bozo
The Karate Clown’ for anyone and besides five year olds simply
couldn’t learn martial arts. He asked me. `Well if they could learn
what would you teach them?’
Well, first I would want them
to learn self-defense that would work on the streets. If a child
molester garbs a hold of them I don’t want them trying a ‘spinning
outside crescent kick’ or some such nonsense. I want them to drop,
kick, bite, scratch, yell, spit, claw, and throw anything they can get
they’re hands on. I want the molester to think he just grabbed onto a
rabid wolverine.
But before it comes to that I
want them to be smart, alert, aware, confident, and shrewd enough to
spot tricks.
Then I would want them to
learn about honor, truth, and commitment, so that they have a chance
of growing into decent honest adults.
“Well then that’s your
solution,” he said “Teach them just what you said and you wouldn’t be
compromising your ideals.”
And so we did. I had two
other adult black belts that would assist and we slowly tried to teach
the children the true spirit of martial arts. I did a lot of research,
reading, and consulting with other instructors, police officers, child
welfare workers, and schoolteachers. We experimented and came up with
our own exercises and drills. Some were failures but most were not and
after a year or so we had developed a whole program. And boy was I
wrong.
Not only were the kids able to
learn the self-defense moves but they also learned to have a sense of
honor, self-control, and focus. I wished some of my adult students had
the focus and dedication that these four, five, and six years old had.
The self-defense techniques we developed were as powerful as they’re
ever going to get for a small child. As evidence for their
effectiveness the instructors and I still have the bite marks and
scars to prove it and we learned to rely on the shin pads and gloves
when testing their escape techniques.
They learned to be shrewd,
too. We did a lot of role-playing games whereby the instructors, and
sometimes even some of parents and I, would try to trick the students
into various situations based on (unbeknownst to the children) typical
child predator lures. We might have tricked them the first time but
you couldn’t fool them twice. These kids are not likely ever to be
tricked into getting into someone’s car, or going somewhere with a
stranger because they have heard all the angles and they just won’t go
there.
Soon the class was a huge
success. The kids loved it, but especially the parents loved it,
because what we taught in class actually carried over into other areas
of their lives. We would hear about grades improving, rooms being kept
clean, siblings getting along better, eating habits improving, and
often they were no longer the victim of teasing and bullying at
school. The parents would tell me about what amazing feats their
children were accomplishing thanks to our program.
I believe that these children
have a much better chance of avoiding and surviving an encounter with
a child predator because of their training in this class. I also
believe they have an intellectual, emotional, and spiritual advantage
over those that have not gone through the program. I believe that
these kids have a far greater chance of surviving the travails of
adolescence and grow into what can simply be called good decent folks
and most importantly – not a statistic or a victim.
I created a student’s workbook
with my own illustrations that the kids could take home and read. Then
in response to the questions from parents on how I taught them, for
example, to keep their promise, or overcome their fear of dogs, I
wrote a manual for the parents on how to apply principles from martial
arts to teaching children responsibly, honesty and perseverance.
Most important of all was that
we had succeeded in applying the martial arts to do something of real
value and real good.
