Ryukyu Ronin and other excerpts from my book

*Warning-My uncensored take on things. Also, if you are sensitive and your feelings are easily hurt, you sound like a bitch-don't read my blog.
Caveat Emptor-Let the buyer beware, my book  excerpts and this  blog are worth exactly what you paid for them.

Chapter Three-Ryukyu Ronin 
I began training in Ryukyu Kempo in 1986 with Kyoshi Greg Lindquist. I started training at Ryukyu Kempo Headquarters in 1990 and continued training there  until 2007. I am still very active, still training. I will never stop working on the things my teacher  taught me.

 My teacher is gone.  I will never  acknowledge  anyone as his equal.
There is nobody remotely close to his skill level and depth of knowledge and
there is nobody else that I would be willing to follow as a true Master. We were all fortunate to train with a living legend, perhaps the last real Master of Ryukyu Kempo. I will spend the rest of my life trying to polish and perfect what he taught me.

Japanese characters/Kanji for Ronin- Literally “wave man” a man adrift, tossed by waves,  a masterless samurai. There is a small group of serious martial artists I am currently training with.This is the symbol we have chosen for ourselves, worn proudly on the backs of the shirts we designed. We have no problem standing alone, or being outside of a group.
Ultimately we all must be able to stand alone with our martial arts.
We are constantly studying and refining kata, weapons, Tuite, Kyusho and tying different techniques together. It is pretty interesting so far. We spend a lot of time polishing certain kata and specific  life protection techniques.There is no rank,no egos, no money involved and there are no politics. It is a wonderful thing and I am perfectly happy.

To me, this is how martial arts training should be.
This is nothing but pure martial arts training, working on what we choose.

After all these years of training, I can stand alone, I don’t need anybody to hold my hand.
I have no interest in training with large groups of people, especially a group full of people who don’t like each other. I am only interested in drama free martial arts training.
I do not have the time or patience anymore to deal with other people’s  bullshit.
It sounds bad to say I don’t care, but the reality is, I just don’t care-save the drama for your mama.


The martial arts I learned from my teacher are enough to keep me busy for the 
rest of my life. Until I find my teacher's equal, I do not feel compelled to listen to
anyone else tell me how to train, do kata or technique.
You do things your way and I will do things the way my teacher showed me.
My loyalty begins and ends with my teacher.

At this point, I am more concerned with training  and passing on the Master’s teachings to a few  worthy individuals than I am  about belts, money , who is better than the other guy, who did what, who said what……..does it really matter any more ? Any of that crap? It sure as hell doesn’t matter to me.

I feel our teacher challenged us on many levels-to be better people, to be honest, fair, to persevere and most importantly : to find the right individuals to train with and teach.
I feel like I owe that much to my teacher- for all the time he invested in me, for trusting me,  yelling at me,correcting me and for sharing his life protection techniques.
The Master stated to me many  times I  only needed to have 2-3 serious students,not to worry about having a martial arts school but to have the right individuals, decent people with  good, strong character, to train with and teach.I could not agree with him more.

My teacher  gave me his permission on several separate occasions to have some private students-that is all the permission I will ever need to train people,I asked for and received my teachers permission and blessing.

Let me be perfectly clear about something:
I will always  work on kata and techniques the way my teacher showed me. 
I will also take his ideas about kata, body mechanics, technical applications
of life protection techniques and add to them, expand and build on these ideas.

Something I have noticed over the years is how many martial arts
practitioners want everyone to do things their way, often trying to
dictate kata, exercises and technical applications to their own standards and
 ideas and trying to tell you this is the only way they can be done correctly.

I have a problem with this and so should any other intelligent, free
thinking martial artist.You cannot put martial arts into one box and
say "this is it, this is the only way we can do  it".
Does anyone else see how ludicrous this is? Yet in every group or
association there are people doing this every day, saying this is the
 only way it can be done or if you didn't get NaihanchI 7 Office, 
the latest updated version, you cannot do or understand Taika's
martial arts. This is complete and utter bullshit.

Don’t be offended if I don’t want to do a kata or exercise or technique  the way you think it should be done.Or if you choose to be offended, it’s your problem, not mine.
I stood in front of the Master  almost every week  for 17 years, being fixed, corrected, yelled at and cross-examined. I spent hundreds, actually a couple thousand  hours training 3 feet away from him, with him watching my every move. I know what he wanted and how he wanted it done.  Generally because he was in my face telling me.
So I wouldn’t forget or misremember, I  wrote it all down, every night after every class.

I also have an interesting memory that is pain based, I never forget a beating or a particularly painful technique.Like many others, I graduated  from Ryukyu University with a degree in hard knocks.

The world is full of people claiming to be students of the Master. I know most of the
people who trained for many years with him.

I wonder how many people claiming to be students of the Master  can honestly say the same thing? That they spent years training in front of/with  a martial arts legend every week.
That they had a close, personal relationship with a martial arts master. I know how lucky I am.
Does any of  this make me great? Hardly, but I worked my ass off,took my lumps, paid my dues and learned  many things over the years from my teacher.

Years ago I was obsessed with getting a black belt from the Master. Once I received this from him, I realized how much more I had to learn and quit worrying as much about belts/rank.
I never asked to test or asked for rank. I waited for it.
It was enough for me that I was training with an Okinawan karate master.
I figured when my teacher felt I  I was ready, I would be tested. Belts and titles mean very little to me at this point, whether it’s my own or someone else’s.

Can you defend yourself and your family? Protect your life and the lives of the people that matter the most to you? That is what’s real, that’s what we should all be training for. That’s all that really matters in the end. I don’t care  how pretty  your weapons katas are, how many katas and exercises you know, how pretty your little  calligraphy is, how good you look in your uniform,how many belts you have, who gave you what title. Do you train hard? Do you have good life protection techniques? Can you put people down quickly?
This is real martial arts, not a social club or fraternity-you better be able to fight when you have to or you are truly pissing in the wind. 
 
 Delusions of Grandeur-Over the years of my training, there have been many people  who seemed to believe they were going to be the one to get a Menkyo from Taika .
( A Menkyo kaiden is a scroll or certificate given  to the person that will assume the leadership position of a martial arts system and has the rights to teach that system). I wish I had  5 dollars for every time someone told me how great they or their teacher are and how he would go on to take his place when he retired. Heard this one a lot.
I have heard multiple people over the years say  they or someone else  were his best or most special student, that he had chosen them as The One. (I believe delusions of grandeur are a classical symptom defined in the manic state of bipolar disorder and also present in  schizophrenia).
I have heard many people over the years stating  that they or their instructor were going to be handed the keys to the kingdom.That they were the Master’s right hand man and would take over after he was gone.

The only living person that has an actual certificate and teaching license
in their possession is my first instructor, Tasshi Greg Lindquist.  Tasshi Lindquist is the only living recipient of a nin te sho certificate, publicly awarded to him by the Master. This certificate gives Tasshi Lindquist full rights and responsibility to teach the public and private family art of our teacher, as well as evaluate and award rank and titles in his art.

If anybody else  had been given one, it would be shouted from the rooftops , would be all over the Internet and message boards and the subject of martial arts gossip the world over.
Had this ever happened,  we would have heard about
people’s heads exploding, martial artists throwing themselves on the ground, kicking and screaming- having tantrums and weeping openly in public. We would certainly hear of some holding their breath until they get one , with some actually turning green and dying from envy  and frustration.
Or perhaps I am wrong, according to all the people I have heard speak of this, there must be several floating around-who knows, maybe everybody but me received one. Maybe there are hundreds. As our teacher would say “I don’t think so”.

I stepped back from organized training  in 2007 for a variety of reasons, but  spending more time with my family,especially my son, was certainly on my mind.  Nothing in my life is more important to me than my  family. I was also tired of the grind, politics and just tired of some people in general. There are no bad feelings, just a general discontent with the status quo.

It was around this time that a fellow practitioner made a rather interesting observation:
He said he thought the Master had taught us 95% of what he was going  to.
At the time, it certainly  seemed that he was correct-we were not doing a lot of Tuite or Kyusho or much technique in general. We were doing a lot of exercises, footwork……….etc.
All of it was very relevant, but not very satisfying.
I felt that we were not working on the things I really wanted to do.

Chapter Ten-Pain is Weakness Leaving Your Body

" From life's school of war, that which does not kill me, makes me stronger"-Friedrich Nietzsche

Bogu Kumite-
Bogu/full contact fighting is only one aspect of Taika's art, but a very important
one that should never be neglected.We did a lot of bogu fighting in those days.
Our instructors would throw the beginners in with the advanced students-
It was painful, you got your ass handed to you repeatedly.
I'm still not convinced it builds character, but it will toughen you up, make you mean.

You learn quickly to keep your hands up, how to block  powerful kicks and punches  and the importance of moving to your opponents weak side.
You also learn what it feels like when people are trying very hard to knock you out and
kick your ribs in.

There are two kinds of people in this martial arts world:
Those who do bogu fighting and really like it and those who try it and never want to do it again.
*If you  don’t want to get hit or kicked, maybe you should find and practice a martial art that is not based on striking and kicking techniques. Perhaps you should look for a hobby that doesn’t involve hard work or pain.Try sewing, macrame, basket weaving, finger puppets, finger painting or kite flying . Excuse me-I digress.

Bogu fighting hurts-it is an exercise in pain , but it teaches you to fight, to respond, to accept the pain and continue fighting. Life is a test and what better test than to  fight someone trying very hard  to knock you out, to physically  hurt you.
I loved bogu fighting then and I love it to this day- a chance to hit people,  hit and kick them as hard as you can and not get into trouble/thrown in jail ? Sign me up.

I had been training for several months, working on basics/ exercises and the first katas.
Aside from Bogu fighting and endless kata training, we did a lot of heavy bag training, shield training, suburito drills (wooden sword) lots of tuite/grappling  and makiwara.

*Makiwara-just a quick word on this, please allow me  a moment  to vent- I have been listening to people bitch and moan about makiwara training for years. A lot of people don’t like Makiwara. A lot of people are also lazy, weak  crybabies.
(This is too hard, ow-that hurts) If you are too much of a pussy to hit a makiwara, then don’t  hit a Makiwara. Nobody  cares!  
There are  different types of makiwara, this is the one I prefer. A thick, wrapped bundle of rice rope attached tightly to a thick  board.

I Hate Crybabies! This is what I see in my mind when I hear  people complaining.
*I don’t want to Bogu fight, it hurts when I get hit- I don’t like to hit the Makiwara, it hurts my  little  hands and makes me cry”. Our teacher  would say ”Like doodle (little) baby”.

If you want to have the punch technique of a schoolgirl, by all means,
don’t ever do any heavy bag work, makiwara or hand/arm conditioning.

Pictured below-Okinawan karate legend Choki Motobu working  technique on Makiwara.
These photos are public domain in the United States

Okinawan martial artists are well  known for their striking techniques, particularly the penetrating
power of their punches, as well as specific knuckle, finger and thumb strikes.

Shigeru Nakamura and Choki Motobu were legendary for their punching technique and power
and well known use of the makiwara. My teacher is equally  legendary for his punching technique and power and well known use of makiwara.
Do you see a pattern forming here? I sure as hell do.
When I first trained with the Master  at the 23rd Street Headquarters, guess what lined the walls-Makiwara!
Guess what we trained on under the direction of our teacher? Makiwara!
I may not be a genius, but  there must have been some reason for this. At the 23rd Street Headquarters I saw the Master hit a makiwara, drive it to the wall and hold it like there like  it was nothing. For the record, I never saw anybody else come halfway close to duplicating that feat, on the type of makiwara we were training with. As hard as I tried,I could never duplicate this feat.
Like everything else we do, there is an art to training with Makiwara. If you are simply punching a Makiwara to toughen up your knuckles/hands, you are only scratching the surface.

I know our teacher stated in his later years it wasn’t necessary, but I will keep my thoughts on that to myself.
I would ask this: How did they (Motobu, Nakamura, Taika) learn to strike so effectively when they were younger? How did our teacher have such a devastating,penetrating  punch technique?  HMMMM………..I am sensing a pattern here.

Some people say makiwara  is mindless, punishment training. I would respond to these people to please  try and take a  punch from someone that has been using a makiwara correctly for years-they will knock your dick in the dirt !   Most Okinawan systems and martial artists still use makiwara. We just have to hit you well one time.

In my home training area,  my personal torture devices include a 250 pound heavy bag I work out on, a Wing Chun dummy, 2 Makiwara and a thick canvas bag filled with 10,000 steel BB’s for iron palm, finger  and hand conditioning. I have been doing this sort of training and  conditioning since 1986.I know all of this training works for me.

The last time I struck somebody in the body with real intent, (they deserved it) it felt like I was hitting a soft bag of water, the effects were immediate and extremely effective. It all comes down to your personal choice and what is packed in your sack.(I have 3 large testicles in mine) Do what you want to, I choose to train on a makiwara.
End of sermon.

“You can only fight the way you practice”-Miyamoto Musashi

My Journey Through Ryukyu Kempo: Training with the Master

                                                           By Brad Hatfield

I humbly dedicate this  book  to my teacher.
He was not only a teacher, he was a  mentor and my friend.  I miss his lessons and the wisdom he shared.I  miss his  sense of humor as much as anything- his jokes and his expressions.(I tell now, I kick ass...etc)  When I got to know him really well, I used to joke with him and tell him he was the abusive grandfather I never had.


I think about the Master every day of my life. I honestly thought he would  live to be one-hundred years old.He beat the odds so many times and survived so much hardship in his life, I began to suspect he would outlive most of us.Sadly, this was not to be. I try very hard to remember everything he taught me. I have always held my teacher and his art in the highest regard.

Now that he is gone, his students will write his legacy by their conduct and actions.

What one man builds in his lifetime, others can destroy in a short period of time.
It is easy to destroy something beautiful and unique, any fool can do it.
Things as intangible and tenuous  as honor or ethics can be undone in a moment’s time.

I have not been directly involved with my teacher’s  Association for several years, but that does not change anything for me.
I never stopped training or working on things my teacher  taught me.
I have a never ending responsibility to my teacher. Not just in martial arts, but in everything
I do. How I conduct myself in my daily affairs, how I live my life and treat people in business and personal relationships.Everything I do and say is a reflection  on my teacher and his legacy.As a personal student , I hold myself to his  high standards-I never want to do anything to betray his trust or undermine his reputation.

Lighten Up-I like to laugh, to find the humor in things that might not seem funny to others.
If this offends you,too goddamn bad!  It’s my book, if you don’t like it, write a book about how much you hate my book.

Life is  short and we all experience pain and suffering-let’s call it the the human condition.
You better take the time to grab whatever happiness you can and enjoy a few laughs whenever you can get them.
You can’t enjoy life with a stick up your ass. (Yes-you can quote me on that).
One thing I have noticed and something that has bothered me over the years is how seriously American  martial artists take themselves-Yes, training is serious business and of a serious nature, but if you are such a rigid tight ass that you can’t laugh at yourself or find the humor in things, I really  feel sorry for you.
I learned this from the Master , he was deadly serious when we were training intensely, but he always found a way to interject his irreverent humor at some point during our training sessions.

He taught us to laugh at ourselves and everybody else. He made fun of everybody equally.
That might be the quality that bound me to my teacher the most.

“It’s always funny until someone gets hurt, then it’s hilarious-Bill Hicks

A quick thank you to all my detractors-
I have  had people underestimate me many times throughout  my life.
I’m not sure if it is because I am short and generally good natured or for some other reason.
Nothing makes me happier or causes me to laugh harder then when someone decides I will be easy to beat, I’m not strong enough, my technique  isn’t very good or whatever else they decide.
Nothing feeds my inner fire, my will and my determination more than my detractors.
I am going to take this opportunity to thank anyone who ever doubted me- To those who thought I wasn’t strong enough, would give up, was too short, too young, too old, too nice…………..To all of you talking smack, misjudging, underestimating-Thank You!
You gave me the fuel to succeed, you helped me! I take that negativity and use it to forge my inner and outer strength, my will,my determination and  my technique.
Keep it up ! Keep doubting me, my will, my strength or my resolve. You are helping me
gather and build my strength. I used all that negative energy, along with my positive energy,  to become a 7th degree Black Belt training as a personal student of an Okinawan karate legend.

I am recalling all of this as truthfully from my memory as possible. I am simply a guy from Kansas who loves Okinawan martial arts and was fortunate enough to train with a  genuine  Okinawan Karate Master. I  feel very lucky that I was able to train with him on a weekly basis for 17 years. I have a story to tell if anybody is interested.

“What the ancients called a clever fighter is one who not only wins, but excels in winning with ease”
Sun Tzu-The Art of War.

Chapter One

About My Teacher-
The world is a little bit  darker place without our teacher. We all miss his spirit, his mischievousness/humor, wisdom and his incredible technique. There are times in our life when we meet someone, a person so unique, so different, unlike anyone you have ever experienced before- A truly original human being.This was certainly one of those times.

To me , Taika  always seemed larger than life, like he was semi-immortal or hewn from a block of Oak wood-immovable, indestructible. If you were ever on the receiving end of one of his punches, it felt like his fist was a block of Oak wood, or his arm was a  tree trunk when he hit you. Even when he patted you on the shoulder or back, just the weight of his hand felt like a heavy piece of wood,  or a brick hitting you.

In my mind, he was slightly more than human in his abilities, he was always 2-3 moves ahead of whatever his opponent was doing. I have never seen anyone duplicate his technique at the same level and really don’t believe anyone ever will.
I saw him do so many amazing things, too many to mention at the beginning of a book.
He had a magnetism, a charisma or energy I have felt from very few others,  a sort of personal electricity.

I sometimes thought our teacher was hard on people, but also understood why he had good reason to be.You were a representative of his art, his “face”. As his student,everything you did and said was a reflection on him. He was tough but he was also very fair.
I would not have the same respect and feeling for him if he had been a  completely laid back, easygoing  guy. What made our teacher great was he never pretended to be anything he wasn’t- I  have never met anybody that was a better judge of human character, he  truly understood  human nature.

“You want easy teach, I no easy teach”-Taika

He did not like people who were “wishy-washy”-Either do it or don’t, there was no middle groundwith him.You had to be committed. I watched the uncommitted fall by the wayside, year after year. I trained with hundreds of people at different schools and Headquarters over the years- very few of those people are still training   25+ years later.

In my opinion, the good teachers hammer you-they push you, press down on you, they throw everything they have at you-They are waiting for the moments when you rise up, when you take everything they throw at you and come back for more, when they know you will never give up.This is not only martial arts, this is a  life lesson for all of us.

Some people can’t take the pressure,being constantly corrected, kata and exercises always changing, being pushed to train harder, try harder.
Real martial arts training is a long, frustrating and sometimes tedious process.
You have to check your ego and your preconceived ideas at the door-especially when you were training with a real Master. When you thought you had mastered or figured out how to do something,he changed the timing or the motion or the footwork to another level.

There is a point in martial arts training where you have to decide- is this the direction I want to go with my life, is this the martial art I will devote myself to and most importantly-Is this the teacher I will follow?

During one training session, many  years ago  at headquarters, Taika  was yelling at me. I was trying to do something he had just shown us and it wasn’t right. He kept telling me I was doing it wrong.There were a lot of very loud “No’s” and “Goddammit’s”.
I finally told him I had to stop  for a minute, my brain was fried.  He was looking closely  at me and said-”you think I too hard on you, yell too much”?
I told him no, that’s what I expected, that he would correct me and bust my chops,
it was the only way I would ever get better. He said” this good answer, I can teach you, no problem”.

Our teacher   told us all many times over the years that if we did not believe him or agree with him the door was right over there. In fact, I think he told us this once a week or every class. Nobody I trained with ever took him up on that offer-I think we all knew how incredibly lucky we were.Over the years there were people that left of their own accord and others who were shown the door for different reasons.  I had enough faith in the Master to believe there was a very good reason for everything he did.

I believe everything was a test of some sort with our teacher- a test to see if you could do it,
a test to see if you would persevere and learn something or if you would give up on your own. Did you have  the willpower, the drive and strength to continue?
He never made anybody do anything, you either did it or you didn’t. Everything was a
personal test and challenge.He wanted you to get better and he had his ways to ensure it happened.

Our teacher never stopped training. He just got better over time.The way he did technique changed quite a bit over the years. There was a serious transition from hard style techniques to a much more fluid type of motion and application of technique as he got older.
What this meant to me : The Master was showing us how your martial arts stay relevant as you get older-i.e.  what I lose in power/speed, I make up for  with covering motion/reaction,body mechanics, timing and footwork. This was an extremely valuable lesson I have taken to heart. I am getting older, at 48 years old, I don’t train as  physically hard as I used to, but I definitely train smarter. Quality of technique over quantity, working on quick, efficient technique that does not expend too much energy. This is how one  should train as they get older, this is how we all keep our martial arts relevant as we age.

Power and speed are fleeting-you better have good footwork, covering motion and timing
when you get older. You must have the foundation and technical skills to defend  yourself
against younger, stronger opponents-good life protection techniques. You cannot expect to trade punches with a 25 year old when you are 55, it is not going to go well. Why would you want to? You might eventually win that way,but you are going to take a beating!
Train smarter as you get older, polish your technique and learn to control your opponent with minimum effort.

People who know me have asked me this question many times-Did you ever land a punch or get through Taika’s defense? I want to be absolutely honest with you. NO!!!!
I never, ever  got close to getting a hand on my teacher. Even when I was young, cocky and fast.I always tried  to punch, push or kick as fast as I could. I knew what was coming, the freight train of pain!
It did not matter what I tried to do, even when I feinted or tried to fake him out-he would grin as he pummeled you, appreciating your attempt yet still crushing you in an instant.

Training with the Master  was a truly humbling experience-by humbling I mean having your ass  publicly kicked ,badly,  by a man 35- 40 years older than you, he made it look so easy.
It takes a lot of wind out of your sails to be taken down effortlessly by someone old enough to be your grandfather. And brother, let me tell you, it was quick! You were on the ground in 2 seconds-no joke. As a young man, you begin to  develop an appreciation that there might be other older, more experienced martial artists than can do similar things to you.
You develop an awareness that there might be other people in general  that have trained longer than you or are just more skilled than you are.
Once you have taken a few beatings from someone who makes it look real easy, your perspective changes and everything begins to fall into place. You should stay very humble and keep your mouth shut.
Being around the Master every week  and having him work techniques on me kept me  very humble.I never lost that quality, I am still that way.

My teacher was so good, it was almost surreal to watch him doing techniques. There were moments I recall that time seemed almost suspended, like slow motion-sounds crazy to some I’m sure, but it is the truth from my perspective, somebody who saw it all unfolding
in front of him or on him.
From the first time I saw him knocking people out effortlessly and throwing them around  like rag dolls, my life was never the same. Something clicked and I knew I was in the presence of the truly gifted-a genuine martial arts Master.
For whatever reason, divine guidance, Fate or just luck-we were all able to share the wisdom, spirit, humor and incredible life protection techniques of a truly original human being.