A2 The Show
Chris Hanson Reveals Tactical Combatives Training Secrets | A2 THE SHOW #527
In this episode, we welcome Sensei Chris Hanson, a martial artist with over 40 years of experience and founder of Karate Unity, based in Toronto, Canada. By blending traditional Karate with cross-training in combat sports and tactical combatives, Chris brings a fresh perspective. We discuss the benefits of cross-training, its role in self-defense, and how martial arts can be a tool for emotion regulation and personal peace. Chris also reflects on his deep respect for all martial arts and touches on classic films like Enter the Dragon and Jackie Chan's Big Brawl.
👉 Website: https://www.karateunity.ca/ 👉 Instagram: / karateunity 👉 For more information, please visit our website: https://a2theshow.com/a2-the-show/
⏰Timestamps: 00:00 - Introduction 05:05 – Concept of cross-training compared to diversifying one's diet 11:13 – Understanding threats like concealed weapons through specialist cross-training 15:00 – Tactical systems like Krav Maga and Systema 20:00 – Enhancing traditional martial arts with tactical combatives 25:10 – Connection between martial arts and peace 29:49 – Martial arts as an emotion-regulation tool 35:41 – Learning through sparring 41:16 – Respecting all martial arts 45:15 – Discussion on Enter the Dragon and Jackie Chan’s Big Brawl
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- Broadcast on:
- 20 Sep 2024
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- other
I was basically bullied when I was a kid. So I'm currently I'm 55. I started I started karate when I was 10. But prior prior to that, you know, I grew up here in Toronto, Toronto, Canada. In the late 60s, early 70s, racial climate was pretty pretty pretty high in terms of like lots of Asian hate, unfortunately. And yeah, I was the only, you know, picture day, right? You see, you see the one one yellow kid in the corner. And and that's me. And what's it? Yeah, it's getting bullied every day, you know, typical story, you know, getting pushed out, you know, bullied from everything from my lunch, what I eat, my parents to the clothes I wear to the things I write with, to you name it, man. And it takes a toll on you after a while, you know, and I didn't know what to do. I couldn't hide out at home and I couldn't hide out at recess. So, you know, my dad says, look, we're putting you into something that's going to get you stronger. So you're either going to, you have two choices. You got hockey, or you got this thing called karate. And I said, hockey, no, no, no, no. All the white guys are in hockey. I don't want to do that. Because those are the guys that were bullying me. You know what I mean? And so I said, okay, let me try something else, because I tried karate because I just wanted to escape. I didn't want to go to hockey. So, as soon as I walked in, man, to that club, I saw white people, yellow people, black people, Chinese people, skinny people, big people, small people, people who weren't sure about themselves. And then once I started talking to them, I started to see that they got similar problems than me. And oh, man, once the class started, I've never experienced anything like you before. It was like military. We're standing in line. People, this person in the front called sensei, calling out commands, we're doing stuff, sparring, doing these choreographed moves like kata and stuff. And I was taken in 10 minutes. And I didn't stop ever since, you know, and the journey continues. So, um, yeah, that's, uh, that's how I started. Yeah. That was a better intro than mine. Yeah. Do you prefer, um, the world being having that element of danger in it? Because that's what led you to karate, right? It led you to your passion. The fact that you were bullied, if you weren't in that situation, you wouldn't ever take in karate. That's right. Are you grateful for the bullies? 100% man. Um, you know, the more I first of all, kudos to you guys. You speak to a lot of people. So, it's really cool that, uh, you know, you see, uh, you get to see, I'm sure I'm going to ask you this. Isn't it true that every single person that you brought on your podcast has a story to say. They've got a struggle of some sort, right? Whether it's interpersonal, whether it's at work, whether it's political, right? So there's struggle. So yeah, man, um, struggles via bullying, via whatever. I mean, I wouldn't be, uh, who I am today. If it wasn't, it wasn't for that because, you know, I, I'm con continuously seeking empowerment and I'm giving that back to my, to my clients and to, uh, you know, the people that, that show up at, at my dojo here and, uh, at the seminar, uh, front. Um, and, you know, the people that do come, they all got something that they're dealing with, you know, a lot of people that come, come to me in particular, uh, karate is a, is a, is a funny place. It's, it's a lot like an organized religion, you know, unfortunately. Yeah, for real man, you know, um, these, these, these people are stuck in a box, uh, sometimes and they, when I, when I show them that, hey, I came from that box. I've got, I've got all those things that you're doing, but the only difference is there's the lid on my box is open and the sides fall down. So you're not in a box anymore. You're standing on the box, bro. You know what I mean? And, uh, you, you, you can be free by learning other things. And, you know, um, when I show them these things and show them the power of cross training, uh, they love it, you know, and, uh, I continuously get invites, you know, to different countries and stuff, but, uh, I'm holding back work because my, my day job is, uh, is a school teacher. Uh, I have a, a young daughter too. She's 12 and I'm married and, um, I'm busy man and I love training more than teaching, to be honest, but, uh, I, uh, I have to, I could say this, this seminar gig is, is a, is a retirement plan. So, um, that it's coming soon. I'll have, I'll have more time to travel the world, but man, I'm having a good time. I'm having a good time so far, you know? Love that. Tell us about cross training. What do you mean by cross training, like, different martial arts? Yeah. So, um, why would you do that? If you're, let me ask you a question, uh, what's your favorite food, man? Oh, Middle East. What do you like eating? Like, like, like, say a Friday night. You want to go out to eat. What's your favorite? What would you go to? Say it. I think, I think a nice, uh, sirloin steak would be nice. Oh, yeah. Sirloin steak. All right. I need that every single day though. Breakfast, lunch and dinner. You know what I mean? I think that's why there's only so much different sauces you're going to put on that thing, man. You know what I mean? Like it's cross training is like mixing things up. It's like, it's like you know, sampling and tasting different things, but, you know, if you want to use a food analogy, but, you know, from, from an educational, uh, you know, content delivery and learning paradigm, cross training is, is the ultimate way to learn. You know, once you learn a base art or, uh, something solid, you put in, like, say, maybe 10 years in, in a particular art, um, I think it's time to start looking at other arts so that you can explore your own art better, right? So for example, karate has, karate has striking. It's got stances. It's got all these moves inside the kata, but a lot of the time you don't get a chance to explore it deeply. Like some instructors think that they, that they're doing this, but they're doing themselves a disfavor sometimes because when you cross train, say a karate guy cross trains against an MMA fighter or a boxer or different styles, um, they don't do that often. And, and if, if they do, their system will shut down, right? So it's important to understand, say, for example, if you're going to be, uh, trying to improve your striking, why not go to the brain surgeon of strikers, such as a Muay Thai guy or a boxer, right? Or somebody who's doing full contact, uh, full contact, uh, fighting for a living, you know, or, or for a living as a coach even, um, because then you'll begin to see that particular skill set striking and, and dynamic mobility along with like, you know, good fight cardio and all that kind of stuff come alive. And, and so, you know, you don't have to, you don't have to like, like, uh, do that, uh, exclusively, but if you take a good deep dive into it and spend, spend some time, you know, with a striker, then you begin to see all these karate movements come out in your kata. Um, and then now, you know, a lot of karate guys claim that, you know, there's a, there's grappling in their karate. Well, there is, there's a lot of throw, throw type moves, but in order for the grappling to be, to be effective, go train with a grappler, go train with a wrestler, right? And so, you know, this type of thing is, is now called MMA. And, you know, and MMA is, is the way to go. And I'm telling you, MMA is evolved man, you know, um, and it's not just sport. It's, if you, like, I've traveled all over the place and, um, one of, one of, one of the clubs that I went to was, uh, tritac martial arts in, uh, in Connecticut. Um, he'd be a great guest to, to bring on your, on your podcast. Okay. Matt, Matt Breyers. Check him out. And if you're cool, you know, if you know him, great, if you don't, I'll hook you up. But, uh, thank you. I, um, I went over there and, you know, he, he, he has contracts with UFC. And so he, he teaches, uh, uh, sorry, he, he trains, uh, some, some fighters there. But his core curriculum is a mixed curriculum in terms of striking, grabbing, grappling, trapping, uh, clinch, um, from a sport perspective, but also self-defense, right? And, and so they train everything, right? Um, because fighting is dynamic. So, I mean, that's cross-training to me. Cross-training is, sorry, it was a long-winded answer, but, uh, cross-training is, is the, the art and science of studying other arts, specifically to grow your own art, you know? Um, and, uh, you know, you want to be the, the best jack of all trades, right? Uh, type of thing. Kind of like, uh, a general, you've got like a general practitioner as a doctor. Um, and that, but then, you know, uh, doctors, as part of the professional development, uh, they have to, uh, take PD, uh, classes and things and, and workshops with surgeons so that they can understand, you know, specific aspects of, uh, the human body experience, right? So it's the same thing, man. It just makes you a better doctor and it makes you a better martial artist, right? A winning cross-training. Yeah. Okay. And so does that mean it's better to do cross-training instead of become like a specialist in one type of martial art or, or the opposite, uh, which one should people aim for? I think it depends on what you want, but even the people who are specialists, they cross-train because, for example, I give an example, um, I, uh, shout out to Rise MMA. It's a club in Toronto. Uh, I, uh, it's a, a Japanese Jiu Jitsu club. Um, and they have a great gear, by the way, uh, but, but anyway, uh, uh, uh, Kelvin Chiang, he's the, uh, CEO of, and, and, uh, head, head coach of this place. Um, he's a Japanese Jiu Jitsu guy. Uh, he's immersed himself in, in JJJ, you know, and if you know, are you guys familiar with Japanese Jiu Jitsu? Is it similar to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu? Similar, similar. Yeah. So they've got, you know, they, they do spend time on the ground. Um, but they, they're more self-defense oriented. So they don't, they don't want to stay there. So they get up. Uh, so they learn how to crash. They learn joint manipulations. They're striking. Um, and, uh, but, but the point is, the point is if you just spend time just in grappling without understanding that you could be struck back. Uh, you could have a, a weapon deployed on you, you know, uh, at different ranges. If you're just, in isolation, just studying grappling, then you'll see that they're not aware of, say, a hand getting shoved into the pants to pull out a knife. They're not aware of that stuff because it just won't happen in that rule set, right? But, but it can cross train. If you cross train with people who train with knives, if you cross train with, with, uh, tactical combative instructors who are aware of multiple attacker scenarios, uh, people who are aware of different kinds of threats, like, you know, hidden, hidden, uh, concealed weapons and all this stuff, then you're, you're wrestling set. Your wrestling skill set is now just hyper focused now. Like you're, you're, you're looking, you're looking at your skill set from a 360 degree lens. And that just made you a better fighter man. You know what I mean? And what's, what kind of martial arts would be best for learning how this, this tactical combat awareness or how to like disarm someone with a weapon. Um, if you're being a, or like being in those situations where, you know, you're in the street, maybe, and you're getting attacked by someone from anywhere, you know, like those people with a knife, people with a gun, what, what kind of martial arts would you recommend? Well, that's a, that's a great question. Just like, just like a, just like a grappler would specialize, grappling arts would specialize and say, uh, you know, you have Greco Roman, you've got BJJ, you got Judo, you got Sambo and all these kinds of things. Um, Japanese Jitsu, um, tactical combatives is, is a big, uh, it's a big content, it's, it's a big subject. So, um, there are specialists in that area. So there are specialist styles. For example, you probably heard of them. A commercial one is Krav Maga, Krav Maga, Systema, right? Uh, Russian Special Forces, uh, type of systems there. Um, pretty much, you know, uh, military special op, uh, operations, they've got their tactical combative systems, you know, police, police combatives. So like, I mean, uh, these, these type of systems are worth, you know, you, you would pay huge dividends if you would have these kind of guys hire these guys into your gym, maybe do a workshop in your gym, you know, have friends in this network. Like that, that's, that's what we've done at, for karate unity. Like I, I've got, uh, a ton of friends in different areas and, uh, you know, part of my grading, for example, my blackboard grading is, is they have to touch hands with all these different people. So one of my, one of my first blackballs, um, he, uh, he had to, uh, trick cross train with combatives instructors, uh, you know, combat sport people and, and all these things. But, uh, yes, Krav Maga, Jeet Kondo is another, uh, Bruce Lee system. Um, they, they are very, uh, uh, uh, how could I say they have a huge, um, emphasis on function. I just spoke to, uh, on, on our podcast over here on our site, uh, karate unity, um, I don't know if you guys followed up, uh, Burton Richardson. Uh, Burton Richardson is, uh, he's an OG in the game. He's, um, a student of Danny, Danny and Asantos, um, which is, uh, one of Bruce Lee's first students. And he's taking JKD to, to different, different levels. Like, uh, his, his, uh, he does striking, he does kickboxing, he does grappling, he does a weapon stuff. Um, but then a big part of his training is tactical. So multiple, uh, multiple attackers, you know, concealed weapons kind of thing, situational awareness. So all of that stuff, like Jeet, Jeet Kondo is another system that I would recommend, you know, for, uh, tactical combative, type of training, you know, um, and then, you know, if you take a look, I mean, pretty much even a lot of people don't know this, but MMA has, is now evolving into this. So a lot of schools are partnering her up with tactical combative instructors and using MMA combatively. So, um, for example, like, uh, tri-tech martial arts, uh, Matt Breyer's, uh, team, um, and even our team here at Rise, Rise MMA, we, uh, we've got law enforcement guys on our team and, and they're, they're, uh, black belts with us. And these guys, we're, they're like our content specialists. So they're always informing our jujitsu techniques, you know, uh, something that say, say, say we're in guard or whatever and we're doing some manipulation on the floor. Uh, you know, uh, we, we would have to be aware of, okay, if they're going to reach in, watch the hands, you got to look at those hands. If those hands are going to go in into pockets, I mean, there's a reason for that, right? So you got to learn how to risk control, you got to, you know, so all these couple of things, and you don't want to stay entangled up, for example, you want to get out really quick and escape because in a self defense situation, you know, um, you could have multiple attackers. So what I'm trying to say is that's an example in, in an MMA club, right, where there's an evolution there. So there, yes, it's a combat sport, but it's evolving now into tactical combatants as well. Right. Um, so everybody's mixing, man, you know, mixing, mixing it up, stirring the pot, you know, that's how you got to do it sometimes. And so you can also learn many different things from many different perspectives, you know, my story is a bit different than yours, yours, Chris Hanson, because I simply, I saw this movie, Romeo must die. Was Jet Li. Oh, Jet Li. Yeah. And then I was like, that's really cool. I would like to do that. And then so I signed up for martial arts and Taekwondo. And this is how it happened years later. And here I am still doing it. And I've learned a lot along the way about my life and about death. And then about just how to live a good life. See, I have a question to you about the violent aspect of martial arts. So if let's say, because kids are a big part of martial arts too. And so when a parent wants to sign up for karate, but they're worried that they don't want their kid to learn violence, what are you telling them? Well, let me tell you. So fighting is the best metaphor for training, right? So this is a message that that has to be approached very carefully, because especially in our society now, I mean, I think all globally, we could say that we've become very sensitive to this to this whole violent thing. But the way like I'm a school teacher, so I teach martial arts in the school system too. So I talk about martial arts as kind of like how Bruce Lee said, it's the art of fighting without fighting. But fighting is important. So by fighting, you don't necessarily have to hurt somebody. If you have good fight training with you, you have a good coach that's going to make sure that you're going to be safe. You're going to wear protective equipment. You're going to watch your athletes and make sure that they're not hurting each other, right? But you're going to push them to the level where the stuff that they've learned is going to fall apart. And that's important. And when it falls apart, what's important is how you overcome that by improvising on the fly. And you only get that with struggle and chaos, right? And just that physical expression unlocks the mental and spiritual piece where, hey, you know, if you can struggle through the through, if you can struggle and push yourself to the limits, man, in a martial art club, then you can you can deal with what life gives you, you know, like you lose in a job, no big deal. I got this, right? You know, breaking up with somebody, losing, losing money on investments, you know, whatever, like, if you, if you, if you get your ass submitted, you know, beaten up regularly in the dojo, you can handle life, man. And I find, I find, so this is the message that I, that I, I, I tell people, you know, what's missing in your martial art training is you don't fight enough, you need to know how to fight. Fighting is important. And you don't have to be a bad person to fight, right? It's, it's fight training, I think is key man. So, you know, that's, that's how I approach that it's, it's training. I, that's how I tell, I tell my clients and I tell my parents, you know, when I, when I, when I, when I introduce their kids to it, and they come and watch, right? And, and they get to see and they're, they're having fun, you know, you got to have fun when you're doing that. Totally. So let's say if you were the prime minister of Canada right now, would you make it? Would you make it a requirement for every kid to learn martial arts? 100% man, 100%. It'll be, it'll be like going to the water fountain and drinking water, bro. It's 100%. You know, like, I think the two most important skills that people should have is swimming and martial arts. Because you see, these two things are like you frickin seat belts, okay? When, when, when we're, when you're driving, you got your seat belt and you got your airbags. I mean, car companies make sure that these things are in place. They make sure that they work. How often do you get into an accident? You don't. But when you do, bro, it pulls you back and it's protects you. So, you know, human beings, we suck towards each other. We just do history repeats itself. You go and take a look at, at, at the history books anywhere, man. And you're going to see that we have, we're fueled by fear, ego, and greed, right? And because of that, we're going to treat each other as human beings. And like, think about it, you're, you're, you're bound to get into some sort of collision with a car. It could be a little fender bender. It could be a little scratch. It could be like a, you're, you're in the shopping mall and something just comes in and dings your car. But you've got some sort of collision with somebody else. It's just, it's just like with human beings. Someone's going to say something that's going to piss you off. And, you know, if you don't have control, it's going to go down. And it'll just happen. Like, you know what I mean? And so I think, I think knowing martial arts and knowing how to survive at what in water, those two things are non-negotiables, man. You know, the parents, they put their kids in so many, so many activities. And I'm saying to myself, okay, that's overkill. Put him in the swimming program. Done. Once they got that, you can put him in everything else. Okay, you know what I mean? But yeah, that's fair. No, I like, I love your seatbelt analogy. That's so true. You need to have a seatbelt. Even whether or not you're going to get an accident, you still always need to have your seatbelt on. Even if you've never been in an accident in your whole life, you're still going on that seatbelt. You hear that saying? You're saying? Audrey, that I will always keep my seatbelt and check. How are you doing that side? Something that I wanted to learn about is the self-discipline aspect of martial arts, because I feel like it has a similar structure to how the maybe on a lower, like less intense scale as the military. You know, it teaches you that physical discipline, which then also can feed into your mental discipline. And I think one thing that it does is it teaches emotional regulation. But I know about that, but I don't know how that happens. How does that work? Maybe you could enlighten us about it. Yeah, I'm just taking the note here. Yeah, that is a very good observation. For sure, there's a lot of parallels between military and martial arts. I mean, if you think about it, it's a default. Martial arts, okay. The Chinese character is a wuxu, so war art, right? And it's funny because wuxu, when you see wuxu, you see all these flowery type of athletic type of things, but really, the actual word wuxu means martial art, right? Stopping art. But yeah, I mean, martial arts is definitely related to the military. It's a killing art. It's an art to protect yourself, to stop violence from happening with violence. But the thing is, it's a conundrum because when people, without people understanding it and putting time on the mat and understanding this, they would never know that by training so violently and physically, when you're redlining your body and your mind, okay, you unlock this spiritual piece, right? Like I could honestly say, okay, I've like, you know, are you guys into cars? Do you like driving sports cars? Oh yeah. Yeah. So it's a rush, right? You redline your car, man. You got to clean out your car, you know, and then when you redline your car, you clean it out, right? And you just, when you get to that level, you feel this sense of, whoa, I'm drifting now, you know what I mean? That's martial arts. If you train at that level, okay, at a very high level, at a physical level, that's so hard, high, you attain this, it's like a yin yang, you attain this piece, right? So to get to your point, martial arts has militaristic aspects because of the way it evolved, you know, as human beings, we struggled. So all cultures developed some sort of protection mechanism, right? Like every single culture on the planet has a martial art, right? And we're all bound by the same principles, you know, rigorous, rigorous training to the point of pristine precision, okay? And then you take this to a high level, you unlock this emotional enlightenment, you know, it sounds all airy, fairy, you know, but, but it really, I mean, I've been in this game for 40 plus years and I've touched hands with monsters. And I've seen, I've seen that these guys, you know, and ladies too, they've reached this level of like chill, you know what I mean? And you only get that man through hard, hard, consistent training, you know, so yes, military, it's related to military out of necessity, I think, you know, historically, that's how it came about. It was based on, you know, protection of your society and all that kind of stuff. And then the training aspect unlocks this emotional regulation, you know, and I'm telling you, if you take a look at, if you take a look at people who have put a lot of time in the martial arts, I mean, there's, we walk a lonely path, you know, like, I mean, think about it, it's to be in it for this long, says something about a particular person's personality, you know? Yeah, what does it say? I know I'm not answering that part of the question, but that was just an opinion there. But, yeah, I don't know if I've answered your questions, sir. But the first part maybe about the military part, but the second part, what aspect of the self discipline, like, maybe that's, that's, I wanted a bit more elaboration on that, because like, so you mentioned, martial art teaches us how to combat violence with violence. And from my understanding, it's actually, that is an aspect of it, but it's not the purpose of it. It's to, you know, I think there's, there's aspect of like self defense, but you learn, you learn this, it's kind of like a power that you gain, you know, like you, you have this ability to hurt someone. But that's not the purpose why you learn it. It's, it's just to have, to understand what that power means, you know, because like, you don't want to have that power, basically, once you do have it. And you touched on a point about the self defense, where you were saying also, these people that you've met are absolute monsters, but they've attained a certain piece once they reach that advanced level. And I think it's because once they've, they have that power, which is, which, if they let go of their emotional control, and just let, maybe let anger drive, take the wheel, and just like, let that direct the controls of how they operate, then they will become a monster, because they are fully capable of being like that. Yeah, I, brilliant, man. I, I, I just made me think I didn't really answer your question as deep as you wanted. So I think I know, I think I, let me try again. So, okay, when these people that I've met, and I, and I'd love to say, I'd love to say that I'm kind of following in their footsteps, because, you know, everybody's got, everybody's got some sort of a fuse, right? And we all lose it to some degree, you know, as, as to how, how you're gonna deal with it afterwards, you know, your anger and all these things, that, that's the key. And I find like, martial arts is, is like, is one of the ultimate ways of self-regulating your emotions. I mean, think about it, right? If, if we weren't emotional, okay, we wouldn't have lawyers, we wouldn't have these people, right? Think about it, right? We need all these people to police us, because we're emotional creatures, right? So we've got, I mean, whether you want to call it yoga, you want to call it breathing, you want to call it, let's have a drink, you know, let's, let's use some substances to calm ourselves down. We need, we need something to regulate who we are. We are, we are emotional creatures, right? So when you train in the martial arts, and you train hard, okay, and you put in enough time to understand it, you develop this empathy towards others, because you've struggled, right? With struggles comes empathy, right? Like, really, you would not have empathy towards others if you didn't struggle, right? Like, like, think about it, people who have gone through things, a lot of, a lot of people who have struggled, what do they do? They, you can go in a couple of directions. If you want to go in a positive direction, what you're going to do is you're going to help others who have struggled just like you, right? And there are people out there, like a ton of people who've given back to society, right? So martial arts does that. So you get submitted, you get punched in the face, you lose, lose tournaments, you, you're continuously growing and growing and growing through your belt ranks and this and that. What that does is the moment you face a struggle, and someone gets up into your growth, and you come into a disagreement with them, rather than fight them back, you're going to, you're going to take a step back automatically from your training, you're going to take a step back and just say, hey, man, you're just making a bad decision. You probably have an a bad day and you're going to have that empathy and you're going to hold back the F bombs, you're going to hold back, throw them down, you're going to hold back all that stuff, maybe walk away or find some sort of verbal jiu-jitsu to get in there and turn things around. That comes with experience and that comes with struggle in the martial arts, man. And that I think is what's, that's the connection, you know, to the militaristic type of training, to unlocking this emotional regulation. As a school teacher, we've got all these learning skills, learning skills that we call them, learning skills in our district, self-regulation, what's it, participation, collaboration, all these type of things. And I often ask the kids, the younger kids of responsibility, that's another one too, I often ask the kids, the older kids get it, the younger kids, they don't quite get it, but I asked some of the older kids, what's the most important learning skill? And the conclusion is self-regulation, right? Yeah. And if you think about it, if you think about it, all of us are trying to control who we are, right? We're trying to navigate ourselves through life, right? Through all kinds of vehicles, martial arts is just one way, but you know, we're trying to navigate this beast in us, right? The struggle that we have, you know, that that's informed by all kinds of things, man, friendships that we had when we were young, interpersonal relationships with our dad and mom, all this kind of stuff, man, it's all part of the fabric of who we are, man, and martial arts, you know, teaches you how to hone in on this several self-regulation skills. It just, like, like, I'm sure you could say, you know, even athletes, man, people who are high-level athletes, they're the chillest people, man, they're chill, you know? Yeah, yeah. To be honest, to be honest, when you said take a step back as part of your training procedure, I pictured you preparing, like, a roundhouse kick position to just, like, take a swing at that person who's annoying. Put this foot on that side of your face, you know? I mean, yeah, that's one way of ending the conversation, it's like, yeah, like, look, man, you don't want to, you don't want to release this beast. Once the, once the feet start dancing, you, you know, you won't be dancing yourself. He answered your question, right, Said? Yes, I was answering the question. Okay, now on to the next question. Let's talk about sparring. Yeah. And so I was thinking about sparring is such a beautiful, it's a beautiful thing, because you're learning how to fight by fighting and... Okay, can I ask you a question? You put the sunglasses on to ask me about sparring? Just... He's ready to go, basically. Oh, you're right. Okay. Okay. So, he'll invite you to a close combat. Okay. Let's go. Let me get my sunglasses on. It's such a beautiful thing, you know, for me, some of the most rewarding moments in martial arts is when you're sparring and you land some kind of strike that you could never do before. You know, for me, I've had a few moments where I've been able to, like, do a spinning hookcake to someone's face and land it, and I'm like, what? I can do that. Yeah. That's amazing. It's such a rewarding feeling. But then also, it's bad because I will instantly feel bad that I kick someone in the face. Well, that's the question, though, again, sorry? About... About... I actually do have a question on this matter. It's been a long day. What I would like to know is, so, for example, when Ali would do that, he would feel bad, but how would you... Like, what would you tell someone who does that kick and lands it and doesn't feel bad that they hurt someone or could have hurt someone? Like, how do you deal with that situation? Oh, well, as a coach, if you've seen somebody who's hitting you and there's no emotional reaction, this guy's a psychopathic killer, right? You know what I'm saying? That's right, Mike. Get out of my club, bro. No, no, no. I... I mean... Would you actually report them in that situation? Like, because if they have no remorse, annoy, no empathy, that means, yeah, they could be a psycho. Would you tell the cops or like, you know, this guy might be a psycho? I mean, I mean, you know, if I were to see that at the club, you know, people going hard and they're not, you know, not saying sorry or whatever, or not holding back, I mean, you know, you give them a couple of warnings and if it doesn't stop, you ask them to leave, you know, refund their money or whatever. However, you want to close up, but I mean, I think it all comes down to culture, man. You got, I mean, culture in the club, corporate culture, you know, your club culture, right? Sparing is not just... Sparing is training. It's a training method, right? So that's bottom line. That's the default definition of sparring. It's a training method and it's a two-way street, right? If I kicked you in the face and you didn't block it or you got a lucky kick or whatever, then there's two sides of the story. The person who received the kick should say, "Thank you." Okay? Second of all, the other person should say, "Sorry." Okay? But, you know what? There should be a conversation going on between both of them and between the coach, right? Like, look, why did you get that kick? Why... What were you doing differently? Like, what could you have done differently, I should say, you know? And top of the thing, and okay, let's now drill. A good coach would say, "All right, let's drill this scenario." So if I see a situation where people are landing kicks and they could have, you know, deal with it differently, stuff the kick, intercepted it, you know, use their head movement or took a step back or countered or whatever. And let's just say, I taught that, but that's not happening. Well, that's on me, because now I'm a coach now. I gotta say, okay, look, these guys are not getting it. So let's work it somewhere, right? But, I mean, I don't know if I'm answering a question. I think, I think if, first of all, the coach has to be set in a sense that, you know, we go at a agreed-upon intensity level. And if we're starting to hurt people, you know, we got a claw back, and let's just focus on the goal here, guys. We're not here to hurt people. We're here to help people, right? And like, you know, nowadays, hard sparring, like, you know, a lot of people think, oh, we spar hard, man, yeah, let's go. We're a school of spar hard. Let me just tell you, professionals don't even spar hard. Did you know that? High-level guys, they hardly spar hard. They would have, like, in their whole life cycle of right before their fight, they would maybe have two or three really intense sparring sessions. But most of the time, it's technical sparring. It's like 10 to 20%, right? And it's fun, right? So I don't know if I answered your question. I remembered what's it called, Sean Strickland, for some reason, when you, when you were talking, and when he, when he had the sparring session with a twitch streamer, and you just beat the shit out of him, he was like, that's kind of, yeah, it was with sneaker. And he just like, it was a bit intense, because I know when he, for example, sparred with Alex Pereira, he, he was very light sparring, because he knows Alex could knock him out. But with the sneaker, he just, like, he didn't care. Just, he, sneaker started bringing from the nose and like, I think he got a black eye out of it. So he didn't, you know, go easy on him. So in that situation, it's just like, he came off slightly psycho, but an also more of a bully. So it's like, yeah, you kind of look at it different from a different lens there. Correct. Yeah. Well, this is, this is a, this is the UFC stage, right? So different ballgame, but yeah, totally. Yeah. Okay. Chris, something that I wanted to ask is, what is an important life lesson that you've learned from martial arts that you think everyone should, you know, should take into consideration? Respect all arts. Yeah. Respect at all. You know, we, we got to go through the whole Bruce Lee, Bruce Lee spin on things, you know, you respect all arts, like, really, and to respect all arts means you have to understand them, right? Like, think about it, if it goes with like human beings, I respect you. Okay. Why do I respect you? Because when you reach out to me, I didn't know who you were. But I saw the work that you're doing and all the wonderful guests you're bringing on. And I respect the hard work, you know, you're trying to grow your channel, move on from one content creator to the next, I respect you because I know the struggles that content creators go through, you know, and, and, and the continuous, you know, revolving door of content, you know, and ups and downs, I respect you. But in order for me to respect you, I got to understand you. And, and for me to understand you, I have to go through similar things. So, so that's how that's the message, man. Like, okay, you could be training in your martial art. You could be training in Akido and Taekwondo or whatever. But you should respect other arts because they can only make you better, you know, they can only make you better. Like, like, if I'm, I'm telling, uh, what, what martial arts do you guys training? If you don't want me asking? KKD. Taekwondo. Yes, sir. Okay. Taekwondo is very much like karate. We get bad reps, you know, like, uh, people who like back in the day when there was a big explosion of Taekwondo schools here in Canada, like we would have a Taekwondo school on every block, right? And, you know, there was a lot of McDojo kind of bashing going on. But let me just tell you, I respect Taekwondo big time because I have met some OGs in the game. These guys can, can, can kick like they box. Okay. Like, you know, these guys could use their legs like a boxer and, uh, and not only that, what a lot of people don't understand is Taekwondo is the, what you see in Taekwondo is just what, when I say you, I mean, you know, the people on social media, people like, you know, without doing deep dives and known people, they just see kicking art. When they think of Taekwondo, they think of kicking art, but I want to tell you some of the Taekwondo people that I know, they're very good at self-defense, inside fighting, um, locking, joint locking and weapon, weapon deployment and all that stuff. These, I know, I know some Taekwondo people that have been bodyguards to some of the political leaders in Korea and I've trained, trained with some of their students and I got respect. So therefore respect all arts, you know what I mean? Because there's, there's, uh, every art has, every art is a martial art, right? And, uh, if you don't spend enough time, you know, in it, uh, or, or have an open mind to understand it, you, you're going to have all these prejudices about it and all these biases that often get countered, you know, um, and you get the stage where, hey, man, we're all the same, you know, we're all the same. Yeah. With all the same respect all arts, respect all people everyone around the world, no matter who you are, your background, whatever we're coming from. Yeah. Chris, I have one last question though. Okay, let's talk about martial arts, martial arts movies. What's your favorite martial arts movie and why? Sorry, say, say again. What's your favorite karate slash martial arts movie and why? Oh, that's an easy one. Enter the dragon, baby. What's up? Why, why, why? Yeah, like, uh, I just thought it's, I thought of a stupid joke. What's Bruce Lee's favorite, uh, drink? What's up, huh? Yeah, yeah. I just thought it was really good. What's the dragon, man? I, uh, I, I, I've never seen, uh, I was 10 years old when I saw this, I saw that, saw that movie with my dad. It was a double feature between, uh, enter the dragon and Jackie Chan big brawl. Um, it was, it was, it was, uh, featured at, uh, at a theater, uh, just about 45 minutes away from here. Theater is closed down now, but, uh, I've never seen, I've never seen a man that can like, trap a hand and hit someone, knock them down, doing these spin kicks and none chuckoos and all this kind of stuff. I mean, that movie was caused craze in, in, in the martial art world. I mean, right after that movie, you know what I did? I went to the backyard, I went to my dad's, um, garage. I, I cut, I cut two sticks off of a broom, right. Uh, got some chains, screws, and I started making my own nunchucks. Well, yeah, enter the door for sure, man. That's incredible. Yeah. Sayin, whatever you learned today. We've learned, uh, quite a bit about the martial arts word world. Um, cross training is pretty good, is pretty useful for creativity, for self-defense, for basically respecting other arts as well, because you don't want to be, because even if you're a specialist of one art, it's good to know about the others. And it, this doesn't just apply to martial arts. It supplies to like all the arts and all of the professions. Um, we learned about self-discipline and we just learned how to respect each other. Thanks to Chris. Chris has been telling us all of these important life lessons and insights that I hope everyone is taking into consideration and learning from them. Chris, thank you so much for being on the podcast and can you please tell everyone how they can connect with you and where they can find you? Oh, yeah. Uh, if you search up karate unity, um, online, you'll be able to find me. Uh, karateunity.ca is my website. Um, and karate unity at Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Awesome. Guys, thank you so much for watching A to the show. Um, please don't forget to like, subscribe and share. Also, Chris, this is how we end the podcast. We salute to cover the camera, but this one is going to be a bit different. We're going to go, whoa. What's up?