August 2026 Newsletter

Hello students,

We have a lot to celebrate this month! Happy Birthday to Ashton, Mariano, Cody, Kelli, Regan, and a special Happy Birthday to our own Shimu Shin, the heart behind so much that happens here.

We're also celebrating milestones in training. Congratulations to Bella on her one-year anniversary with the academy and to Marshal on an incredible four years of dedication.

Also please give a warm welcome to Joshua (Morning Taiji) and Tiffany (Evening Taiji)!

Beginner's Class - if you're testing, you'll now be testing with our Advanced Class on Tuesday night, August 4th, since we missed the date on July 30th. Let Shifu know if you'll have issues with that.

Here's our calendar for this month:

• Morning Taiji: No class on August 31st

• Evening Taiji: No class on August 31st

• Beginner Gongfu: No class on August 31st

• Kid's Gongfu: No special dates this month

• Advanced Gongfu: No special dates this month

GOLDEN STATE/WORLD WUSHU TOURNAMENT 2026 (UPDATE & EXTENDED)

This year's in-person Golden State tournament (now called World Wushu Open) will be held on September 5-6. Many students will be traveling to compete in person, while Shifu will be reaching out to all students/parents who aren't traveling to compete online as registration deadline has been extended to August 10th, and video submissions are due by September 20th. Taiji students - you're totally allowed to compete as well! First-time competitors are highly encouraged to compete. To compete in 1 category is around $73, with $20 extra for every additional form. See the website for all information.

UPDATES TO SASH RANKING SYSTEM

Our self-proprietary sash ranking system was developed to ensure that students would meet the minimum expectations of certain sashes, such as agility exercises and skills. However, we're adding a new adjustment to help those out that may struggle at a certain level:

The minimum amount of time needed to maintain a certain sash before you can be considered to rank-up can be bypassed if your cumulative time can meet it. For example, if you're an Orange Sash that has been with the school for 20 months total, you'd normally be at a Blue Sash at that point. However, once you're able to do a Kip-up for Green, you just have to hold onto Green for one month before being allowed to test for Blue. That way you don't have to wait an additional 9 months to get Blue Sash.

The older system forced students to hold onto a sash for a certain period of time. Whether it's splits, kip-ups or Mandarin holding you back, just know your cumulative time training is being taken into account.

THE MAGIC OF GONGFU

"There is one place that you have not looked, and it is there, only there, where you shall find the master."

This quote comes from one of my favorite movies growing up, The Last Dragon. Not because it's a cinematic masterpiece. Quite the opposite. It's probably one of the cheesiest gongfu movies ever made. If you've never seen it, do yourself a favor and watch it sometime. It's wonderfully cringe-worthy.

The movie is very much a product of the 1980s, when traditional martial arts exploded in popularity but weren't fully understood in the West. "Kungfu" was still new, mysterious, exotic, and people were fascinated by the unknown. Stories about Qi destroying opponents with Dim Mak, secret techniques hidden in monasteries, and masters with supernatural abilities were everywhere. At that time, "everybody was kungfu fighting." It was also a time when Karate, Kung Fu, Ninjutsu, and Taekwondo were often thrown together in the same schools as if they all came from the same country, which is laughable in hindsight.

There's a scene in the movie where Bruce Leeroy Green (I know... just stay with me) finally learns from his master that the key to all of his training was inside him the entire time. Throughout the movie, he's sent on a wild goose chase, believing that an artifact supposedly belonging to Bruce Lee will lead him to a new master and reveal the secret to reaching his final level, where he can achieve "The Glow," a golden aura surrounding his body.

Instead, he discovers there isn't some final master waiting to teach him one last secret technique. His final lesson is realizing that everything he had been searching for was already within him. And that his master that he held in high regard wasn't leaving his home to go on a quest for knowledge. Nope. He was going to visit his mother in Miami.

It's a little anticlimactic...But it's also true. Either way he still gets his "glow" (which is still fiction, people,) but he attained that through himself.

What I've always loved about that lesson is how grounded it really is, even if it's wrapped in an over-the-top martial arts movie. Throughout my years teaching gongfu, I can't tell you how many people have approached me hoping to learn the mystical side of martial arts.

I once had someone ask if I could teach him to control his energy well enough to communicate with aliens. Yes... he was serious. Others have wanted to know how to project energy from their fists like a Hadoken or Kamehameha. Some thought I would speak in poetic verses like I'm Mr. Miyagi only to be disappointed in seeing that I'm more of a Johnny Lawrence.

The first time I traveled to Wudangshan, part of me hoped I'd discover some hidden secret too. Instead, I found some of the most humble, practical, and down-to-earth people I've ever met. They trained hard but knew how to have fun. They laughed while they shared stories on the school's balcony late at night after class. They ate together, drank baijiu and lived simply. However, there wasn't some old immortal floating through the mountains waiting to reveal the ultimate technique, even though the incredible scenery would say otherwise.

At the same time, those stories are part of what makes traditional martial arts so captivating. Every culture has its legends. Gongfu has tales of undefeated masters, impossible feats, hidden lineages, magical swords, and secret techniques passed down through generations. Anyone who grew up watching old-school martial arts movies probably wanted to believe there was one technique that nobody else knew, one lesson that would change everything.

And there are certainly aspects of traditional Chinese martial arts that seem mystical because they're often misunderstood; Chinese medicine, Qi, breathing practices, meditation, philosophy and internal alchemy all have depths that many people never explore.

But I think we sometimes become so focused on chasing magic & masters that we completely overlook the stories happening right in front of us.

To me, the real magic is watching a student finally land a technique after failing hundreds of times. It's seeing someone who thought they could never kick above their waist suddenly throw a beautiful head-height kick or pop off the floor with a kip-up. It's watching someone who's never even thrown a punch before to now taking people out in sparring. It's watching someone lose weight, become healthier, and carry themselves with confidence they never had before, or seeing someone who's never been out of the country before only to compete in the homeland of gongfu and win medals. It's seeing a child who walked through our doors with no martial arts experience step onto the competition floor for the first time. Those moments aren't fantasy. They're transformation.

When I was living in Wudangshan, there was something magical about waking up every morning in a town where life revolved around martial arts. Training wasn't something you squeezed into your schedule - it was simply life. The mountains, the temples, the people, the culture... it all reminded you that gongfu is bigger than punches and kicks. It is a way of living, and it's how I'd want my students to live with their own gongfu culture.

After decades of training, I can honestly say that the magic of gongfu is very real. It just isn't the kind we usually expect.

The magic isn't shooting energy from your hands. It's developing the discipline to keep showing up when you don't feel like training. It's transforming your body, sharpening your mind, and becoming someone your kid self would look up to, that if they saw themselves 10 to 30 years from now swinging a giant sword around they'd say, "SO COOL!" It's learning patience in a world that demands instant results. It's carrying traditions that have survived for thousands of years and passing them on to the next generation. Maybe that's what the old masters were trying to teach all along.

We spend so much time searching for extraordinary powers that we forget the most extraordinary thing we can do is change ourselves. Sure, you need the right schools to show you the way, build the foundation and maybe a journey to discover yourself is in order, but it's when you dedicate yourself to the process, train with sincerity, and embrace the philosophy behind the art, you begin to realize that the "magic" was never hidden in a secret technique. It was hidden within you.

And that's a lesson worth spending a lifetime discovering, and you didn't even need a fortune cookie to learn that.

-Shifu

HOUSEKEEPING & POLICY ITEMS

• Stay hydrated! It's going to get hot at the studio, as usual.

• Parents - please share these newsletters with your kids. It's a great way to connect with their training and ensure they're learning the same things the adult classes are learning.

• Friendly reminder - no discussion of politics at the school, please. We're a safe, neutral zone and always will be.

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