To all the masters that joined GKYS.

Not too long ago a Hapkido master called and asked about the instructor course.
As well as other masters he wanted to know if he can learn all the techniques of GKYS in 5 weeks of instructor training course.

My answer to this question is always “No“

Persistenly they ask “Then, how much of GKYS techniques in 5 weeks?”

My intuition tells me when masters ask this question their Dojangs are near closing state.

“During 5 weeks of instructor training course we will be teaching our GKYS programs and system. In it, are the techniques” When I reply this was a lot of people do not understand.

When someone wants to open a martial art school, they probably did thing following ways to set up martial art schools and this is also a common scenario in Korea as well.

In the beginning they went to martial art schools as a hobby. As time went on they grew in skills. This brings confidence. They loved the martial art that they practiced and want to turn this in to career.

This is a most common case. What this person has is only techniques so the one will use it as focal point. When they open a martial art school that is based on techniques you can only grow up to 80 students. Main problem is when you get older and become mid 40s. This means now you have to close the school because you can’t do things as great when you are at this age.

Often this is why Gold medalist in Tae Kwon Do closes their schools when they get older.

Boxing’s legend Mohamed Ali and Mike Tyson do not portray as a great trainer or business minded gym owner. A lot of people can predict this and it is in the similar context of what I mentioned.

The martial arts associations of all kinds for example Tae Kwon Do, Hapkido and Hae Dong Gumdo associations do not focus or give information on how to expand and retain a lot of students. Instead they only focus on what’s on the test. Only caring about the techniques of yourself and your students creates this lack of information from the associations.

When you use this method on modern day Dojangs, It will surely fail.

Martial arts associations I have seen in US and in Europe are same as well. They do not provide any systems for the Dojangs. It is solely ran by the ability of the Dojang’s master/owner. In the end, they also talk a lot about the techniques when they don’t have proper techniques themselves.

The reason for people going to places such as Kumon (A learning center.) is to bring up school grades so they can get accepted in to good colleges. I am sure no one will argue otherwise. Students wanting to achieve higher level, they will seek out a tutor that has gotten accepted into great colleges. This will determine the quality of your future life.

When a tutor has a lot of students, the cost of learning from this particular tutor will be more and the tutors will determine if the learning center is great or not. Instead of a system that can bring up the students grades they focus more on who is teaching. For these learning centers they must have these high level tutors or they will not make it.

However, Dojang owners/masters think they are these tutors from the learning center or the center owner.

What kind of the people are learning a martial art from you?

Let’s say you have learned a martial art. Now you Know how to dominate others and learned self-defense. On top of that, you learned how to KO a person with one blow. How is this going to help your student’s future?

Just because your students have learned from you, it does not give them a good career or can have them get accepted in to a good college.

The reason for them coming to you is because they want to exercise and relieve the stress they get from school or from their work.

Their intentions are not to break off bull’s horn with bare hand like Bae-Dal Choi ( A Korean Martial artist that has ability to break off bull’s horn with bare hand strike) or to enter UFC.

Still, the owners/masters talk about techniques over and over. While only having 40 students, they speak of how great their techniques are.

Owners/masters that speak this way are mostly don’t have great techniques themselves. They speak this way because they do not possess great techniques. When you teach in this environment, it is stressful for both teachers and students.

This is because of traditional culture. A martial art must follow traditional history and must come up with new modern day systems and programs. We are living in the 21st century that has great technologies but training methods and the masters are still living in the past when they were wearing a huge rice bags instead of uniforms.

No matter how much I explain the masters still ask “How long does it take to learn all of GKYS’ techniques?”

I understand US and Europe not understanding this because I cannot explain because I don’t speak the language but for Koreans not understanding might be because of old habits that has been passed down for a long time.

A Subway sandwich has 7000 stores worldwide. It is a very famous.

Although it’s expensive a lot of people are attracted to it because of variety of menus. In our prospective a sandwich is simple. Slices of hams and vegies. When people try, they realize it’s just not sandwich. There are more than one type and being able to choose what you want gives you a satisfaction. Main HQ of Subway are always coming up with new menus and they put a lot of vegies and state they are good for your health.

The owner of each stores goes through a training on how to run the store from how to decorate to how to treat customers.

The Subway HQ supports the people who joined the franchise by giving them the system to make most profit.

When people want a sandwich they think about the price, taste and health.

Instead of focusing on what people want, the owner focuses on something totally different.

“What degree does the ham cook?”

“Do you use tap water or purified water to wash the vegies?”

“What country did the sauce come from?”

“How thick are the bread?”

Most people that wants to open a sandwich store are probably thinking about these but these are not for the store owners to worry about. It is for the HQ.

People that are buying these sandwiches do not care about these at all. As I mentioned earlier they only care about the price, taste and health.

There for the HQ must come up with the right price, good taste and good for health. Plus they add limited time only to advertise. They are matching the busy life of modern people to advertise.

If the store owner wants to focus on taste, the owner is missing the main point of a cook and business.

Yes, the owner should know what makes the buyers buy but they are missing something that is more important.

So, what should the store owner focus on?

The owners should focus on understanding the HQ’s system and profit.

Most importantly, the HQ must follow the trend of buyers taste and provide variety of menus and customer service. This will be a great help to the each stores.

The Subway HQ and the GKYS Association are not the same but has similar context. It is difficult to explain the GKYS ways so I used this as a comparison.

All the seminar participants are not beginners in martial art. Although different martial art than GKYS, still they all have been in their field for over 10 years and either they are a Dojang owners or master.

When participating in GKYS seminars please try to understand the overall system of GKYS. This is a skill

For example, a GKYS Assoc. provides advertising to fit all ages. We use the web to begin. After each GKYS Dojangs use this in their own Dojang. After doing so, each owners should focus how to teach these great techniques that has been created by the GKYS to the students and research it. Plus must try it yourself as well.

The GKYS Assoc. improves the training method a few times a year. You must study it and pass it down to your students.

As if you are trying to create a different tasting sandwich using same ingredients. Students do not like to repeat same thing over and over. They do not like this. That is how you trained in the past. This is a different times now.

Even the same technique, you can train it in many different ways and it is important to do so and because of it the programs and systems are important.

Recently there are a lot more Dojangs joining the GKYS. This most likely means they are having hard time running their Dojangs. All GKYS joined branches are doing their best to succeed 100% without any mistakes. We the GKYS Assoc. will provide advertising, consulting, contracts, retention, training programs and GKYS systems.

I hope this can explain more of Instructor seminars and association affiliated registrations.