Why this blog!

The decision to establish this blog has been in the works for many years.  Like most adults I had my experience with bullying in public school but in my case it ended abruptly when  the company my dad worked for transferred us to a new city.  

My youth was spent in many activities including organized sports and the scouting movement.  I was introduced to judo as a young teen and continued an interest in the martial arts as a young member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.  It was in the mid 1970s I began training in the traditional Japanese Karate Association (JKA) Shotokan style of karate.  It was also a time when interest in martial arts was kindled by the Bruce Lee movies.

History repeated itself in the early 1990s when my 12 year old son was being bullied at school.  The school staff were concerned and took steps to curb the bullying but as many of you reading this post know, bullying can be very subtle; often being more psychological than physical in form.  The bullying began to take its toll affecting my son's self esteem and confidence.  I decided to look around for a suitable martial arts program that might interest my son.  At age 12 its hard to interest a youth in something that is not "their" idea so I shamelessly manipulated him with several weeks of martial arts movie rentals.  As  I hoped, he eventually approached me asking if he could try some classes.  To make a long story short, within a year he had regained his confidence and the bullying had disappeared.  My son and I started to train  together and by 1996 I had opened my own school.

I am not implying that martial arts training, in and of itself,  is a remedy to bullying.  Taught properly, martial arts can improve the student's self esteem and confidence but like any personal improvement program, there are many aspects that must be present.  In later posts I will talk about how to find the right school should you wish to pursue this avenue and other ideas for those of you struggling with the issue of bullying.

If you would like to learn more about our program, feel free to visit our school's website at:

http://www.langleykarate.com