Kosho Chronicles Issue #7
TO THE READERYou trust your eyes. You have been trained to watch the punch, track the kick, follow the weapon. Your eyes are the first sense you turn to in danger, and they are the reason you get hit.
Mitose called them the great betrayer. I did not understand what he me...
To the Reader
If you teach, this will challenge you. If you study under someone, this may confuse you.
Either way, pay attention. What follows strikes at something most martial artists protect without realizing it.
The Teaching
The student is a better teacher than the teacher.
This is not a contr...
Kosho Chronicles Issue #6
To the Reader
Every martial artist I have ever met wants to know what to do when the punch is coming. That is the wrong question. The right question is why you let it get that far.
Mitose began explaining the manuscript to me in a way that turned everything I thought I k...
Kosho Chronicles Issue #5
To the Reader
I told you the manuscript was a riddle. That Mitose wrote it using religion and politics to hide the martial arts. That he said it was his duty to teach me everything in that book.
This issue begins the teaching. The first thing Mitose explained to me from ...
Kosho Chronicles Issue #4
To the Reader
Last issue I told you about timing. About how Mitose moved slow but moved on time. About how he dropped me to my knees and called me stupid.
This issue is about something that confused me even more. Something that took me years to understand. Something I ...
To the Reader
Speed is a lie. Everything you think you know about being fast is wrong. If you cannot let go of your obsession with speed, stop reading now. You are not ready.
The Teaching
One visit, Mitose asked me to hit him. Real hard.
At the prison, there was a guard there who knew who I was....
To the Reader
Most of you reading this have spent years learning how to hit. You have practiced strikes, blocks, throws. You have conditioned your body. You have trained your reflexes.
I am going to tell you that the highest level of what you do requires none of it.
Sit with that before you conti...
Kosho Chronicles Issue #2
To the Reader
Have you ever tried to explain something you understood perfectly, only to realize you had no words for it? That the moment you opened your mouth, the truth of it slipped away?
This is the challenge I faced every time I walked out of Folsom Prison and back...
To the Reader
What I am about to share may disturb you.It may challenge everything you think you know about mastery, perfection, and what it means to be a martial artist.
Good.
If you are not disturbed, you are not paying attention.
The Teaching
There is a saying in Zen Buddhism:
“If you meet th...
The Teacher That Wasn't Dead
To the reader: What I am about to share with you is more than history. It is the beginning of a journey that changed everything I thought I knew about the martial arts. I ask that you read this not just with your eyes, but with your heart. Feel what I am telling you....
TO THE READER
I would like to share my thoughts pertaining to what you are about to receive in the weeks and months ahead.
Much has been said over the years about James Mitose. About the history of Kempo. About what occurred during the period from 1977 to 1981.
Much of it is wrong. Some of it ...
