Episode 620 - Sensei Stephen Ferraro
Sensei Stephen Ferraro is a Martial Arts practitioner and instructor. He is the founder and lead instructor at the Ferraro Karate & Martial Arts.
You have to allow people to experience Karate. Karate needs to kind of grow as we all train into it. It’s one of those things that there’s no definitive answer to technique, how you do things, and practice. It’s all up to the student…
Sensei Stephen Ferraro - Episode 620
For someone who started training at a young age, it’s kind of special when you still remember the exact date, time, and place of your first training. Sensei Stephen Ferraro still remembers the church basement where he started training as a Karate Kid and Power Rangers-inspired teen just like his peers. Sensei Stephen Ferraro’s passion spans over 20 years and he has no signs of slowing down. In fact, he is the founder and lead instructor at Ferraro Karate & Martial Arts in Ontario, Canada. Listen as Sensei Stephen Ferarro tells the story of his journey into the Martial Arts.
Show Notes
You can find out more about Sensei Stephen Ferraro’s school on their website at FerarroKarate.ca
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below.
Jeremy Lesniak:
How's it going everybody? Welcome. This is whistlekick Martial Arts Radio Episode 601 and my guest today is sensei Stephen Ferraro. I'm Jeremy Lesniak, I'm your host here for the show founder of whistlekick passionate martial artists, and someone who's invested tons of their life and all kinds of their everything else into promoting supporting the traditional martial arts. That's what we do here at whistlekick. And in fact, if you go to whistlekick.com, you're going to see all the things that we're working on projects and products. Yep, we've got a store, one of the ways that we pay the bills, because but in this podcast together, it's not free. So, if you go over there, you find something you like in the store, use the code PODCAST15 gets 15% off. And lets us know that this podcast does lead to some sales. If you want to go deeper on this, or any other episode of the show, because yeah, they're all available, go to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com, you're going to find transcripts, you're going to find social media links, website links, sometimes email addresses, photos, videos, all kinds of good stuff that come out of each and every episode, all the way back. And those are at whistlekickmartialartsradio.com. Why do we do what we do with the show? Well, it's to connect and educate, entertain the traditional martial artists of the world. Our hope is that in doing so, you love training, and maybe train longer or more or meet some friends or whatever. I have a long-standing belief that martial arts training makes people better. And that's why we do what we do. If you want to support us, you got a bunch of ways you can do that. Like I said, you could buy some, you could support our Patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick. Or maybe check out one of our growing lists of training programs at whistlekickprograms.com. Right now, we've got a strength program, we've got a speed program, we've got a plate conditioning program, we've got a hybrid of the strength and speed program, where you're building a flexibility program. We've got all kinds of things that are going on behind the scenes, and you know what? I think you're going to like him. My guest today is Sensei Stephen, and we had an absolute blast talking about martial arts. I really can't sum it up in any better way. Because we went all over the map, we talked about a bunch of different stuff, his background, and it was just a really fun conversation you want one of the best parts about what I do is that I get to talk to martial artists about martial arts. It is the best part of my day. And here we are, and we're doing it and you get to listen to it. So, let's do that. Sensei Stephen, welcome to whistlekick Martial Arts Radio.
Stephen Ferraro:
Hey, man, thanks for having me. Appreciate it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey, thanks for being here. Thanks for doing this. This is the best part of my job is I get to talk to martial artists about martial arts and call it work. And I mean, what's better than that?
Stephen Ferraro:
This is the best part of my day is talking to people about martial arts. So yeah, feel free to go at whatever you want to talk.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well, let's talk about I was trying to come up with some sarcastic examples. And ironically, I couldn't quickly come up with something related to martial arts that was sarcastic. I could I think we could justify just about anything. I was going to come up with something about, like, ankle articulation. I was like, No, actually, that's a pretty legitimate topic to show but we could anchor.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, especially with heel hooks being so prevalent in BJJ. Now, right? You know, it's the Coupe de gras. It is. It's one of those things everybody wants to be a part of, is the heel hook. The heel hook team.
Jeremy Lesniak:
They want to give them; they don't want to receive.
Stephen Ferraro:
No, nobody wants to receive them. That's the worst part of you.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. Yeah. There are a lot of it seems like the most memorable aspect of BJJ right now is the heel hook. Well, hey, you're here to talk about martial arts. And you know, maybe it's obvious, but I just find it gives so much context. So, let's rewind on the tape. That is your life.
Stephen Ferraro:
Absolutely.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And let's talk about how you got started. You know, what was the impetus for your initial training in martial arts?
Stephen Ferraro:
You know, I think I started like a lot of kids start, you know, the longer you're in martial arts, the more you recognize that there's always like, a lot of common traits amongst starting for me. I started in 1991. And I think their Karate Kid movies and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Power Rangers and things like that were really prevalent in my life. And as well as like, my dad wasn't around very much. And so, I think, you know, every kid that kind of comes up from that upbringing has that same story of like, okay, well, we need to get them involved in some form of martial arts in 1991. Really the only things that you could do or you know, karate, Taekwondo, and maybe Judo, if you were from a big city, I wasn't really from like a huge city in Ontario. So, you know, there were a lot of martial arts gyms and most of them were karate gyms. So, I started when I was nine, needing a little confidence, needing a little boost. My mom put me into a place that was operating out of the basement of a church. And, you know, that was September 9 1991. And that I haven't looked back.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You can remember the day.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, September 9 1991. That was the day I signed up in my first class. And I was a part of that club and a part of that dojo for a really long time, you know, all the way through until I opened my own school. But yeah, 30 years coming up on sit in September, I think by getting into it was, yeah, like a lot of kids, you need a little confidence. Your mom wants you to get involved in something, you know, like, I was involved in a lot of organized sports, but I was missing a lot of that confidence piece that would have really benefited me in an organized fashion.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I also started that early period of September. And yeah, it's making me wonder I hadn't thought about this before, how many kids start training in September? Because, you know, falls in line with the new academic year in school? Yes. You're setting all these new habits and, and schedules.
Stephen Ferraro:
It's always September, or it's like January, you know, it's either like, you get the back-to-school crowd or you get the New Year's crowd? Yeah, either.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It would be interesting to see if there's any law, I'm sure there's no data on this, because we don't track anything in our industry, because no one wants to talk about these things. But is there any correlation between when people start and how long they last?
Stephen Ferraro:
I don't think so. I think for a lot of people, especially kids, like when you get kids into like a traditional martial art, the majority of the time, I think how long they last really ends up being how long they're interested in it. And you would probably see a lot of kids, you know, most kids probably peter out and fall off the grid around like the summertime. You know, there's always the constant thing that I always get from parents. Well, we're just going to take a little break, which is like the famous last words, right? We're just going to take a little break, which is just kind of code for yeah, we've lost interest or yeah, we want to quit. And a lot of times, you know, black belt examinations and things will come up around that spring, summer time. So, for people, it's a bit of a checklist, like okay, I'm going to get my black belt, check. And then I'm going to start, you know, parasailing or other things of that nature, we get into like a million other things afterwards. So, I don't know if it has anything to do with when you start, but I definitely would see there's a lot of change over the summertime.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And that's been a problem that martial arts instructors have faced forever.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, forever. It's that constant like, okay, well, you know, just because other sports are coming up, doesn't mean like you have to stop training, you can, you know, there's lots of days that you can train and do karate, there's lots of days, you can train and do martial arts. But you don't necessarily have to have it, you know, as part of fall completely off the map. So, people come back. They like to spend their summer and I think it depends to like, I'm in Ontario, you know, like our winters are really harsh. It's easy to be inside in the winter months, and even in the spring and the fall. But as soon as the summer comes, it's like you got eight weeks, you may have a full week to actually get something done. And, you know, people really like to take advantage of that they like to go on vacation, they like to, you know, go up north, they like to get off the grid. They like to you know, to do the cottaging stuff and so on and so forth. So, that's always I think everybody's number one priority when they start getting into those. Summertime months is that they end up wanting to enjoy themselves and they don't necessarily want to trade, but the summertime. Yeah, that's when you start to lose kids, baseball, soccer, day camp and so on and so forth. It's just that time.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Does that describe you?
Stephen Ferraro:
Not really No, I trained like year-round. Like I'm always training. Like I'm always doing something, you know, the summertime normally is when we'll go to Okinawa, when we go to visit should go to sensei or [00:10:12-00:10:16]. But anytime we go to Okinawa, it's normally like July when it's extremely hot and unbearable. But you know, that's kind of what I enjoy doing a lot of my own personal training, because I guess maybe the classes are little lighter. And so, it gives me an opportunity to kind of pursue the things that I want to pursue, like Brazilian Jiu Jitsu being one of them. But I'm always training, some are not I enjoy.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Nice. What was it that kept you sticking around?
Stephen Ferraro:
What kept me around, I think, really, what kept me around was probably just the confidence that I got from it. And it was one of those things like, I think we've all kids like, you find yourself in a position where you start doing well at something. And then all of a sudden, it's like, well, why would I quit this? Like, I'm good at this. So why would I? Why would I quit? Why would I quit this? Yeah, I get that, you know, like, it's the thing that I'm the best at. It's the thing that I want to do the most and more than anything else. So, as you get better at it, and as you progress... You know, it's one of those things like you find yourself wanting to continue it, because you're finding success in it. You know, I think it's really rare for people to find success in something and then all of a sudden, they immediately are like, well, no, I don't want to do this anymore. Because, you know, the more you enjoy it, the better you're going to get at everything. So, it's just one. Yeah, I think I stuck with it. Because it was, you know, really important for me to you know, have something in my life that I was going to enjoy. So, you know, for me, it was just that thing that I stuck with, and I kept sticking with and I kept getting better and better and better and better and better at it. And it's difficult to quit something that you're good at.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Now, the way you talked about, I think we can imagine what, nine-year-old you look like stepping into class and doing some karate. But as you got older, and you got better, and you stuck with it. What did that start to look like? Did you branch out train elsewhere? Competition? What was that for you as you got into your teen years and later?
Stephen Ferraro:
For me, it was more like, you know, competitions up in Ontario were always a little bit weird. They’re very, like, open tournament asks. It was point fighting and Ambassador was like, you don't really actually like hit or touch anybody or so on and so forth. It's like, getting the closest that you can to somebody and calling the point, I never really liked point fighting. Just because the dojo that we were in at the time was pretty hard-nosed, right, it was just one of those things that that I just couldn't stand because it didn't feel very real. And we had a hard-nosed dojo, we did a lot of like knockdown style kind of [00:13:35-00:13:36] and then there wasn't any kind of structuring body up here, there was no [00:13:40-00:13:42] there was no like IOC kind of integrated Association, there was none of that. So, it was difficult for me to like, be involved in something in a competitive aspect. Because the avenue for me to compete in the way that I wanted to wasn't there. I could do that then placing tournaments and things like that, and that was fine. But you know, as for sparring, and things like that, it was really unorganized and a bit raw. So, I never really got into the competition aspect outside of like, dojo wars. Where your teacher would take you and the team and go to a different dojo, kind of like a frenemy of his who had like a rival school and it was very Cobra Kai, right. Like, you just go team versus team and oh, wow, then go to McDonald's afterwards. And then, you know, go home. But I didn't really get into like the competition aspect of martial arts until I started doing jujitsu in my 30s. So, the nine-year-old me was kind of just plowing away at the dojo and getting into these epic battles with your buddies that you also train with in the basement of the church.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh, you started basement of a church, basement of the church based martial arts program start in the basement of some kind of religious hall.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, awesome. Well, it's because they're always looking for subsidies. And running school is not cheap. Like, it's not easy to do. You know, it's a labor of love at best. Sometimes I know a lot of people can. I know a lot of people; they can make a good run at it. But it's kind of difficult, you know, to do, especially if it's, you know, like your livelihood. Like, if you're paying your mortgage with your school, there's even a smaller percentage of people that can make that work for them and all the power to them. But that's just kind of not my style. I like the day job and so on. But I enjoy having the evenings open in order for me to, do what I need to do at the dojo, but I can't pay my mortgage on it for crying out loud. It's a nice little. It's a nice little hobby is a glorified hobby, I would say.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I get it, I totally get it. Now, you've brought up Brazilian jujitsu a couple times. But you mentioned that you started in karate, I find that when most people end up, branching out, there's something that's kind of set in their mind fairly early in their training, whether it's their first instructor encouraging it bringing in outside instructors, or maybe they transition to another school, something happens that makes people go, ah, I want to keep trying new things. How did that manifest for you?
Stephen Ferraro:
Brazilian jujitsu was something that I started probably about. I was probably in my late. I want to say, I was like, in my mid to late 20s, I'm probably about to between 25 and 28. I'm 39. Now, I kind of started dabbling in it because a friend of mine, at the time, was like, I'm going to start a martial art. And I was like, oh, great man, like, what do you think? And he's like, well, I really want to get into Jiu jitsu. Because at the time the UFC was on a bit of a resurgence, they were coming back with the Ultimate Fighter. And, you know, being a young guy, and like my college years, or like, post college years, and living with some friends, and so on, you know, we would watch all of the resurgence of the UFC on Saturday nights. And that was something that he really wanted to do. There was one other school in town, but I was probably one of the only people he knew with a geek. And I was like, “Okay, cool”. So, he would just basically go to class, and then at the end of the week, we would get together on a Friday night. And we would do just round after round after round, throughout, which is basically me getting my butt handed to me constantly over and over and over and over. And that's where I kind of really fell in love with the art. And then afterwards, you know, I kind of approached them and said, you know, eventually he got his black belt in it. And I said, “Hey, you know, we should do, like a program at my school because I really enjoyed doing it”. And he was like, “Yeah, no problem”. And that didn't really work out as well as we had hoped. And then I kind of was like, “Okay, this is something I still want to pursue”.
So, I ended up having to go to a club that was an hour outside of town, just to get in rounds, and so forth. But I would say I've probably been studying consistently over the last two to three years. And it's something that I've like, really fallen in love with. And it's something that really adds to karate knowledge, because a lot of people consider around especially in traditional martial arts, like karate, or Taekwondo, or so on and so forth. And they don't have that application piece outside of the cost of study. It was that application piece that is super important. And blue skies have always been something, in applications, have always been something I've always enjoyed immensely. And it's just another avenue for us to be able to carve out a path into developing applications in these weird and abstract motions that you see inside of kata, you know, that I had talked earlier before about coming up in a dojo that was really heavy on sparring, and striking is great and everything, but you know, it's not always the end of karate. And you know, karate, I feel is very raw, very all-encompassing martial art. That takes a couple of, you know, it takes a lot of avenues to help you develop skill that will allow you to do these techniques. When people look at karate, they might think like, oh, there's no throws in crap. And it's like, oh, no, there's tons of throws and kind of say, well, there's no joint manipulation. Well, there's lots of joint manipulation with what people think right? There is just no kicks and blocks and, and punches. But that's just like the tip of the iceberg. It gets so much more complex as you go through it. So, I guess it was a bit of a like a backward solving method for me. Whereas like, some people can go into karate, and eventually, you know, they get right into applications and stuff right off the hop. For me, I've kind of studied all these other different arts to see their connections to karate, as a kind of a backward solving method.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I get it. Now, where did this love for application in this interest in rounding things out come from?
Stephen Ferraro:
I don't know. Probably from some of my instructors, one of the individuals that I've worked with over the last little bit is my karate instructor. And kind of my mentor, [00:20:34-00:24:36], he was a guy that I was introduced to probably around that same time in my mid 20s, in my late 20s. And it was at that time I started getting a little bit bored with Kata, there wasn't really like enjoying it as much. And I was kind of like, on the cusp of like, maybe I don't want to do this long term anymore, and so on and so forth. So, I kind of was, after meeting him and training with him for a little bit, I was introduced to somebody, who had a lot of knowledge about, like, the applications of these movements inside of our Kata, and they didn't seem weird. And they didn't seem abstract. And they didn't seem wrong. They were great. They were great applications. They were, you know, fantastic. And I was like, “How come? I don't know any of this?” You know, how come I don't know any of this stuff? And it always confused me that, like, why don't I know any of this stuff? And it really comes down to like, well, who are you training with? So, I've spent the majority of my time over the last little bit training with him out of unpacking a lot of these applications, and it's really helped me develop their sense of what I want to do as a martial artist. I suppose he really gave me like, be okay. Like not of being like, oh, okay, so like, when I do this, could it be this? Yeah. Could it be this, it can be whatever you want it to be, as long as it works. And it was great to finally have like, somebody who outranked me. Give me that kind of permission to think outside the box. So, once I started thinking outside the box, that's whenever they really started to really started to come into fruition for me. Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And the way you phrase that, you know, it can be whatever you want it to be. That's something that a lot of martial arts schools not only don't get discouraged, a lot of martial arts schools say, when you do this movement, it is this.
Stephen Ferraro:
Right? And that's not something for me, like I've ever really wanted to, you know, it's when people sit and people talk about this all the time, where they want to say like, “Oh, well, this move is this, or this move is this, this move is this, this move is this”. And unfortunately, that's not how it goes. Like, if you take the idea of self-defense, or you take even the idea of fighting like just the simple idea of fighting, you know, you're saying well like a jab, as a jab. And like when you jab, you always jab to the head, and you always do it this way, then you're basically eliminating any possibility for it to be anything else. Like, you know, [00:23:14-00:23:15] had a different jab then Floyd Mayweather has a different job. You know, everybody has a different way of kind of expressing themselves through martial arts, it's supposed to be an art form, it's supposed to be something that's different for everybody, it's supposed to have that those nuances, it's supposed to have those layers. And for me, it was always like, when you run into people who are very traditional, they're like, no, this is all and end all of this move. And it's just kind of like a stuck pattern. And I never wanted to have style. I never wanted to train in something that was just so narrow minded of like, no, this is this move. And this is all this, and this is this move. And this is all this is. For me, if it works, great, keep going. Now, you know, some applications could be a little hokey-er than others, some might not have the same, you know, high percentage of practicality versus usefulness. But you know, as long as you're thinking kind of outside the box in that way, then you're probably on that correct path. And to turn around and say, you know, something as nuanced or something as layered as fighting or as self-defense, to narrow it into this idea of like, no, this punches this punch in, it's only this punch is I think, the stupidest way to think about anything. So, if something is working, then you know, then great if it's working for you, then fantastic. And when you get all of these people in the room who think about things in a complex manner, that's where everyone is going to learn because if everybody's bringing the same skill set to the table, why do you need so many people at the table? Right? Why would you only have you know, if everyone's going to agree, if 20 people are going to agree that they know the technique behind this move in this topic is this why do you need 20 people there? You only need one. Right? Or that's to say, you know, like, even if you look at the idea of martial arts, it's supposed to be... John Danaher had said this, you're looking at the implementation of skill, over a lack of kind of over a lack of ability. So, you're taking a look at people come to martial arts, because they're looking to fill a void for something that they don't have/ if you might not be the biggest person in the room, you might be the most athletic, you might not be the fastest, and you're looking to implement a strategy by using technique. So, in that in and of itself, how are you supposed to have a great strategy? If you've only got one strategy? If there's only one way to defend yourself, or one way to attack somebody? How are you going to implement that?
Jeremy Lesniak:
And what if it doesn't work?
Stephen Ferraro:
And what if it doesn't work? Then all of a sudden, it's like, well, then I guess. And that's the other thing, too. It's like, well, what if it doesn't work? There are so many people that just assume that it's going to work, right? Which is, but it always works, but magic, right? It's, well, then that's the thing too, right. And I say this a lot in my dojo, I'll say, you know, karate isn't magical, it's practical. And if you are going to look at something as being magical, then you've got another thing coming, like, none of this is magic, it's not going to work. Unless you work it. The same thing is when people are like, well, you know, I don't you see a lot of black belts who are like they got their black belt in 1994, they really stopped training in 1995. But they're still walking around as if they're the be all and end all of all things. And really, that they're not like, you haven't trained in X number of years, you just you have not trained in X number of years. So, you know, where do you get off telling people that Oh, it needs to be like this, or it needs to be like this, it needs to be like that but you're not really even training yourself. You know, like, you're making this hard on everybody. You know, the person that was learning and the person that's listening. So, you'll see a lot of people who are like, 100 pounds overweight, and they've got like, all these degrees and there's the self-professed, Grandmaster, whatever. And that's really why I hate titles because I think you can you hide behind them. It's like this mystique of who you think you are. But really, at the end of the day, like the mats don't lie. Like if your technique doesn't work, it doesn't work. They know, if your strategy doesn't work, it doesn't work. And you can sit around and you can profess all you want about well, this is going to work, but does it? And have you tried it? And are you still working on yourself? Because if not, then all you're really doing is selling snake oil. And, you know, I think we could both agree there's enough people doing that.
Jeremy Lesniak:
It sounds like just in your tone, as you talked about that. This is striking a bit of a nerve. Yeah, it sounds like this is something that you think about, you've talked about before. And you know, full disclosure, we talked about this on the show. Yeah, we in there in too, often seemingly paradoxical ways. You know, I am style agnostic and believe whatever you train, if it works for you, if it checks your boxes for why makes you happy, go do it. Write it on the other side, there's a tremendous amount of ego in our industry that I think holds people back at all levels. Yeah. And that's what I find myself speaking out about most is the ego and how it is an anchor to where you are, it's never going to get you where you want to go.
Stephen Ferraro:
You know, I always just want part of my pursuit, as a martial artist has always been to bring a credibility back to karate. You know, like, I feel like karate and of itself is a great all-encompassing martial art. You know, it's got joint logs, [00:29:30-00:29:33] it's got a lot of really great avenues for study. And it just seems like people have gotten to a point where they just want to collect kata, and they want to obtain rank, but they don't necessarily want to train or they don't necessarily want to get better. And that's never been my pursuit, my pursuit has always been to get better and to obtain the knowledge of you have people generations and generations and generations before, but then also to add to that, like, there's that saying that you [00:30:07-00:30:07] Sensei once said, karate can't be a body of water; I'm paraphrasing it best in this is going to be brutal. But you know, it can't be a body of water that stagnant, it's got to have rivers that go in and out, or else it will dry up. And you've got to allow people to, you know, to experience karate, and karate needs to kind of grow as we all train into it. It's one of those things where there's not an answer, there's not a definitive answer to technique, there's not a definitive answer to how you do things, it's not a definitive answer to how you practice stuff. It's all kind of up to the participant. And when people turn around, and they're very narrow minded about, well, it needs to be done like this. And it has to be done like this. And it has to be done like this. What I see is a lot of posturing from people who really don't know, any of the application behind it. I've been to classes, I've been to workshops, where people will turn around, and they'll ask questions about like, how their feet are supposed to be when they bow. Like, what does it matter where your feet go, where you bow, you want to spend 20 minutes on where your feet go, when you bow, if you go to Okinawa, or any place where they're a high ranking karate-ka, and you don't shop, they'd like half the time, they don't even put their feet together, when they bow, this slap, besides, you know, the front of the eyes, or the side of the thighs, and they smile big, and then they go after it. It's like your knowledge has nothing to do with your performance of your bowing, of your race ceremony. You know, like, it's either technique, or you don't know, technique, you either understand that the principles of the applications, or you don't, but to turn around into and spend like 15/20 minutes on where your [00:32:13-00:32:15], Oh, come on, you know, like, what a high horse opportunity? And then somebody is going to answer that question. Well, you know, you're really supposed to have it out like this. And people eat that up. Like they're learning something.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Because they want to get it “right”? I mean, you're talking about is this interesting dichotomy between people who I think you and I are probably pretty similar. I've, for a very long time, had what I like to call it and I'm not the one who coined this phrase, but a white belt mentality. I want to train, I just want to train, if you have something, you can teach me that. I don't know, I'm going to eat that up. Right, you know, I'm going to assimilate. You know, Borg at a Star Trek, this came up in a podcast episode we recorded earlier today, you know, just this idea that if there's more to learn, and you can teach it, I want to learn it. I really don't care who you are, what your rank title style, is, I want that. And then you've got other people who are fearful, I think of training, because they don't trust their skill. And instead of putting in the work to get better, they like to find these specific aspects of training. And usually, it's around formality and etiquette in my mind, that they can hang their hat on and say, when you bow it is supposed to be like this. And if you don't do it like this, you're being disrespectful. Yeah. And it's this interesting form of bullying those creeps into what we do.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, yes. It's like this, kind of, well, I've got this, it's like a subordination. They want to keep you down and dam up. But at the same time, it's more like, yeah, but you're nickel and diming. Everybody, you know, all the worst aspects of something, it's foolish. It's like, well, where does my hand go when I do this? And where am I supposed to turn on this? And it's like, you're looking at, it's like buying a car. And all you're doing is looking at how cool the paint job is. It's like, what why are you focusing on the paint job, like, focus on you know, the mechanics of what makes the car go. Focus on you know, like, the aspects of the vehicle that are going to keep you safe. There are so many more things to worry about. And you're sitting around going, well, I really like the color blue. Well, who cares about the color blue when you're talking about like this idea of karate, this idea of martial arts training, and I think people get really hung up on rank and certificates and titles and all of those things? And those are great. You know, like, it's nice to obtain rank, it's nice to get something from somebody who you respect, you know, and it's kind of promoting you to another level of what they feel is excellence. And that's great, these are great moments. But if that's like all you're doing, or you're just collecting kata, like I want to be able to do that. Great. How many times I've been in a room, and people are asking Bunkai questions, and application questions. And they can't do like, you know, the application might be somebody trying to show, let's say, a throw, you know, like a Harai Goshi or Uchi Mata, also to [00:35:41-00:35:42], and you're looking at all of these different these. And this person is asking that this really specific question about, you know, this throw that somebody sees and in particular Kata, when people ask me that, like, well, “how are you supposed to perform this throw?” I always say to them, can you throw? Have you done a throw? Do you know anything about the mechanics of lifting a person up and throwing them on the ground? And if they often will say, “Well, no”. And it's like, well, why are you asking a question about this, the intricacies of this particular throw, when you don't even know the basics of how to throw, they don't want this advanced knowledge of Bunkai without actually going through the raps. You know, it's like if you want to get better at throws in karate, go to a judo class man. You want to get better at joint manipulations, go to Jiu jitsu class, you want to get better at striking, go to a kickboxing gym. Like that's where you're going to learn the principles of what you're going to find inside of your karate. That's why cross training is great. Because it's going to amplify your karate, it's not going to make you sitting down with somebody and asking them questions and having them show you stuff. Isn't going to make you automatically be able to do it. You can download this; this isn't the matrix. You know, just plug in and go. I know Kung Fu. There's a [00:37:10-00:37:12] that famous Neo versus Laurence Fishburne his character, I can't remember who it is. But that's not how it works. And so many people in so many associations and all over the world, that's what they want. They want to sit down and they want to hear about what they're supposed to do. But they'll never take the rank off and go into another gym and learn. They're just like, “Oh, well, this is what it is. Okay, well, can you show me?” “No?” “Well, then why do you want to know?”
Jeremy Lesniak:
How to how do we attack that is not the right word. But how do we discourage that?
Stephen Ferraro:
It's a difficult thing, I think the ego thing is one of the things that you got to tackle first, like, ego is great. And at the same time, it is, like, having an ego is probably what will keep you in a gym. Because you know, it's a pursuit of something that you want, but as soon as it starts to get to the point where it consumes you too much, where you're not learning, that can be disconcerting, I think, it comes down to like, two things, one, not caring so much about your rank, that you feel you need to hide behind it. And to developing a room that is welcoming, and competitive, but also supportive, that will help people because if your pursuit is the rank, you're going to quit as soon as you attain it. And people get ranked for all kinds of reasons. You can be inside of an association for decades, and you're going to be promoted based on your time in, whereas other people might promote you because of your skill in. But like, there's no guarantee. So, you find yourself amongst all of these different people. I think the best people are people who have cross train, like are you aware of, or do you know, Major Perry? Doug Perry?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Huh? No. Okay.
Stephen Ferraro:
So, Perry is one of very few Westerners who was promoted to ninth dawn in Okinawa, karate himself and Dan Smith. You know, there's a lot of individuals but, you know, these are the ranks that are difficult to obtain what makes Perry Sensei such a great karate person is all of the things that he has done outside of karate, the man is a multiple time Purple Heart recipient, the man had over 147, amateur boxing fights. The man was a Golden Gloves champion in the Marine Corps, the man was had an exhibition match with Billy [00:40:23-00:40:24]. So, when you ask him a question about striking in Karate, he's going to be able to tell you, because he's been in conflict, both as a marine and as a boxer. And then he's taken that and brought it to his karate. Whereas a lot of people who are going to have high ranking titles in Karate, have never been in a fight. The last time they've ever sparred, might have been decades ago, they don't know anything about self-defense, because they don't constantly practice live resistance training, they just don't. It's like, it's funny to me how karate or martial arts can be like this one thing, where people go to you to learn how to protect themselves, and you don't know anything about protecting yourself, because you aren't, you're showing like techniques on an opponent who's not resisting. And you're selling people like a confidence level that they don't deserve to have, because they don't really train. You have these high-ranking people that run these schools. And you know, when was the last time that they've ever been in a conflicting situation. Now, I'm not trying to say that, as a martial artist, you should be going out and testing your skill and street constantly, and so on and so forth. But you should be looking actively to participate in things to get better at your craft. That's like watching a Master's class on acting. And assuming you can act. It's always drove me the most nuts are the thing about combative. I'm sorry to ramble here, man, like, I don't want this.
Jeremy Lesniak:
This is perfect. This is a homework of the show on a subject and you run with it.
Stephen Ferraro:
I thought this to be like a one-sided conversation. But it's always like fighting is the one thing that people just assume they can do. Like, you never know what in the right mind is like, well, I played a little basketball in high school. So, I'm pretty much sure I could play in the NBA. You know, no one believes that. But as soon as it comes down to fighting, you have everyone's like, oh, well, I can fight? And it's like, No, you can't. Because people just assume that they can punch or that they can kick or they can defend themselves. And they'll say things like, oh, it's not the size of the fight and the dog. Well, that's something that people who have never been in a fight saying, right, because it's a way of hiding behind their ego, because they don't want to admit to themselves. They don't know what they're talking about. everyone assumes they can fight and they can protect themselves. But fighting is one of the hardest skills to obtain. Like, you look at major boxers, major kickboxing, major grapplers. These are people that spent countless number of hours working on their craft. And it takes a lifetime to and not even master but to be, you know, fairly decent. Anybody that is a prizefighter. Will tell you that you're never going to master it, you're just going to get proficient. But yet, hundreds of people all over the place will say, “Well, I know how to defend myself or I know how to fight or I know how to”. And most of the time, these skills are being taught by teachers who really don't know what they're talking about. Like, I can remember being taught a class on how to like, it was a knife fighting class. Or it was like somebody brought up this idea of like, well, when somebody presents a knife into the fight, and the person basically said, “Boy, you kick it out of their hands”. How stupid is that? You kick a knife out of their hands, what's only stupid if you've tried it? Right? And then you know, that is a great way to get your leg cut. It's foolish. And I think one of the things that drives me the most nuts, the more time I spend in martial arts, the more I just want people to take off the rank, get on the mat. And my favorite saying, all of karate, you know, is the Japanese saying [00:45:10-00:45:12], which is loosely translated as shut up and train. Yeah, and if everybody just learned to do that more, oh my god, we'd probably have more proficient traditional martial arts. And that's what gets me the most is like, I consider myself a traditional martial artist, you know, like, I've been doing karate for 30 years. And if there's one thing that I've learned about doing karate for 30 years, is that I can study this my entire life. I'm still never going to get to a mastery level of it. I'll never get to a mastery level, I'll get proficient. But my responsibility to karate is to bring people you know, bring people to the well, I want them to see it, like I see it, I want them to see it, like, “Hey, you need to cross train, you need to learn from everybody, everyone's got something to show you bring knowledge back to karate to make your karate better”. Don't just assume that because you do karate, that you are the be all and end all of all things. Because that's just the first way to ruining your training in the first place. For sure, rant, rant over. Well, that's too bad. So, now there'll be another one man.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I appreciate the passion and a lot of what you're saying, I agree with completely and everything you said I agreed with at least partially, we're on the same page. And I think that's great. Now, I find that these conversations aren't always easy to have. Do you have people in your life that you exchange these views with? Or have you been keeping this bottled up?
Stephen Ferraro:
Oh, no, I talk about this all the time. I think it's because of the last years that means studying Brazilian Jiu jitsu that I've just been a little bit more upfront with it, you know, it's like, because when you're looking at a grappling or like I said before, the mats don't lie. You're either going to win, or you're going to learn, right? So, you're constantly interacting with people that are better at you and a lot of different ways. Like so for instance, I might be a black belt in karate, but 'm just a blue belt. In Brazilian jujitsu, there's so much more to learn. And if you don't kind of open your eyes to some of this stuff, you miss out on all this knowledge. So, for instance, there are two guys that I train with who are, you know, that one's a blue belt in BJJ? And one's a white belt in BJJ. But they're both like, you know, fairly decorated wrestlers. They're fairly decorated wrestlers. So, when you take a look at what they can do, you're going to learn something, because for me, I'm like, okay, there's all these throws and takedowns in karate. I want to get better at them. Why wouldn't I ask a wrestler? Hey, can you show me how to do that throw? Or go to a friend of mine who's a judo guy and say, hey, can you show me how to get better at this? Because that's exactly what they specify it. So just to kind of assume that I'm going to be able to do all of this stuff, because I want to be good at it is ridiculous. So, I'm very upfront with this with a lot of people, like, you know, have the conversation, spend the time. But what I have found more often than not, is that I'm kind of, you know, I'm definitely not the majority voice. I'm definitely the minority voice. Then I'm not expecting people to come to karate, and then all of a sudden be like, great, go out there and cross train and find a wrestler and find a judoka and find a boxer and fight, and then you learn all this stuff, and then come back because people come to martial arts for different reasons. Some people might not get to that point in their training whatsoever, and that's okay. But definitely don't you know, one of the things that I kind of can't stand it's like when certain traditional martial arts kind of rip on other traditional martial arts, you know, they'd be like, oh, Taekwondo, that's garbage, because I'm a karate person. And Karate is better than Taekwondo. And it's like, I'm not sure. There are some really legit Taekwondo athletes, who, you know, have done like amazing things, olympically in the ring and so on and so forth. And to turn around and to say, oh, well, because they do Taekwondo makes them less of a martial artist. It's like, I think your understanding is twisted. You know, it's kind of like saying that one is better than the other. And one isn't better than the other. It's just depends on who you train with and the intensity of your training.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So, what if any martial art was objectively better than all the rest across the board, the others would have fallen away.
Stephen Ferraro:
Exactly, exactly. And one of the things that you get with traditional martial arts is a specified knowledge of x. You know, like, if you're going to do judo, you're going to get really good at throwing, and maybe some good ground techniques. Maybe if you're going to do Jiu jitsu, you're probably going to get pretty good at joint manipulation, you're going to do boxing, you're going to get really good at throwing your hands, you're going to do Taekwondo, you're going to get really great at throwing your feet. And it's kind of just, you're looking at all of these really specified abilities. And, for me, karate, I figured out pretty quick was like [00:51:14-00:51:15] has got all of this stuff in it. I should probably like go out of my way to learn how to do all of these specified techniques better. So that when I'm teaching karate, I can show people like, well, here's the throw, I was like, it's pretty raw. But if you [00:51:28-00:51:30], like they're going to do [00:51:31-00:51:32]. But anyway, this is what it's kind of like. And have people just forgot about, like Budo. And people just forgotten about Budo, like, didn't we all kind of disseminate from the samurai kind of knowledge, and then it all kind of trickled down. And then it became like this gigantic spider with all these different legs of all these different offshoots. But at the end of the day, it's Budo. Like it's fighting, it's martial arts. So, to turn around and say, one is better than the others, to me, it just drives me nuts. I want to be a voice out there, that's like, you know, hey, you know, come back to center.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Come back to center, I like that. I think what you're talking about all comes from the same place, you know, that fearful ego position, makes you say those things. Whether they're talking about applications, they don't fully understand, couldn't implement if their life depended on it, or they're disparaging someone else's skill, style, application, etc. It comes from a place of fear. Yeah, they're afraid that of any number of things. And I think the one that is most common is, they're afraid that they could have possibly been in a better place if they had trained differently, or with different people, or in a different way, etc. And they are so locked into this idea that they are the hero in their own story, because we all need to be right, otherwise, the world falls apart, right. So committed to that and not considering another perspective, that they will do anything they can to remain such.
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah. And I kind of look at it like this, like, everybody has this admiration for their teacher. And you should always have a great admiration for your teacher or your coach. But they're never going to be the be all and end all. And I think like in parenting, I have a son and a daughter, then they’re nine and seven respectively. And I'm watching them kind of grow up and go through sport, and it's not my job to coach them. It's my job to be their father, and to encourage them. And one of the things that I think has gotten lost over the years is this idea that you can only learn from, like your coach, or your teacher. And also, the fear of losing students to other people, is what I think is really attributed to people kind of creating these like close knit little circles, you know, like you could get, well, we don't go there from this dojo because of this, we don't go and do that. Because this, we don't trust this person, or we don't do this or this. Because the instructor is kind of fearful of the revenue. Well, if they go over there and they train there, then they're going to like that better. And if they like that better than they're not going to come back here. So, you know, we keep them at a distance. It's like that joke. How many black belts does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Jeremy Lesniak:
[00:54:52-00:54:56]
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah. 99. Well, at our dojo, we do it a little bit different. Right, like, it doesn't matter what it is, you just have to learn, and then bring that back to center. And for some reason, we've gotten to this point where like, we don't even want to associate with other associations, even though we might be doing the exact same technique. We don't want to associate with other people because of that and the other thing, but associate or we might not even want to associate with people in our association, because of this, that or the other. But isn't that like, the whole idea of association [00:55:37-00:55:41].
Jeremy Lesniak:
Now, you brought up something. I want to go back to briefly, this idea that, as a school owner, if you allow people, if you encourage them to cross train and meet other people, that they may leave and go there because they like it better? How do you as an instructor with a school? And no, it's not your primary or full-time income? But I'm sure you care? How do you handle that?
Stephen Ferraro:
I've always encouraged like, if I've always been encouraged people to go and do whatever it is that they want to do. But I tried to bring different programming to my school that I would enjoy and that I think other people would enjoy. So, not only do we have a karate curriculum and a Kobudo curriculum, but we also have, a kickboxing element to our school. We've added a Jiu jitsu element at our school. So, for me, it's like, yeah, you can go wherever you want. Or you could just go to a different class that's already happening here. Right?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Let me rephrase, because I think it's important for people out there to hear this, to what you're saying is, instead of trying to control their reality, such that they're not aware of other options that might be better, you focus on delivering the best possible offering to your students and potential students.
Stephen Ferraro:
Exactly. Like if I kind of look at it, if I was a young person, or if I was the younger me, would I not benefit from going to one place where I could learn all different kinds of systems of self-defense? The answer would, you know, resoundingly well, yeah. You know, as opposed to being indoctrinated into being like karate, it's the best, that's all you need. When you look at it that way, it's like, that's not the way to look at the study of anything. It's like, oh, you just need to do this one thing. No, I'm passionate about Karate. I'm very passionate about Karate, I always will be a karate-ka at heart. But what brings out the best in my karate is my ability to see things that other people might not see, because of the knowledge I've obtained in other arts, but then also to bridge those gaps between these martial artists and these martial arts, in order to make things more cohesive. I like to think of martial arts much more like a Monet and less like a mosaic. You know, I like the smearing of things across. Because the more that you do your research, now, everybody turns around and thinks that martial art is, especially karate, you know, is this Japanese thing? Well, Kata is a Japanese thing. But [00:58:29-00:58:36], and that's Chinese. And before that, you know, it was all of these different rudimentary aspects of Budo. And that's Indian. So, when we turn around, and we try to, like, label this data, and the other thing is being specific to these particular parts of the world, are these particular techniques or this that we're missing the entire experience of martial arts, the entire pilgrimage of martial arts, which was that living history of going from one person to the next one person to the next one person to the next to one person to the next. For us to turn around and assume that we're doing a good service by essentially, you know, closeted ourselves in our associations or causing ourselves in our rank, positing ourselves in our systems or our styles isn't what brings new life to martial arts. It's just what maintains the status quo, and eventually kind of kills it and rots it up.
Jeremy Lesniak:
For sure, wow. It's done. Let's talk about a few other things as we start to look at winding down here. Sure. So, the first thing is, we've talked about the past and all these things that have led you up to know what's coming up. What are you looking forward to? What are your goals? What is keeping you up at night or getting you up early in the morning?
Stephen Ferraro:
You know what, man? COVID is bad?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes.
Stephen Ferraro:
COVID has been has been bad. Where are you at right now?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I'm in Vermont, here in Vermont.
Stephen Ferraro:
So, Ontario is the most lockdown place in all of the globe. We are in our third lockdown. They're just starting to open up things again. But martial arts schools, like we haven't been able to do contact training with a partner or anything, since this whole thing began over 16 months 17 months ago. So as of March 2020, my students haven't been able to fight. And we are now in a lockdown that started our third lockdown that started beginning April. And I'm teaching classes online. I'm having to do zoom Karate online, which is frustrating at best. So, for me, what's coming up, you know, hopefully, what's coming up is the end of all of this lockdown nonsense, and into getting back to regular training and partner training and contact training and those things. That's what I really am looking forward to it, because it's been brutal, there's been so many schools up here that have closed. There are so many places that are shutting down. And I don't know what the end result is going to be except that we're looking at a three-stage kind of a situation. And even by the third stage of opening everything up. They still won't tell us if we're going to actually be able to spar or touch each other or anything of that nature. It's getting ridiculous. So, for me, what I really want is an opportunity to get things back to normal. So hopefully, what's coming up in the fall is getting things back to normal. I prayed to God about what's happening. And literally Canada is in one of those situations right now where, you know, every other place in the world, maybe outside of Australia is kind of opening up and recognizing that these lockdowns are working and we've got to get better at things and so on and so forth. But it's been crippling to a lot of places, I've seen a lot of great schools close, and we're hanging on, we're surviving.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And is that because it's not your full-time gig?
Stephen Ferraro:
I don’t know, a lot of that has to do with... A lot of that is a testament to my students. And their willingness to keep training and their willingness to want to keep training and their willingness to keep showing up. And I think they're finding a value in it. I also think that it's a bit of a situation where like, it's kind of the only game in town, like you can't really do anything right now, like organized sports are like shut down, everything's really shut down. So really, the only thing that you can do is log in for a Karate class, or a fitness class or so on. You know, you can't really do much else. So, the only reason I think that I'm still in the game as of right now is because of my students. They've been incredibly resilient. And they've shown you know, they've shown a lot of love to their school and into their passion for you know, for training in martial arts, that they're continually showing up online each and every day, as we slowly get back to being in the dojo. That's awesome.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well, if people want to get ahold of you, social media website, email, anything like that you're willing to share?
Stephen Ferraro:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, people can always reach out to me personally. Steven Ferraro, you know, I'm pretty readily available on Facebook and so on. But the dojo, ferrarokarate.ca. You can get ahold of us on the majority of our social media platforms app for @ferrarokarate. Or @ferrarokarateandmartialarts on Instagram. But, that's the best way to follow ferrarokarate.ca or www.ferrarokarate.com
Jeremy Lesniak:
We'll put all that stuff in the show notes. Now, this is your chance to give some last words. Maybe not quite that dramatic, some parting thought to the folks listening, you know, you've talked about some big stuff, some pretty high-level concepts. And anybody who's still listening is they're at least appreciative of your willingness, I think, to go out officially on record, and share your thoughts. So, you know, for those people hanging on here listening to you, what would you say to them as we roll to the outro?
Stephen Ferraro:
I think it's important when you're training, I think it's really important just to be true to yourself and to keep, set a goal and keep moving forward. But also, surround yourself with good people, surround yourself with like-minded people, surround yourself, to be in an environment that's accepting and supportive, loving and intense. Because those are all the things that you know, that you want from your martial arts training that you've come, you've come to want from your martial arts training. And don't be afraid to put yourself out there to be the new guy or girl. Don't be afraid to take off your rank. Don't be afraid to step outside of yourself. Don't be afraid to learn something new. Don't be afraid to try something different. Because at the end of the day, you're still you. And, you know, if you look at karate as or whatever martial art that it is that you do, if you look at it as being the be all and end all of self-defense, you're missing out on two things. One, you're missing out on a lot of knowledge that you can bring back to what it is that you do. But secondly, you're missing out on so many great relationships that you could build with other people who are in different forms to study. You know, part of what makes a great orchestra are all the individual pieces of the unit. You've got your woodwinds and your percussion; you've got your brass. And everybody brings a little something different to the table. But the beautiful layers of that music can only be created simply by being a piece of the of the puzzle being a piece of the bigger thing. So, you know, don't think of yourself as being so big as you can't take off the rank. But you know, also think of, there are other people out there that you can learn from. And those are those wonderful little things that are going to add new life, a new breath to what it is that you're doing.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Had a great time. I'm 100% convinced that you had a great time you're listening to the outro after all, you made it this far, you enjoyed this episode, probably not quite as much as I did, because I doubt anybody enjoys these episodes as much as I do, but maybe you do. Well, at the very least, I want to thank Sensei for coming on. I want to thank him for sharing so openly and being so generous with his time. If you want to go deeper on this or any other episode, go to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com. You can check out every episode we've done. You can sign up for the newsletter, all kinds of good stuff over there for this episode, for other episodes, so check it out. If what we do mean something to you, please consider helping us out. We've got a Patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick. You can get in as little as two bucks per month. We've got our store at whistlekick.com, use the code: PODCAST15. And we've got our training programs like you want to get stronger at home with no equipment in a martial arts way designed to supplement your martial arts training. Yeah, we made that program. Nobody else made that program. It's available at whistlekickprograms.com. If you've got feedback, whether it's guest suggestions, topic suggestions, if we screwed something up, if there's anything we want to hear about, we want to hear from you. Email me jeremy@whistlekick.com, our social media everywhere you can imagine is @whistlekick. And that's all I have for you today. Until next time, train hard, smile and have a great day.