My Trip To California, Post 14: Laura’s Jujitsu

This is the last of the California series, we did it! Yay! Now we can start into September. I’m still a month and a half behind.

On my last night in Santa Clara, Laura took me to watch her Jujitsu class. I haven’t watched one of her classes since she was a teenager. It was very interesting.

Laura wrote up an explanation about Jujitsu for us, which I’m posting below. I want to make a quick clarification first – in the first sentence Laura refers to her siblings – plural. In addition to Callan, she is referring to Rob’s daughter, Sarah (I was briefly married to Rob between 1999-2001). Laura and Sarah still consider each other stepsisters.

Laura says:

“I started training in martial arts when I was about 11 or 12, along with my siblings. We went to a school that taught Byakka Ryu Jujitsu. This style was invented by our Sensei (head teacher) and was a mix of Danzan Ryu Jujitsu and Bok Fu Kung Fu. It is common in martial arts for an experienced practitioner to start their own school and even their own branch or new style.

Our style of martial arts was heavily rooted in traditional Japanese martial arts, and the techniques we learned and the culture of our school were very similar to Danzan Ryu. I trained in this until I was 15, when we moved, and had reached green belt. In that style, a green belt was two below black. Different schools use different colors in different orders, but they all have black to indicate a high level of proficiency.

After moving, I went to other martial arts schools and over the next couple of decades dabbled in Ninjitsu, Karate, Judo, Aikido, Kajukenbo, and Krav Maga. Finally, after moving to Santa Clara I discovered a Danzan Ryu Jujitsu school and returned to my roots. Many people are familiar with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (same original Japanese word, different English spelling), especially the Gracie schools, and I understand this is because their practitioners do very well in MMA, which is quite popular.

In a way, jujitsu on its own is already a mixed martial art because it incorporates striking techniques, throwing techniques, ground/wrestling techniques, weapons practice, and more. My understanding is that Brazilian Jiu Jitsu focuses primarily on ground techniques, and puts a lot of emphasis on competitions. Danzan Ryu is more similar to Judo and Aikido, with lots of focus on throwing and fighting techniques that use circular movements, using your opponent’s own energy against them.

We do almost no competitions, focusing more on personal growth – not only improving in rank through the techniques themselves but with a full mind-body-spirit approach. The meditation, mindfulness, and self awareness I have found to be particularly useful in my day-to-day life when managing my own emotions in times of stress. The other main benefit I get from training is my body instinctively knowing how to fall!

The only times I have used jujitsu outside of school have been when I tripped and fell, or fell off a skateboard, or got knocked down by my dog. I have a jujitsu classmate who is a little old man with a shock of white hair, and he loves to joke that when his doctor asks if he has taken any falls recently, he gleefully replies, “Oh yes, all the time!”

Another thing I love about Danzan Ryu is that it teaches a number of different techniques for the same situations, giving you the option of deciding what level of force is most appropriate. Handsy guy at the bar? You don’t want to permanently injure him. Perhaps use a joint lock that is painful only if he tries to move towards you and releases when he moves away, just to send a message. Someone is trying to kill you? Yeah, you probably want to incapacitate them and not worry so much about breaking their bones.

I have used jujitsu once that wasn’t just falling down – I was at a bar after work with coworkers, and one guy came up and put his arm around my shoulders in an overly friendly way. I pretended to get startled and spin around in such a way that I *almost* elbowed him in the face. He backed off and never tried that again, and it avoided unnecessary confrontation (in my opinion, though I know some would advocate being more direct in protecting oneself and calling attention to the inappropriateness of his behavior in that situation).

I’ve been studying Danzan Ryu at this school for a few years now and have reached brown belt, which is just one below black. And black belt is not the end of the journey, it only marks the official beginning!

Here are several short video clips that I took during Laura’s class. I’m very grateful they all agreed to allow me to video.

In this first video they are practicing exercises individually.

Next they are practicing a move in pairs.

This next video shows an example of the instruction process when Laura was learning something new.

Here she adds another move when she got stuck.

I call these next three videos “Don’t try this at home.”

I would be hesitant to throw this little old guy!

I also want to comment that Laura’s ability to fall gracefully is nothing short of phenomenal. I remember once when she was still in school, she was leaving a concert where she played the clarinet. It was a dark, windy, rainy night and she slipped on the wet pavement wearing high heels and a narrow long black dress. Instead of sprawling hard onto the pavement, she did what I can only describe as a levitated twist in the air, landed and rolled, completely unhurt.

That concludes my series on my most excellent trip to California!

To send me a comment, email turning51bykristina@gmail.com.

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