One of the difficulties I have had in teaching Hapkido to
military people is that either they or I have to transfer every three to four
years. It is fair to say that I have
students all over the world at this point.
I myself would have to spend hours upon hours in a car just to get to my
own Hapkido teacher.
A students commitment to learn is mirrored by the
teachers commitment to teach. I have
felt the burden of not being able to continue teaching my students. With that in mind I began tooling around with
the idea of an interactive Hapkido website, so that I can effectively continue
teaching my people anywhere in the world.
I had the idea some three years ago and even made an early site that
didn't really work too well.
I decided recently to give it another try. I'll be the first to admit that I am not a
great web designer. I decided to use a
provider and work from a standard template this time and the results have been
WAY better. I've only been building the
site for about a week but it is already a great resource!
I've known so many who desire martial
arts training but never pursue it. Many never learn martial arts because it's
either too expensive or sometimes not even available in their area.
When I began learning martial arts (20 years ago) it was
reasonably affordable (my first classes cost $14 a month). That has changed considerably over the
years. Nowadays Hapkido instruction (if
you can even find it) runs between $80 and $250 a month. Even learning from a DVD series runs in the
$500 range, sometimes more.
Some try to learn from free videos on YouTube and such
but this is a very inefficient way to learn and often ignores the fundamentals
that a beginning student must learn. If you
have learned this way, good on you, but I bet if you could you would rather
have formal instruction.
So with all this in my mind and in my heart I give you
Hapkido Online:
Please understand that this is a work in progress, I've
only been at it for about a week now.
But already it has all the elements that I feel are needed to 'distance
learn' a martial art:
Step by step instructive videos with written tutorials
-
A forum for questions
-
A video conferencing feature for interaction with teacher
and student
-
A pool of willing instructors
-
A pool of willing students
So far I've only begun fleshing out the White Belt level
but every week more content will be added till it has every single practical
Hapkido move. I am happy to offer White
Belt through Yellow Belt absolutely free of charge. In conventional terms that is like three to
six months of training for free.
Regrettably I cannot offer the whole site free of charge
because it costs money to keep it running.
Believe me when I tell you though that I will be operating it 'at
cost'. I am not looking to make money
here, simply to teach Hapkido to those who want to learn. I have decided to charge what I paid 20 years
ago, $14 a month. I am also offering a
onetime lifetime membership to any military, fireman, police, or other "people who serve" at a greatly discounted price out of
gratitude for your service. Simply
mention that you are 'one who serves' in your application.
As I add content to the site I will put updates in this
thread of the blog. If you decide to join you will
have my undivided attention and instruction and occasional help from three
other guest black belts.
I look forward to training with you!
Jon
