Karate Nobody

 Now that I’ve described the two competing bunkai paradigms that I’ve worked within – the Core Bunkai Model  that I ascribe to and the Flexible Bunkai Model  which I grew up ‘learning’ – I thought I would take some time to describe a third model that is common and, I think, also useful. While I was struggling to understand the Flexible Bunkai Model,   I stumbled upon a critical book called Four Shades of Black by Gavin Mulholland . This book is a must-have for any Goju-ryu practitioner. Mulholland has a clear point to make and he drives it home in a beautiful and illustrative book. I can’t recommend it enough. The basic idea is that the Goju-ryu kata form a progressive curriculum so that the student develops more advanced karate skills as they move through the kata. The book uses the first four Goju kata to illustrate the point (Gekisai Dai Ichi, Gekisai Dai Ni, Saifa, Seienchin). Each kata gives the student a new area of study and a new set of skills to develop. You move from the