looking for the right martial arts?

I have done both Tae Kwan Do and Kendo. Both require regular sessions (once a week) and involve sparring.

The amount of meditation during classes depends on your instructors. How much meditation you do during your own practice is up to you. The purpose of meditation is to remove yourself (ie. your emotions) from your surroundings and any distractions. In combat, this enables you to focus on the battle at hand without getting "personal".

I think it was mentioned in The Last Samurai as having "no mind". In The Book of Five Rings (Miyamoto Musashi), it is mentioned in the book of Emptiness/Zero/Void (depending on translation). nb: The Book of Five Rings was derived from principles in Japanese swordfighting and lends itself well to Kendo.

Again, depending on how far you wish to go, you could apply meditation to other parts of your life besides martial arts.... and end up a Buddhist. Personally, I don't recommend it. Life becomes tasteless.

Personal notes on Tae Kwan Do and Kendo. Tae Kwan Do is much better all-round exercise. Kendo is higher maintenance - you need body armour, headgear, and the shinai (bamboo sword), but Kendo is much more fun especially when it comes to sparring.

If this is your first martial art, I suggest Tae Kwan Do or Aikido. I don't have any 1st hand experience, but my friend is an mid-level Aikido master. Aikido is defensive in nature, and more fluid. Aikido requires the opponent to make the first move.

OK. Whichever you finally decide upon, embrace the discipline, enjoy the experience, have fun.

If you are looking for something involving the spiritual side (meditation) and yet is a very effective self defense art, then I would suggest Aikido. It is an art that teaches you to use your opponents weight and momentum against them to guide them into locks and throws. It is considered a non aggressive art but is very, very effective in real life situations. There is alot of one on one sparring.

If you are looking for more sparring then I would look at Karate. It is the opposite of Aikido in that it is an aggressive art that teaches you to harness the power in your own body to strike perfect blows and kicks. It too is very effective in the real world.

See my answer to KATTALNUVA on the question "How many and what?" for a brief description of the major art styles.

It is NEVER too late to start martial arts. I have trained people in their 70's to a black belt level.

Look into each art very well and pick the right one for you. If you don't get the one that suits you, you will spend 22 years or so hopping around different arts and never really learning anything well.

Don't listen to that dork, you can start whenever you want to. Better late than never. I would suggest looking up martial arts in the yellow pages and calling around to see what they offer. I tried Japanese Karate mixed with Tai Kwon Do, no meditation. But the sparring was great. However, Chinese Kempo is pretty cool stuff! It really depends on the teacher.

Tae Kwon Do is the most enjoyable martial art. The sparring is an olympic sport that can be fun and safe. Other martial arts will give you broken bones and other injuries. Martial arts is good, but don't use it for meditation.

I'd recommend Muay Thai. I've been practicing Muay Thai for the last year in conjunction with traditional western boxing and have found it to be the most effective martial art...period. I've studied many arts in the last 22 yrs or so including Judo, Karate, Arnis (stick fighting art), Ju Jitsu and Kung Fu. It combines the spirituality of Buddism with the raw power and no nonsense techniques of the eight limbs. Best part is it's very cheap to practice, all you need is a pair of shorts and most boxing gyms know where you can find a trainer in your area. Look in your phone book for a community boxing club, most are subsidized non-profit orgs so the monthly fees for gym use are next to nothing.

It really depends on the school. My first martial arts training class was karate and for our belts tests, we did have to spar upper belts. Depending on the belt you were going for, determined the time. If I recall correctly, yellow belts was 5 minutes and it went up to where brown belt was 40 minutes straight. Once you got over 10 minutes, you also had to spar with different people so that they were fresh and you weren't. That was a great place, too bad we moved.

Differeent martial arts concentrate on different aspects. TKD is more of a workout. no offense to TKD'rs, I have a 3rd black in TKD. A good martial art that you will never get tired of, It involves working out, study, meditation and learning for the rest of you life is Ryu Kyu Kempo. I would go to www.dillman.com and look for an affiliated school. He has them all over USA.

"Breaks out crying uncontrollably and bangs head against the wall"... in case you'll look, you'll see that this question has been requested upwards of three,000 cases!!!! there is not any proper MARTIAL paintings (meaning there is not any longer one, zilch, zip, nada). it is like asking what the proper coloration is. the answer will continuously be an opinion. even as i ought to assert Ninjutsu, somebody else will say Judo or Jujutsu, or Kempo. contained in the top it easily relies upon on the practitioner and the popular of their education. extremely than hectic about what form to take, have a glance at each and every of the colleges on your section. opt for the single with the proper instructor and although he teaches must be the proper martial paintings attainable to you.

Tae Kwon Do is a great martial arts. I do Tae Kwon Do and out classes are 45 minutes long. The studios are open Monday thru Saturday, and you can do class 1-6 days a week.

Look up Jeet Kune Do. Bruce Lee's System

Jeet Kune Do takes the most functional parts of other systems and form a solid base to build off of.

In most JKD schools you will learn western boxing,gung fu, muay thai, jiu jitsu, wrestling, silat, arnis, kali, judo,submission arts,trapping, and more. Every school is different.

A nice variety to be a well rounded fighter. After all, mixed martial arts is the way of the future.Most people I know do not study one style or system anymore. In JKD you will learn to fight stand up, ground fighting (grappling), and weapons fighting. And it is NEVER too late to start. Best wishes.