How a Book from My Dad Inspired the Birth of Kaizen No-Michi, Karate in Grimsby and Cleethorpes
In 2007 I decided to run my own karate dojo in Grimsby. The name for the dojo came from a book that was passed to myself from my Dad in the late 80's.
My Dad at the time was a Engineering Plant Manager for Dana Spicer Corporation in Wolverhampton. He was sent by his company to Japan to learn new quality Engineering concepts at Toyota, which I also learned in my training as an YTS apprentice, when I joined the same company as my Dad in 87.
He passed on a book to me 'Kaizen, The Key to Japan's Competative Success'. The message of the book was to Do Things Better. Improve it, even if it isn't broke. Making little things better and achieving never ending standards.
To me, this is what Karate is all about. Constantly trying to be better every day. Not trying to be better than everyone else, but better than you were yesterday.
So Kaizen was the name I had in mind for the dojo.
I toyed around with name
Kaizen Karate Academy
Kaizen Karate Club, but felt it needed to be something more.
I thought about my own training when I lived in the Midlands under my instructors Steve Carless, Kelvin Raynor and Hanshi Asano. All these instructors showed me the way to achieving Black belt excellence. They layed the Path for me to walk the Journey of a thousand miles.
In following there footsteps my goals were, to pass on what I had learned.
In July 2007
Kaizen No-Michi (The Path to Constant and Never Ending Improvement) was born.
Osu
Andy Jones
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