Martial Arts: not just for kids
Ask anyone to describe a typical martial arts class, and they’ll probably feature a room full of kids in matching uniforms, all yelling and kicking things. And sure, martial arts training is excellent for burning off excess youthful energy and teaching healthy discipline - just ask any exhausted parent dropping their kids off at class so they can spend a peaceful, silent hour doomscrolling in the car. But …
Martial arts training is not just for kids. Adults can train, too, and with greater benefits.
pictured: grown adults training kung fu
Speaking (typing?) as a someone who started training in Ving Tsun Kung Fu in 2015, at the bright young age of 35, overweight and chronically ill, I can personally attest to each and every one of these benefits:
Greater Strength & Stamina
Do you know anyone over the age of 30 who’s not tired? Like, all the time? A few hours a week in a kung fu school, and you’ll build up deep wells of energy and endurance. Muscles you didn’t even know you had will solidify into cords of functional might, from your fingertips to your toes. The only downside is you may become your family’s go-to opener of jars and lifter of heavy things.
Stronger Bones & Connective Tissue
Any adult can point to a problematic joint somewhere on their body. Maybe your shoulder clicks, or your wrists lock up, or your knees go snap-crackle-pop. Kung fu training takes your whole skeleton and the ligaments that hold it together, and gives it a tune-up from the inside out. Bones grow more dense and less likely to break, joints firm up and resist strain, and overall mobility improves.
Personally, my hips and knees used to be so bad that I sometimes had to walk with a cane. Training kung fu has got me on my own two feet, while my cane sits in a closet, gathering dust.
Improved Balance & Coordination
I’m right-handed, so my left side has always been my dumb side. My can’t-really-do-anything side. Kung fu taught me to not only use my left hand, but to use it along with my right hand to do wildly different things at the same time, often to poetically devastating effect. And not just hands, but feet, as well. Every step I take in kung fu makes me more sure on my feet and harder to knock over, because the training isn’t just about muscles, but about activating both sides of the brain equally to coordinate the whole machine of my body.
Which is great, because the last thing I want to be is a little old lady who’s fallen and can’t get up.
Cognitive Decline Prevention
Speaking of brain training, kung fu can help your brain stay healthy. Our drills and techniques involve both sides of the brain, firing up neurons and forging mental connections to puzzle out how to move your body in new, intricate, lethal ways.
Studies have shown that actively training the brain can help keep declining diseases like Alzheimer’s and dementia at bay. And it doesn’t get much more active for the brain and body than kung fu.
Self-defense = Self Care
Remember that exhausted parent, dropping the kid off at martial arts class so they could have an hour of peace? Now imagine if that hour of peace was spent quietly morphing into a badass. I’ve gone whole multi-hour classes without speaking a word to anyone, just sweating the clogs out of my pores and the weakness out of my muscles until I walk out the door feeling like a ten foot tall demigod.
For me, nothing says self-care like taking some Me Time to learn how to keep myself and my loved ones safe in this wacky world by forcefeeding a bad guy his own kneecaps.
So by all means, sign the kids up for activities. But maybe save the therapeutic hand-to-hand combat training for the grown-ups. Not sure where to start? Denver Kung Fu has a 6-week beginner program to help launch your journey.