THE BEST KARATE STYLE (EXPLANATION) — Jesse Enkamp

What is the best karate style? This is one of the most popular questions when it comes to the world of karate because there are so many different styles, so many different ways of practicing karate. And the answer to the best karate style might blow your mind. Check it out. Before we can answer what the best karate style is, we have to understand what the word style even means. I remember when I started practicing karate, I didn't know there were styles. It was just punching, kicking, blocking, striking, self-defense, the usual stuff. But as I got more advanced and I started looking outside of my own dojo, I realized there were more than one way to do the same thing. These were what we call styles of karate. But does that mean that one style is more right or better than any other style? I don't think so. However, there's something you need to know if you wanna determine what the best style is for you. Imagine karate is like a mountain. We have this huge mountain here, right? Every style is like a path to the top of the mountain. So we have Shotokan, which is a really popular style here. We have Goju-ryu, another path here. We have Wado-ryu, Uechi-ryu, Shorin-ryu. Now, when you're first starting out, you'll be standing down here, right? At the bottom of the mountain. And it looks huge, it's terrifying. And you wanna get to the top, right? You wanna master karate and become a black belt. But you're not sure which style to choose. Because down here, they all seem very distant from each other. And that's natural due to the shape of the mountain, right? But here's the cool thing. Once you start on a journey, on a path, on a style, the higher you get on the mountain, the closer to each other the styles get. Until ultimately, at the very top, all of the styles come together. You see, at the highest level, all styles are basically just different expressions of the same fundamental biomechanical and combative principles of the human body. I mean, if you have two arms and two legs, there are only so many ways you can use them in self-defense to cover up your weaknesses and exploit the weaknesses of your opponent, right? The main thing that differs styles is in what end they start teaching these different principles and how they are expressed. Can you really say that one way is better than another? I'm not sure because, for example, six plus four equals 10, right? Sure, but seven plus three also equals 10. And one plus nine equals 10. Is one way of getting to 10 better than any other? No, they're just different. Just like the different paths up the very same mountain. See, as you achieve the summit, as you reach the top of the mountain, we're all gonna be looking at the same moon. That being said, I still believe there is an answer to the very best karate style. And in order for you to understand that answer, I wanna share my experience because one of the most popular questions that I get is, what style do I practice? To get the answer to that, you'll have to follow me. All right, so the style that I initially started practicing was what my parents practiced, right? Because we have this family-run martial arts center where me and my brother basically grew up kicking each other's butts and practicing karate plus other martial arts since day one. The style that my parents practiced is what's called Yuishinkai Karate Jutsu. Jutsu means that it's a practical skill as opposed to the modern interpretation of karate known as Karate Do, which means the path where you go for spiritual perfection rather than self-protection. And it's funny, this is actually the dojo in Japan. It says Inoue Karate Dojo because Inoue Sensei, this man right there, was my parents' teacher. As you can see, the style that I practiced from the beginning was very well-rounded and consisted of a lot of different influences. For example, we have Chojun Miyagi, the founder of Goju-Ryu. We have Motobu Choki, the notorious street fighter from Okinawa, practicing with his student, Konishi Yasuhiro, who was Inoue Sensei's main karate instructor, right? We have Mabuni Kenwa, founder of Shito-Ryu. Funakoshi, founder of Shotokan. And all of these people influenced the karate style that I originally started practicing. So it's like a mix of many of the modern styles, but before they were modernized. And then we also have Seiko Fujita, the last living official ninja of the Japanese government. We have Taira Shinken, the famous Kobudo weapons master. And we have Gozo Shioda, direct student of the founder of Aikido. And all of these different teachers and their teachings influenced the Yuishinkai Karate Jutsu, which my parents learned in Japan and what they taught me and my brother growing up. So now that you know a little bit more about the style that I started practicing, here's what you really need to understand. Your karate will be heavily influenced by everyone that you meet in your journey up that mountain. Every master, every instructor, every world champion you see, all the videos you consume, all the books that you read will contribute to your growth in karate. That means you're a product of your environment and everything that you experience will influence your style of karate. So to say that you practice one style or one way of karate, in my opinion, would not be fair to everybody who influenced you in your journey. And that holds true for me too. Although I started practicing Yuishinkai Karate Jutsu, I've practiced with so many people these days, both as a member of the national team with different coaches, but also in my own growth as a karate nerd in Okinawa, Japan, and the other countries that I've traveled to, that I can't even say what style I practice today. In the words of Bruce Lee, I have absorbed what is useful, discarded what is useless, and added what is uniquely my own, sometimes even from other martial arts. I guess that I'm trying to say that the very best karate style is the one that is shaped by your experiences, your observations, and the different types of exercises that you've encountered in your journey up the mountain of karate. You see, at the end of the day, truth does not conform to any one particular style, but styles are expressions of truths, and that truth has to be your truth. That's when it's the best karate style for you.