What do you guys do for a living?

[mossman]

I'm in college and trying to find a major that ties in with my wing chun. Right now I'm headed towards Business. Maybe I could open up my own school somewhere down the road. What are some other subjects that I should look into? So what do you guys do and what have you studied?

[taltos]

I have a degree in Anthropology, History, and Religious Studies, and am currently getting my Masters in Education. All of which I'm sure will be put to good use when I become a Sifu simply because they all deal with social conditons and better equipt me to deal with people from varying backgrounds, beliefs, and experiences.

-Levi

[YongChun]

If you don't want to waste your time teaching Wing Chun then look into business and marketing. Leung Ting is a pretty good example of how it's done. Also good is to study coaching and various types of fitness training, weights etc and to spend some time with boxers and wrestlers to broaden your perspective and to keep up student interest. Then you need a very organized training system to keep everyone enthused for years and years. The healing arts are also something good to add to your studies.

Ray

[Gangsterfist]

Medicine of some sort would be ideal too if you want to incorporate kung fu into your work. Learn qigong, massage, diet health, accupuncture, accupressure, so on and so forth.

I work in the IT field with computer systems. I am not sure if its what I want to do with the rest of my life but its easy for me to do and it pays the bills.

[sihing]

They say that the health industry(vitamins, herbs, TCM, yoga, chi kung, etc..), will be the next "Trillion Dollar" industry due to the increasing costs of health care for the governments of the world, especially North America and it is getting more violent out there, so since WC is a Chinese MA with health benefits attached to it, I would learn my WC well and take some marketing courses or join one of the MA marketing organizations and buy a course from there. If you choose to make teaching WC a living you will enjoy the teaching part immensely but the administrative parts and getting people to pay that haven't part is not always the greatest, but like any business it has it's up and down's.

Right now I'm making a go at teaching full time in my Sifu's school, so far so good, it's been a good month.......


James

[lawrenceofidaho]

Originally posted by YongChun
If you don't want to waste your time teaching Wing Chun then look into business and marketing. Leung Ting is a pretty good example of how it's done.

Ray, if you had LT's skill & knowledge, and set out to teach full time and build an organization, -you wouldn't market like him or do business the way he does, would you?




LT has made big dollars for himself, but IMO, it's not only about money. There is also such a thing as karma to think about, and the question; "Will I like what I see when I look in the mirror each morning?"


Spend some time on Matt Thorton's Straight Blast Gym site, and you'll get a different idea of how to successfully market in a way that I'd consider quite ethical (not a pyramid scheme, or playing to people's; fears, fantasies, & egos) and not as self-aggrandizing as most other schools.


There are other good & lucrative schools out there that are giving students a decent value for their training dollar, but Matt's just happened to come to mind first.......

-Lawrence

[anerlich]

Lawrence is correct about the SBG. His teaching and business models set the standard as we go into the new century IMO.

My instructor diversified into real estate investment, which is where his real money comes from. He was struggling while trying to run a school and do nothing else, now he still manages to run a fulltime school to a high standard and has a Rolls Royce as well as a "regular" car and a 30 foot boat moored on Sydney Harbour.

In the future, most people supposedly will have several careers. Start now, stay ahead of the pack.

[sihing]

Good advice Anerlich to diversify. I think one should do the same if they want to have a true business in WC. I'm not aware of the Bad rep Leung Ting apparently has, but he has good marketing sense for sure, and if it has helped one person in their lives then maybe it was worth whatever faults he has.

Personally I do not believe it is wrong to teach, use WC to make money, as long as it is done in a ethical way and benefit is received for the student/customer. So, building a large organization, producing tapes, DVD's, books, clothing lines, seminar circuits, private lessons, etc.. are not wrong in my book. At least with MA you are actually selling something of true value to another, of course only when something of true value is offered.

James

[Gangsterfist]

I don't want to be rich though. Rich people work too hard. I want to hang out with my friends, party, and chase women. I can get rich when I am married and lose all those freedoms.

Or, I can keep going to the casino and playing craps, maybe I'll win it big one of these days.

[foolinthedeck]

become a monk in a wing chun monastery.
if there are none - join the church and create one.

[old jong]

I have been working in that Montreal psychiatric hospital for 26 years now.I work as an educator,taking care of the patients directly in their dayly life.As my job title suggest,I work on helping them build on their social and comportemental skills so they can function better in society or at least in the institution.
My job is also a risky one from times to times due to the aggressive nature of many of our clients.It is a nice thing to have knowledge in martial arts in that type of work.The employer gave us some formation in basic self-defense and "non abusive control techniques" but these things don't work unless the "client" is not too strong or ferocious. Most agressive patients are very strong and ferocious so,I prefer to use my Wing Chun (minus the strikes)and some Aikido type basic moves for controling.The trick is to hold them on the ground or in a corner with some armlock and wait for help.I stay away from "Judo types" techniques because these guys will always bite (very hard!) and go for your eyes or they will get very "dirty" to prevent close contact from you. Who want to wrestle a guy full of ****!...Anyway!...I am happy to say that I always been able to control my clients without causing injury to any of them.Maybe I was a bit lucky because I had to do a lot of these physical interventions in all those years.

[Vajramusti]

Old Jong's professional experience has enabled him to handle the low points on the forum well!!!

Better than yours truly.

PS My wing chun does not put much bread on the table.
I do not recruit kids. My goals are not really commercial.

[AmanuJRY]

Originally posted by sihing
I'm not aware of the Bad rep Leung Ting apparently has, but he has good marketing sense for sure, and if it has helped one person in their lives then maybe it was worth whatever faults he has.

IMO, LT't maketing sense is mediocre, the bad rep (usually only obvious to those who have experienced the business side of his organization) is in how his organization is run. In short it's his management skills that are lacking, more so than his marketing skills.

And, to say about LT's system, 'if it has helped one person in their lives then maybe it was worth whatever faults he has', I would give more credit to the individual instructors who do more to cause this than LT himself.

[yellowpikachu]

Make a living might not be a key. Perhaps, instead of asking what do you do for a lving.
listern to the burning desire inside you on what you want to do?

[lawrenceofidaho]

Originally posted by AmanuJRY
And, to say about LT's system, 'if it has helped one person in their lives then maybe it was worth whatever faults he has', I would give more credit to the individual instructors who do more to cause this than LT himself.

I have met some very cool people in WT. Unfortunately, it seems the jerks of that lineage that get most of the attention.

-Lawrence