Join Sifu Scott Jensen as he sits down with the legendary Sifu Kisu Stars, renowned Northern Shaolin Kung Fu master and celebrated martial arts choreographer for the iconic animated series, Avatar: The Last Airbender.
In this dynamic conversation, Sifu Scott Jensen welcomes Sifu Kisu Stars—renowned Northern Shaolin master and martial arts choreographer for Avatar: The Last Airbender—for a heartfelt discussion on real Kung Fu, the pursuit of mastery, and the inner journey of the martial artist.
Part 1 of 2 highlights:
How to find authentic Kung Fu in a world of commercialized martial arts
The essence of being a dedicated student and forging long-term relationships with teachers
The meaning of “eating bitter” and why hard work transforms more than just your body
How real martial arts develop strength, confidence, and character
Tournament stories, personal growth through losing, and why performing under pressure is a rite of passage
Whether you're a lifelong practitioner or a curious beginner, this episode will challenge and inspire you to seek something deeper than just technique—true personal transformation through Kung Fu.
🎧 Listen now and discover why the best Kung Fu may be hidden in plain sight.
Connect with Sifu Kisu on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kisu_stars/
Hi everybody. Thanks for tuning in and tuning up. This is Scott Jensen with my ancient wisdom, modern health podcast.(...) Here I share and explain how to get and stay healthy with Tai Chi, Qi Gong and Kung Fu.(...) Mixing interviews with incredible people and my own insights and experiences.(...) We look for timeless wisdom and proven practices to be healthy and happy today.
Today, my guest is Sifu Kisu Stars.
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Sifu Kisu is a lifelong daily practitioner and master instructor of Northern Shaolin Kung Fu.
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highly charged tournament scene of the 1980s and 1990s, Kisu earned a well-deserved reputation for his explosive high-kicking and many victories.
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Today, Sifu Kisu is most well-known for the outstanding choreography and martial law he brought to the original animated Avatar TV series.
we're talking about Kung Fu, Northern Shaolin Kung Fu, and how to become a master.
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Sifu Kisu, thank you for joining us today.
thank you for having me at
your show today.
an honor to be here with you. You're one of the most respected teachers in the Northern Shaolin.
Thank you. I'm happy to be your associate and your friend.
(...)
Sifu Kisu,
of the real Kung Fu talent, it's hard to find on the internet,
people new to martial arts, it's actually sort of hard
discern because you lack experience, whether a teacher is a good teacher, do they actually know martial arts or are they posing and their martial arts school is very low or maybe,
they're sincere, but their Kung Fu just is no good.
Those are all good insights.
the best Kung Fu is hidden. It's in backyards and, and that community centers.(...)
you know, if you see a big commercial school, you're probably making a mistake because
ones with all the advertising and the ones
are
super well appointed, they're about that money
and they're more interested in getting your money than they are in giving you some sort of usable skillsets.
(...)
So that's something to consider. It's, and I don't want you to just lump everyone into that category that has a commercial school. I have several friends with commercial schools that are very,
honorable and talented teachers.
but it's unfortunate.
pressure and the society to be financially successful.
a lot of it has to do with luck.(...) I was lucky to meet my teacher. Uh,(...) goodness gracious, I could have ended up anywhere. And I just happened to meet
couple of my
older classmates, uh, when I was at college and I saw them practicing the Northern Shaolin style. And I eventually convinced them to take me to the man that would eventually become my teacher.
(...)
it's, it's the luck of the draw, but you can also research it.
then see which one speaks to you.
my next question is
found a good teacher, you like the school, you've started training.
(...)
Well, how do you be a good student?
especially one thing that interests me is that,
this can be a new thing for a lot of people is how do you develop a long-term relationship with a teacher?
in our modern world, it's not common that we have many long-term relationships, especially learning things. Usually our relationships are a little bit shorter term.
Yes. True.
(...)
Teachers are really impressed when you work hard,
right? So when the teacher shows you, let's say he shows you three moves and you go home,
the average person is only going to practice it right there in front of the teacher and then they won't touch it again until the next time, whatever you learn from that teacher, you go home and you practice it until you throw up. Sorry to be gross, but you really want to dig deep and come back and show that teacher that you're worth teaching.
The best teachers teach just to further the culture and,
to,
keep the arts alive,
only see a few people, which you're one of them
who's seriously dedicated, long-term teacher, who
produced some,
champion students,
it's people like you that are the example of what I would like to see in the future from traditional cultural schools. Thank you.
I think every teacher loves the hardworking student and
hard work will overcome any obstacle in my experience.
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And that is the essence of bitter work is you just do the work.
eat bitter to taste sweet.
Yeah. Eat bitter is like a classic,
saying
that's like standing in your horse stance and your thighs are burning and you really want to stand up. But you know, if you stay down, your mind will get stronger.
that's eating bitter.
but I read an interview with Lil Yung Ji, uh, Jet Li, everybody knows him as Jet Li back in the day. Back in the day. And he was talking about his experience of learning kung fu.(...)
And one of the things that he said really stuck with me. He said,
says classmates, you
they'd learn something and they'd practice it a couple of times and they would go sit down and he would go home and practice it 10,000 times and come back. And that's how he got the attention of his teacher,
um, believe it. And,
you see the results of that is one of
greatest stars in martial art media,
ever.
(...)
it's so rare nowadays that somebody actually gets it. And when I say, when I say gets it, there's a, there's an essence to this that is beyond fighting and beyond physical fitness
beyond health.
essence of, of,
personal growth in us, even the spiritual revival from this practice.
and I guess in the long run is what I'm, I'm saying to be successful. To be successful. The last thing is establish a practice for yourself and then burn that. Stick to it. Get on it. Just, you know, take it to the next level, everything. Take it to the next level.
me, one of the
keys to our training and sort of the essence of what we do, which is actually becoming healthier and stronger,(...) you know, if you're sick and you're weak,
not ready for a fight. Let's face it. You know, if you're sick and you're weak and need other people to help you and take care of you, you can't really help anyone else.
And I had struggles coming up. I was, I wasn't the strongest kid. I was, I was bullied and abused in a lot of ways coming up. And so,(...) you know, to be able to learn kung fu kind of gave me that, that security to be nothing else is to own my own space.
(...)
Right. Absolutely. And you know, the bullying is so common in some places. It's none of my kids were bullied. It's they all learn martial arts from the time they could walk and a couple of them before they could walk.
(...)
it's a really good thing for children because especially
the, in the early ages.
(...)
really good for full body development, the development of the brain and memory
you know, developing a strong body. Like again, back to my kids, each one of them, some of them haven't practiced kung fu in years. But if you shook hands with one of my sons, you'd feel it right away. It's just, there's a strength there that is, it only comes from a certain type of training
and don't tell my kids. You
know, there is something to be said about growing up and developing a trained body method, body movement and trained physique that your body's actually growing into that as you're growing up, that that's actually what your body is being built for.(...)
it's an amazing gift.
It's not easy to start as a kid and keep going. And it's not easy as a parent or a teacher to help
a child continue to study that long.
(...)
It's really easy. It really takes enormous support from the family,
And the
got to be
teacher's got to be patient and skillful, but I think it takes a lot of things, it's not that easy.
(...)
thing I really liked that you brought up was going to the tournament and then your attitude about winning and why you're at the tournament and sort of viewing the tournament as a place to test yourself or to challenge yourself.
(...)
And that was my attitude early on. I think you really have to sort of have a mature, you, you gain a maturity about winning and losing when you compete in tournaments. So naturally you want to win. Well, I, well, we all want to win. And I think it's important that you go with the attitude of striving to win with everything that you've got. And if you're not, you don't have that attitude, then you need to work on that. But there's also at least I know, and I'm sure you've experienced many times, um, especially back in the eighties and nineties, I think things have improved quite a bit, frankly. But sometimes, you know, that things would happen to tournaments and maybe not the best person got the prize. And it could, there could be political. It could just be things people didn't understand. I mean, there, there could be all sorts of things that happen. And also early on, we would be a tournament since a little bit of a wild west scene, like
(...)
what could show up in the ring and who could be competing and what they might do and how do you judge all of these things? And, you know, the categories were much broader and more different,
So for me at a certain point,
absolutely. I went to, I trained hard. I would go to compete. I go to win, but
I liked competing to see how well I could perform and,
and it
pushed myself a little bit. It's just some schools over emphasized winning, getting a trophy, you
know, all of this nonsense
when in reality.
again. It's a testing ground.
a place where you go to, to demonstrate your form in front of a panel of experts.
it's, it's very difficult to judge a tournament
It's really difficult to judge. People really don't understand that.
you're not only performing in front of the judges, but you're performing in front of the other competitors and their classmates and their teachers, and you're performing in front of the community. And if you want to be acknowledged,
We actually need to see you show up.(...)
when I see a tournament
there's 30 people in the division and we know only three people are going to take home a medal or a trophy,
to me, that's a very exciting,
event actually,(...) that's a real, that's a real event, you know?
so to go in
get too upset to be crushed, to be too upset,
to
lose your cool if you don't win,
Uh, and whether you judge, whether you had a good day or whether you judge, it was a successful tournament or whether you judge, you learned anything(...)
I've had fantastic days of tournaments and fantastic experiences. And I didn't win any
event. My teacher said,
the first thing you need to learn is how to lose gracefully. Absolutely. Absolutely. There's a couple of competitors that I saw whining on the internet about not taking the first place or the grand champion or whatever,
that's not gracious friends. No, it
isn't. And I've seen it over and over again in person at tournaments and
it doesn't serve anybody.
truth is,
at the tournament, you can really develop a lot of character in this whole process. You should lose. It's you should, you should actually have a couple of instances where you lose badly or you are embarrassed of your performance because that is a really great impetus to move forward from there. You've got nowhere to go from there, but up, right? Some people are kind of naturals at it and they go and they win their first tournament and then the second term at third tournament, and they just, they've got this thing, they got the body type there, you know, something, but whatever it is, it's some people move better than other people.
taller people are kind of awkward and gawky shorter people or compact and, and, and very strong
they're two of you in two different ways.
the first time, um,
I won a big tournament. I wasn't even trying to win. It was the
Vegas ICMAC.(...) And I went up to see a friend of mine who was going to fight and,
he didn't do so well that day, but I impulsively
forms competition
there was like about 40 or 50 people in the,
advanced division for
(...)
nice.
at, when the, when the competition was over, they called me and gave me a gold medal and I was even surprised that I placed,
I remember something happening that day that had never happened before. And that day the crowd disappeared that day, all of my apprehensions and all of my expectations disappeared, the whole room disappeared. I couldn't see or hear anything from the time I started my form till the time I ended, I did the short strike, which is very popular tournaments, by the way, you know, it in Shaolin people. So let's start doing some of those intermediate and advanced forms at the tournament. Come on guys. That's I, I, I second that too. You know, I, I'd like to see the advanced division, you're doing long forms and maybe we got a three minute limit on the long on, on the advanced division, not necessarily even long forms. No, I'd love to see some one note. Number one, number two, number three, number nine, number 10, you know, everybody's always doing number six. And then we see some number fours or number fives. So when I was a child, there's 10 forms, right? Out of those 10 forms, half of them are short range, which is the shirt strike. And half of them are what we call long fists, long range
yeah, long fists, long strike is, um, I'm going to mispronounce because my Chinese is horrible, but it's a distance boxing. It's the word. And, um, but the style is arranged in such a way so that you become familiar with all of those stuff. The thin doctor instances is a short range fighting using long range techniques. And then the next thing you learn is, um, the plum flower is,
to fight in five directions, long range.
just get out there. Practice some kung fu, find a good teacher,
get him to trust you. If you're in the Bay area, master Jensen is available. I'm up in Colorado now. I'm only teaching a few students privately.(...)
but I've been teaching since,
the night, early nineties, 90, 91 was
(...)
when I opened my second school.
still practicing, getting old still practice. There's still some good teachers out there. You can find them, you can find them. You might have to look a little bit and it's worth looking and you might have to even travel a little bit or inconvenience yourself a little bit. Maybe, maybe the closest school right next to your house. Maybe that's not the best one. You might have to look, go to martial art forums. I think a kung fu magazine has a forum. There's a few other places that have forums where you can go and you can ask questions about a particular teacher and find out what his reputation is.
(...)
why Northern Shaolin? Why, why would you recommend Northern Shaolin to someone in today's modern world and also maybe why, why, what attracted you to Northern Shaolin so much?
Northern Shaolin is in short, at least from my perspective is it teaches you how to ward off or strike in any direction with little apparent quote winding up, right? That you wind up and you unwind in various directions. And it's, it's again, it's good for the development of the body. It can be hard on the body. You have to be careful. You, you've got to strengthen the subtle muscles and tendons in the knees and the ankles and the hips.
it's very easy to injure any one of those nodes.
it's a lot of demands. It's like, I'm going to be very frank with every one in the audience.
(...) Kung Fu is not easy to learn.(...) Real Kung Fu may even be almost dead. I hate to say that out loud, but so few people are actually practicing. There's so many people that they learn a couple of moves and then they want to start teaching.
(...)
And that is not the way you need at least 10 years of personal practice before you want to go and start teaching other people. That's just, that's my opinion.
it's fair to say it's difficult to learn.
(...)
And if you're going to pick Kung Fu styles among Kung Fu styles that are difficult to learn Northern Shaolin actually is one of the most difficult in terms of the sort of raw athleticism of the style. You know, we have high kicks.
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Yeah. What has high kicks, it has leaping kicks. It has ground sweeps. We roll on the ground.
(...)
Yeah. Also, I mean, incredibly diverse number of different hand techniques and our foundation stance is the horse stance, the bow and arrow stance.(...)
they're all very low and long compared to what most other styles do. So, you know, that's a real challenge. You don't actually always have to do them that low.
but the process of conditioning your ankles and knees and hips,
building the foundation of strength and flexibility in your legs, you do have to be sort of systematic about that. You can't rush it there. It's an organic process. Your legs only develop flexibility so fast. They only develop strength so quickly.
joints only become really supple and strong.
It takes time for that
grow and mature
you don't want to rush it, but you do want to do it. And
it's sort of a personal challenge to do it. You know, like, can I actually do this? And for me, I was recovering from a lot of injuries and illnesses and it was very, very difficult for me.
but I, I loved it because once I, it's difficult if you're healthy, it really doesn't matter who you are. It's a very, very challenging art and it's designed that way.
you know, I think it's,
the most challenging art physically in many ways, especially the formist practice.
Well, going back to tournaments, um, for instance, if I'm sitting on the judges panel,
the person who's going to win, at least from my perspective, is going to be the person that moves from the stance. The kung fu is a full body event.
it's
footsteps, the ankle flexes, the knee flexes, the hips flex, the spine rotates and multiplies,
vertebra vertebra,
shoulder, the elbow, the wrist and the head,
We're all moving in harmony with one another. And so the best practitioners are the ones that move from the stance.
don't get a strong punch with a weak step.
that's exactly what I look for as a judge too. You know, I think it's much easier for people to have high kicks or to have fast hands than have good stances.(...)
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