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NWMAF February Newsletter
Brooklyn and Chicago, oh my! (Registration links, news, and more!)<!–
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February Newsletter
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February Reflection
Here’s hoping your Valentine’s month was full of togetherness, connection, and bold-hearted love! ♡ This month’s newsletter features two awesome upcoming opportunities to train and connect with other NWMAF members, so read on — we hope to see you soon as we continue to Weave Strength through our commitment to our practice and our community.
Weaving Strength at Brooklyn Martial Arts!
BROOKLYN, NY — MARCH 28-29
The first Weaving Strength Regional Conference of 2026 is coming up soon! It will be held in partnership with Brooklyn Martial Arts, March 28th-29th. Check out the fabulous instructor roster below. Registration and more info available here!
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Save the Date for Weaving Strength Chicago!
CHICAGO, IL — JULY 24-26
The amazing team at Thousand Waves has begun planning a powerhouse training to take place in Chicago, July 24-26th. Mark your calendars and watch this space for registration to open in early April!
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ESD Opportunities at Weaving Strength
Good news for those seeking certification or re-certification: sessions taken at Weaving Strength events may count towards your ESD professional development! You’ll need to provide the title, instructor name, date, location of the session, and a few sentences about the value of the session to your professional ESD development. Keep it in your records and include when you complete your application. For more info, contact Martha at certification@nwmaf.org.
Check Your Website Profile!
Since our website refresh, members can once again “opt in” to show up in the NWMAF’s member directory and/or our instructor directory. If you’re not displayed and you would like to be, simply log in to your account. It will immediately take you to a screen where you can select Update Profile (see image below).
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Empowerment Self Defense (ESD) News
The February 9th ESD Community Meeting brought together 25 people from five countries to hear Dani Lizano share about their work in promoting ESD in Latin America. Our colleagues in Europe and Africa stayed up late to attend and we appreciated their presence.
The March 9th meeting will be a discussion around ESD and ICE Resistance with practitioners who have been part of efforts to combat the campaign against immigrants in the US invited to share their approaches and the impact of this work. In April, Carmen Alonzo will present on the Building Empowerment and Resilience (BEAR) curriculum that Jennifer Keller developed for women with a history of relational abuse using the three pillars of: mindfulness, healing from trauma, and ESD.
We are planning an initial meeting to explore forming a standing ESD committee (rather than one that only meets around conference planning on: Sunday March 22nd at 12pm est. All members engaged in ESD are welcome to attend. Here is the Zoom registration link.
Our monthly ESD Community Meetings (open to all – not just NWMAF members) are held the 2nd Monday of every month, generally from 4:00-5:00pm (EST). These sessions are open to everyone interested in Empowerment Self Defense. Please extend the invitation and registration link to anyone interested in participating. Zoom registration link
Board Update: *URGENT* Candidates Needed!
The following positions must be filled by this summer: Chair, Secretary, Development Coordinator, and Self Defense Coordinator. These are in addition to four positions that are already open: Events Coordinator, Digital Coordinator, Marketing Coordinator, and DEI Coordinator. Terms are for two years; the Board meets one Sunday a month via Zoom. Please reach out to chair@nwmaf.org if you might be able to serve and keep this storied organization going strong!
Board meetings are held on the 3rd Sunday of each month at 3pm Eastern/2pm Central and all members are welcome to attend. The next meeting will be Sunday, March 15th. Click here for the Zoom registration link for 2026 meetings!
Join Us on WhatsApp!
Just a reminder that we now have a permanent (not just conference-related) NWMAF WhatsApp group, which will be particularly helpful to join as the regional trainings get rolling!
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Member Submission: ENERGY FOR THE JOURNEY
by Shinshii Janet Aalfs
Some years ago, I was invited to give an International Women’s Day presentation at the local vocational and agricultural high school. I arrived the morning of the event to find that it was being held in the school library with chairs arranged in rows facing a podium. My preference in educational settings is to engage with people of any age and ability through experiential activities including movement, poetry, storytelling, etc., and to follow what unfolds. Though it wasn’t my favorite set-up, I trusted that the students and I could create some kind of site for revelation. Hoping to catch their attention, I introduced myself by performing the following Poemotion© piece, a weaving of spoken word and martial arts based dance:
Full Open
Survival has a body big as the sun
and vast as the deepest ocean.
Peace within she thrives
through every storm and heartache.
She shatters the smoke blue shell
of twilight, wanting us to remember
first sound of wind, bird, shadow of tree
on snow, to speak the way they speak
interrupting. Her voice expands
within, golden rays through every pore.
And though it may hurt to breathe
full open in her light, bold
is the way love chooses us.
The vibrant feeling in the room was encouraging. I continued by offering my etymology of the word Question: quest/ journey, plus ion/ a particle of energy, a question being energy for the journey. I asked, “Has anyone here heard of Bruce Lee?” Every hand went up. Okay, great, they were still listening. Then, “Who here has heard of Ng Mui?” No hands, but an electric pause. Suffice it to say, we had a lively time together exploring how important it is to question why the vast terrain of women’s history, martial arts and otherwise, is not more known, and how we can shine more light on women’s contributions throughout the world, past, present, and future. The poem below grew out of what I learned on that spirited adventure that we experienced as a group:
The Question
It begins as an absence. In the dark
movie theater she appears
not to exist. On screen neither flying
kicks nor spins of her wit can be seen.
A good story, he said. But who would believe
a Buddhist nun developed the
system our hero delivers reel-
to-reel, bare chest rippling, iron grip.
Do you know the difference, I ask
in that high school library, between movies and real
life? A boy in the back shouts the challenge,
Could you fight Bruce Lee and win?
I’m standing before the artist as I answer,
We’d figure out how not to begin.
In words and gestures, forms flow; I honor
White Crane, legend and true. Ng Mui. Who
can prove her bones have not
led to these bones, sharp and soft
as columbine through cracks in rock? A girl
later in the hour, black hair draped over one eye, barely
raises her hand. Could you fight Bruce Lee and win?
I almost ask did she hear me before, about
to repeat myself, when I realize what
her question is not. I can see in her other eye, light
falling from a thousand wings,
she wants me to promise I’ll survive.
Questions made way for more questions. I offered movements that they could do standing in front of their chairs. One basic motion, “Heartwheel,” both healing and protective in everyday ways, is also useful as a safety emergency release from any kind of grab, with follow-up escape strikes to vulnerable areas of the body. Hands begin together at the heart. One hand reaches toward ground, the other toward sky, simultaneously rooted and buoyant (gravity/levity). Then both arms spiral around, connected through the life energy point at the center of the pelvic bowl, stretching outward like the horizon line, continuing to the opposite up/down, and returning hands to the heart.
We practiced the move slowly, breathing deeper. With heel-of-palm strikes we yelled “No!” to giving up, and “Yes!” to perseverance, encouraging confidence in all directions. I’m reminded over and over again that hope is not something we lose or find, but what we create as we work together for justice, peace, healing, safety, equity, and liberation for all.
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“Full Open,” from Full Open, Orogeny Press, 1996.
“The Question,” from What the Dead Want Me to Know, Human Error Publishing, 2022.
Shinshii Janet Aalfs, founder and director of Lotus Peace Arts at Heron’s Bridge/Valley Women’s Martial Arts, a non-profit community school since 1977, received the NWMAF Founders Award in 2016, and a Hall of Fame Award for 40+ years of teaching from the Association of Women Martial Arts Instructors (AWMAI) in 2024. Her poems and essays have been widely published in journals, anthologies, and online, including 3 full-length poetry collections and 7 chapbooks. She was the poet laureate of Northampton, MA, 2003-2005.
Member-Submitted News
We love hearing from you! Do you have news related to your practice in one of our three strands — Martial Arts, Healing Arts, or Self Defense? As an NWMAF member, you can submit material to be featured in our newsletter and/or on our social media pages! We love to share member news, photos, events, and brags! To contribute material to future newsletters, please send details to Tasca Shadix (secretary@nwmaf.org).
The requirements are: (1) Items must be member news/announcements, and be consistent with NWMAF mission and values. (2) Items that could be considered promotions of goods or services for sale (e.g. books, paid workshops, etc), are limited to 2 posts and/or newsletter items per member per year. (3) NWMAF cannot “endorse” member products or services.
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