Seeking Cool Careers In The Martial Arts Industry
If you’ve finally attained your black belt and you’re looking to get into Careers in the martial arts industry, good luck. It’s not as easy as filling out an application for work as a fry cook. But, there is money to be made out there, even if it can be fairly tricky.
Of course, that’s not to say that you simply cannot find work in the fighting arts. You most certainly can, it’s not at all impossible for those with the skill and the passion. Remember, though, that you’ll be judged more on your ability to relate to others, to treat others with respect, than on your skill alone. Martial arts are, above all, a path to self knowledge and knowledge of others, and an unfriendly, dog-eat-dog careerist won’t last in this field.
Instructor
The most common job in the industry is that of instructor or sensei. There are two ways to go about this. You can start your own dojo, or you can work as an assistant instructor. If you want to run your own dojo, it’s important to take time to learn about the business end of things. When your whole life is the art of fighting, this can be difficult, and sadly, this means that the best senseis usually bring in the least amount of business. You might be able to find an assistant instructor, though, who can help you run the business well.
Being an assistant, you’ll typically earn an hourly wage. If you treat your sensei with respect, if you play your cards right, you may even inherit the dojo from them should they wish to expand or retire.
It’s hard to say exactly how much you’ll make as an instructor, but most do it for the passion, the love of teaching, while drawing their living expenses from investments and so on. Not to say that you can’t make a living as a sensei, just that you do need to study the art of marketing as well as the art of fighting.
Stunt Work
Stunt work isn’t quite as big an industry as it once was. As action movies have become more ambitious, they actually have been phasing out traditional stuntwork in favor of CGI and actors doing their own fight scenes. However, television still has a lot of room for stunt work. You may also find work performing for motion capture for video games and so on.
The downside: You’ll have to live near a big entertainment city like New York, Toronto, LA, etcetera. The good news: It’s easy to find the work and get employed if you have the skills and you’re not afraid of falling off a roof and landing on your butt.
Stunt actors are paid well, but they usually get paid per stunt or per fight rather than on a salary. It’s largely freelance work, so it’s not always easy to make sure you can get paid every week.
New Ideas
You’re in the age of the internet. Take a look at your average martial arts website. It’s usually… Pretty poorly designed. The people who spend their whole lives learning martial arts spend very little time learning about much else. However, if you know what to do, if you know the angles and you have some real, helpful advice to share with your viewers or with your readers, then there’s real money to made in the world of martial arts online.
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