About Us

For a number of years Charlie Wildish was frustrated with the way that martial were being taught!  He realised that they had been dumbed down from their original combative and spiritual focus, even in the Far East for various social and political reasons.  Language barriers between Eastern Masters and Western students did not help either.

The post war trend coming especially from Japan and Korea is to focus more and more on sport (as a way to measure success and build prestige).  Often the self defence skills were watered down and unrealistic.

More recently still, many martial arts teachers have simplified their syllabus’s to teach larger groups for commercial reasons.  Some schools are little more than a fitness class with a martial arts theme.  Generally speaking, the more flash, the more it’s about cash!

So Charlie began to train further afield and sought out instructors who thought outside the box and taught a more practically applied version of Karate.  He also trained for a while in Wing Chun Kung Fu and Tai Chi, which ironically led to unlocking some of the secrets within his Karate.

He attended special courses/seminars with world leading authorities on conflict management and the psychological factors of confrontation.

Separate to his martial arts study Charlie developed a keen interest in self development and how the mind works.  Although he did not do for his Karate, he was able to see direct implications for self defence!

So in 2012 he put all these aspects together and created Holistic Karate in Midsomer Norton/Radstock area.  It combines the best parts of training in traditional martial arts along with with modern reality based training and philosophical aspects.  This gives a great combination for self protection effectiveness and personal development.  It’s not a new style or system, it’s just a more complete, realistic and authentic approach to training martial arts in today’s world.