Michael Rodriguez was born in the Philippines and  immigrated to the US in the early 70’s.  Spending most of his childhood in New York and eventually moving to Pittsburgh in ’87.  He had a love for martial arts when he was young, watching Sunday Kung Fu theater and Ninja shows every weekend.  If you ask him what he wanted to be when he was young, he will tell you “A Ninja!”, but he didn’t start learning any Martial Arts until he was about 18.

At that time he got his start in Filipino Martial Arts with Escrima (Filipino stick fighting, knife fighting and empty handed arts) the way they traditionally did it back in the Philippines, “In the backyard.”  Eventually it branched off into other arts like Muay Thai and Silat under the philosophy of Jun Fan/Jeet Kune Do started by the late Bruce Lee.  Fast forward 15 years later and he accepted an unpaid internship to learn and teach Defensive Tactics and Body-guarding.  During that time, he took a job as a direct support professional taking care of the profound intellectually and physically handicapped.  You can say that it was a testament to his caring, understanding and patient nature.

He spent 14 years with that personal security company, attaining Master Instructor status, teaching kids, teens, adults, parents, doctors, CEO’s, CFO’s, Police officers and FBI agents looking for better training, former CIA, former professional athletes, Teachers, Nannies, Nurses, Welfare case workers, victims of violent crimes and even had the pleasure of helping teach the SWAT team.  Since going his own way, he works part time as an in home care aid for the elderly while being focused on his teaching techniques and applying all of his experience into useful information that everyday people can use to keep themselves from harm.