Shifu Billy Greer

Owner of Jing Ying Institute

As a young child, I was never very athletic and was always small for my age. I discovered wrestling in high school and was hooked by this sport where size didn't matter. I was not naturally quick or strong, so I felt I needed to work twice as hard as my teammates. I became interested in all aspects of health, fitness and nutrition; reading as much as I could, then putting what I learned into practice. During the off season, I joined the gymnastics team to help improve my strength and flexibility and the cross-country team to help improve my endurance. By my senior year, I was a wrestling team captain and a district champ.

In 1977, it was off to Hampden-Sydney College where I continued to run Cross Country and to wrestle. One of the highlights of my running career was having the opportunity to run the Boston Marathon in 1978. I was also Captain of the Cross Country team my senior year. I was Captain of the Wrestling team my sophomore, junior and senior years. In wrestling, I also won the Sportsmanship Award my freshman and senior years. During my junior and senior years, I won the Most Valuable Wrestler Award and I was the Old Dominion Athletic Conference Champion at 134 lbs. As a senior, the college awarded me the Joshua Warren White Award for Sportsmanship.

My studies in fitness and health convinced me that most of what we accept as part of growing old has more to do with changes in lifestyle rather than actual age. As I left college and moved into the work world, I was convinced that I would stay active and avoid falling into a sedentary lifestyle dictated by work. I continued to run, but found that wrestling was not a sport easy to continue after college. Knowing I had always been interested in martial arts, my wife Nancy signed me up for some trial classes in karate as a birthday gift in the summer of 1987. Although I enjoyed them, the karate classes weren't really what I was hoping for from the martial arts so I did not continue after the trial period. Fortunately, the classes did provide the momentum to get me looking at other schools in the area and when I tried a kung fu class at the Dennis Brown Shaolin Wu-Shu Academy in Glen Burnie, I knew I had found what I was looking for. Nancy and I both signed up for classes and began training enthusiastically. Within a short while, we were both getting into great shape. Despite having never been athletic or interested in sports, Nancy could soon keep up with the best of us when it came to sit ups, kicks or holding stances. Unfortunately, she started experiencing motion sickness and nausea which made classes less enjoyable. We soon discovered she was pregnant! As her pregnancy progressed, she decided to discontinue classes. Despite falling in love with the training, I was also forced to discontinue classes about a year after starting when the school was closed. With a new baby at home and more responsibilities at work, I decided to wait before finding another school to start training again.

While my work garnered me recognition  and rapid advancement, it also led to my becoming less physically active. One day I realized that I was spending most of my day sitting in front of a computer. My weight peaked at about 25 pounds heavier than when I left college, and I could no longer consider myself an active person. I knew I needed to get myself out of this trap that I said I would never let myself fall into. Deciding to start off slowly, I signed up with my kids for the Friday PE classes at Jing Ying Institute. Through attending some of the monthly tests and meeting some of the students, I realized that the kung fu classes at Jing Ying had everything that had originally attracted me to the martial arts. The school also had a family friendly atmosphere that seemed perfect for me and the kids. So, after only a 15 year "wait" before finding another school, I enrolled with the kids in the summer of 2003 and we made a pact to stay together at each level for the first year, no matter how much faster one of us might learn than the others. Of course, I thought that as an adult with previous training, I might advance too quickly for the kids without this agreement. In hindsight, I realize that starting training at 44 does not necessarily give you any advantages over teenagers! Fortunately, Glen and Lane generously help their ol' dad remember the moves in new forms.

Within a few months of starting classes, the extra weight I had picked up since college began disappearing. After two years, I was back to my college weight and my strength and flexibility were improving immensely. In the third year, I actually started adding weight as I gained some muscle mass from more intense training. While I am not yet as flexible as I was in my days as a high school gymnast, I am heartened by studies showing it is possible to improve flexibility well into your 70s. A nagging shoulder pain and several other aches have also disappeared since I started training. I am once again convinced that so much of the weight gain, stiffness, aches and strength loss we attribute to the normal aging process are actually results of lifestyle changes that occur as we get older. Age brings the added responsibilities of work and family that often cause us to give up activities that provide much needed exercise. As we become more sedentary, our joints and muscles start to feel "old." Fortunately, the regular exercise provided by Kung Fu training can help rejuvenate those joints and muscles. Kung Fu is also a great brain exercise. Sparring is one of my favorite activities because the very nature of dealing with an unpredictable partner forces you to think and react quickly and it allows you the opportunity to experiment with strategies and techniques to find what works best for you. I also enjoy learning and practicing forms because of the opportunity to go beyond simply memorizing a sequence of moves and instead trying to fully understand the purpose of the moves and becoming aware of the body mechanics involved.

Pertinent Experience and Recognition:

Pre-med biology major in college with interest in nutrition and physiology.
High School and College Wrestling including Olympic Freestyle and Greco-Roman competition
Taught Gymnastics to boys and girls ages 5 to 17 for Virginia Beach Department of Parks and Recreation
Taught Gymnastics to boys and girls ages 3 to 17 at Docksiders Gymnastics in Maryland including Boys Program, Girls Program, Coed Preschool, Homeschool and Daycare Classes, Cheerleading Camps and private lessons.
Who's Who Among Rising Young Americans, 1993 edition
Who's Who in the East, 24th Edition
Who's Who in Science and Engineering

Kung Fu and Tai Chi student of Shifu Sean Marshall
Also trained with Mfundi Tayari Casel

Seminars and workshops with Willy Lin, Chen ZhengLei, Chen XiaoWang, Chen XiaoXing, Zhu TianCai and Wang HaiJun

Numerous medals in tournaments including gold medals for sparring, forms, weapons, push hands and tai chi.