about budokon

founder CAMERON SHAYNE & Director MELAYNE SHAYNE

Born in 1971 in the United States founder Cameron Shayne holds black belts in Olympic style Taekwondo (5th Degree), Yoshikai Karate (3rd Degree), and Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He is a 30 year Zen Practioner, and a contemporary Yoga pioneer establishing the first and only yoga style to integrate yoga with martial arts. Considered the father of the Mixed Movement Arts culture Cameron pioneered the phrase and concept of Budokon Mixed Movement Arts in 2001 by combining the combat arts of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts together with Yoga, Crawling Patterns, Mobility, Calisthenics, and Cognitive Studies into a single black belt system known as Budokon.

Our Director Melayne Shayne was born in Berlin in 1986. She speaks 5 languages as a Brazilian German. She relocated to the United States in 2015 to join Cameron Shayne and Budokon University. She holds a purple belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, a brown belt in Budokon Mixed Movement Arts and has been a certified yoga teacher for over 10 years. Melayne Shayne is the VP of the Mixed Movement Arts System Budokon and Director of the Budokon University Certification Programs. She is Budokon Mixed Movement Athlete and the Founder of the Running With Wolves Mentorship Program For Women. Melayne has made her passion for movement and expansion of self her craft and sharing. She has become a leading movement innovator and teaches worldwide.

The concept

Budokon is a synthesis of Cognitive Studies, Zen Meditation, Yoga, Mobility, Calisthenics and Mixed Martial Arts (including Jiu-Jitsu, Wrestling, Muay Thai, Olympic Style Taekwondo & Japanese Karate) designed to improve the quality of life and longevity of human beings.

our name

The term Budokon (BU) warrior (DO) way (KON) spirit is Japanese in origin and means “way of the warrior spirit”.

The symbol

The Budokon University symbol is called the Mitsu Tomoe. There are many versions of this symbol. The most common is composed of three intertwined flames, but it can also be represented as one, two or four flames. This symbol reflects the Shinto Buddhist trinity: heaven, earth and humanity. It is also associated with the Samurai and the Shinto god of war, Hachiman. The tome is surrounded by the 4 orignal movement elements that inspired the system: Jiu-Jitsu, Karate, Yoga and Mobility.

our school mascot

The University mascot is ironically named the Guru Killer. The term coined by Cameron Shayne to describe his teaching style was inspired from a Japanese Koan. The Buddhist sage Lin Chi told a monk, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." He meant that those who think they've found all the answers in any path or religion need to start questioning. The Guru Killer is represented visually as continuously changing identities from a skull, to a dragon, to a Samurai mask with it’s core identity remaining purposefully mutable.

The mission

Since its founding in 2001 by its founding architect Cameron Shayne, Budokon University has been dedicated to expanding and sharing knowledge in the pursuit of human health and longevity, inspiring innovation, and preserving cultural, artistic and scientific understanding of mixed movement arts for future generations by developing black belts in the art of Budokon.

Budokon’s reach is both local and international. It partners with it’s global teachers and coaches to strengthen the culture’s community. It engages with students and movement institutions across the globe in the quest to promote cultural understanding, improve the human condition, delve more deeply into the secrets of the universe, and train the next generation of world movement leaders.

budokon Quadrapedal Locomotion

Influenced by his first Jiu-Jitsu teacher Rickson Gracie and the movement patterns of his teacher Orlando Canni, Cameron expanded further on the application of quadrupedal locomotion to improve the athletic prowess of combat athletes. He read the works of Frans De Waal and Moshé Feldenkrais seeking to understand more deeply humo sapien locomotion and the apes we evolved from and the animals he was simulating. Cameron started by introducing crawling concepts to the yoga and fitness community at large. Eventually he was to meet Jiu-Jitsu legend Xande Ribeiro who took a serious interest in his mobility system and saw its utility for his own style of Jiu-Jitsu. Together Xande and Cameron developed Budokon Mobility for Jiu-Jitsu.

budokon yoga

The Budokon Yoga style created by Cameron Shayne in 2001 was originally created as a condition practice for grapplers and mixed martial arts fighters. The style unites the ancient traditions of Zen mediation with a modern movement lexicon comprised of classical yoga with, martial arts, mobility, crawling patterns and life sciences. This physically demanding style reshaped modern yoga postural practice by introducing a number of transitions not commonly found in traditional yoga including spinal undulations, spiral transitions, and martial arts stances.

The foundation of this style is the Budokon Yoga Primary Series. This series consists of 7 intelligently assembled sections of slow and controlled movements designed to improve mobility, agility, flexibility and strength. The techniques are learned through repetition and precision, the emphasis being on the transitions from posture to posture, rather than the holding of postures. The purpose of this class is to gain muscular strength, cardiovascular stamina, and joint mobility. 

budokon jiu-jitsu 

Budokon Jiu-Jitsu is a synthesis of solo and partner mobility patterns taken directly from practically applied Jiu-Jitsu techniques. Rather than simply being singular patterns repeated the style connects continuous solo pattens to create a movement language in and of itself. The style’s focus is the development of the fighter as both a general movement athlete and practitioner of Jiu-Jitsu. By developing their ability to transition in unbroken solo patterns they inevitably become more proficient at the chained partner patterns required for Jiu-Jitsu.