KICKBOXING FOR SENSITIVE TEENS

Tender Warrior is a supportive martial arts practice that helps teens (ages 12 - 16) to transform stress, overwhelm, and anxiety into resilience, confidence, and a deeper sense of belonging

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Being a teenager right now is intense

Social pressure, academic stress, and the weight of the world can lead to nervous system overload. For sensitive teens especially, life can feel like too much.

Kickboxing for Sensitive Teens offers a space to find your center and tap into your strength in community. Through mindful martial arts and connection practices, teens learn to release stress from their bodies, reset their nervous systems, and discover strength they didn’t know they had.

Here, sensitivity isn’t a weakness — it’s a gift. With instructor guidance and peer support, teens learn how to harness their strengths to develop resilience, presence, and self-trust.

Is this program for you?

You may already be a Tender Warrior if…

  • You have big feelings

  • The world feels like it’s too much sometimes

  • Your care hard about other people, animals, and/or nature

  • You feel like an outsider

  • You’re creative, and/or deeply engaged by art, games, music, etc

  • You want to move your body but aren’t into team sports

There’s a place for you here. This program will help you to discover and tap into your strengths as a sensitive person (i.e. a person who feels the world all around them).

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Four elements to build strength from the inside out

The Tender Warrior approach is built around four elements. Each one helps you turn stress into strength, sensitivity into power, and fear into confidence. Together, they create a path that’s simple, clear, and fun to follow.

Air / Focus

Techniques to quiet the noise and help you choose how to direct your attention

Earth / Presence

Find your power as you regulate your breath, body, and nervous system

Water / Connection

Build trust in yourself and others as you master partner holding pads for one another

Fire / Expression

Discover your personal style and authentic voice through community engagement

A note from your guide

I started karate when I was 13, at a dojo across the street from my house. I wasn’t into team sports and I struggled to find where I belonged. The dojo was a sanctuary for me as a shy, artistic kid who got bullied.

By 15, I was teaching classes. Martial arts gave me something I hadn’t experienced before: confidence, self-esteem, and a way to move through the world with strength.

Decades later, I opened my own dojo, Fighting Chance Seattle, and launched a teen kickboxing program. I had so much fun teaching those classes. I valued passing on the mentorship I received as I supported advanced students to grow into strong, confident instructors.

However, I was starting to see how martial arts reinforced a culture of dominance and insecurity, both in myself and in my students. There was a gap between what was being taught and what we needed as individuals and a community to thrive.

In 2018 I made the difficult choice to close my dojo to go on a multi-year journey of healing and discovery. I didn’t expect to teach martial arts again. I completed trainings and workshops in mindfulness, conscious communication, and somatic awareness.

Each experience helped me to see myself more deeply and move towards wholeness.

I discovered I was neurocomplex, broadened my understanding of masculinity, and addressed the impact of trauma on my nervous system. Through this lens I came to see that while my teenage dojo experience was valuable, it also encouraged me to mask my sensitivity with toughness.

My vision for Tender Warrior: Kickboxing for Sensitive Teens is to offer a program for kids like me that integrates the best parts of my martial arts training with everything I have learned about cultivating resilience: a safe place to move, belong, and to discover that your sensitivity is the source of your greatest strength. 

I look forward to training with you,
Jordan Ferretti

tender warrior is a practice of gentle strength and fierce compassion

Parents FAQ

  • We recommend loose, comfortable workout clothes, and depending on the season, they may want to bring layers. Bring a water bottle. We will provide boxing gloves for the first session.

  • We recommend trying to attend both weekly classes, but if you are only able to consistently make one class per week that can work. There is no contract required, but to benefit from this program we recommend committing for at least 3 - 6 months.

  • There is street parking available on the streets around the studio. We can provide a parking map. For drop-offs you can pull onto Dearborn and your child can enter through the front, or you can enter through the Big John’s PFI parking garage and take the elevator up to our back entrance.

  • While there are some chairs in the studio, it’s a small space and our emphasis is on creating a distraction free environment where teens can practice being in their agency and autonomy with peers. 

  • Our classes are oriented towards skill-building and pad work, while we do occasional light play-sparring activities, these are more like games, and we don’t allow any head contact.

  • Our recommended age range is 13 - 16. We are open to considering mature 12 year olds who are comfortable participating with older teens in a supervised environment.

Be part of our newly forming class community!

Our students don’t just train together, over time they become friends and supporters, helping each other to level up inside and outside of the dojo.

These photos are from our original Teen Kickboxing program at Fighting Chance Seattle (2013 - 2018).

Launching in October

Start with a low-risk, 90-minute intro workshop! If you decide to continue, your registration fee rolls right into your first month of membership.

  • First Intro Workshop: Sunday, Oct 5 @ 10:30 AM

  • Location: NW Kajukenbo Club, 718 Rainier Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144

Note: This is a different location than our adult classes.

What to Expect

  • A fun, beginner-friendly introduction to kickboxing for sensitive teens

  • A light workout with plenty of breaks

  • Connection and trust-building practices to get to know the group

  • A free pair of boxing gloves included with your registration

Membership & Tuition

After the intro, you’ll be eligible to join our weekly classes:
Mondays & Wednesdays, 4:30–5:30 PM

  • Membership: $135/month

  • Launch bonus: Your intro workshop fee applies to your first month!

  • Early bird special: First 10 members lock in $120/month for your first year

  • Sliding scale options available — reach out for details

Contact / Waiting list

If you have any questions or if you’d like to be added to the waiting list for a future intro workshop, please use this form to contact us.