From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
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From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
Each class, Hatsumi sensei speaks about moving “Yukkuri”, slow. This is different from training slowly. (1)
Training slowly: Study level/acquisition/Dōjō
Moving slowly: high-level/reaction/fight
Training slowly is part of the learning process, reacting slowly deals with actual fighting. When you train slow, you create new mental/body patterns that will be useful in a real fight. When you move slowly in the encounter, you stop emitting intention. Therefore it is easier for you to read the opponent and to adjust your reactions naturally to Uke’s attacks. Many practitioners, high ranks included, misunderstand this difference. We end up mimicking Sensei’s slow movements. And as we don’t have his many years of practice, if we only copy his slow moves, it will get us killed.
For years now he has been saying that he is teaching for the Jūgodan not for beginners. What he shows is Ura, if you copy his movements, you stay at the Omote level. Buying a black belt in a Budo shop doesn’t make you a black belt. What Hatsumi sensei shows in class is a result, not a process. Do not mistake the end result for the path. Stop copying, you don’t have the level for that! Moving slowly comes after many years of moving fast. The “no-waza” state he has reached is beyond our grasp. We are heading towards it, but we are not there yet. It comes after years of repeating the forms of the waza. There’s no shortcut. As I said many times here, in order to forget the techniques, you have to learn them in the first place.
Yesterday, Hatsumi sensei insisted on moving slowly. This is the secret of high-level taijutsu, he was insisting on the “yukkuri”, but he added that to be successful, one has to keep moving. We did several sword attacks from behind similar to train the Sakki feeling. Each time, the sword could not touch him because he never stopped. Turning his back to Uke, Sensei didn’t wait, he kept walking, and the blade was avoiding him like by magic. Hatsumi sensei insisted that if you stop, then you give a fixed point in space that the attacker can use against you. What we do is effective taijutsu, even if we are moving slowly. Senō sensei often asks us to move out too late and to be hit. Then to move a little earlier, then again and again until we can move slowly enough, and at the right distance, and with the perfect timing to avoid the attack. If you never get hit during training how can you possibly know how to fight for real? The truth is that you cannot.
Instead of repeating Sensei’s movements, you should listen to what he says, and build a training progression that will teach you how to do it. If you are a Bujinkan high rank, hopefully, you have studied all the Waza. You come to Japan, not to learn Waza but to bring back home new insights and new feelings, that you will train in your Dōjō until your next trip to Tōkyō. You come to Japan to bring back homework.
If you want to improve your knowledge of Taijutsu, stop copying and begin to listen.
Don’t copy the Omote, the visible, it’s a dead-end.
Listen to him, it will teach you the Ura of things, and help you improve your movements.
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From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
I don’t speak Japanese, but I do my best to pronounce it correctly. Too often, I can see t-shirt written “Gyokko Ryū Koshi Jutsu” instead of “Gyokko Ryū KoSShi Jutsu.” (1)
Twelve years ago in a Nagato sensei’s class, he asked what we wanted to study as he always does. An American teacher jumped in and said: “Koshi jutsu.”
So, we trained hip-throws for two hours. I remind you that back in 2005, Nagato sensei’s classes were more “dynamic” to say the least.
At the end of the training, everyone was happy that training was over. Then my American friend came and complained to me (why me?).
– Him: Why did Nagato do Nage Waza? I asked him to do Koshi Jutsu!
– Me (soft and enjoying it): Because Koshi means hip in Japanese.
– Him (getting excited): But I wanted to study the Gyokko Ryū!
– Me (playful): So you should have asked,
– Him (getting aggressive): That’s what I did!!!!
– Me (enjoying it): No. You asked for Koshi instead of Kosshi
– Him (troubled): …Yes, it is the same, no?
– Me (in heaven): No. Koshi is the hip, where Kosshi is the main kaname for this year’s study of Gyokko Ryū.
– Him (not getting it): ugh?
– Me: You have to pronounce each one of the “Ss” if you don’t, it means something else, like hip in that case.
– Him: ???
He left me with the bright, and sharp look of an oyster. (2)
To this day, I’m not sure that he did understand, but luckily he is a high rank… (3)
As I said in the introduction, I do not speak Japanese, but I know that some sounds with nearly the same spelling can have different meanings in Japanese. When you learn the vocabulary, we use in training, pay attention to those double consonants.
That is also important with the long vowels like “o” / “ō” and “u” / “ū.” (4)
So, learn Bakka correct Japanese sounds if you don’t want to look like a Baka. (5)
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1. 腰, Koshi: back; lower back; waist; hips; lumbar region
骨子, Kosshi: main point; gist; essentials; bones (e.g. of an idea); pith. And in 2005, Sensei used it with the meaning of “central pivot”, “vertical axis”, “coccyx.”
2. Metaphor intended
3. pun intended
4. The correct transcription uses an extra “u” after the o for the long “ō” and long “ū”. For example, Happou is Happō; Doujou is Dōjō; Chuu is Chū, Juudan is Jūdan. Because in the French language the sound “ou” is “u” (like in “Bujin”), I use the transcription with the flat accent on top. More on this here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Japanese
5. 許, bakka: only; merely; nothing but; no more than
馬鹿, baka: fool; idiot
From Shiro Kuma by kumafr
Hatsumi sensei is getting deeper, every class, into the world of Mutō Dori.
The majority of you is now familiar with the vast complexity os this concept that we have been training on and on for nearly a year and a half now.
As he explained here, Mutō Dori is not only the “unarmed defence against a weapon. It is much more. In “Japanese sword fighting”, sensei writes that “(…) Even if you have a sword, Mutō Dori starts with the development of the courage to face an opponent with the preparedness of not having a sword.” (2)
My dragon name being Yūryū, it resonates with me. (3)
Courage is to face the enemy even if you risk to lose your life.
The Mutō Dori of 2017, the way I understand it now, goes beyond this bravery. And he explained it during class when he said “Yokenai”, don’t protect yourself! (4)
Not concerned by the outcome you go straight to the opponent with no intention and ride the wave of his intention. Fear is not at play, you do your best and watch the result. As you have no plan of action, it is Uke that defines your reactions. Not frozen in the “I want to”, your body adapts to the situation.
But this detachment finds its origin in another concept that Sensei mentioned the other night. This concept is Mumei. (5)
At dome point during the class, Sensei did a particular grip on the sword, and I went to ask for its name. “There is no name for it” he answered. Maybe I looked puzzled, so he added “at Mutō Dori level many techniques have no names. You do them naturally.”
Kacem late told me that these techniques have no name (even if they have) because a name would limit them. I thought of Plato saying that “knowing the words led to the understanding of the world.”
It means that when you name something, you define it. You set limits to what it is, and what it is not.
Therefore, you are trapped by its definition. And this is where the Oriental philosophy have invented Mumei, the “no-name” concept, so familiar to Zen practitioners. Mumei doesn’t limit things to a single reality. Things are not “de-fined”, they have no boundaries, no finitude.
In Mutō Dori, as you don’t name the technique you stay away from the limits of the definition.
This is why Sensei moves naturally. On a few occasions, he dodged easily the sword and knife attacks of Shiraishi sensei, he kept walking towards him as if nothing would touch him. Strangely, nothing cut or stabbed him, his distance was always perfect. Because in the “un-limited ” world of Mumei and Mutō Dori, there is nothing to fear.
“Courage knows what not to fear,” said Plato. When you face your opponent with no fear, you cannot be defeated. So, you don’t need to protect yourself, Yokenai!
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1. 無刀捕, Mutō Dori
2. “Japanese sword fighting”, by Hatsumi sensei, pages 64 and 65 (published 2005 by Kodansha). Read here. More on Mutō Dori here
3. Yūryū: 勇竜, Dragon of bravery; courage; heroism. At the beginning of the 90s, Hatsumi Sensei gave us, Yūro Shi Tennō, “dragon names.” Today people don’t bother receiving them; they only add a dragon name to look cool. (sic)
4. Yokenai: 除け無い, yoke/protection + non-existent, not being there
5. Mumei: 無名, nameless, anonymous
Paris Taikai 14th to 16th of July. 3-day seminar with Sven Bogsater, Peter King and Arnaud Cousergue. Registration opened here