Author: Michael Glenn

From Bujinkan Santa Monica by Michael Glenn

Uto, Scenes from the Noh Theater, Tsuskioka Kogyo (1869-1927)

A sudden change in the atmosphere. The kukan shifts. The air itself feels alive. Only to be shattered by the tip of the bo.

This was the feeling I tried to communicate in one class. It was something I had experienced with Hatsumi Sensei and I wanted to share. But how to teach that?

How does this occur in a technique? How does the body and weapon come alive in that instant? And to make it absolutely crass, what are the mechanics?

In fact, the mechanics are super basic. Yet as with all basics, they quickly grow profound. We've been doing a lot of walking practice, or 足馴らし ashinarashi, in my classes recently. It's difficult to understand taijutsu without understanding this. Not just in our art.  Many disciplines start here, including Noh theater,

The walk is so important in Noh dancing that the highest compliment that can be paid to a player is that his walking is good. - Carl Wolz, 1976

The experience I had with Hatsumi Sensei was of the movement through the kukan having a particular quality to it, a particular way of walking. Sensei described it this way,

"You've got to walk like a Noh actor moving through yūgen 幽玄."

I've written about yūgen 幽玄 before, but how exactly are we supposed to walk? What do you do with your feet and legs? How do Noh actors walk?

There are many styles of walking in Noh, for example:

Ashibumi 足踏み : stamping
Uchimata 内股に: inward walk
Waniashi 鰐足: pedaling
Sotomata 外股 : outward walk
Tsumasaki 爪先: tiptoe
Yokoaruki 横歩き:side slide
Yokoaruki 横歩き: side cross step
Ashi o horu 足放る: side stamping
Shikko 膝行: squat walk


But before a Noh actor learns any of those comes suriashi 摺り足 or Hakobi 運ビ. This comes from 舞 Mai which is an old style of traditional dance. Mai means "to circle." In Mai the feet mostly stay in contact with the ground. While the arms gesture slowly and gracefully. This walking  has the soles sliding along the ground so lightly the performer appears to float.

If you study this movement through the kukan and Yugen, you may look towards Noh as an inspiration. The artist John Brzostoski gives a great description of the feeling of Yugen in a Noh theater,

"It appears upon the blank stage almost as if in a cinema, in slow motion, at the wrong speed of a recording, a stretched tape about to snap, pulled into intolerable pauses of holding breath, lack of breathing, lack of thought, the complete comprehension of all movements. You know where everyone has been and where everyone is going."

For me, that is what control of the kukan feels like. When I get it right anyway. The advanced form of this walking has a quality of 引張り間 hippari ai, pulling something or someone towards yourself. And if we go back to the roots of Noh Zeami tells us to walk so that, 目前神後 "the eyes look ahead and the spirit looks behind"

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From Bujinkan Santa Monica by Michael Glenn

Blue Biker, Kyoto. photo by nWevurski

Lately I've been studying Kukan no Kyūshō 空間の九勝 in my classes. When Hatsumi Sensei introduced this idea at the 2011 Daikomyosai, not many seemed to have heard of it before, but it made sense in the way elegant mathematics make sense. In other words it just felt right. But that doesn't mean I knew what to do with this feeling.

I decided to look into what I felt and observed from Sensei's classes. What is a good way to study kukan no kyūshō? If you've been receiving my keiko kiroku training notes you have seen me describe various strategies for doing this. To get my mind around this concept and be able to use it in my taijutsu requires studying it from many angles.

One idea we were working with the other night was a movement Soke described as 撚り型 yorigata. This involved spinning the sword through the kukan after twisting the body. The twisting action begins with with exposing your own 隙 suki to discover or open up suki on your opponent. For example if you want to strike the opponent's left side you first expose your left side. Then when you twist or pivot there is the opportunity to connect to kukan no kyūshō in that moment.

Hatsumi Sensei describes what may happen in that moment as "二転三転 niten santen," which is to change again and again or be in a state of flux. The truly odd part about this is if you have found the right kyusho in the moment, these changes will be hidden from your opponent. From there you can strike or act freely, without danger. Soke says,

The place where one cannot see, it's here where changes to the extraordinary happen.

I definitely witnessed these extraordinary changes while in Sensei's classes. And in my own training there have been moments from this study that have surprised me and created wonderful results. Those moments are some of the gifts to be found in our training. You can find them too- they are just there waiting for you in the kukan!

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From Bujinkan Santa Monica by Michael Glenn

Eastern Slope of Mount Fuji, photo by by ninja gecko

I'm going to take a risk here. I'm going to risk trying to inspire you. The reason I want to take this risk is because I am inspired every day in my training and I want anyone who trains to find that for themselves.

How do I get inspired? Remember what it felt like the FIRST time you trained? You were new and hopeful and open to try anything. As a new student your mind was just ready to open up. Almost every class with Hatsumi Sensei feels like that. At least for me it does.

Is Bujinkan just a martial art? As a student I can tell you that it has given me a lot more than the study of combat. And as a teacher I work for moments of clarity in training that open the training up so that it is more than just a martial art and expands to reflect the lives of me and my students.

If you don't believe this is possible in Bujinkan training, then why are you studying? You should answer that question. And the mystery to this is that the answer you come up with is based only on what you have learned about training so far. It is based on what you already know. If you leave it at that, then you don't even need to go to class anymore. If you want to learn, then you must risk going beyond what you already know.

In fact, the great fun of training is in discovering ideas and movement that lead you to that "aha moment." What makes you say, "Aha!" Or "yes" is that you felt there was something more and then a teacher shows you where it is. When that happens for me it is satisfying. And it keeps me coming back to see that teacher. It is also satisfying to help students have those aha moments. Because it reflects back to me and expands my own learning.

A good teacher can help you see past the edges of your own knowledge. A good Bujinkan class can open up your awareness to something bigger than yourself.

I hope you find teachers to provide insights that you cannot easily comprehend at this moment. Give them your trust and your training will accelerate to provide clarity in your life and expand what the meaning of training is for you.

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From Bujinkan Santa Monica by Michael Glenn

"My father Koichi Oguri had a long long sleep..."

 Thank you Oguri Sensei for your wonderful spirit and training. I will miss your infectious laugh, and the way you held your hand on your hip right after you put me in a body crunch.

I also appreciate all the easy conversations we had. Even though the language barrier was awkward, you were never impatient with me.

We will train hard for you tonight!

If anyone has pictures or would like to share memories of Oguri Sensei, please comment below or email me: [email protected]


You can read about one class I had with Oguri Sensei here:

The Power of Juuji in Taijutsu, Discovered via Oguri Sensei

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From Bujinkan Santa Monica by Michael Glenn

Monomania-Light and Its Grand Narrator, photo by DerrickT

How do you train to be a ninja nightmare? I was attending a class with Hatsumi Sensei when he did something terrible to his uke. I mean it was so hideous and gross I don't want to repeat it here. Maybe later in this article I'll work up the nerve.

Then he looked at the expressions of everyone watching and told us,  as if we just didn't get it... When you are dealing with bad people, you have to do worse than they'd expect.

This idea gets to the heart of a big problem with training. We get too comfortable in our dojos and our knowledge. Training becomes habit. We lean on technique. We become reliable and complacent in our ability.

Bad people, or desperate and crazy people willing to do bad things, are the opposite. They will go to any lengths. They will have no technique. They will do things that just don't make sense. That is hard to defend against.

So we can take a lesson from them and drop the "common sense" or the group think or dojo inbreeding that gets everyone training sensibly. Anytime anyone says that "this" or "that" is the way something should be done, I try recognize that for what it is… a trap.  I think, "Maybe that's the way YOU do it!" Memorized kata or techniques are a disease.

Sensei urges us to separate ourselves from the waza so that we see the whole picture. If you think in your own mind, "this is the common sense way to do the technique," that is very dangerous. He has told us to use 非常識 hijoushiki which is a lack of common sense.

I'm definitely not using common sense in giving away my current training notes. I explain why I'm doing this here: 稽古記録 Keiko Kiroku

Hijoushiki. This idea is not new to Budo. It goes back to some of the earliest documents in Japan. An example is the Shinden Kohyō no Hikan where the "Starving tiger" or even "Nursing tiger" kamae might reflect this spirit.

But beyond this is a secret or hidden sense. Another kanji for hijoushiki is 秘常識. This feeling is described in the Koteki Ryoda scrolls. Here you develop the uncommon sense or the secret sense yet still very natural ability to predict, sense, and see through things.

Sensei tells us that if you try to memorize these forms you will end up trapped. He says that any conventional "common sense" about the martial arts prevents you from adapting or changing. He writes,

"In real life, people who live beyond the bounds of common sense attack you suddenly, with scant regard for rules of combat."

Soke punched the guy in the throat. Not from the outside like common sense would lead you to believe. His fist was in his uke's mouth and he said to punch it down the esophagus and then maybe rip the tongue out as you withdraw. It was shocking to witness. His poor uke definitely had to learn some sutemi that night.

So when dealing with bad or crazy people, this might be the only way to communicate some sense in a language they can relate to. Do worse than they'd expect. Be worse than their nightmares. They can't prepare or defend against that.

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