Tag: Thoughts on Budo

From Shiro Kuma's Weblog by kumafr

Daikomyo Sai apart from being sensei’s birthday is always a very particular moment in the life of the bujinkan. People from all over the world gather here in Noda and Tokyo for this occasion and this year more than ever. I spoke with some residents who told me that they were expecting between 300 and 400 participants this year! Friday night we were almost 200 in the Honbu and 230 on Sunday!

This moment is also special as sensei concludes the theme of the year and introduces the new theme for the next year. On Friday he told us that “kihon happô” will be the theme for 2011 and added: “same sounds but not same writing…”. As sensei invited a few of us for lunch on Sunday, I took this opportunity to ask him about the meaning of this new “kihon happô”. Hatsumi sensei said that “ki” was “season” and “hon” was “reverse”. He didn’t explain about “happô” but I will give you my interpretation.

Before that I would like to share with you a few concepts he detailed last week during the previous classes.. Tuesday he demonstrated a few techniques where instead of hitting uke he would hit the space on the side of uke creating a moment of total fear in his opponent and opening endless possibilities of action. He said that we should “hit the kukan” to influence uke’s reactions. On Friday he defined our movements as being “chûto hanpa” or “half way half finished”. To illustrate this he spoke again of the goshin (ken, tachi, juo, katana, modern weapons). Modern weapons were compared by him to “robots”. Your actions cannot influence a computer or a machine following a program. And if you train budô in a “robotic” way your actions can be interpreted and deciphered by your opponents. On the opposite if your budô is artistic and does not follow a “beginning-end”; if your techniques are not finished then the opponent is not able to counter your actions. In the fight, he added, you have to feel the “fun iki” i.e. “the atmosphere, the ambiance” of the situation and to move accordingly. All the information you need is available to you if you have no intention of doing anything in particular. Your movements are natural ( i.e. not created) and participate of the feeling you get from the situation at hand.

Our footwork is the key to adapt our movements to the situation. Hatsumi sensei said that until recently he didn’t understand why Takamatsu sensei had taught him the “josei no goshin jutsu” (woman self defense). With the small footwork of a woman trapped by the limited amplitude of her kimono (traditional kimono are very narrow at the legs) you can, with tiny movements of your feet, take the balance of the opponent in close-combat (remember that we were around 200 in the dôjô that night and that moving was difficult).

In a situation like that using “josei no goshin jutsu” is the only solution. Instead of doing a technique we move in an artistic manner invisible to uke’s analysis. In the name “martial art” this is where the “art” is to be found. Art is not about applying a technique. This is not the answer. Sensei added that the new mission of the jûgodan was to transform their mechanical robotic budô movements into artistic ones. Through Art one can feel the atmosphere and respond with natural and unfinished movements.

This vision of taijutsu was repeated on Sunday when he insisted on the flow of our movements coming from the feet: “Nagare comes from the legs” he said. In fact uke thinks and then acts (ten-chi process) and tori should do the exact opposite (chi-ten process). It reminds me of Dr. Paul Watlawicz explaining that action should always precede reflection in human relations, and fighting is part of human relations. Too bad for Descartes and his “cogito ergo sum!”.

How come all of the above can be linked with the kihon happô of 2011?

When sensei spoke of kihon on Sunday during our lunch and said that “kihon” is “season reverse” he didn’t explain the new meaning of happô.

When you look in a dictionary happô (hachi hô) has many meanings. My interpretation (possibly wrong) is that hachi is the recipient (bowl, basin), a little similar to the “ki, utsuwa” of 2009 (sainô konki) and “hô” is information. Happô becomes the recipient of all the possible information of a situation. As we understood it in the sainô konki year, the bigger the utsuwa, the bigger the kûkan.

Therefore if “kihon” is the beginning of a new cycle (season reverse) and “happô” as the sum of information in the kûkan, then the “kihon happô” of 2011 could be interpreted as follow: By feeling the atmosphere (fun iki) of the situation i.e. reading the information of our environment (happô) we can change the cycle of action (kihon) and turn it to our own advantage by reacting without any preconceived ideas to the definite actions of uke.

Moving softly with the “josei no goshin jutsu” attitude, uke has no possibility to read our actions because we do not know ourselves what we are going to do next. Each one of our movements having no end we only do things half-way,  “chûto”, and never finish them, “hanpa”. Hitting the kûkan will send false information to uke and gives the ability to overcome his intentions.

Everything above is my own interpretation and can be totally wrong.

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From Shiro Kuma's Weblog by kumafr

(version française)

I just read a nice article by my brother Pedro Fleitas and I would like to dig deeper in its direction.

When we began training in the Bujinkan martial arts we couldn’t fathom how much it would bring to us as a human being; how much it would transform us. We were more interested in learning a “martial art”. Through the last 26 years we learnt the martial art but  we also learnt to become true human beings.

Too many practitioners today are training for the wrong reason as muscle power is limited in time so it shouldn’t be our main objective while training. What is definitely more important is to develop our own potential, our own abilities. All through these years people have been focusing too much on the omote where in fact only the ura matters. Knowing thetechniques can be interesting for a while but knowing yourself is more vital to live a happy life.

How many teachers in the bujinkan are only teaching “forms” and do not get the essence of the bujinkan? A lot! I remember once speaking with sôke who told me that the important thing he has been teaching in the last years were not the schools but the concepts they conveyed. These concepts of san jigen no sekai, yûgen no sekai, kasumi no hô, shizen, etc have taught us more on how to live our lives than fighting techniques. Even though this apprenticeship has been the key to learn to defend ourselves efficiently. By understanding the ura side of things, the omote becomes obvious.

In 2010 we have entered a new era in the bujinkan with the arrival of many high ranks. Things are changing as always and now is the time to ask yourself the good questions. Long time ago I have decided to put aside the “ninja” stuff and to follow the teachings of a man, Hatsumi Sensei; I decided to become a disciple and not only a good technical martial artist.

Is it what you are doing? And if it is not, do you think it is worth spending your free time collecting forms instead of developing the fantastic human being hidden within you?

Hatsumi sensei might be the last true budô master of Japan and his teachings go far beyond simple body mechanics. Maybe it is time to think about it.

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From Shiro Kuma's Weblog by kumafr

(version française)

Last Sunday at the Hombu, Hatsumi sensei said that “if you cannot control yourself, you cannot control others”.

This is the secret of every learning process as we must understand our own behavior before trying to understand the one of others. The quickest path to achieve that is to master our basics.

When you learn the basics, you force your self  (body & mind) into unusual forms and reactions. This is the first step. Here the opponent is not somebody else, it is only yourself. This is the kihon level. Many martial artists stopped their understanding of fighting at this level.

The second step is to learn how your movements can interact with formal ways of attacks. Here uke appears and follow a given set of movements and you apply the kihon that you learned, and you adjust them to a different reality. This is the kata or waza level and this is the main objective when you train in a dôjô with fellow practitioner. There is no surprise here as everything is predetermined, and there is no violence either. Few martial artists get to this level.

The third level is the one of shizen, here the attack is unknown and your personal ability (sainô, 才能) flows naturally and will save your life or get you killed if you did not achieve the personal control at the first two  levels. This is the level of training that is given by sensei to the bujinkan practitioners.

To master and control these three levels of: kihon, waza, and shizen take a long time and only a very small number of practitioners will succeed. This is why it is said that budô is a life-time commitment. Even well polished, a mirror can always be polished a little more. Perfection is an attitude in life, not a manifested reality.

• 基本 kihon: you learn to control yourself
• 伎 waza: you learn to apply this control of yourself to known attacks
• 自然 shizen: you are in control of yourself and any attack is controlled naturally through your ability to flow into your environment. There is no surprise.

This is a  三心 sanshin.

Therefore the dôjô 道場 is not only the place where you learn the way, it becomes the place where you learn to ride with others 同乗 (dôjô). Learn to control yourself through this sanshin and you will be able to control the others.

Banpen fûgyô, 10000 attacks, no surprise.

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From Shiro Kuma's Weblog by kumafr

 

(version française)

In a recent post we established that “ki” was not magic but only natural.

Q: But what manifests this natural state of things where no preconceived idea can exist?
A: The natural flow and interaction of inyo (yinyang).

The I Ching, the book of changes (ekigyô 易経 in Japanese) says that:

“the only thing that will never change is that everything is changing permanently”.

In this sentence lies the truth about the ki, inyo, life, death (i.e. a fight); everything can be reduced to this equilibrium between in and yo. The inyo concept is based on the eastern understanding of eki 易 i.e. change.

In modern Japanese the word “eki” is used for “divination” (or “easy” when pronounced yasashii). When we study the kanji, eki we discover that it is made of two kanji: the sun 日 on top; and the old writing for rain 勿 under (today this kanji is used for “be not, must not”).

The original meaning was then “weather change” from rain to sun to rain and the only thing to do was to watch those changes and to adapt to them. This is the same in the dôjô. The opponent’s actions are to be watched carefully and “naturally” answered by going with the flow of the inyo interactions. And this is why we should never separate in and yo as it would create a duality; as it is from this duality that things get confused. Unity with uke is the path to the natural flow.

To define this permanent change in the flow of life, the chinese took two old kanji and showing this alternate state in all things. Those two kanji are one in two (in cannot be separated from yo), historically this ishow the Chinese called the two sides of the mountain. The north-facing side, dark and humid (in) and the south-facing side, bright and sunny (yo). You cannot separate them, this is the same with inyo.

Yo 陽 is composed of eki (sun and rain) but separated by a horizontal line (check by yourself). This extra line emphasizes the idea of differentiation compared to a natural change as in eki. It defines a moment in the flow where change will occur, where rain will let the sun shining. This is the end of the rain, an instant of change, a kokû 虚空. A space between two moments.

The right part (after the “B” shape kanji) of in 陰 is composed of gathering, accumulation 亼 and cloud 云 it gives the idea of an accumulation of tension like before the rain comes. Here also we have a kokû, another space between two moments. Change is everywhere and in the encounter only the one who is able to adapt to the permanent switch happening in the instant is able to manifest the ki and use it within the flow of things.

Inyo are (is?) the manifested components of this flow of permanent change that we call the ki. Eki is the essence of the ki and our movements should use this energy to move naturally. In a way we can say that with the use of change eki 易 offered by inyo, we gather 会 the ki 気 so that our actions become easy 易(yasashii).

易会気易 (eki e ki eki): natural change gather the ki to make things easy.

nb: some of the explanations are taken from C. Javary “le discours de la tortue”, ed. Albin Michel

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