Cause and 'Affect'

“Never lose. Be effective. And don’t try to win – let the opponent make himself lose.”

So says Nagato sensei through a friend who has just returned from Japan. It feels good to hear him put very plainly what many of us probably take for granted, like it’s his own definition of Shin Gi Tai (I-chi). By that I mean, the spirit or will not to let ourselves give up, lose, or stop persevering. Knowing enough to know, how to make what we’re doing work, for what we’re doing it for. And not allowing ourselves to get ahead of ourselves by wanting to win, by showing our intention to an opponent, who could then use it against us. This is the kind of understanding we have to continually incorporate into our own training.

This weekend, we tried to do just that with our monthly workshop - the topic was bojutsu. Lately, I’ve taken a more refined approach to training, starting it off last month with hanbojutsu (the basis for all weapons) and looking specifically at Rokushakubo this past Saturday. 

(Check out the photos here: http://s742.photobucket.com/albums/xx70/sgtidojo/2010%20April%20Seminar/)

Now, I could have just shown everyone grips, kamae, strikes, and kata, after kata, after kata, and let them figure it out – in like, 10 years. But I want people to be effective – today. And the only way I know how to do that is training by context – show them the map of where we are and where we need to go, and let them discover how to get there. The great thing about it is, it works. For instance, by repeatedly switching back and forth from hanbo to bo, I tried to demonstrate how a hanbo is not like a bo, and a bo is not like a hanbo, and yet they are more similar than they are different because of the way we must manage the Kukan – the underlying principle in all of Taijutsu. In other words, be able to strike (or whatever) without being struck. Once folks could perceive how the space of the Kukan expanded and collapsed around them – giving them more or less time to maneuver - they could figure out how to move in ways that gave them more time and not allow space to collapse completely. Now, I’m not easily impressed, but yesterday, I was impressed – everybody did it and did it well.

This is the very reason why hanbo is the basic and most important weapon in Taijutsu - it’s so easy to cheat with it. It’s small and maneuverable enough to ‘get away’ with faster movements that slip inside an opponent’s defenses and utilize our own power to perform the outcome we desire. But when you translate that understanding to other weapons - bo, sword, whatever - they fail, and we often don’t even know why, giving rise to thoughts of the superiority of the techniques, instead of their unifying principles of application.
I keep reminding myself it’s Shin Gi Tai I-chi – a unification ‘affect,’ caused by the effect of mindful training.