The scale of things

Pursue something, anything long enough and with enough attention and it will start to affect your thinking. What I mean is your interactions with the world often go through many layers; experience, influence, emotions, health, traditions etc. But talking physically, where you actually manipulate objects and learn from those reactions, that is possibly the strongest factor. I`ve worked construction and learned about structures, supports, joining materials, of reading a building`s exterior to understand the interior. I remember I began seeing in every structure a method of adapting materials to suit the need . I think this is something architects excel at, uniting need with limited space with available materials. Stay in construction long enough and you can feel the major supports of any building, glance at a piece of furniture and read the conclusions the wood-maker came to when finishing it. I also spent time as a specialty gardener. Creating various types of designs, each an adaption of the environment it was in. It was not natural work, One had to work to shape the plants to specific forms. All elements had a specific place, a place that if wrong would immediately draw the eye`s attention. One had to consider the seasons, temperature and health of plants before making the smallest cut. Doing this work day in day out started to make me notice the greenery of our cities. Again one could notice at a glance the intentions of a garden design or skill of a pruner by the shape of a tree. Stare long enough and you start to see the city as a large scale urban garden. Some cities have tightly controlled plans while some are just controlled chaos.

After pursuing swordsmanship, I can read in a person`s movement the level of skill, dedication, thought or personal style. It difficult to pinpoint one thing but often I see how well the body flows from one posture to the next. Often it seems knees are stiff or shoulders too straight etc that draw my attention first. After, one can notice the repetitions of sword movements or footwork. Although hard to describe it is the ones that have a personal touch, movement that suits a personal style or body type that impresses me the most. Its a sign that one is seeking to use the whole body to express the sword.

It is this scale of things that so interest me. If we as humans always utilize this small-large scale adaption, in things like manufacture, horticulture, economy, politics etc what else can I infer from only seeing one side of the scale? I think these are thoughts trying to explore the idea of inter-relatedness, that if you disregard the size difference we can reach a base unit from which to solve the equation.

Thoughts on self-training

This is training outside of classes, away from teachers, separate from those already cultivating a style. This training done on your own time, time dedicated solely to incorporating techniques, ideas or moves that you have learned from others or thought of yourself. It is important to do this self-training, you must make a technique yours before truly utilizing it. Only you can decide if it is worth committing to muscle memory or if it will remain a theoretical idea to recognize in others. This training should take place in a special spot, a place that is easy to fix in the mind. Why? Well there are times when recalling a technique or thinking about a series of movements it is good to first place yourself mentally in this place. It is like a rooted spot that links you to various angles of training. Training by yourself, away from your teacher is also away from the mentors influence. There is no one to correct you, but therein lies the attraction. You must learn your body, you must learn to judge the correctness of form. You do not need a mirror, the feel of your muscles will tell you the alignment of feet and shoulders. Let your self be the demanding seeker of perfection. For only when you reach the point of having no excuse are you truly training your self.

Using ten to describe one

Somethings you have to reduce to absolutes. "I am" or "I am because ....", which carries a greater determination? We like clear, conscious answers but we also like long, detailed elaborate explanations. We need relation, abstraction offers nothing for us to relate to. To deal in words is to deal in structures, pre-arranged rules, logical assemblages of units. It is inherent in language and words to attach meaning, to change ideas to fit the form of words, to depend on an agreement for a vague definition of the external. To express your idea as simple as possible is not a sign of a lack of concise vocabulary but an effort to unite reality with the idea. It is the intellectuals, the scholars who see a missing part, a required piece of the logical equation. To them "It is so" is infinitely less beautiful because it lacks in minutie the amount of words to give it proper place in the world.

Thoughts on "training"

I should try to reach a point where training is life, where I train regardless of where I am, what the circumstances are, what emotional state I am in or physical state for that matter. There is a misconception that training is sub-standard to the reality of the actual deed. That can be no further from the truth. I must act from my training, so I must train the reality of my actions. In other words, there must be no separation between my idea of practice, training and reality. This applies most to my mind set, how I focus myself. In all honesty motivation and dedication should be of no consequence. If I accept it as my desire they become irrelevant. How much mores so do I have to be dedicated than professional athletes. They often have the added incentive of being paid to perform well. What more incentive do I need than to strive to reach that goal, my ideal perfection in form.

Training is one good cut in a thousand, training that feeling and improving the odds. It is finding efficiency in movement, eliminating tenseness in muscles and finding shortcuts between two actions. It is building muscle and strengthening tendons with a single goal to aiding the cut. It is building connections between muscles, learning which aide and which hinder the generation of power and speed. It is feeling the center of balance, that point from which any move may be branched off. Training is not training, knowing how to relax the body and the mind, relieve the strain.

Extension of the mind

I am not often happy and outside of being in nature I don`t often experience pure joy. But it happened today, a breakthrough in my studies of the sword. It is truly a great experience to suddenly see something in a new perspective. I had been practicing cuts with a heavy sword, trying to perfect the angle of cut for different situations. I took a break and moved on to torso and leg muscle work, practicing generating power and torque. I was using hand strikes, knife edges similar to sword edge. And it hit me then that I had slipped into sword techniques, blocking at angles, using footwork to open and close distances, and naturally there is no difference in the movement of the body and mind whether I grasp a sword or not. There are only degrees of distance. Simply, I am utilizing all my muscles to be in the proper position to act, be it a punch, throw, cut or thrust. But I know this insight is only the surface. Im trying to think past this thought, trying to see connections that this could lead to. Some wild ideas:

-Is it possible to read in the rhythm of movement the opponents level, depth of skill, intelligence?

-Is it possible to build up torque in a wave fashion with just the slightest muscle movement?

-Can one develop enough sensitivity to read an opponents next move in the movement of the muscles in his feet?

-Is it crazy to assume one can outdo the speed of the arms and hands and dodge a blade using the muscles of the legs, feet, stomach and back?

-Just as there are basic stances, there are those stances that exist in every second I move. If I can comprehend the innumerable postures and balance one must take, how much more so will I be fluid and quick?

In the eye of the storm

I wrote this after returning from the country into one of the larger metropolises in the area. This journal entry is as close to expressing the actual emotion I felt as any I`ve written so far. I feel it is wordy but I was searching, searching for the right words.

-It seems even stranger this night. The world more confusing than ever, sights and sounds harry me beyond belief. What will it be like a month or more after living in the heart of it? Yet the city is an integral part of humanity. Here, in the belly of this culture must lie some source, a nugget of outflowing inspiration, outflowing influence. I would like to try and recognize it. Maybe there are others like me, searching in the shadow, in the garbage for that singular rarity, that bright awe-inspiring nugget of enlightenment. I imagine there are others, perhaps 1 or 2 people who are hiding in this biological, pulsing entity. Testing, pushing the limits of this nations web. Spreading knowledge of a world a hair-breadths from this one. I looked for those areas, these people that are sources, but I failed in that aspect. Maybe again the answer lies not in the vast natural landscape of the rural areas, where one`s mind is free to roam at will. Maybe it lies at the opposite end of the spectrum. In places where its hardest to express freedom, hardest to see the true ideal of thought. I must admit it makes logical sense. If I wanted to challenge myself, really push, its hard to do it through thought alone. If I could put myself in place to receive intense pressure, intense contradictions, then shouldn`t I do that? But in a way it sounds like Im trying to find some way to rationalize my acceptance of moving to the city.

What this means is when I`m standing in the dark, looking out over a strange landscape and a stranger future I will have to make a decision. Those solutions depend upon a reality only I can judge. Ultimately my judgement is the only safeguard to sanity. That makes my biggest enemy doubt. What if Im wrong, what if Im making the wrong choices, what if Im deluded about what I think reality is? Those are doubts that can destroy a person, destroy his trust-his confidence in his ability to exist and perceive. To go so far down one road and find that its a dead end, that its just a deer trail. That can make one give up on life, give up on the dreams he thought were precious, that were his guiding principles. That is why it takes a strong will to dip into the pool of doubt every once-in-a-while. If I don`t evaluate my beliefs, my convictions then how can I go any further. To test them is to make them stronger. To find the fallacy in my beliefs and correct it, is that not the definition of self-improvement? But the pool is deep, the current strong and the waters very inviting. One must be prepared and be willing to fight even as you strip yourself bare and fight your own identity. This is what it means by the expression "Before you can understand others you must understand yourself."

Writing Free- escape to the forest

And he stood on the rocky ledge, awash in the first rays of a new day. The forest stretched endlessly below. The ground he was going to cover was on his mind and he shifted his pack, letting the weight center on his back. It was times like this, the dawn of a day of possibilities, that reminded him why he chose this path. For truly, in his eyes, the world was never so beautiful as when it was first touched by such striking light. It was just now reaching the far crest of the mountain that was his goal. "And on," he thought, for many rivers, valleys and hills must he cross. But it was not worrisome for he had grown into this land and could run for days over the wild terrain. With that thought he sprung up from a crouch, took a running leap and dived over the edge of the cliff.

He had taken leave of his people, of his culture to come to this place in search of something. But it was not something to be found here but what was simply not here that he had painfully tore himself away to reach. Waking up with thoughts of hopelessness and despair were not here. The revulsion he felt at being amongst the city was not here. The agony of missing the sounds of trees and views of sunsets was not here. And the feeling of compromising on every aspect of his life was not here. To see with eyes cleared of obstacles, to hear with ears the individual songs of life, to smell with a nose unaccustomed to chemicals, to taste with a tongue that had become virgin to all spices. And to touch, to touch as if a blind man, discovering through textures the depth of reality.

But it was more than that. It was a personal experiment, a experiment he thought of as the human experiment. He had given himself 20 years, time to think, time to explore, time to test the limit of his knowledge. In his own words it would be a "search for the truth behind ourselves." And so he had put up his own life, for his own judgement and in that span of 20 years he would find that sliver of light in the dark or he would end his life with at least a little more certainty than when he had started.

Patterns or reaction?

When I juggle something other than a spherical ball there are two ways to go about it. One-to learn the timing of each revolution, so as to catch an object in the same spot no matter the number of spins. Two-to learn to catch that object on all surfaces, that my hand is able to catch it at what ever angle it may fall.

I bring up juggling because it illustrates a point in swordsmanship that I am thinking about. I am at a certain point in training where I am starting to see patterns of cuts and blocks that, if done succesively, open up spots to strike. Strikes on opposite sides of the body which force an opponent to take wider blocks, sending the sword further away from the middle. Or using hard blocks to force an opponent to strike at a certain angle, which is a setup for a rebound parry.

But the problem is that for certain levels of swordsmen these patterns are useless. Beginners wouldn`t see or recognize openings and more advanced practioners should have more complicated patterns, perphaps even the strategy of utilizing one`s pattern against oneself! So what I am pondering is, like juggling, should I study up on different patterns, ways to draw an opponents strike, and even the rythm of a pattern itself? Or is it better for one to know every type of cut, block, parry and every possible response to each? Should I aim to be seemingly complex, never aiming to strike on my cut but planning four or five steps down the road? Or does the answer lie in the fast, decisive cut, the only one for that given situation?

What can I Believe

-A quote- "What can I believe?" It was proper for a person of his generation to believe that individuals needed a profound sense of their own limitations. Traditions were surely the most controlling element in a secure society. People had to know the boundaries of their time, of their society, of thinking, of territory. What was wrong with the hearth as a model for all thinking? A sense of enclosure should pervade every individual choice-should fence in family, the community and every step taken by a proper government. And he tried to fall back on the traditional catechisms of his people. "Each aspect of life required a single form, its inherent circularity based on a secret inner knowledge of what will work and what will not work. The model for life, for the community, for every element of the larger society right up to and beyond the peaks of government; sameness and stability."

And this has led me down the road, to the cliff, to the very edge of limits.

Applied to me, applied to my life, applied to all I can encompass within the range of my imagination and it leads me to this:
All I know, traditions, values, roles, modes of thinking, even definitions of emotions are all based on the evolution of my environment. These ideas did not simply fall out of my head. The shape of our cognitive abilities are the result of evolution and adaption to the situation at hand. Like the strongest survive, does it not make sense for the fittest mode of thought to perpetuate?

And I am on this cliff, this thin edge, poised to make the leap into the shadows, into the areas of humanity that exist in contrast to those ideas of sameness and stability.

A note: I remember reading or seeing something like humans are the only entities able to hold two complete opposite ideas in their heads and not explode with the effort of understanding.

Discussions with the Master

I had spent the day walking. I saw the fiery red sun rise up above the horizon, I saw it sink slowly behind the mountains leaving a radiating aura of color. I saw the entire spectrum of light that passes on a single day. I saw the stars spring out of the dark and marveled. And so I wrote this when I returned home.

Seated around him were eight of his closest disciples, closest because they understood the least and had that much to gain. They had all studied under this man for ten years, with only two signs to show for their devotion. Their sword style was simple and, the master thought, they asked better questions.

"Master" says one disciple, "we have much contact with the outside world, to what extent should we allow ourselves to be involved? Is it good to be thus isolated?" The master replied "It is true we are isolated here, but not by desire, it is that your nature, my unconsious ambtions shape the environment around. Do you wonder why it is clean and tidy here? Why we devote a part of each day to servicing our lodgings. Why there are no loud voices, why each of you choose to run or walk here from the city yet I made no such prohibitions against cars. Do you not see that after awhile garments become cleaner, that it is not troublesome to tend to daily affairs. Why then do you make a distinction between the outside world and here? It is simply your adjustment to one set of standards. Do not consider others with different standards of living different. Like in swordsmanship-they have their own unique style. It may not be good, it may be unstructured, rigid, weak, flashy, or complex. Yet how much more so will your own style be strengthened by recognizing flaws in others and seeing it in yourself.

"Master, I know my self-worth, my strengths and weakness. Yet I still feel other`s opinions too strongly. How am I to deal with other`s comments and criticisms? I find it strangely difficult to weigh the truth of a man`s judgement." The Master replied " Let no man force his opinion upon you. To do so destroys your ability to judge the truth and sincerity of his words. Ultimately it takes the strong will to decide, but I would add it requires the accumulation of wisdom and knowledge to judge, confidence to choose and intelligence to see the changes that will happen based upon such a decision. All men will judge you, it is rare for a man to give you a chance to judge yourself. I give it to you now, the knowledge that the sole responsibility of any act of will is yourself. This is hard, people will call you arrogant, judgemental, prideful, egotistical and even self-centered. Better yet they will say righteous, accountable, dependable, self-sacrificing, even innocent and naive. Which word is the worst? the best? Why should it matter to you? Please think on that and prepare your thoughts for next meeting."