Martial Arts Make You Gentle?

One of the most important factors on body movements based on classical martial arts is to use whole body cooperatively.

              There are lots of merits to do so, and today I focus on how the state of body influence the characteristics.

              Think whole body as a company, parts of the body as a number of employees, and brain as the president.

              If you use only a few parts of your body, only a few employees are working. For example, when you pick up a heavy object, you tend to tense up your muscle of your arms. This state is like this; only a certain employee (=arms) is working and the others are not working.

              When you want to come to pick up heavier objects, weight training is thought to be a common approach. However, this solution means like this; to make employees who are already working (=arms) work more, but leave the other employees who isn’t work doing so.

              Is there something strange in it? Classical martial arts choose different way; try to make share works with lazy employees and make everyone cooperate.

              If someone works too much, everyone supports him. If someone doesn’t have job, everyone shares the burden. This kind of company seems to be full of cooperation and have a gentle atmosphere.

              Same state is likely to happen on your body. If you can use whole body cooperatively, each parts of your body is becoming have a “gentle” characteristics. Therefore, you can become a gentle person by “employing” gentle employees. In fact, some of my acquaintances have changed their characteristics by mastering body movements based on classical martial arts.

              On the contrary, if you train only some parts of your body, you will “employ” selfish employees who don’t have a spirit of cooperation. Employees rob jobs each other, and the president put a few employees who assert themselves strongly in this “company”. This kind of company (=body) cannot produce gentle atmosphere.

              Which company (body) do you want to have? I must choose gentle one.

              Martial arts are thought to be violent, but it can help us to make a “gentle body” by using a whole body cooperatively.

If you have a good mirror, reflected you will be better.

　　　　　　A person who is in front of you is your mirror; he or she reflects how you are.

              For example, when you think that your counterparts of conversation boast of themselves, your way of receiving them reflects how you are. This situation shows that the counterparts have a desire to show off or to be praised, but at the same time it shows that you also have the same desire as they have.

              If you don’t have such desire at all, you must not think the counterparts as people who crave the limelight. If you think so, this is an evidence that you also have same desire.

              Your counterpart is your mirror. This proposition also means that you can play a role as your counterpart’s mirror. Therefore, it is possible to change how counterpart is by how you are, and it is also possible to be changed how you are by how the counterpart is.

              Hence if you meet a good person, you can make yourself better by using him or her as a mirror. I realized this fact when I met a great person recently.

              I thought this man didn’t have a desire to show off or to be praised at all. It is usual for us to have a desire to appeal ourselves to some extent especially when we meet someone for the first time. However, when I met this man for the first time, my latent desire to be praised didn’t reveal at all.

              We usually use this kind of words; “you should be just the way you are”, but it is not easy to embody this word. It is natural for most of us to have a desire to boast of ourselves and to be praised.

              However, what if there is a person who doesn’t care about evaluations from others at all and concentrate just on what his or her true self seeks…?

              What you can get from attitudes or atmosphere of who is in front of you has much stronger power to change you rather than what you are said. When I met the man and share atmosphere with him, I felt that I received a silent but strong message; “you should be just the way you are.”

              Therefore, if you have a “good mirror” in front of you, reflected you will become better. My next challenge seems to keep this good state without this “good mirror”.

              If I can make it, I can become a “good mirror” for others, and I can make others better.

Yoga for Happiness Right Now

                      Taking variety of poses, I usually notice that my body is stiff. Sometimes I lose my confidence when I face difficult poses. Especially when I cannot but everyone can do it, I tend to feel embarrassed.

              So I have a will “to become flexible”, but there is a misunderstanding here.

              If I become more flexible and become able to take more difficult poses, will I get more confidence?

              No, even if I get confidence by becoming more flexible, this is a mere relative confidence. Even if I get confidence by comparison with “my past self” or other people, this confidence is easily shaken if I face more difficult poses or comparison with more flexible person.

           Relative confidence is not reliable.

              Therefore, it is much more helpful to make efforts not to lose confidence even if I am inferior to others rather than to make efforts to become superior to others.

              The essence of yoga is not becoming flexible but allow myself even if I am weak or stiff. In other words, yoga is an approach to become happy on “my present self”. If I exaggerate, those who practice yoga with having a will to become flexible cannot taste happiness if they die before they become flexible enough. On the contrary, those who practice yoga to make “my present self” happy can taste happiness on the process of daily practice. Even if they come to an end today, they can taste as much happiness as they can during their lives.

              This is different from seeking a fleeting pleasure or making other times sacrifices. Yoga is, so to speak, “a double amplification of happiness”; to taste happiness on “my present self”, and make “my future self” happy by making body and mind healthy and stabled. I don’t think the former should be forgotten.