Author Archive
I went up into the mountains around Musashi Itsukaichi (武蔵五日市) with a priest from Shugendo. He was to lead a seminar on conch-blowing, and when I got to the station, there were some dozen people cradling conches against their chest, protected in a sort of rope webbing. In another hand, many held a staff. The [...]
Darkened room. Lights on you. Now the tune. Sultry then stirring. You whirl, building tempo, and dance! Flowing hands, swaying sides, Our hearts delight. In the room there is only you. So let the universe sing through your body, In time with a tune from far away lands. Flashed wrists, swayed hips, Embodied electric time! [...]
I’ve been really physically active this summer, training Aikido nearly six days a week on average. One day, I trained for seven hours. This taught me that eating well and sleeping well make a huge difference. Vegetables make a big difference in stamina and recovery times. I feel best when when I eat lightly steamed [...]
One effect on me of living a life of leisure was that it made me reactive – not setting many goals, I just basically dealt with what came up. I did various things for fun and intellectual stimulation, like hypnosis sessions and business communications consulting, and while I gained skills from these, I didn’t have [...]
Our life is necessarily based on goals – they give us direction – almost any sort of activity that we do, for work or pleasure, has goals, from acheiving revenue goals in sales, to scoring points in tennis and soccer, to ascending ranks in Aikido. We invest an incredible amount of time toward acheiving goals [...]
During a break in morning practice: “What’s your name?” I asked my practice partner. “Hino.” He said. “I’m Yeoh.” “Pleased to meet you.” “Pleased to meet you.” He smiled, and said. “Shall we?” I was later reflecting on my morning practice with a fellow dojo member. “I practiced this morning with someone who didn’t grab [...]
I have been training aikido at Honbu Dojo (Aikikai Headquarters) since February, and steadily ramped up the number of times a week that I train, from twice a week in January, to four times a week in March, to averaging seven times a week now, including about five times a week in the morning, at [...]
At an introductory seminar to Aikido, I learned about how to structure a class for complete beginners, and of different paths to understanding. Aikido is a martial art, and as such, it’s meant to be experienced. I wish we had spent more time doing Aikido basics, instead of talking about principles and how they worked, [...]
Synthesized over the course of three aikido practice sessions this week, key learnings are in bold. Starting position: Extend right hand vertically or palm-up. Partner grabs your wrist with his left hand. Extend left hand above. Partner grabs your left wrist with his right hand. You are now in gyaku hanmi stance. Your elbows are [...]
I have been formulating in my mind a path to mastery of topics – a way to generically apply oneself to mastering anything – to developing an intuitive feel for the art of something. It has been crystallizing through my study of Aikido, guitar, foreign languages, swimming, and through my experiences teaching foreign languages, tutoring [...]
