A spot of gardening

Many of students who began their training in the garden dojo of Miyagi Chojun Sensei would recall stories relating to how strict he was with regards to the cleanliness of the training area.  Even the smallest of stones and weeds would need to be removed by hand before training could commence.  Of course, Miyagi Sensei was no doubt trying to instill certain qualities in his students, but the stories also bring something else to mind.

Teaching karate is very similar to tending to a garden in some ways.  New students can be compared to an unmarked packet of seeds.  On the outside they all appear very similar, but you never really know what they will grow into until they begin to form. 

The good thing about a mixed bag of seeds is that you will get many different types of plant.  Some will have nice bright flowers, whereas some will be more hardy, and able to retain their leaves for longer in harsh conditions.  Some might even look a little weak or appear to struggle in the conditions, but their perseverance and strength of character secures them a place in the garden alongside the other plants who seem to accept it and help it along when the conditions get hard.

Every now and then however you will find a weed hidden amongst the others, which needs to be removed right away before it gets a chance to spread its influence across the whole flower bed, spoiling the garden.

The weed can be compared to a student who has an excuse for every occasion.  On Friday night training they have to work late, on Sunday morning they have a cold, on Tuesday they can’t possibly do push ups because their dog got hit by a car at the weekend, and being down on all fours brings back such painful memories.  These people are only fooling themselves, and will never gain anything from karatedo; but we need to be careful that their influence doesn’t spread across the dojo like the weeds in the garden.

If other students see this person getting an easy ride whilst they are struggling away, the temptation is there to try the same; take the easy route.  This is not the students fault as they are new to the art, and probably do not completely realise what is happening inside their head.  The fault lies with the sensei who hasn’t been attentive enough to the situation, or maybe hasn’t had the strength of character to deal with the problem.

This same comparison also applies to students with a bad attitude, or unsavoury character.

I think there may be something to be learnt from Miyagi Sensei’s approach to gardening.  As soon as you notice the weed growing in the garden, get rid of it before it takes hold, or be prepared to compromise the overall appearance of your garden.

Learning humility

The first line of the dojo kun reminds us of the need to ‘be humble and polite’.  This of course is an admirable trait, and something for us all to be mindful of in our daily lives, but how do we go about practising this lesson?

Politeness is something which we as karateka should strive to show in our daily actions, and we are given ample opportunity throughout the course of our day to practise this trait.  Most children are reminded of the need to show politeness by their parents, and this is something which should already be second nature before a student ever steps foot inside a dojo.  Unfortunately in this day and age, simple manners are no longer considered important by many people so any lapses in common courtesy should be pointed out by the sempai and sensei of any serious dojo.  As I have already mentioned though, we are given many opportunties during the day to put this into practise and there is no excuse for any serious student to forget simple politeness in their everyday actions.  This is something which should be practised more so than any kata or physical technique inside the dojo.

Humility can be a little more difficult, as perhaps we are given fewer opportunities to put this into practise, and in addition to this, a person who fails to display humility in their actions will often be blissfully unaware of the fact until it is pointed out to them.  A good sensei is able to remind his students about humility by simle lessons in the dojo.

Not bragging about ones achievements is merely a small part of displaying humility, and like saying ‘please’ or ‘thank you’, is something which ideally should already be well drilled into a persons personality before they ever step foot inside a dojo.  Any person who fails to display such simple qualities would find it difficult being accepted into any serious dojo anyway.

Humility is more than that though, and requires the student to subject themself over and over again to correction and scrutiny from their seniors.  I’m sure that many readers will have experienced demonstrating a basic kata in front of a senior only to be told to stop before they have even concluded the first technique due to a basic error in their movement.  This is a lesson in humility that serves as a stark reminder of how far along the path a practitioner has left to travel.  The practitioner can choose to act in two ways.  They can either listen to the voices in their head that suggest ‘the senior is being mean for the sake of it’, or ‘I’ve been performing this kata of 20 years and have never been told that movement is wrong before’.  Such voices are your ego talking to you, telling you that you are more important than you actually are.  To listen to such voices is to ignore one of the most basic lessons of the budo. 

Alternatively the student can put their unimportant hurt feelings aside, and be thankful that they have found a teacher who cares about their development enough to point out such errors in their form and character in an effort to help them grow as practitioners of the budo.  Such teachers are rare, and the more you stand in front of such a person, the more you can gain from your practise.

Regretfully the age of undergoing an apprenticeship in the arts under a sensei has passed, and many practitioners teach large groups, subjecting their students to their scrutiny without ever having to experience the discomfort of having themselves examined.  This is a sad situation, and I wonder if such people are afraid of having their over-inflated egos suddenly burst through the realisation that they might not be as good as their students keep telling them they are?

I remember seeing a video of Yasuda Tetsunosuke sensei (10th dan) having his kata corrected by Miyazato Eiichi Sensei.  Yasuda Sensei was already in his late 60’s and had pursued the budo for a great portion of his life.  Despite this, he was humble enough to still accept critism from his sensei, and what’s more, he actually looked very grateful of the fact that his sensei cared enough about him to spend the time. 

The path of karatedo is endless, and the only way to keep walking forward is through constant correction of ones form and character.  Whilst the physical benifits of karate have limited value, the lessons learned through the pursuit of the physical have unlimited value and stay with us throughout the entire course of our lives.

Next time you are corrected, please do not be offended.  Your teacher is only trying to help.

More about Tensho (part 2)

All things Chinese were considered pretty ‘Gucci’ by the Okinawan’s, particularly with regards to the martial arts. You can see this from the ‘1936 meeting of the masters’ where everybody appears to get quite excited about the fact that Bushi Matsumura was trained by a Chinese teacher. Anything Chinese was embraced and considered cool by the Okinawans.

The ideas and theories that Miyagi Sensei must have come across as a result of his travels in China would have no doubt had a profound influence upon his understanding of the art he was actively developing up to the time of his death. I truly believe that in order to understand Tensho better we need to look toward the various Chinese arts and research their theories of power generation, body alignment, energy circulation (qigong), intention, and even more obscure areas such as folklore, superstition, geology, numerology etc. The Chinese were, and still are to a certain extent, a very superstitious folk, and any opportunity to invite good luck into their lives would have been actively encouraged, hence the names and configurations of certain templates.