Excellent New Books

Perfection is not impossible.

It's right here in front of us.

In the myriad things we do, we are enacting that perfection.

When our breath stops, and we sense that we are not,

when we cannot stand, and choose to fall,

we curse our own special gift of perfection.

That is part of the gift.

Just here, in this moment of knowing without a mind,

there is perfection.

I really am going to tell you about some interesting books, but first I'm going to talk about something else.

It's very clear to me that I do much more than kyudo. Shooting a bow and arrow in the Japanese fashion of kyudo is one of the things that I do that is part of my Way ... but then again what I do is not limited to just "the Way" we think of with calligraphy-like writing, Asian characters we don't understand, and an all peaceful illusion. What I do runs deep into the veins of the earth, stretching like my arms across the art of various generations, then down my torso like the tribal and intellectual traditions of the past, and sinking through my feet into a volcanic core of rocks and gravity and exploding suns.

It's very clear that putting my faith into a religion called kyudo, or aikido, or Japanese, or writing, is a superficial illusion I manipulate to satisfy my own insecurities.

What I have is a feeling and a direction, from that follows the physical characteristics of the world, like kyudo, aikido, Japanese, writing, etc.

I don't know.

I move throughout my life sniffing the paths and making lots of subconscious decisions based on the vibrations my hair and skin pick up. I do my best to honor what I realize, and mistakingly trample upon the treasures of others. I look at people in the eyes and when I like what I see I stick around. I ride my bike past telephone wires and pachinko parlors ... I don't ever buy anything in the shopping malls because they are all empty to me.

My life is one of art. By that I mean expression and experience and interaction. It is a life of great love, great frustration, great searching, and deep sleeping. I look to the sky to try to fly and jump, and in that highest moment of false belief I fall to the ground and crack.

It should look strange, because no one has ever done this before. This is my style. I'm finding my style and it's bigger than what's ever come before.

Moving on ...
I went to kyudo tonight and had an good practice. I have never described a practice like tonight's as good before, something has changed. I've thrown away a lot of insecure egotistical trash I've been bringing to kyudo, thanks to many failures and the acquisition of inspiration from new books.

Basically, when I say I'm practicing kyudo, I'm practicing kyudo. Before, if I didn't like my practice, say I wasn't feeling good, wasn't hitting the target, or wasn't receiving praise others, I would call it not-kyudo. I became picky about what I called kyudo, and so that black non-kyudo side of my practice took over all else. I've been doing non-kyudo for months, just waiting for some good fortune to come by and bless me with skills.

That is trash. Everything I do in kyudo, is kyudo, and my failures are a part of it as anything else. It isn't about hitting the target. It isn't about impressing people. It isn't about justifying your life.

It's about doing your best.

That's all.

It's about doing your best in a very difficult practice. I will no longer expect perfection to bless my bow and arrow, and rather just work ... but it's not just work ... "work" just seems like a humble word to go about putting effort into a great project. It's really more like creating, or expressing, or living through a labyrinth of puzzles that test various parts of our existence.

As for the issue with my hand, it's healed pretty well, and until I'm confident with its condition not deteriorating again, I'm wearing a kind of leather cover over the thumb. It's not ideal, but it's all I can do at this point. I went with it tonight and had a good practice, being able to focus on other things.

I went to a meeting with the other English teachers I work with in Oita Prefecture, there are seven of us in total. We might and talk about various things with our job. Usually a large part of that is sharing games and methods of training.

It's wonderful. We escape our own routines to see different, necessarily fun and effective ways to do the same thing we've been trying to do on our own. It's never about making things more detailed or complicated ... it's about simplifying and making our methods more fun and effective.

There is more than our one way that we get stuck in, but sometimes it's impossible to see. Perhaps we benefit from individual practice and experimentation within our discipline, but in order to advance we must meet with others.

When we do so, it's not just about going to a teacher and asking for specific answers. It's about meeting as equal artists simply revealing our own ways of doing things. It's like a buffet where we are free to choose what we like at our own discretion. It's not a button we press to receive immediate sure success ... this isn't McDonald's.

One other thing, I had a very interesting revelation during that meeting pertaining to budo...

We were practicing songs/dances that we do in class (and yes it's embarrassing as it sounds. It's funny the things you can get used to) and there was one point when we got together with a partner and did a kind of patty cake action. I was paired with a guy from Ghana, a few inches taller than me, and athletically built (I think he's really into soccer), but not necessarily huge or skinny or anything. Anyway, while we were doing the patty cake I noticed he was overwhelming my slaps with his. His hands were so relaxed and heavy, just like the wet towel/ox tongue/etc analogies we try to emulate in a lot of martial arts. I don't think this guy has martial art experience, and yet he was doing this patty cake in a way that revealed great ability ... he'd probably be an amazing martial artist (maybe he is!) I don't know if he noticed it, but I did, and I noticed how light and weak my hands were. After all the years I've trained in the arts, I wonder if that is some kind of conditioning, or just my natural reaction that has remained unaffected by my training. Maybe it reveals a tendency of mine, for better or worse. Regardless, I was surprised, impressed, and jealous of this guy.

So what I was initially getting at is that there are many ways to go about doing something, and I've been in my own little shallow rut for so long, going to kyudo with a fresh mind to listen to my teachers and the protective gear to do something other than worry about my thumb allowed for a great training session. I was able to look at other things, more important things perhaps.

Specifically, my back. I won't go deep into the details, but I need to stretch my elbows out in the beginning, not just to stretch them, but the stretch my back. I need to keep that tension as I rise into uchiokoshi, maintain the tension by turning my elbows slightly in daisan setting up the draw, and then pull that draw with my elbows and back. Also once you do this, just spreading sideways isn't enough and will warp your stance and inhibit your release. You must also focus on stretching up and down with your spine as well. This small focus changes everything for the better. I didn't do it perfect, but that's not important.

I've started chiseling. With sensei we started pounding on this issue and I felt my back cracking inside. We will continue to crack until one day the shell falls off and my new soft skin will bring life into the bow and my kyudo.

Kyudo is like we are statues, slowly cracking away at ourselves until the shell one day falls and we arise natural and soft and advanced.

It's also like getting past a wall.

The wall is so high we cannot climb over. It is so strong we cannot burst through it. We must walk through it ... like magic. It takes a kind of magic faith to acquire such other-worldly abilities in this art. We walk through the wall, perfectly calm.

So, I've got some new books, and THEY'RE EXCELLENT!

2 of them are about kyudo, which is the really shocking part for me.

"Zen Bow, Zen Arrow: The Life and Teachings of Awa Kenzo" by John Stevens.

What I like about this is that it talks about this master, Awa Kenzo (1880-1939), who is responsible for having a huge effect on kyudo in a time of great transitions in Japan. The information on him is a bit short, but the stories are great and very helpful to my practice. The later half runs similar to "The Book of Peace" about Morihei Ueshiba's teachings in that it is a bunch of one-liners or small paragraphs about the practice. It's something I'll read through at first, but then surely revisit from time to time.

Next is, "Illuminated Spirit: Conversations with a Kyudo Master" by Dan and Jackie Deprospero.

This is a great read because it also focuses on the teachings of one particular master. It is written by Dan and Jackie Deprospero (who have written other good books on kyudo) who write from great experience and humility. It's good writing and based on the personal experiences of a master so you can get the first hand teachings along with a subjective interpretation of it all. I'm finding this book very helpful in looking at my own experiences in kyudo here in Japan.

Last is, "Crooked Cucumber: The Life and Zen Teaching of Shunryu Suzuki" by David Chadwick.

Perhaps many of you are already familiar with this book about Shunryu Suzuki, author of my favorite book on Zen, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind", and person largely responsible for bringing Zen practice to North America, though his life is much more than that. I don't know much about the man beyond this book, Shunryu's other book, and a few other stories, but it's interesting to learn about his life. It's great because it's one of the first books in a while I can casually read through.

Next in the line up is: "There is No God and He is Always With You" by Brad Warner. I haven't started it yet, but I'm very excited to get to it. He lived in Japan for 11 years (I think) studying Soto Zen and returned to the states to practice as well as write and do lectures and play music and many other things it seems. He is the author of a few other books I really enjoyed, and with each work it you can really see the progression of an honest man searching for the answers that come up with Zen, and really life itself. You can check out his fabulous blog at http://hardcorezen.info/.

So there it is. It's been a long time since I've read such interesting books in English, and with these I can only think of more I'm just waiting to order. I'm not much of a book reviewer, but I'll surely continue to post interesting titles that come up.

Thanks for reading.

Our Goals and a New Book: "Illuminated Spirit: Conversations with a Kyudo Master"

We make these goals and call them God's decree. These goals construct our fate which becomes painful chains. Over our hearts, our minds, our eyes ... all of the world's phenomenon becomes filtered through the domineering vigilance of our goals, our fate. They are both synonymous with decay, as well as success. In such fine lines, like clouds or the wind across sand, Form appears in the world, revealing its existence. We are captivated by this contradiction to chaos, but it is not such a thing. In fact, the goals we make are no different than that "chaos". Though, Form isn't nearly the same as our "goals", our plots. Upon the lines of thought we can measure and we can see a chance to graduate from our stations. We manipulate the lines to make a ladder with which we can crawl over the pile of life we deem waste. Waste. Does such a thing exist? Our goals, what should we do with them? Perhaps we can't live without them, and so perhaps we are cursed. Or perhaps we can hold them at a distance. Maybe we can live in honor of the world and all of its beauty, holding such filtered lies apart, but still confidently approaching an imminent death. The goal is a tool, and without that tool I still live. I, live.

I've got a new book about Kyudo, "Illuminated Spirit: Conversations with a Kyudo Master" by Dan and Jackie Deprospero. I've read only the first ten pages and I'm already brimming with reflections. I think it's going to be good. It already is. Of the other books on Kyudo I've read, it was another written by Dan and Jackie Deprospero that I consider the most interesting, "Kyudo: The Essence and Practice of Japanese Archery." These books are written with a respect for the tradition that kyudo is, and the life it mirrors, while also writing from an experience rooted in long practice and skill. Or at least that's what I feel. But anyway, without further ado, I'll just get to the point and quote a section that discusses the idea of having a goal, while also discussing another topic that's been on my mind (and on the blog) recently, the balance of learning from a teacher and learning on your own:

"Kyudo, perhaps more than any other martial art, is considered to be an excellent spritual discipline when practiced under the tutelage of an inspirational teacher. It would be hard to imagine a teacher more inspirational than Onuma Sensei. He repeatedly told us that if we practiced diligently and made a real effort, kyudo could help us change our lives for the better. We once asked him if the practice of kyudo could also help rid the world of evil, or at least change it for the better. As silly and naive as our question must have sounded, he did take the time to answer that great philosophers have tried, for thousands of years, to address the question of good and evil, and that human beings have been trying to change the world from the first day of their existence - and yet humanity still struggles with the same questions.

"Many people, deep down, are waiting for someone else to take charge of their lives and hand over a prescription for what to do or say in a given situation. Onuma Sensei always stressed that his intention was simply to teach us kyudo, not to teach us how to change the world. He also made it quite clear that neither was he trying to change us, adding that on one has the power to effect real change in others.

"For Onuma Sensei, kyudo was a means of observing, understanding and changing his own life. He worked only on himself, believing that each of us is totally and completely responsible for improving his own character. Sensei had faith that if every human being were to approach life this way, the result would be smoother relationships, a more caring society and, ultimately, a better world to live in.

"Can it really be so simple? The cynic will say that Onuma Sensei sounds like a man who would have students isolate themselves from other people's problems in order to better themselves. But this is far from what he meant, as can be seen in one of his favorite analogies, of two people climbing a mountain:

"The mountain looms equally high before us all. And the goal and the struggle we face is the same. The only difference between us lies in the fact that I started climbing long before you. Now when you look ahead you see me in a place where you, too, would like to be. If I allow myself to look back then I can see that in comparison with you I have came a long way. But I don't like to look back because that hinders my own progress. Just like you, I'm always looking ahead toward the top of the mountain. But this doesn't mean that I ignore others as I climb. I must always be ready to help those who follow. There is a great difference between looking back to compare yourself with the progress of others and looking back to guide others as they climb.

"The point he is making is that one should follow a virtuous path simply because it is a good and proper thing to do, not from any expectation of compensation, glory or praise for our efforts. The reward lies in the act itself, and in the knowledge that having traveled that path we can then act as a guide to the others who will surely follow."

-Dan and Jackie Deprospero, "Illuminated Spirit: Conversations with a Kyudo Master", pgs 1-3.

What do you think?

I think it's an excellent story about the challenges in finding the right balance of goals and interaction with others.

In kyudo we set goals to enhance our technique, not change the world.

We seek to answer the questions, and so that answer is a goal, but though humans have endeavored such since our first moments, we still question for that answer.

We proceed under the tutelage of a teacher, but it is not that teacher's sole occupation to enlighten us, just as it is not our job to be such for others.

We should not look to others for the answers to our own personal hidden questions.

We exist in this world, and talk about bow techniques, and climb mountains ... all else, is well something else indeed.

...

It's natural that we feel we stray from the path. We start doing things we're not supposed to, believed we never would before, and things that hinder our virtuous growth. Perhaps that is a helpful part to our growth as well. Maybe not. I don't know. But I've sown malicious plots in kyudo and reaped no desirable fruits. Twisted up, I move to untangle the knots, and daily replan my approach to my life and my experience with budo. I've begun a new journey with iaido and jodo. This will affect my relationship to kyudo. I think it will improve my experience. Taking my mind away from goals of success, I'll introduce new characters to change my relationships to the ones that have been here before.

In kyudo I make things harder than they are. I regress to past fumbles when there isn't much of a problem at all. I create demons that pull the bow instead of me.

I have one specific problem that may fix all else: I grip the bow too tightly. I grab the bow and demand my success trying to push and pull it to where I want. I only injure myself and stray from good technique.

I can see this now.

My hand is almost healed and I'm ready to go back to kyudo, and relax. I'll use my hand as a tool to work together with the bow and experience the world that is kyudo instead of demanding deadlines.