Meaning

Below is a reprint oN part of the meaning of the folds in the Hakama from the Shindai Aikikai Website (http://www.shindai.com/articles/hakama.htm)

The 7 folds in the hakama (5 in the front, 2 in the back) is said to have the following symbolic meaning:

Yuki = courage, valor, bravery
Jin = humanity, charity, benevolence
Gi = justice, righteousness, integrity
Rei = etiquette, courtesy, civility (also means bow/obeisance)
Makoto = sincerity, honesty, reality
Chugi = loyalty, fidelity, devotion
Meiyo = honor, credit, glory; also reputation, dignity, prestige


I know its been a while since I last wrote, but being busy at this time is never a bad thing. The year is coming to a close and soon another year will fold into the next. It has been a difficult year for most either finacially or personally. I know that for myself, it has been both. I an so grateful for the generosity of others who have helped, over the course of the year, to keep a roof over my head, a place to train and their friendship to help me through my difficulties. My emotional well-being has improved as well and I believe that I have finally turned the page on a very old and long drawn out chapter.

Part of this is my own creation and I have learned much from these experiences. This year has been about stepping back. It has been about becoming okay with me and the decisions I have made. With that said, the next moments look better and not as gloomy.

What now?

In a recent reading of "Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings" by Paul Reps, Nyogen Senzaki, I came across this koan.


A Cup of Tea

Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era, received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen. Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor's cup full, and then kept on pouring. The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. "It is overfull. No more will go in!" "Like this cup," Nan-in said, "you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?"


After reading this koan, I saw myself. It was,as Oprah puts it, an "ah ha" moment. All those questions I had been asking myself, became very unimportant. What an usual feeling. How weird it was to have a smile on my face and not have it feel forced. The feeling of joy, which I haven't felt in a long time, felt really good. Whether or not I experienced some kind of breakthrough, I'm not sure. I just feel as though things are a little better, at least for now. I wonder what might happen next.

Sailing the sea of uncertainty

In the beginning you didn't know any better and you just did what people told you. As time goes on, you gain some knowledge from your experiences and you begin to make decisions. The more people you meet, the more places you go, the more chances you have to do, try and experience new things. Some people become complacent while others forge on boldly into the unknown. So what type of person are you?

I'm in kind of a gray area lately. I'm beginning to feel as though some people are just meant to be free spirits. No matter how much you want them to try and conform to some structure, they're just going to do things their own way. Some people it drives absolutely crazy while others just chalk it up to thats how they are and life goes on. Some recognize it while others don't. The world needs a few characters. I just don't need to or want to be chasing them around. How tiring.

This time around, I have to look at what is best for me. I wish we could all be on the same page together, but that's not the nature of life. Training, like life, has its ebbs and flows and sometimes you're just not going to all make it together. Training for me has entered another phase. Its about me. Its about making the effort to go and shape and build on my foundation. Its about letting go of what i know and seeing and experiencing other teachers and students. I'm not giving up on where I am now, thats for sure. I just need to build my own relationships and stop worrying or trying so hard to hold on to others. If I hang on to tightly, I'll never learn to let go.

This isn't going to make sense

"There are more pleasant things to do than beat up people." Muhammad Ali

Why am I so hard on myself? Why can I not enjoy much of anything lately? Why does it feel like such a pain to be me lately? What have I made this all out to be? Why do I feel so outside of myself, by myself when I'm surround by people?
Can I not be happy with myself without the constant criticism? The constant critiqueing that runs around in my head?
There is a part of myself that thinks that if I just hang on for a little bit longer, its all going to work out. The universe has to come swinging around my way at some point and what was once negative will turn into a positive right?


"We don't know what we want, but we are ready to bite somebody to get it." Will Rogers

Why do we even bother to watch what passes for the news anymore? Why do allow ourselves to be bombarded? Its like being beaten mercilessly only to ask for more. Death. Violence. War. And now weather followed by sports.


"You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat." Albert Einstein

But when you pull my finger, the response is immediate.


"My definition of an expert in any field is a person who knows enough about what's really going on to be scared." P. J. Plauger

This is why I only know a very little about a lot of things. I'd rather be a thesarus than an encylcopedia anyday.


and finally...

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." Douglas Adams

Exact change please Sir.

On shuffle

As I was sitting here, listening to my tunes, I realized how little control I have over my choices. I, like a good portion of people, have an Ipod. This little device has fundamentally changed how, what and why we listen to music. Some may say it allows us to listen to songs or artists we're not aware of. That it allows us to rediscover music we may have forgotton about or taken for granted. All hail the power of the shuffle. Or should we?

Is choice slowly slipping out of our control. Are we slowly letting go? I'm not taking about a particular choice, but just choice in general. Think about it. How much influence is exerted on us? The minimal and subliminal suggestion of do this not that. Buy this. Wear this. Take this. Make yourself feel better or make yourself worse. How much is a push and what is a pull?

Is it still possible to do the unexpected or has that choice already been made for us?

Saying less

In the world we live in, we are constantly bombarded by words. Everyone is talking. Everyone is shouting. Everyone is being loud. Yet is anyone hearing anything that anyone is saying. Nope. Not really. In this more is more world, the more we say, the more we think we're being heard and the more important it makes us feel. Then more people try to out do one another, it all turns into rhetoric and noise. Can't we enjoy a little bit of silence for a change? Do you really need to be talking right now?


Mia: Don't you hate that?

Vincent: What?

Mia: Uncomfortable silences. Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about bullshit in order to be comfortable?

Vincent: I don't know. That's a good question.

Mia: That's when you know you've found somebody special. When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.

- Pulp Fiction, Uma Thurman and John Travolta

Its out of your hands or is it.

I was thinking that sometimes things happen because they're meant to happen no matter how aware of ourselves we are. I had this thought while trying to remember friends of mine who I had grown up with whose lives have gone in varying directions. One has gone on to studying theology and hopes to become an evangelical minister. Another has gone on to becoming a bus driver, a third works for an insurance company, while still another has gone on to run and manage a series of stores for a mattress company in the southwest while pursuing his MMA training.

Myself and these four friends of mine all met through our local community church which was also where most of the community went to meet. The group doesn't exist anymore, but the church still functions as a church just for a different organization. Anyway, I was thinking about how the five of us all shared a relatievly similar experience. As we grew up, each of us had a different take on our the information presented to us. Each of us affected in a different way. I don't keep up with them as much as I should and that is a sad reality.

For me, my experience has been filled with questions which continue with me to this day. The biggest question I have is about the role of religion and God in my life. If I have been exposed to religion and this teaching has brought me to where I am today, then why should you be angry with me if I don't see the world in the same way you do? If this is God's will and this is my role to play, then I don't understand why you make me feel like an outsider looking in. I'm not chastising religion because to know the world and the decisions that are made, you have to know something about its influence. The current situation in the Middle East with the Taliban is a good example. Whether or not you believe in a particular doctrine is up to you. I'm not questioning that.

How you worship and why you worship are very personal decisions. I've felt many times that the people I have the most confrontation with are ones who believe that their way is the correct way. That I don't know who God really is because I'm not doing it the right way. Again I ask, If God made this world, made us and allowed for these different points of view to exist, then what makes your point of view more correct then mine? is there no room for me?

I think about my friends who have gone on to varying degrees of success and hopefully rich full lives thus far and wonder if they ever ask this of themselves. Do they feel the same doubt or curiosity about how they got to where they are today. I wonder...

Hard Times

A classic wrestling promo from the American Dream Dusty Rhodes to then NWA Champion Ric Flair -


"Ric Flair the World Heavyweight Champion. I don't have to say a lot more about the way I feel about Ric Flair. No respect! No honor! There is no honor amongst thieves in the first place! He put hard times on Dusty Rhodes and his family. You don't know what hard times are daddy! Hard times are when the textile workers around this country are out of work. They got four or five kids and can't pay their wages, can't buy their food. Hard times are when the auto workers are out of work and they tell em' go home. And hard times, are when a man works on a job thirty years. THIRTY YEARS! They give him a watch, kick him in the butt, and say HEY a computer took your place daddy. That's hard time! That's hard times! And Ric Flair, you put hard times on this country by taking Dusty Rhodes out. THAT'S HARD TIME!! And we all have hard times together. I admit I don't look like the athlete of today is supposed to look. My belly's just a lil' big. My hiney's just a lil' big. But brother, I am bad and they know I'm bad"!


What made me think about this? I think its because I'm feeling the pinch lately. I'm feeling the weight of little or no work. I'm feeling the self doubt and trying not to spiral into some form of self-pity because I feel like people don't want me around. Knock me down over and over and I'll try to keep picking myself up. I'm trying to stay away from pointing fingers and saying "you're the cause, you're the problem, you're the reason I'm having such a tough time." I can't put a smile on every moment of every day, but I can at least try not to frown about it either. I am not being singled out and made an example of. The universe doesn't hate me and want to see me fail. This is the time when I have to learn to be smart about what I do. This is the time when I have to learn how to be smart with what I have. This is the time when I have to learn to refine and redefine who I am. Hard times may be what I got, but hard times are not going to keep me down.