Anyone who has done martial arts themselves or perhaps sends their kids to martial arts will be familiar with the claim of most clubs to instill moral values and a code of ethics.
Good advice is timeless and transcends cultural boundaries. What can we learn from the great samurai, Musashi Miyamoto?
Get-Fit Guy is hosted by Kevin Don. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
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Hello listeners and welcome back to another episode of Get-Fit Guy. If you are joining us for the first time, then welcome! Regular listeners will know that I am more concerned with health and wellness than aesthetics or high performance, being that fitness is defined as the absence of disease in an organism. But fitness isn't just limited to your physiology, because as organisms, we are a system. We can’t ignore that our minds are an integral part of the concept of fitness also.
I like to think of this as a play on words around the famous Japanese manga, Ghost in the Shell. Across the last 20-plus years of coaching and the thousands of people I have helped and come to know, I see a familiar pattern: many people start to train or go to the gym as a coping strategy for some form of life trauma and stress. Time rolls forwards and the dose-response required for training to have the same effect as a distraction or coping mechanism increases and either reaches a point where it's not recoverable or enough time cannot be devoted to it.
At this point, I often see people abandon this physical fitness entirely and instead deep dive into more alternative or spiritual strategies: breath work, cold water therapy, manifestation, energy healing, and so on. In the first example, they are working solely on the “shell” and distracting themselves from the “ghost” and in the latter situation, they have abandoned the shell to work on the ghost. The reality is that your spirit won’t get far in a broken vessel, just as your vessel won't get far with a broken operating system. We need to work on the ghost AND the shell.
So, with that in mind and with the Japanese theme already set in motion, I thought I would talk this week about some life lessons from martial arts. Anyone who has done martial arts themselves or perhaps sends their kids to martial arts will be familiar with the claim of most clubs to instil moral values and a code of ethics. But is this true? Are the martial arts more optimal for the development of the spiritual self as well as the physical self than other sports or training methodologies? Let’s take a look.
With myriad martial arts to choose from—judo, karate-do, tae kwon do, hapkido—it might be hard to think of one to hone in on for examination, but looking at all the arts listed above, they have one thing in common: the “do” suffix. So what does that mean? Well, “do” means “the way.” This seemed very familiar to me and I realised that, preceding all these “modern” martial arts, was a book called Dokko-do, or “The Way of Walking Alone” by the greatest samurai ever to walk the earth, Musashi Miyamoto. Miyamoto lived from 1584-1645 and become renowned for his unique double-bladed fighting style and also his unique ability to still be alive after 61 duels to the death. He authored several books, including Dokko-do, but more famously The Book of Five Rings which I will focus on today. It was written in 1645 and includes the teachings that Miyamoto passed on to his own students in his dojo.
The “five rings” refer to his idea that there are different elements to battle or conflict in life. The first book or ring is the book of earth, which ends with nine basic principles, which he considered to be the ground upon which the samurai must stand. The nine principles are:
Now, let's have a closer look at each one of the nine precepts and see how we could apply these to training or modern living in general.
1. Do not think dishonestly:
For me, this is about being objective and having truthful self-talk. We should welcome feedback from others and avoid confirmation bias and lower-order thinking, because we may end up believing in untruths. Make self-assessment and objective reflection an ongoing practice.
2. The way is in the training:
You have to have the opportunity to apply what you have read, to apply what you have trained for. Once you have the chance to see your learnings have a real-world outcome, you can readjust accordingly for success.
3. Become acquainted with every art:
In order to tackle, competently, as many situations as training or life may throw at us, it will be more useful to have a toolbox full of different tools for different jobs. Remember: specialization is for insects.
4. Know the way of all professions:
Keep your eyes on the bigger, more objective picture. Knowing how others operate will allow one to be more flexible and ultimately more supportive. Learning other ways and principles allows us to fill the gaps in our own practices. It also facilitates relationships because you can communicate with and understand the perspective of others.
5. Know the difference between loss and gain in world matters:
To me, this is related to how you choose to direct your energy. Activity, according to Intel CEO Andy Grove, is not output. In martial arts, jumping spin kicks look great but are highly ineffective in combat or self-defense. Investing energy into them will be gainful if the goal is to be a stuntperson, but a loss of energy if the goal is to be confident and competent at street defense.
6. Develop an intuitive judgment and understanding for everything:
Martial arts rely upon doing so many repetitions that you can intuitively react to a situation—you can easily read the movement and intent of another. This is a useful skill in the real world also, to be calm and interpret messages and choose a suitable response.
7. Perceive those things which cannot be seen:
Whilst I am a huge fan of data and don't believe we can progress without it, there are also unseen factors influencing reality. Mood, intention, resistance to change, etc., are all outside of standard data sets but by finding ways to track them (a mood journal for instance) will help you see the unseen and add this to your data!
8. Pay attention even to trifles:
Things that may at first seem small and insignificant have a way of accumulating. Stress is one such thing. Training stress slowly and gradually accumulates, even at 1 lb increments a week, to a greater overall adaptation. But so do things like a missed night of sleep, a stressful car journey, an addiction to caffeine, not having time for yourself, and working shifts. Pay attention to these small things, which when added together can have a larger effect.
9. Do nothing which is of no use:
Maximize your outcomes by focusing on things that provide big bang for your buck. But remember that sometimes doing nothing is doing something of use also! Relaxation allows us to reset and recover.
Miyamoto Musashi did not leave us any indication of how to interpret his tenets, these are just some ways I think about them. Do you have any lifestyle tips from the ancient masters? If so, email me at getfitguy@quickanddirtytips.com and I will do my best to get a reply to you or answer your question on the show!