Coming To A Close

Unfortunately, my project is coming to a close. A week from this Friday is my presentation and there are several loose ends that I need to tie up before it happens:

1. Post my research about:

• The three major principles on which Seido is founded
• Self Defense Techniques
• The Spirit

2. Polish:

• Kata
• Self-Defense
• Strikes

3. Practice actually going through my presentation several times (at least over the weekend)

I also have to complete and send out an email containing documents to the people who will be grading my project. These tasks may seem like a lot, but they are doable.

Balance

The journey through my WISE project has been full of extremes. In the beginning, it was extremely intense training followed shortly by extreme jumps between my WISE work, other school work, and my part time job. These last few weeks have been no exception. I have been feeling extreme amounts of stress about all of my projects and papers. Very recently, one of my friends mentioned to me how eventually I am going to burn myself out and I have to say that he was right. Up until the start of this weekend, I lacked balance.

At the beginning of this weekend, I was able to just relax with my friends as I went out to dinner and saw a movie. Since then I have been spending a lot of time with my family. There were times when I had to work but the shifts were rather uneventful. Needless to say, this weekend has been exactly what I needed to balance all of the work I have been doing.

There is balance in the way a Seido karateka is supposed to train. Seido training is structured such that intense physical training is counterbalanced by periods of tranquil meditation. Diet is even mentioned in Kaicho's writings and how important it is to maintain a healthy one which is something that I have not considered for the duration of my project, but will after the school year is finished.

Karate Class and Training

After a long break, I went back to my Karate class. It was not really a voluntary break as I have been focusing on my studies. Throughout the entire class I was thinking about my technique. I was thinking about how easy it is to notice flaws in other people's form and that it is extremely difficult to notice flaws in one's own form. I tried to notice all the flaws in my form and I was surprised. I noticed certain things about how I kick and how I am better kicking with my right leg instead of my left. I need to work on both in addition to my balance. Overall, though, it felt really good to go back.

Following my class, I went home and trained for awhile. I practiced specifically actually striking an object, which was my heavy bag. I am pretty proficient at striking correctly, but there are times when I kick the bag incorrectly and it is painful. It is an immediate indicator of whether or not I am doing it right.

First WISE presentation

Today was the first WISE presentation of the year and was a mandatory meeting for all students  in the program. The auditorium was more filled than I expected it to be and immediately thought to myself that I would hate to be the one presenting because I am not particularly fond of public speaking. However, as soon as it started I noticed the confidence of the presenter and how he carried himself. He seemed almost unfazed by the fact that there were so many people watching him intently. Throughout the presentation he was calm, cool, and almost friendly which made the atmosphere feel very laid back which I thought made it go extremely smoothly.

The presentation was about learning how to play the harmonica. It was very interesting for me because I am very familiar with music and music theory and I found it interesting how he applied it throughout his project. At the start of his project he was not a music person, and by that I mean he had very little past experience playing any sort of music so he was forced to learn how to read music and the theory behind chords and key signatures and so on.

It made me think about how I need to approach my project for the last several weeks of my project. The biggest struggle for me for WISE was actually just writing blog posts. I had the research done and I enjoyed my hands on practice but found it extremely difficult to set aside time for it, especially after tests began. I have been practicing for my presentation also, though I still have to time everything out and practice just speaking about it.

General History of Karate: Zen, Bushido, and Karate

Zen became an integral part of Japanese culture. Zen heavily influenced the culture of Japan, especially art. The feudal period of Japan was a very prosperous period for the samurai. They garnered the respect of many and held a significant amount of influence. They were notably influenced by Zen during the Kamakura period (around the thirteenth century). They adopted many ideologies from it, and they also contributed to the practice of Zen. Eventually their calm, humble nature was incorporated into the system. Moving forward to the seventeenth century (Tokugawa period), the samurai reached the height of their power in the Tokugawa period. At this time the samurai focused on both their intellectual studies and their physical training, which involved practicing swordsmanship. Through their studies, they created Bushido (the way of the warrior), which was a combination of kendo (the way of the sword) and butsudo (the way of the Buddha). The values of Bushido are at the core of traditional karate training.

These developments were not the only ones that were made at this time. On the Ryukyu Islands, on Okinawa, the natives created techniques that they used to defend themselves, as they were prohibited from carrying weapons. These techniques became known as "Okinawa-te" which translates to "hand techniques of Okinawa." Eventually, Sakugawa, a student of Kempo and stick fighting, formalized these techniques into a style which was called "karate-no-Sakugawa" (translates to "Chinese hand techniques of Sakugawa"). The Okinawan islands became a part of Japan in 1879. Following that, in 1916, Gichin Funakoshi and other Okinawan masters held a karate demonstration in Kyoto, Japan. Afterwards, Master Funakoshi changed the meaning of the character "kara" from meaning "Chinese" to "empty" which is reflected by the fact that Karate now means "empty hand."

(Information found in Karate: Technique and Spirit)

General History of Karate: Buddhism and Japan

Bodhidarma's teachings spread from India, to China, and through Korea to Japan during the sixth century. During this time, numerous clans were vying for the favor of the emperor. One such clan was the Soga clan, who had been heavily influenced by Buddhism and they were successful in influencing the royal family. This resulted in Prince Shotoku Taishi studying Buddhism heavily eventually becoming a scholar of Buddhism. In addition to the spread of Buddhism, China also influenced Japanese architecture, politics, etc. But Buddhism took on a different nature in Japan. After some time, it became what we now know as Zen.

There was a Japanese monk, known as Dogen who wanted to learn Buddhism from those who first sincerely developed it, the Chinese. For this reason, he traveled throughout China observing the practice of Buddhism in many temples but he never liked what he saw. Not until he resolved himself to go home did he come across a senior Chinese monk who was "drying mushrooms in the sun." Dogen then questioned the monk, asking him why he was performing such a menial task when it should be the task of a "junior monk." 

The monk then responded:

"If I do not do this, if I do not work here and now, who could understand? I am not you, I am not others. Others are not me. So others cannot have the experience. I must dry these mushrooms here and now, today, at this moment. Now, go away so I may work!"

Dogen then spent a year studying under that monk's teacher and returned to Japan, introducing the practice of Zen. The two fundamental ideas that Dogen based Zen on were "direct, personal experience" and "practice of zazen" which is the practice of "seated meditation."

(Information found in Karate: Technique and Spirit)

General History of Karate: In China

Normally I leave informational posts on one of my research pages as updates, but there is no easy way to place the general history of karate in my blog, or even the general history of martial arts. According to Kaicho Nakamura, Karate originated in China. One Bodhidarma, also known by the Japanese as Daruma, left from India for China and arrived at the Shaolin Monastery, which is on the slopes of Song Mountain around 520 AD. The reason Daruma left India was to spread Buddhism, which he felt was decaying in India. During his stay, he spent a significant amount of time in meditation and physical training, during which he developed techniques to defend himself against wild animals. Daruma passed these techniques on to the Shaolin monks who incorporated the techniques into their training who eventually became well known for them. As a result of their fame, they were drawn into politics and were the most powerful under the T'ang Dynasty, which was when they had hundreds of fighting monks as well as people who worked the Shaolin farmlands. In 1928, the monastery was burned down and following that, the practice of martial arts was banned. These two actions were taken to reduce the power of the Shaolin Monastery. The self-defense techniques developed by Daruma were organized into a style which was called Wushu. Since then, kempo (temple boxing) has taken it's place.

(Information found in Karate: Technique and Spirit)

Night Training

Today was the first day I trained outdoors at night. I did not know what to expect because I have never really spent that much time outside past dark save for the occasional bonfire that my family and I would have. Nevertheless, I was not disappointed. The atmosphere was so peaceful and tranquil. The only thing I heard was the wind in the trees and the occasional snapping of tree branches.

There were several things that I accomplished outdoors. The first and foremost was practicing my kata. After  the detailed update I posted in my Seido Research page, I have been eager to practice my kata which for me has been rather stagnant, meaning I have not seen or felt a significant improvement. There was one minor improvement I noticed though, and it was in the way I turned around. At the beginning of my training, it was difficult for me to consistently turn far enough for any kata, but now I am doing it with relative ease. One major difficulty I was not accustomed to was how uneven the ground was. I have always practiced my kata on a wooden or cement floor and took it for granted how level everything was which made it more difficulty.

The two other things I accomplished tonight were working my lower body and practicing my self-defense techniques. I went over all of my self-defense and as a result of both the kata and self-defense, I also got a very intense leg work out. On top of them, I also did a form of jumping squats which has made my legs so sore, it is kind of difficult to walk.

General Progress

Earlier this morning, I woke up and started to train. It has been awhile since I was able to get up in the morning and work out, as I would always sleep through the multiple alarms that I set up, but today was different. As far as what my workout was, it consisted of push ups, sit ups, pull ups, and a wide variety of other exercises that worked on my arms. I do need to however, start stretching a lot more in the morning because I was extremely tight at the beginning of my work out, which made doing any sort of exercise that much more difficult.

As far as my presentation goes, I still have a significant amount of research to complete. I need to expand upon what I already know about my style and Kyokushin Karate as well as describe the origins of certain aspects of karate, specifically kata. I have the general layout of my presentation down, though, which will be me describing the history of karate and all the other "informational" parts of my project, then I will move onto actually demonstrating all of the kata and self defense techniques that I have been practicing.

Presentation

Today, in my WISE class weekly meeting, we reflected on the what was our biggest worries and fears about both our projects and our presentations. Almost immediately I started to panic when I first thought about my final project. My biggest worry is that I will crack under the pressure of presenting my project and performing what I have learned. That worry is closely followed by the problem that I may not be able to meet the thirty minute time requirement for the presentation itself. However, after some thinking, I realized that if I pick up the pace and start putting the presentation itself ( a powerpoint for the historical background information) I should easily be able to fulfill that requirement, especially considering the fact that I actually have a karate demonstration in addition to just the factual research.

As far as my project goes, I am panicking and that panic has not gone away. I do need to start diligently working on my blog to meet the journal requirements as well as the research ones. I have not recorded enough of research to put my final presentation together yet, but I do have my sources lined up, I just need to use them and dissect them and reflect upon which I found valuable.

Kata

I recently updated my research page describing what kata actually is, but I never mentioned what it means to me. I remember that when I was a child practicing kata I did not like it. I never really saw the purpose of kata and I only viewed it as something extra that I had to know. I remember demonstrating a kata to my family with my father and that he was just using it to show off how much I knew and how capable I was.

When I restarted my training winter of last year, I remember how eager I was to learn the more advanced kata, techniques, etc. thinking that my training would progress quickly because of my experience as a child. It never really did and now I understand why. I can always vividly picture how I often stumble when I practice my kata. Whether my foot sticks to the floor, or I execute the wrong technique, there is always something for me to work on and improve.

Most of my training, excluding the sparring sessions with my father, solely consists of practicing kata. I never thought about how much I actually do kata in relation to everything else, but in a way I prefer it. It combines everything, the mind, the body, and the spirit. I think of it as a complicated puzzle. One that you know how to complete, but requires your full attention down to the smallest detail, otherwise mistakes, more often than not, happen.

Training

My physical training now consists of short morning workouts which involve practicing my kicks, katas, self defense techniques and basic exercises like push ups, sit ups, squats, etc. For the most part my physical training is comprehensive in the sense that I work every major muscle group but my mental training is lacking. Senioritis has kicked into full swing and as a result my work ethic has dropped significantly and I find that I have not achieved the discipline for which I had hoped. In order to fix this I will remind myself that I still have final projects and essays due. In relation to this project, my final presentation is in a month and I need to start practicing it.

General Project Reflection

For the past several months, I have been training heavily in Seido Karate. Despite my hard training, I have yet to see as many improvements as I had originally hoped for, which is something that I expected but still is upsetting. As a result of this, I have started to train even more intensely than before which will have to be enough for my final presentation in which I will be demonstrating what I have learned and how I practiced everything. I am going to heavily focus on knowing my kata, which will be one of the cornerstones in my presentation, as well as my knowledge of self-defense techniques.

Up to this point, my meditation which counterbalances hard training has been lacking. It is difficult for me to make the time to sit down and clear my mind when I have so much school work to do and finals approaching. I am going to start practicing meditation immediately before I go to bed which will hopefully help me prepare for the next day.

In addition, I am going to start doing a lot more research and start putting together a presentation that explains the general history of karate and then specifically in Seido Karate and Kyokushin Karate. I very recently read about the general origins of Karate and martial arts in general. Unfortunately as I do not have the book now, I am going to post about that later on the Research page.