Don't Look!

This week presented me with a perfect parable between dojo and life.  Monday evening at the dojo, we ended practice with kokyu dosa - a practice by which uke takes nage's wrists gently, and nage attempts to break uke's balance using ki and full-body motion alone.  I was practicing with an older gentleman, who is probably twice my weight.  I was doing pretty well - keeping unbendable arm, moving as one, staying relaxed.  But then, my partner said to me, "That's right.  Don't remember that I'm here, because there's a lot of me to move."  Suddenly, I was intensely aware of just how true that was.  All of a sudden, the light partner became a heavy wall, and I felt my arms and lower back tensing when he next took my wrists.  I was finally able to regain my presence and ki by closing my eyes - then, I was simply moving that which touched my wrists, not the larger, higher-level aikidoka before me.

This lesson reminded me of just how important it is to simply react when you need to, without thinking about how insurmountable a task it is.  Such a state of consciousness is crucial to me as a grad student.  Within the next week, I have set a goal to finish drafting my second dissertation chapter.  At times this week, all I could see was my dissertation looming before me - not only the 20 pages or so left in my chapter, but the entire 250-odd page work it will eventually be.  I worried about how I would structure my next semester, my next year, juggle my eventual job search...  At those times, I felt paralyzed.  My mind could not focus on the task at hand, even when it was not writing, and I felt the same physical symptoms of tightness throughout my body as when I lose ki at the dojo.

Finally on Friday, I had a breakthrough.  I had a review session with my writing partner, and we came up with a lot of great ideas for me to build on.  Suddenly, I was filled with thoughts, but none of them were about how to time myself over the next week (or month, semester, year...).  I got home with a couple of hours left before dinner, and I used those to write.  The words flowed through me, and for those hours, I sustained that feeling of perfect connectedness with the world that is so desirable at the dojo.

Like aikido, writing happens most naturally in a state of mu shin - no mind.  This does not mean thoughtlessness, inattention, or lack of scope, but just the opposite.  Instead, it is a state of preternatural thought and attention, but a receptive one.  Rather than forcing things to happen the way we see them, we allow ourselves to follow the flow of ki.  If things happened as I think them possible, I could not move someone twice my size, in kokyu dosa or any other physical attempt.  Instead, I must trust my unbendable arm in the dojo, my unbendable mind at my desk.  As a receiver, I can then redirect myself effectively against any goal, rather than remaining in a state of conflict with the world and my own body.

Mu shin is one of the aikido feelings I have the most trouble pinning down on a daily basis, but for that very elusiveness, I recognize it as one of the most desirable.  I now head to the dojo for my first kyu test, and hope that I can face it by feeling connection to uke's center, rather than looking at him or her.