Volume 3 number 3 absolute #12 MAY 1991
Send your stories, comments or announcements to Kim Taylor, Dept. of Animal and Poultry Science, University of Guelph, Ontario Canada N1G 2W1.
(519)824-4120 ext 6225 FAX (519)836-9873
PHOTOCOPY AND SHARE THIS NEWSLETTER!
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SEMINARS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Sei Do Kai Summer Seminar featuring Haruna Matsuo Sensei, June 27,28, July 2-6. See the notice later for details.
IKF GRADING AND SEMINAR in Toronto at Varsity arena, in association with the World Kendo Championships. More information is available from the CKF, Iaido section. Write c/o Mr. Roy Asa, President CKF, Japan Camera Centre, 88 Lesmill Rd. Toronto Ontario, M3B 2T5. FAX (416)445-0519.
Send all information on seminars etc. to the editor as soon as possible. It's incentive to publish the next issue.
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CONTACT LIST ADDITIONS
The contact list will be printed once every 6 months from now on, we will simply include new entries each issue.
*J Hiryu Bushido Kai, c/o Fred Walker, 110 Lilla St. Port Perry Ontario Canada. L9L 1J8. (416)985-0205.
Ki Dojo, c/o Carol Froelich, 598 Hertel Ave, Buffalo, New York, USA 14207
S* Peter Koves, 139 Greyabbey Trail, Scarborough Ontario, Canada. M1E 1W2.
Marianopolis Kendo Club, c/o Dr. Gabriel Weitzner, 2021 Atwater, Montreal, PQ H2H 2P2. (514)937-8318.
Ayal Ron 800 Tzviya and Yitzhk, St Gilo 9111, PO Box 11133, Jerusalem, Isreal. Tel 02-764424.
Washington State Iaido Federation, c/o Pat Y. Murosako, 16320 76th Ave, N.E. Bothell, WA. USA. 98011.
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QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS
IKF IAIDO TESTING REQUIREMENTS
These are the IKF rules, revised May 11, 1987 and passed in Seoul 1988.
It is of course necessary that anyone wishing to be tested by the IKF must be a member of the IKF through one of the national organizing bodies. In Canada that is the Canadian Kendo Federation. Individual memberships are $12 per year, you must be a member of a CKF dojo.
| RANK CHALLENGED |
TIME REQ'd post last test |
EXAMINERS | MIN RANK (of examiners) |
#YES |
| 1 kyu | -- | 5/3 (5 or 3) | 2d | 3/2 (3of 5 or 2 of 3) |
| 1 dan | 3 months | 5/3 | 3d | 3/2 |
| 2 dan | 1 year | 5/3 | 4d | 3/2 |
| 3 dan | 1 year | 5 | 5d | 3 |
| 4 dan | 2 years | 7/5 | 6d | 5/3 |
| 5 dan | 3 years | 7/5 | 7d | 5/3 |
| 6 dan | 4 years | 7 | 7d | 5 |
| 7 dan | 5 years | 7 | 7d | 5 |
8dan 8 yrs. past 7d and over 48 years old
9 dan...no specific time period
10 dan...no specific time period
Note: CKF grading requirements state that the minimum time for each dan grade are one year extra, so you must wait 2 years before challenging 2 dan, rather than one, 4 years before challenging 5 dan rather than 3.
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KATA REQUIREMENTS
Ikkyu 3 Seitei
1 dan 5 Seitei or 1 Koryu, 4 Seitei
2 dan 5 Seitei or 1 Koryu, 4 Seitei
3 dan 5 Seitei or 1 Koryu, 4 Seitei
4 dan 1 Koryu, 4 Seitei..examiner's choice
5 dan 1 Koryu, 4 Seitei..examiner's choice
WRITTEN EXAM 3 questions, from 1dan on up.
PRACTICE REQUIREMENTS
It is expected that students will be practicing two or three times a week. Once a month practice will not give enough skill to pass in these time requirements.
So, to challenge for, say, 5th dan, you would have had to have passed your 4 dan test three years
ago. A test committee consisting of at least 5 and preferably 7 examiners holding the grade of at
least 7th dan must be available. Of these members three (or 5 if there are 7 of them) must vote a
pass for you to be awarded the rank. The test consists of one technique from your koryu and four
from Seitei Gata Iaido. These are chosen by the examination committee. (Before 4 dan the katas
are usually your own choice.) You will also have to write an exam consisting of at least three
questions. These are all minimum requirements and the particular examination may require more.
IAIDO AND THE NEW AGE
by Kim Taylor Sei Do Kai, U. of Guelph
Yes, I realize that Iaido has been practiced for about four hundred years longer than there has been
a "New Age" but the pre- existance of a technique has not prevented it from becoming New Age
so far. Iaido is ripe for inclusion on the bookshelves, right between Crystals and Jungian therapy.
We can all agree that Iaido is not practiced for self defence, unless of course, we fall through the alternate universe interface (AUI) and end up cast as the hero in a fantasy novel. Like all the other Budo, once the initial training is over, the next 20 years participation has to be undertaken for some reason other than the off chance you will get into a barroom fight. Just what that reason is, is seldom if ever discussed. There are good reasons for this but I will ignore them since if I didn't this article would be pretty short. There is no actual need to know any of what is discussed from now on in order to obtain the benefits of Iai; if you have something that needs to be done around the house go do it.
So what is it that makes Iaido a candidate for the Channeling to Tarot shelf.
BODYWORK
Iaido is, in actual fact, what the New Ager would call bodywork. It is a means of using the body to bring the mind and reality into closer agreement. To put it another way, it is a method used to learn how to live in (through) your body. The name (Iai) itself refers to your position with regard to your body stance, and by extension your position in the universe. By stressing correct and precise body alignment to transfer maximum power from the ground through the sword you train the mind to regard yourself as connected to the world. You are not something that acts on and is acted on by something outside the bag of skin we erroneously call our self. While connecting the body to the dojo and to the sword we are, at the same time, reconnecting the mind to the body. When facing an oncoming sword there is no time to deal with an information interface at the eyes and then another one wherever the "body" meets the "mind". Without having the opponent included in your "mind" there is a gap which, to give it the technical name, is a suki. This weak point is the opportunity for your opponent to break your defence.
When performing kata your mind must be totally diffused through your body. When you focus your attention on one thing you create the illusion of a mind/body split since "there is the mind" (attention) and "there is the body" (angle of the right hand perhaps). Try performing a kata with the attention fixed (fushin) on one point and the whole thing falls apart. If you practice like this the subroutines for playing volleyball may get triggered while you're not looking and you start leaping to your feet or something equally embarrassing. The only way to do kata is to keep the mind free to range throughout the body (fudoshin).
Yes, as you know, even this is not enough for Iai. The mind must also range outside the skin to include your position in the dojo, your attention must encompass your stance and direction on the floor and an imaginary opponent as well. If you don't achieve this integration of mind, body and environment the katas fall apart. You can prove this easily by starting a multidirectional kata (like Shihogiri of the Kendo Federation Seitei Gata) at a different angle to the one you normally use.
The concepts of Sei and Do in Iaido reveal a slightly different angle of approach to the integration of mind and body. Sei is calmness, quietness and Do is action and violence. When you sit ready your body is exhibiting Sei, stillness, while your mind must be Do, active. When you start to move and especially when you are cutting, your body is Do, activity and your mind must be Sei, as calm as possible. If you don't achieve this balance your kata will be rough edged. Through working toward a seamless transition between Sei and Do in your "mind" and "body" you come eventually to realize that they are one and the same.
This is a central axiom of bodywork, you can modify the mind by working on the body. In the west the conception has often been that the body is a "mirror" of the mind but this is slowly being replaced by the idea that there is no mind apart from the body, nor is there a body without mind. When the mind is in turmoil the body is tense, relax the body and the mind becomes calm. Iaido entrains a body and mind awareness that is in balance, able to respond instantly as required but not tense enough to be in stress.
Iai includes aspects of the New Age other than bodywork.
Meditation is one such aspect which at first glance seems to deal exclusively with the mind. On deeper analysis it is revealed to have the same goal as bodywork.
MEDITATION
If one wants to be simplistic, meditation can be described as being of two different classes. The first and most familiar is the type where one concentrates on something, a mantra, a problem, a mandala or a kata. This concentration acts to keep all extraneous thoughts from arising in the mind.
The second type of meditation is simply to sit quietly and allow what thoughts arise to do so. The trick here is not to get attached to any one of the thoughts and let it drag your mind along with it, you keep your mind where your body is, in balance.
Iai practice produces both types of meditation. As a beginner (and who isn't) one is fully concentrated on the kata to the exclusion of all other thoughts. If one is not paying attention, there is a very real risk of injury. Slightly less dangerous (depending on the instructor) is the fact that the technique will almost immediately fall apart if you start thinking about mortgage payments.
This is not to say that this type of meditation is unlike the second. Even while concentrating on the movement as a whole one must watch against getting caught up in one little aspect. We have all had the experience of trying to correct the angle of a cut only to see the rest of the kata blow up in our faces because we are no longer concentrating on it. Here we see fushin and fudoshin again.
As you train the subroutines and start to let the body take over more of the concentration on the kata you will still be using the mind to maintain focus but you will now be able to start noticing other thoughts in your mind. This is where the second type of meditation becomes evident. You must maintain fudoshin, an immovable mind on the "mental" plane, one which does not become attached to the extraneous thoughts that you can now notice since your whole attention is no longer taken up with the movements. At this point in practice you might consider some sitting meditation.
THOUGHTS
The most difficult aspect of any practice of the way (Do) is to learn to let the thoughts go. They arise and then drift away the same as the small aches and pains arise and go away in our bodies. When the wrist starts to ache in Iai practice, more exercise, violent stretching and lots of concentration is guaranteed to make a small problem larger. The same goes for thoughts, small ones can be put into a "loop of worry". You think of a problem, then concentrate on the further difficulties, then the impossibility of solving the problem, the further difficulties that will make the problem larger, and zoom, you are in a cycle. These thought cycles never reach a conclusion no matter how hard you think about them. They only stop if you break the cycle by such methods as drinking (bad idea), exercising (OK) or some other distraction.
Iaido, with its repetitive practice would seem to be a good example of a physical cycle which would be the mirror image of the thought cycles. Nothing is further from the truth as we all know. If we are practicing in good faith then not one kata will ever be the same as any other that we do. Iaido practice is a method of learning how to break cycles. If katas are done mechanically, without involving the mind (paying attention) then we fall into a pattern, we make the same mistakes over and over without even realizing we are doing it. In order to continually improve our skills we are forced to learn how to break these patterns without breaking the form of the kata. This same skill teaches us how to break the thought cycles as well.
HOMEWORK
Maybe its the university atmosphere but I always figure that there should be work to do outside of
the assigned time slots. Iaido practice three times a week is not too bad for North America but I
like to work on something full time. (Full time is whenever I think about it, lots of you know me
personally so I can't even pretend to be perfect.) Perhaps a way can be found to assign homework
from the Iaido classes.
As far as the bodywork aspects of Iaido are concerned, there is no need to confine practice to the dojo, you are actually expected to carry the practice home with you. This homework can be as simple as paying attention to how you walk, without actually correcting anything. Just watch and get more in tune with the way you move.
KEY POINTS
Here are some hints that may help you develop a private practice. These are all physical exercises and they have a mental component that you can easily figure out. In most cases the same word refers to both the physical and the mental activity. Think of the word balance.
BALANCE
Work on maintaining an even distribution of weight across your body. Stand on two feet instead of one, sit on both cheeks of your buttocks, try to keep the shoulders horizontal no matter what you are doing. Balance Sei and Do (In and Yo, Yin and Yang).
SHOULDERS
Keep the shoulders relaxed at all times. This is the same as keeping the neck relaxed. As the shoulders or the neck tighten you become a stiff necked person. Your centre of gravity rises and your head becomes fixed. Drop the shoulders and free the head.
HEAD
Almost all motion is initiated from the head. The body position follows the head, so the head must be free to move. Keep it in balance atop the spine so that the neck muscles don't need to work to keep it up. If the neck gets stiff it creates tensions that transfer throughout the body. Pull in your chin and stretch the spine up to the sky, keep those disks out of compression.
DIAPHRAGM
The diaphragm must be free to move so that the breath is natural and full. If the diaphragm is constricted only the chest can be used to breath. This is too shallow and leads to nervousness. Whenever you are out of balance and feeling anxious free the diaphragm, take a big belly breath and drop all the weight off of your shoulders into your hara.
CONSCIOUS MOVEMENT
Keep an awareness of your body. Don't allow any nervous twitches or jumping of the legs, watch and relax every time this is detected.
HARA AWARENESS
The hara is the centre of your physical and mental balance. Keep an eye on it and continue to belly breath. A soft stomach means an unstressed stomach, who knows, this might mean one less ulcer.
UNSTRAINED BODY POSITION
It makes sense to work with gravity, not against it. Don't hold up your bent head with the neck muscles, or force them to be a bridge between the head and the shoulders by propping your hand under your forehead. Put your head where it is supposed to sit, above your spine. When you slouch against back of a chair with your butt on the edge of the seat you force the muscles of the lower back to act as cables to hold the bridge. In no time the muscles become fatigued and prone to damage. After you stand up the back takes very little abuse before going into spasm.
Think of the body as a set of stones (bones) that work best as a column in compression not as a cable in tension.
CHAIRS
When you are in a chair, keep balanced, the feet should be flat on the floor, the head balanced on top of the spine, the spine on the back of the chair. Sit so that the bodyweight is transferred to the support (the chair) without needing muscle action to hold it up. The shoulders should be down and the neck relaxed, the diaphragm will be free to move if you are not slouching.
When you are getting up, don't use your arms to push yourself up, instead use your legs under your body. Concentrate on lifting the head to draw the body up, smoothness counts. If you think about pushing your head toward the ceiling your muscles will naturally align your body and your spine will actually lengthen in the process making you more open. Contrast this to crunching over and lurching forward out of the chair barely in control.
SEIZA
After getting over the first screaming agonies of this sitting position, a lot of Iaidoka start to find that they prefer sitting in seiza to sitting on chairs. There is a reason for this. From seiza it is very easy to find the natural balance of your body. Swing to and fro a bit until you find the apparent balance point, sit for a while and then locate the muscle fatigue to identify problems with your posture. Have someone else arrange your body so that you are symmetrical. Once you are in balance you can sit until your lower legs fall off from lack of blood.
LOTUS
The lotus position has a few variations and is one of the main meditation positions. You need a cushion or something under your rear end to get to an unstrained position. Personally I've never been able to get into balance in any of the lotus positions.
WALKING
When you walk keep the knees flexible, never locked, and you won't be forced to fall forward out of balance in order to move one foot in front of the other. The calves should also be kept flexible and light so that you don't move up over the toes on each step. A lot of wasted energy goes into the up and down bouncing that so many people use when walking.
HEAD
Make sure your head is not bouncing around. It should ride smoothly on your neck in its proper balanced position. Don't look at your feet, they are right where you left them, instead, look ahead at the ground you are about to cover and at your
destination. As an exercise, think about where your head went, you can see everything else but where is your head? See D.E. Harding "On Having No Head", (Arkana Books) for more on this interesting subject.
SHOULDERS
The shoulders should be kept aligned square to the direction traveled, the arms free to swing naturally. It is important to keep the shoulders down and relaxed, like you were carrying a couple of shopping bags (cloth of course). All of these postural adjustments should be done naturally, with full relaxation. It will do no good if you force the body into a different position by muscle power. All of us can get tense without instructions, it is learning how to use relaxation that is hard.
ARMS
Just as for the shoulders, the arms must be relaxed. There should be no tension as they swing naturally. The elbows out, shoulders swaying, "weight-lifter" swagger that one sees in the gymnasium makes for a very high centre of balance which, in a martial artist, is dangerous.
WAIST
It is very important to keep the stomach and lower back under an even tension. With too little tension in the stomach, the lower back curves too much and is subject to damage by jarring it. Too much tension and the lower back becomes stiff as the muscles fight the abdominals, the shoulders round off and the balance becomes awkward.
HIPS
When your hips move they should swing from the legs not the waist. The motion must be driven by your stride instead of the lower back. The hips should ride level to the ground as if supported on shock absorbers (knees), not in bumps over the toes. Keep the legs flexible.
STRIDE
If the stride is too long, you can't stop still at any moment. Stay inside your balance, walk with control, not falling forward and catching yourself continually. Move from the hara not from the shoulders. Keep the arms relaxed and swing them freely to balance the legs.
STAIRS AND RAILINGS
This is an important exercise, don't use railings. Keep your hands to yourself at all times. Grabbing anything puts your body immediately off balance so don't touch. Practice moving by leading with your head not your arms.
WALLS AND POSTS
In the same way, never lean up against anything outside of your balance. You should always consider that the support is about to fail.
RUNNING
If you run, you can use the same method of correction used in Iaido to correct your running style.
A. Keep the stride in control, not stumbling forward.
B. Keep the head level as in Iaido, no extra motions to bleed off energy.
C. If you suffer from cramps or other problems, concentrate on loosening the muscles without stopping the run. With the
practiced ability to focus on certain body parts this becomes easy.
D. Keep your breathing deep and controlled instead of accidental. If you need more breath, adjust your pace to allow faster respiration.
One can also make a case for running to help the Iaido practice. The knees are tightened up as the leg strength increases. The increased stamina means less control is lost due to tiredness in the dojo. You can use the run to loosen up your forearms. Run with the hands flopping instead of tight, and the elbows bent just far enough for balance. This will relax the shoulders. Never worry about looking silly, take a look at your fellow runners. Remember to run with a forward motion of the arms not sideways. This is the same as keeping your elbows in when doing Iai.
As you can see, there is a good chance for lots of homework in Iaido if you want it.
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TECHNICAL NOTEBOOK
The notes on Seitei by Don Harvey will continue in the next issue, we're having some problems
with striking typists....they want to get paid, the beggars!
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If you are hungry
you must eat
To read about food is folly
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The Sei Do Kai Presents an Iaido Seminar
at the University of Guelph
with Haruna Matsuo Sensei 7 Dan Kyoshi
Chief Instructor, Musashi Dojo Ohara, Okayama Prefecture.
June 27 and 28 1991 (ZNKR Seitei)
July 2 to 6 (Koryu and lots more???)
Accommodation in University Residences
single $27 per night
Cost: daily $35, 2 days $65, 5 days $125, 7 days $150 (Space has been expanded for the Seitei
section so if you haven't yet registered, get that pen out again.)
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THE PRACTICE OF SEIZA
Kim Taylor
Seiza is a method of sitting which, in some places, is used as psychotherapy. It is a way of sitting on the knees that is used extensively in the martial art of Iaido. Practice of seiza can involve this art or it can be done simply as a sitting exercise.
"Quiet sitting" using the seiza posture is a way to overcome the generalized fears of life and the underlying fear of death. It is an excellent way to regulate the body functions. It can bring the mind closer to the world "as it is" rather than its usual residence in "things as they should be". In other words, seiza is a method of breaking through the illusion of everyday life. When sitting, the endless cycles of thought which are so crippling to mental health are broken and the clean freshness of simply living in the world is allowed to come forth.
To sit in seiza bend your legs and place the left knee on the floor. Place the right knee down about two fist widths from the left. Now flip down the toes and place the feet onto the floor so that the big toes just touch each other. Lower the buttocks down so that they rest on or between the heels.
Straighten up and let the lower back move forward so that there is an S shaped curve to the spine. Rounding out the lower back to the rear or trying to sit back too far will cause muscle fatigue. The weight should be centered somewhere between the top of the feet and the knees, more toward the feet.
The head is carried in balance on top of the spine. The ears should be in line with the shoulders and the nose in line with the belly button. Note that putting the nose into this position moves the back ever so slightly off of a strictly vertical position. In Iai this is important as it will encourage "seme" or pressure to the front. Pull the chin in slightly and stretch the back of the neck. This should feel as if someone is pulling straight up on the hair to stretch the spine.
To find this centreline you can rock in circles from the hips, slowly reducing the swings until coming to rest in a stable position. This centering is important to prevent muscle cramps or fatigue while sitting.
Another way to check the posture is to imagine a string attached to the top of the head on the inside. The string drops down inside the neck and trunk and is attached to a weight at the height of your tanden. If you bend your head forward or curve your trunk too much the string touches the body shell. If you lean too far forward or back the weight bangs into the hip girdle. Put the weight in the front half of the hara.
Relax the shoulders and let the arms fall downward naturally. The right hand is placed palm upward on the lap with the little finger edge lightly touching the lower abdomen. The left hand is placed on top of the right, palm upward as well. The fingers should be together without strain. Place the tips of the thumbs together so that they are just touching with no pressure. The thumbs and fingers should make an oval shape around a point about 2 to 3 inches below the navel. This point is called the tanden or seika tanden and corresponds roughly to the centre of balance. The left hand over the right represents the calm ("Sei" or "In" in Japanese) aspects covering the active ("Do" or "Yo") aspects. The thumbs unify the two. The tanden is seen as the centre of being around which the Hara or hip girdle is organized. The centre is the point from which your life is lived.
Variations of this form are sometimes used but this is the most balanced and relaxed method of sitting.
Without tipping the head forward lower the eyes and look at a spot centered about one metre in front of the knees. The nose should be in the field of vision or the head has dropped forward. This serves to half close the eyes cutting out most of the visual input without providing the conditions to fall asleep.
Place the tongue on the roof of the mouth and place the teeth lightly together. Draw the air out of the space between the tongue and the palate. This will cut down on saliva production and the need to swallow.
Breathing is done in a very specific fashion and is the most important aspect of the practice. The ancient Taoists believed that breath was life and that each person was only allotted so many. Deep slow breathing was seen as life prolonging.
Inhale easily and quietly through the nose using the diaphragm. The belly should expand forward while the chest should expand without any muscular assistance at all. Keep all tension and muscular effort out of the upper body. The shoulders should not move upward at all but don't hold them down, simply let gravity do the work.
Breath in until the lungs are full and no further, let the breath dictate the turnover to exhalation. Don't hold the breath or do anything special, simply begin to exhale. The exhalation is even more gentle than the inhalation. There should be no noise or fuss, simply breath out softly, letting the belly collapse. Breath out until the need to breath in is felt, then change over to inhalation. When exhaling don't let the belly go flabby, keep it alive with some tension or tone, without actually tightening the muscles.
Never force the breath at any time. With continued practice the rhythm will slow down to perhaps two breaths a minute but don't try to reach any goals, just breath quietly.
Following your breath, count both inhalations and exhalations or, later, exhalations only. Count from one to ten and then start over. If the count is lost, start at one again, don't try to remember the last number, it's not important. Getting to ten should not be a contest or a goal, just count.
Any thoughts that arise should be noted but then ignored. Just look at them and then let them go, don't chase them or follow any line of reasoning. Go back to the counting. All thoughts have the same worth, nothing, when sitting. When sitting...sit. Return to the counting. The same goes for any light displays,
hallucinations, panic, fear or other illusions. Simply
sitting...sit.
When the thoughts don't run so fast and furious you can drop the counting and just sit. If the thoughts become distracting, count again.
Eventually, try to sit in seiza for about 30 minutes early in the morning and again at night. When starting the practice shorter times are advised until the legs are flexible and the circulation adjusts. If the legs begin to fall asleep, rise up off of the knees to allow circulation. Alternatively, roll up a blanket or something similar and place it between the lower legs to raise the hips up off of the heels. A small amount of pain is to be expected but don't make it a test of willpower to sit as long as possible.
Ideally the sitting should be done in a quiet room with soft illumination and few visual or other distractions. Music is inappropriate since the idea is not to be distracted, rather than the other way 'round. Eventually the practice can be done anywhere with any amount of activity nearby.
When the sitting is finished or when the legs must be relieved, bend forward from the waist and place the forehead on the floor while keeping the hips on the heels. Place the hands palm upward on the floor beside the head, now lift them up a few inches. This symbolizes being open (and accepting) to anything that the world cares to offer. Breathing in this position for a short time before sitting up again will allow longer practice times.
There is a vast literature of self-help and meditation and there are many who are willing to teach secret methods of healing the soul for a price. All that is really necessary is a place to be alone and a few breaths. If some support is helpful then seiza can be done in a group but this is not necessary.
Just sit...Simply sit.
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Convincing others of the Right Way
Oh pointless, pointless
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