Aikido in Combat

I often find myself attached to the results of my life. I get upset over seemingly unimportant things and am swayed by the currents of the conditions surrounding me. I know intellectually that I all I can control is my output yet nonetheless I’m drawn into the narrative of my life.

We have two options in any situation. The first is to become battle-hardened, making success and failure a life or death situation. This is the feeling we have when we think we need a promotion to be successful, need to be healed of disease to feel good, or need to be in the perfect relationship to be happy. This intensity serves only as a conduit to the attachment to the results. It fuels the ego and makes everything we do heavy with the burden of results.

However, the crux of life is not attachment and clinging to it, but rather for it to be light, fun, and exciting, to primarily view it as a game. Instead of having a competitive mindset, turn toward an appreciation to just be playing the game. This helps me become process-oriented and become grateful for the present moment.

Just imagine when you’ve had to clean up your apartment. There are times where you have viewed it as a chore and other times you’ve thrown some music on and danced around as you cleaned. One of these you had the battle mindset, the other actually gave you energy as it was just part of a fun game. The same can be done with all areas of our life.

When we believe something, it is an attachment to an idea and we make it part of our identity. We begin to believe this mask of beliefs to be who we actually are. This manifests in numerous ways within me. I often believe I’m a golfer and so I put undue pressure on myself to perform. I believe I am sick and therefore I’m fighting an illness.

It is all about reframing how we look at things. This doesn’t mean we ignore the issue at hand, we simply position ourselves in a better place for more happiness and success. For example, rather than say I’m fighting an illness, I can say I’m becoming the healthiest I’ve ever been.

With golf, I still find trouble in finding what my alternate perspective. This is an area I’ve struggled with and it’s likely because I’ve identified so strongly with it my entire life. (And if you have ideas on how I can better approach this that would be great!)

I’d like to share a story that best exemplifies how to approach the world from a new perspective and in doing so, finding harmony in what you’ve done. The following is a story from the life of Ram Dass.

The Story of Aikido in Combat:

The train clanked and rattled through the suburbs of Tokyo on a drowsy Spring afternoon. Our car was comparatively empty, a few housewives with their kids in tow, some old folks going shopping. I gazed absently at the drab houses and dusty hedgerows. At one station the doors opened and suddenly the afternoon quiet was shattered by a man bellowing violent, incomprehensible curses. The man staggered into our car, he wore laborer’s clothing and was big, drunk and dirty. Screaming, he swung at a woman holding a baby. The blow sent her spinning into the laps of an elderly couple, and it was a miracle that the baby was unharmed.

 Terrified, the couple jumped up and scrambled towards the other end of the car. The laborer aimed a kick at the retreating back of the old woman, but missed as she scuttled to safety. This so enraged the drunk the he grabbed the metal pole in the center of the car and tried to wrench it out of it’s stanchion, I could see that one of his hands was cut and bleeding, and the train lurched ahead, the passengers frozen with fear. I stood up. I was young then, some twenty years ago and in pretty good shape. I had been putting in a solid eight hours of Aikido training every day for the past three years. I liked to throw and grapple, I thought I was tough. The trouble was that my martial skill was untested in actual combat, as students of Aikido we were not allowed to fight.

“Aikido,” my teacher had said again and again “is the art of reconciliation. Whoever has the mind of fight has broken his connection with the universe. If you try to dominate people you’re already defeated. We study how to resolve conflict, not how to start it.”

I listened to his words, I tried so hard, I even went so far as to cross the street to avoid the kids, the pinball punks who lounged around the train stations. My forbearance exalted me. I was both tough and holy (laughter). In my heart, however, I wanted an absolutely legitimate opportunity whereby I might save the innocent by destroying the guilty.

“This is it!” I said to myself as I stood up. “People are in danger, if I don’t do something fast somebody will probably get hurt.”

Seeing me stand up the drunk recognized the chance to focus his rage, “Ah hah!” he roared “a foreigner! You need a lesson in Japanese manners!”

I held on lightly to the commuter strap overhead and gave him a slow look of disgust and dismissal. I planned to take this turkey apart, but he had to make the first move. I wanted him mad so I pursed my lips and blew him an insolent kiss.

“Alright” he hollered, “you’re gonna get a lesson!” He gathered himself for a rush at me, a fraction of a second before he could move someone shouted “hey!” It was earsplitting. I remember the strangely joyous lilting quality of it. As though you and a friend had been searching diligently for something and he had suddenly stumbled upon it “hey!” I wheeled to my left and the drunk spun to his right, we both stared down at a little old Japanese man. He must have been well into his seventies, this tiny gentleman sitting there immaculate in his kimono. He took no notice of me, but beamed delightedly at the laborer, as if he had a most important, most welcome secret to share.

“Come here” the old man said in an easy vernacular, beckoning to the drunk, “come here and talk with me.” He waved his hand lightly, the big man followed as if on a string. He planted his feet belligerently in front of the old gentleman and roared above the clacking wheels “why the hell should I talk to you?” The drunk now had his back to me. If his elbow moved so much as a millimeter I’d drop him in his socks.

The old man continued to beam at the laborer, “whatcha been drinking?” His eyes sparkling with interest. “I been drinking Sake,” the laborer bellowed back, “and it’s none of your business!” Flecks of spittle spattered the old man. “Oh, that’s wonderful!” the old man said, “absolutely wonderful! You see I love Sake too. Every night me and my wife, she’s seventy-six you know, we warm up a little bottle of Sake and we take it out into the garden and we sit on our old wooden bench and we watch the sun go down and we look to see how our Persimmon tree is doing, my great grandfather planted that tree and we worry about whether it will recover from those ice storms we had last winter. Our tree has done better than I expected though, especially when you consider the poor quality of the soil. It’s gratifying to watch when we take our Sake and go out to enjoy the evening, even when it rains.” He looked up at the laborer, his eyes twinkling.

As he struggled to follow the old man’s conversation, the drunk’s face began to soften, his fists slowly unclenched. “Yeah” he said “I love Persimmons too…” His voice trailed off. “Yes,” said the old man smiling “and I’m sure you have a wonderful wife.”

“Nah,” replied the laborer, “my wife died.” Very gently swaying with the motion of the train the big man began to sob “I don’t got no wife, I don’t got no home, I don’t got no job, I’m so ashamed of myself.” Tears rolled down his cheeks, a spasm of despair rippled through his body.

There I was, standing in my well-scrubbed youthful innocence, my ‘make this world safe for Democracy’ righteousness, I suddenly felt dirtier than he was. The train arrived at my stop and as the doors opened I heard the old man cluck sympathetically “my, my” he said, “that is a difficult predicament. Sit down here and tell me about it.” I turned my head for one last look. The laborer was sprawled on the seat, his head in the old man’s lap. The old man was softly stroking the filthy, matted hair. As the train pulled away I sat down on a bench. What I had wanted to do with muscle had been accomplished with kind words. I had just seen Aikido tried in combat, and the essence of it is love.

What does this mean for us?

The story Ram Dass shares with us shows that before we react to an event in our normal conditioned way, we must take a moment to pause. Reflect and be silent as the old man was at first. Rather than tense for battle, relax into the game. We never have a full perspective of a situation, let alone our own.

View life as a game. It’s light-hearted. The little things don’t matter. Remain open and loving to everything in the present moment. Life can feel like it does when you clean with music on. I like to close my eyes and repeat, this is a game and I know my subconscious has begun to transform as I feel my emotions change. Our response to life’s events will be that of wonder and amazment the better we become at this. Life is a game and I’m just happy to be playing it.