The following is a guest editorial from Alaric Dailey
Being a student of traditional Karate-Do, when I make mention to a school owner or martial artist or parent of a child taking classes somewhere that “martial arts is more than punching and kicking, there is more to being a martial artist than simply being a fighter” I get a blank stare. At this point, I have to explain the following.
The Wudan Assassin, on kindle or paperback…click on the cover!
These days, tradition is often poo-pooed with some comment like “if it doesn’t make me a better fighter than I don’t care”. But being a fighter doesn’t make you a good person, in fact, simply knowing how to fight can make you arrogant, or worse, a bully.
This is often evidenced in “fighter” gyms, people walking around with bad attitudes, all about testosterone and ego, injuries abound because people are always trying to prove they are the king of the mountain.
The way of the warrior, Bushido, is about being a gentle soul, learning not only to punch and kick, but to help others, to be calm and humble.
In other words, learning all those “useless” things, like the language, the manners, the meditation, the discipline, reciting Dojo-kun are not useless, they are about expanding your mind, and making you more than a fighter.
In my original dojo, my sensei not only give us the meditation and such, but would also tell us stories of the Samurai, and give us pieces of Bushido that most westerners never hear. “Ikebana (flower arranging) is a great way to clear your mind”, and “self-defense is not just about punching and kicking, it is about avoiding and defusing danger in the first place” were words of wisdom that we often heard from sensei.
When the Japanese would teach an art, they would distinguish whether or not it included only fighting techniques, or would give you “the way”. If you have “the way” it is a Do, Karate-Do, Ju-Do, Aiki-Do, etc. If it is purely fighting techniques it was Jitsu, Karate-jitsu, Ju-jitsu, Aiki-jitsu, and Nin-jitsu.
As a side note here, you will notice there is no such thing as a “Do” for Ninja fighting techniques. This is because the ninja weren’t fighters, they were assassins, their skills included, poisons, escape, evasion, not being seen, killing techniques etc. Being a hired killer, and being a better person have nothing to do with each other.
and 3 more associated virtues
Filial piety (孝 kō)
Wisdom (智 chi)
Care for the aged (悌 tei)
I see it as a great loss that so many have thrown away history and tradition, the Do, in favor of the more testosterone fueled (and MMA fanned) jitsu. It is a sad state of affairs that our children grow up idolizing real and fictional people who push the ideas “might makes right” and “the ends justifies the means”, never once mentioning justice and mercy.
I just finished a book, Matrixing Karate: Master, which is number five, and the last, of a series on how to Matrix the Martial Arts. It should be up on Amazon ina couple of days or so.
One of the last things I wrote I figured I would share with you. Hopefully whet your appetite for more; for the precise method as to how to get to this level of thought.
You can’t speak and listen at the same time.
Go on, try it.
What you’ll get is a garbledegook where you have to rely on memory, or mocking up the confusion you just experienced, to describe what you ‘heard.’ And whatever you said was premade and ejected without thought.
So, in the martial arts, you can’t attack and defend at the same time.
Physically, by the technique, you can.
But the frame of mind leading up to the attack or the defense, you can’t assume both frames of mind at the same time.
You either have to be in the attack mode, or the defense mode. You can’t be in both.
Go on, try it. If you succeed, it will be because of mental gymnastics, and not because of clarity of thought and calmness of mind.
What this does is make the universe into a binary experience; it makes it black or white…depending on whether you can isolate the difference between speaking and listening.
And, for most of us, this means you have to shut up.
If you don’t have to shut up you are going to be classified a ‘beta’ personality by the people in charge of labels, and life is going to be a frustrating experience of you being a victim.
But, if you can be ‘alpha,’ and I mean while you are actually ‘listening,’ then the universe is going to peal back for you and give up its juicy innards.
Most people, you see, are so confused, so garbled, that they run around screaming and shouting mindlessly, and then wonder why everybody in the world is so stupid that they can’t listen.
So you have to do your forms, calm your mind through this ritual, through this pattern of circuitry (I know, a bit redundant, but it is better said that way).
And you have to make yourself not speak, except in the most gentle and precise sense.
When you go into a hamburger stand, don’t ask for no pickles and extra ketchup and could they toast the bun not so much…just ask for a number one. And whisper, so that the girl actually has to listen to you.
When you teach, don’t speak. Remember, teaching by speaking is not listening, speaking too much while teaching and you won’t have any idea of whether your students get it.
Instead, summarize the teaching in one sentence, a short sentence, and then watch, observe. Listen. See if the student gets it. If you have to use two sentences then your teaching is lacking.
Okay, that’s how you do it. Though, to be sure, I certainly recommend getting a course on Matrixing, and the five book series, available on Amazon, called ‘Matrixing Karate,’ and further divided into white belt, green belt, brown belt, black belt, and Master appellations, is the latest and best way to get where you are going.
And where are you going?
To the truth. If you can just shut up long enough to hear it.
Have a great work out!
Al from monstermartialarts(dot)com.
If you want to check out Matrixing Karate (the series), then go to Amazon and type in
Right from the first block you ever learned…
the low block.
First off,
people are trained to block kicks with it.
Not a great idea.
Yes,
it is for kicks,
but you have to be careful in how you use it.
It is actually better for low punches.
It fits,
it makes sense.
And if you use it on a kick,
before you are ready,
you can hurt yourself.
Like…
break a bone hurt.
So here’s the deal,
Kicking is a certain range.
Punching is a certain range.
And so on.
If somebody kicks at you,
you should step back.
They are at their longest range,
a simple step back
keeps the range extended,
makes them reach,
makes them have to overcommit
if they want to get anywhere.
So you step back,
side step,
and just watch.
Calm your mind,
take your time,
and observe.
Finally, they will over commit,
and here’s the trick.
When you do the low block
DO NOT
block a fully extended limb.
Full extension means full power.
So you have to block their kick before it reaches extension.
This means sliding in to punching distance,
blocking,
and launching your counter.
If you counter a kick with a kick,
you will both have bruised shins,
and the fight will go on.
But if you counter a kick with a punch,
you are closing the distance,
and making him blink,
jamming his space and threatening him.
He now has to recalibrate.
He has to reset his thinking.
Set his body up for a whole new potential of motions.
A simple change in range will do that do an attacker.
I remember really messing with people’s minds,
simply shifting my weight an inch forward,
or an inch back,
right in the middle of their kick.
If they kept kicking,
they would be jammed, or overextended.
A kick is that slow,
that you can do that.
Especially if you calm yourself,
sit back,
and watch.
I would do this,
jamm or back back up,
just a little bit,
and people would stumble,
almost fall,
from trying to keep up with such a small motion.
So here’s the key,
for leg attacks,
which are further away,
and slower in coming,
you simply change the range.
Shift forward or back,
lift the leg as if preparing to kick,
but not kicking,
and just throwing the guy’s general sense of timing
into the dumpster.
When he closes,
a low block is what you do for a punch.
Don’t block a bigger bone with a smaller bone,
until you have enough experience.
Instead,
mess up his distance,
which will mess up his timing,
(Time is a measurement of distance),
and save the low block for the lower level punch.
NOW,
let’s say you’ve got the experience,
and it is time to use the block on the leg.
Remember,
time is distance,
and if you practice your forms and techniques
you will reach a stage,
where your sense of time is different from his sense of time.
He kicks,
and you will feel time slow down,
and you will be able to slip your arms forward
and block the kick
in the middle of it all.
You won’t block bone to bone,
but rather move in on his slow and predictable motion
and block as if apart from his sense of time.
By your own sense of time.
That’s when your low block will start to work for blocking kicks.
This is really a zen thing,
a mushin no shin thing
(Mind of no mind),
and the way to get it is not by fighting,
but by doing your forms and techniques,
endlessly,
and analyzing fighting.
Examining fighting,
looking at it,
until it stops being fighting
and starts being a science of motion.
Okey dokey,
you guys and gals practice.
The Matrixing Karate series
has four volumes published,
white belt, green belt, brown belt, and black belt,
and you can find them on Amazon.
I am currently living atop a mountain, caretaking a ranch, and putting together a ‘dojo in the sky.’
If you have lived on a ranch you know how rough it can be. The wildlife is hard at work surviving, and even the tame livestock can be pretty fierce.
The ultimate warrior in ALL the martial arts!
The mice, for instance, will crawl atop your warm motor and chew on the wires. Thus, we need cats, fierce cats, to control them.
But the cats are risk from coyotes, so we need fierce dogs to protect them.
My dog happens to be ‘city stupid.’ He wants to hide in the cabin all night and snooze. And even if he did go out and patrol the property, Mrs. Coyote is liable to give a yodel and lure him out…a fresh plate of coyote food.
So I talked to my partner about the situation, and he said, “Al, I’ve got just the dog for you,” and a couple of weeks later he brought out a pregnant Malenois.
A malenois is a small version of a German Shepherd, it has smaller jaws so it won’t break bones and cause lawsuits.
This particular Malenois earned a quick reputation as ‘The Hell Bitch.’
First, it rolled my Labrador over, introduced the poor, loving smurf to the matriarchy.
Then it went after the cats.
Cats! But it was supposed to protect the cats.
My partner said, “I‘ll bring you a couple of feral cats.”
But we had feral cats! And The Hell Bitch had made short work of them!
My partner didn’t think about that; didn’t consider that he was just bringing up more ’dog food,’ and a couple of weeks later he brought a couple of feral cats to the ranch.
“These guys are extra vicious,” he promised, and he let the first one go.
ZING! The Hell Bitch was on that cat like a rocket, and the cat disappeared into the wilderness.
My partner just smiled. “She’ll show up later,” then he released the second feral cat, and that was when I met the ultimate martial arts warrior.
Before I tell you about this warrior, however, let me tell you an old story.
Two samurai decided to see which one was better. So they exchanged invitations and arranged a meeting.
One morning they both arrived at a clearing.
They circled, and then stepped towards each other.
They drew their swords, and they edged closer and closer. They arrived at striking distance, and became motionless.
Hour after hour they stood there, each waiting for the other to make a mistake, to leave an opening.
Finally, just before dusk, they backed away from each other, sheathed their swords, and bowed.
One of them had made a mistake, an internal flinch, a moment of lost concentration, and the other had seen it. They never acknowledged who was the better, but they both knew who had won and who had lost.
So my partner released the second feral cat.
“Mew.”
He was white and orange, and he crossed the yard, coming straight for The Hell Bitch.
The Hell Bitch. whose name was Bel, gathered her legs, prepared to leap upon the cat.
“Mew.”
The cat walked right past her.
Bel growled and barked.
The cat ignored her, came to my wife and rubbed up against her leg.
Bel circled, snarling and snapping, waiting for the moment of weakness so she could charge in and tear the tabby apart.
“Mew.” The cat walked past me, up the steps to the house, and went in.
Bel followed her, looming over her, drooling and moaning with the desire to fight.
The cat jumped up on a chair and curled up.
Arrrooo! Grrrr! Bark!
Drool and slobber foaming out of her mouth, Bell snapped her jaws over the hair of the cat.
The cat rolled over and went to sleep.
Two days later, totally defeated, her whole DNA betrayed, her pregnant bitchery stymied, Bel took sick. She nearly died before my partner could come get her, hook her to an IV and drive her to an animal hospital.
The cat, you see, never showed a weakness. Did not hesitate or falter, and entertained no thought of resisting, of cringing, of shrinking, of reacting to the mad, foaming, insanely rabid hound.
The cat manifested, exactly, the attitude of Daniel in the lion’s den.
My question is this: how many of you have this concept in your martial art? How many of you can claim to have ever demonstrated even a fraction of this kind of behavior?
And, can you see this type of attitude emanating as a result of your training?
You always hear the term about ‘the good, old days.’ And, in the martial arts, this is really true. I always hear people thinking back to when men were men, and sheep were…you know.
But it is a legitimate question.
On one hand, you have the great arts coming out of the orient. I was studying back in the sixties and seventies, so the main arts were judo and karate, with a smattering of Kung Fu. We studied in in dirty dojos and did manic drills. We brooked no nonsense, and we were patient with beginners.
On the other hand, you have designer water, contracts and classes in the Y, at the gym, down on the corner, and in every friend’s garage.
So, my personal opinion is that the martial arts were better. I started at a McDojo, then went to a classical korean Karate school (Kang Duk Won).
The McDojo was the state of art to come, with thick mats and air conditioning and tournament freestyle and contracts and good looking chickies.
The Kang Duk Won had a mat that had been ripped and stitched so many times it was like walking across Frankenstein’s face. The bag went to the cobbler’s every week. We packed out own bags for better texture and weight and resistance to our endless kicks. Warn’t no chickies allowed.
The McDojo had shiny trophies, high fives for points, and you pressed your gi before class.
The Kang Duk Won you did hundreds of kicks, you didn’t wash your gi, and you couldn’t press the clutch down because your shins were so badly bruised.
In modern times we have scientific achievements that enable one to get more strength in the muscle.
Of course, modern times has a lot of junk science and internet gimmicks, so…?
Now, it’s pretty obvious which way I am biased. I was there, I don’t think alzheimer’s has obscured my memories of those old work outs, and I have seen modern schools that teach 18 arts on their front sign, but are a jumble of bags and exercise equipment inside.
But, nobody made me God, and if you think otherwise, then go ahead and tear me a new one. Heck, I might even learn something!
And, if you are old school like me, then feel free to leave your memory. Heck, it might just become legend!
If you want to read more about old time martial arts and the Kang Duk Won, try KangDukWon.com!
Here is the lie: Kung fu is a physical art based on mythology, and it has no modern combat applications. The point is that Kung Fu is based upon five animals, and that these animals do not relate to combat. This idea, that the animals don’t relate to combat, is, as we shall see, is so ridiculous it is…ridiculous!
The five kung fu animals In the Shaolin Butterfly are not the classical five animals. The butterfly, the crane, the monkey, the tiger, and the dragon are the five animals in this kung fu. The battle strategies of Shaolin are easily illuminated through a study of these five animals.
The first animal is the butterfly, and the stance utilized by this animal is the back stance. This stance is used because the butterfly must flit and flee to avoid damage, and the back stance is a step backward. Thus, the direction of the Butterfly is to the rear.
The Crane is the second animal, and the Crane utilizes a one legged stance. Standing on one leg and using kicks a student will achieve great balance. Thus, the crane goes in an upward direction.
The third animal is the monkey, and the stance used by this animal is the horse stance. This stance requires that a person drive their weight downward and hold their position. Thus, the direction of the horse is straight down.
The tiger is the fourth animal, and the tiger utilizes a forward stance. This stance is designed for charging, for attacking, and it is an aggressive stance. Thus, the tiger goes in a forward direction.
The dragon is the fifth animal, and the dragon utilizes a twisted stance, with the body turned over the feet. This stance is good for spinning to catch an opponent unawares, catching oneself in awkward positions, and so on. Thus, the dragon moves in a spin or a circle.
If you examine the points of a compass you will find the directions that the five animals take, and a strategy based upon handling all incoming potentials of attack. The Monkey goes down and the crane goes up, the tiger goes forward and the butterfly goes back, and the dragon circles, which illuminates a distinct possibility for lateral motion.
The directions of these five Shaolin Butterfly animals create a thorough and strong strategy with no weak points–just one of the secrets of the Shaolin Butterfly, which you can find at Monster Martial Arts.
I have people asking me, every once in a while, for an example of Matrixing in the Martial Arts. This is something I don’t want to give, and there is an exact reason for me refusing. Let me explain this reason.
The mind is a bunch of memory. That’s all it is. An animal mind has very short span. A goldfish forgets within three seconds. That’s it. Simply, the goldfish is a being that lives within three seconds, and then moves on.
Bound by your own logic, matrixing sets you free.
Man is a rather longer memoried beast. It would be nice to go into this more, but this is not the time and place. So let it suffice to say that you can remember virtually anything. This lifetime alone, you can recall the most minute memories.
Now, mental abilities are something else, and they have absolutely nothing to do with the mind. Mental abilities, such as the ability to create problems, intuition, telepathy and telekinesis and all that sort of thing, that are not born of memory…they are what the awareness of the individual can do.
Separate them: mind is memory, and mental ability has nothing to do with the mind. Mental ability is what you, the human being, can do in your wildest dreams.
When you do the martial arts you memorize patterns. You memorize techniques. You memorize muscle motion.
You put all this into your mind.
But what can you do?
Well, you can do whatever is in your mind, but that has nothing to do with what you, the human being, can do in your wildest dreams.
You see, all this stuff you memorize into your mind is nothing more than…circuits. Just like an electrical circuit, bound by nodes and boards and such…everything is on a set path.
But you can only trap a human being so long. Eventually, be it a few seconds or a million years, the human being is going to say, ‘wait a minute! I recognize this place! I see what I’ve been doing! I see this memory!’
At that second the circuit is blown, the pattern disappears, and you become free.
Now freedom is relative, and that’s an absolute, and this is another one of those things I should skirt during the course of this essay.
So the point is this, when you blow a circuit you enter into mushin no shin. Mind of no mind. Or…a place where there are no memories telling you what to do.
Here’s a couple of things that go along with that phenomenon.
Mushin no shin can be achieved through the necessity of the moment…because of the need for survival. A fellow on the battlefield may experience it. Time slows down, he develops other perceptions rather instantly.
I remember reading of one fellow who survived Viet Nam because he could ‘smell’ Viet Namese. We could argue whether he actually detected by odor, or whether the human being sensed and attributed this ability to his nose, but the fact remains, he survived through an ability ‘grown’ for the moment.
Mushin no shin might last for a brief instant…then the memories come flooding back in. Still, that experience, that ‘aha’ moment, will open up a human being and let him or her know that there is a lot more to him, and life, than is ever written in a book, any book, in western society…or eastern.
Indeed, it is near impossible to describe this moment except in general and almost cartoonish terms.
The world glows. You understand God. You can see forever. These are descriptions of something that cannot be described.
And there are other phenomena connected with mushin no shin, or as I have segued into…enlightenment.
The difference between mushin no shin and enlightenment may be merely one of degree, or perhaps depth of understanding. Or perhaps the type and size of circuits blown.
But let’s return to the martial arts and why I don’t give examples of matrixing.
The martial arts are a series of memories. They are patterns. They are circuits implanted in the mind through hard work. And here is the bugaboo.
If the martial art is sufficiently illogical, there will be no mushin no shin, except by the severest accident. There will be no enlightenment.
One example of this is boxing. There are no examples that I can think of where a boxer suddenly threw off his gloves and said, ‘I understand that the essential nature of the universe is a golden vibe which we call God.’
There are a few boxers who have been pounded into believing in God, but this is not enlightenment, this is worship by the beaten.
Another example would be kenpo.
To be plain, I love Kenpo, I have loved it since I encountered in 1967, but I was not able to matrix it for a variety of reasons.
It doesn’t create a connection with the earth through serious stance work. It is a put together, a real conglomeration, of everything Ed Parker encountered and thought about: it is the memories, jumbled and reconstructed in a desperate effort to make sense, of one man. It is five evolutions of thought as one man went through life without ever encountering mushin no shin, or an ‘aha’ moment.
Nothing against kenpo, it just best exemplifies illogic in the martial arts.
And what it specifically exemplifies is the basic training method, which is memorization, or implantation of training sequences in the mind.
When I developed matrixing it seemed like an accident, but it was really my search for logic in a universe that is rather slipshod and haphazard and put together by whim and shamble.
Why me, why the martial arts, why the million and one experiences that set me free, I don’t know. Call me a cosmic accident.
But the fact remains, I tripped over a form of logic, described briefly in Boolean algebra, that puts order to ALL the jumbled up strings of random motions that we have been memorizing and calling the martial arts for a zillion years.
Now, if I could, in one word, or simple sentence, describe matrixing, I would, but you wouldn’t understand it.
Here is that sentence:
For something to be true the opposite must also be true.
Doesn’t make much sense, does it?
But it will if you do a few hundred hours of logical work in the martial arts.
Mind you, you could do a few thousand hours of work, a few million hours of work, and get nowhere. You would merely be trying to make sense of the insensible, the stored up memories in your mind.
You see, without the logic, without matrixing…the mindless mass of memorized circuits that are the martial arts just won’t make sense.
And, without the martial arts, with only the logic, you are left with:
For something to be true the opposite must also be true.
A simple phrase that means everything, and nothing, and is sort of like a zen koan, and doesn’t describe any sort of logic you have ever experienced.
So, it is impossible for me to give you an example, your jumbled up memory of a mind just won’t accept it. You will translate it into gibberish.
And, here is a cruel trick, when somebody gets close to understanding they say, ‘Oh, we’ve got that in our system.’
Simply, they have latched on to some simple point, and they do have it in their system, but their mind has slid right off of Matrixing the way teflon slides off bacon and eggs.
So you are caught. You are trapped in your own hard work, trying desperately to justify it, and refusing any example of real logic I could give you.
And your only real solution is to dig into the martial arts, and dig into matrixing that you might hope to understand the martial arts.
And, nobody really understands the martial arts.
True. Sad, but true.
They think they do, and they explain the martial arts by saying something like, ‘a punch is just a punch,’ or, ‘a kick is just a kick.’ Or some other pithy saying after a few decades in the martial arts.
Nope.
That’s just more teflon sliding off the pan.
The real martial arts are a thought.
Not meat, not mind circuits, not even freedom.
They are a simple thought.
And the only way you will ever understand the thought that is the martial arts is through matrixing. I say this because the martial arts have never been understood in the history of mankind. Ever. Not on any planet, not on any plane of existence.
If they had been understood they would have, like one of those circuits, disappeared, and we would have a civilization without war and disease and the general corruption of mankind.
This essay has been written by Al Case, the discoverer of Matrixing. You can read more concerning matrixing and martial arts at Monster Martial Arts. If you are more interested in the type of thought process described in this essay, you should go to the Church of Martial Arts.
Don’t forget to subscribe to the newsletter, download any free books, press the FB like button, and donate (order matrixing materials).
This has been a page about why there are no examples of Matrixing in the Martial Arts.
Many people have asked me for an example of how neutronics works. The answer, on a person level, is in the book, ‘Neutronics.’
On a larger scale, one effecting all of society, the answer is in ‘Neutronic Prison.’
Neutronic prison is about the largest problem our society has…criminals.
We spend immense amounts of money on the incarceration and rehabilitation of criminals. And the money is wasted, as people are not regularly rehabilitated, and they treat the prison like a college to learn new ways to be brutal and violent and break the laws of man.
Neutronic prison offers the only viable option, the best way to reverse this trend and actually create a society without criminals.
Oddly, the book is useful on many levels. The only real monster that man has not been able to slay, you see, is himself, and this book offers a heartfelt example of how simple it would be to control others, and to control the self.
Heck, you could even use it to raise children, and be gauranteed they would not turn to criminal options!
The book is only $10, and it is at the Church of Martial Arts.
I find that there is vast misunderstanding in the martial arts as to what mushin no shin is…people usually and incorrectly compare it to reaction time.
Now, to be precise, when people talk about mushin no shin they mix it in with not just reaction time, but especially muscle memory. The idea they are coming from is that if you do something long enough then it becomes intuitive, and even ‘on automatic.’
Mushin no shin is far beyond muscle memory…it is the other end of the spectrum.
Mushin no shin means mind of no mind. Another way of saying this would be time of no time.
Which is to say that there is no mind, or memory in this case, involved.
When you train in reaction time, when you build ‘muscle memory,’ then you are building memory, and memory is based on time.
But mushin no shin refers to no time…to perceiving things as they are, and not through the artifices, or demanding the reaction time, of muscle memory.
Now, the real world difference is this.
You feel a tap on the shoulder, you spin, you chop, your grandmother, who was offering you a plate of cookies, goes down for the count.
That is reaction time. It is not intuitive, it is knee jerk reaction.
Or, you feel a presence behind you, or, better yet, without feeling the presence behind you, you turn in concert with the tap of the finger to your shoulder.
There is no contact because you have merged with the action. There is no reaction; there is no moving after the fact, or moving violently because of something.
That is mushin no shin.
The first time I ever experienced mushin no shin I was 16. I was at a bowling alley, and one of the bowlers put a pencil on the slanted desk, and it started rolling.
I watched it, and watched it, and time started to stretch out and become inconsequential…I was ‘in the moment,’ free from reaction time.
The world glowed, and I felt this delicious sense of freedom. I realized that I had total control over the flight of the pencil. I could move any way I wanted to, and there were no boundaries or limits.
The pencil fell, and I reached out and plucked it out of the air.
A fellow there said he had never seen such fast reaction time in his life.
But it wasn’t reaction time…I was moving in between moments of time. I wasn’t using muscles to make motion, I was making motion directly, as an Awareness, as an ‘I am.’ And this was without any martial arts training; years before I ever started training in the martial arts.
Now, a quirk of the moment, was that experience, and the real problem came when I tried to make it happen at will. Couldn’t do it. I needed the training.
And, even with the martial arts training, it took me nearly 20 years before I started experiencing these things as a matter of course.
The point here, however, is that it is not muscle memory, or reaction time. Muscle memory trains the body, but not the awareness, and that is knee jerk out of control. Reaction time means something has to happen before you act. Neither of these are mushin no shin.
Mushin no shin is when you are aware of life as it happens, without the interference of muscle memory, or reaction time, or training, or anything.
People who are asleep use the term muscle memory, or reaction time, to describe phenomena they don’t understand.
What makes it really confusing is when you get some fellow who trains for years, then tries to explain what he is experiencing. in the western world we fall back on the inadequate descriptions provided by science, a science which, I might add, has never adequately explained such concepts as are manifested when a person is showing mushin no shin.
Terms such as ‘reaction time,’ and ‘muscle memory,’ are offered by western science for concepts they do not understand.
The term mushin no shin is used to describe a person who is free from muscle memory, has no reaction time, and is in a realm beyond the simple physics of the universe. He is in a second set of physics, the physics of sixth senses and intuition and dreams and all sorts of things.
Mushin no shin is used when a person is not confined by his memories, and other such limitations to the human spirit.
Here are some articles which touch upon the procedure for waking the person mired in Martial Arts reaction time, and endowing him with muslin no shin.
Good Lard is it a beeootifull day for a horse stance!
Good day to work out, limber up the muskles, knock the fat off yer frame…a karate horse stance. Get healthy. Ya know? Are ya ready to talk?
One of the karate drills I hated the most, but got the most out of, was the simple horse stance. We would spread the legs, get the thighs down to where they were almost parallel to the floor, and put up one high block, and extend the other hand to the side in a chicken beak, and look at our finger tips. We called this karate horse stance position Kima Chasie. Horse Meditation.
Focus awareness,, get out of the pain…get out of the body.
And we meditated on the pain it would cause us.
Now, forget the pain of the karate horse stance, forget the stronger legs, forget everything but the real purpose of it. Get out of your body.
After a couple of years of dabbling with the karate horse stance Meditation I decided to do it right. I decided that pain wouldn’t cause death (in this instance) and that I should just do the exercise until I got what it was all about.
So, I hit the stance, looked at my fingers, and concentrated on breathing. Time passed. Minutes seemed like hours. My mind began to still, the world slowed down. Seconds seemed like hours.
And, suddenly it all stopped hurting. No pain at all. The whole universe was one peaceful concept that i could live with forever.
how long did it take me to get there?
Five minutes.
That’s all.
Zingo bingo, instant enlightenment.
Now came the problem. When I tried to move, I couldn’t. My whole body had locked up. Man, I was freaked. Tried to wiggle backwards, couldn’t move, couldn’t even rock. Tried forwards, ah, there we go, I could fall for…oh shit…ah! Landed on my face.
So, enlightenment is possible through the old training methods, but sometimes it can be weird, freaky, and even as significant as a punch on the nose.
Hey, any of youse guys feel like coming over to see me, I live on good old Monster Martial Arts. Brings your friends, the doors are open, leave your old life outside.
See ya.
Al
This has been a page about karate horse stance meditation, and here is a great page about breaking heads with your board…uh, breaking boards with your head!
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Hi Sensei Al!
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Be blessed my teacher, ~ Rev. Ernest R
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Win from Master Instructor Course
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My students have started coming up to me after class telling me how much more they are enjoying it, and that the classes have stopped being so ridged and now flow in a kind of give and take between me and them. I have stopped being a task master and started having fun and letting them teach me as well.
I did the Master Instructor Course and it hit me. The Basics that are so concisely communicated in this course including the Matrix principle IS the solution. It doesn’t matter what “style” I call my art, because all styles follow these same principles. It doesn’t matter how hard I train or how many repetitions I do if I don’t train the right way. And I would never become a master if I didn’t know how it all fits together. Now I do! I can honestly say that I am now on the path that I have always sought as a martial artist. Thank you Al!
I conducted a Matrix Aikido training class for a Security Team at a local manufacturing plant. I tailored the training according to their Use Of Force policy. As you know they need control and takedown skills. I knew Matrix Aikido would be the answer. The training plan you shared was boss. The class went so smoothly. The participants learned very quickly. By the end of the class you could see techniques of Monkey Boxing coming through. They were also able to create their own techniques. There was one female officer in the class who asked to become my private student. She was throwing, locking and taking down guys twice her size. The Security Supervisor wants me to come back and with more participants! I'll keep you posted. ~ L M
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