Internal Power

[kyudo]

At the end of the day you have to be able to destroy people otherwise what's the point?

As far as I'm concerned there is no point. Wado is useless for most part. Just like a painting of Van Gogh is useless. It's even too small to use as wallpaper, so what's the point?
However, even though Wado is useless, it is still quite valuable to me. Just like a van Gogh painting. One thing is sure though, if I were in the business of destroying people (which I'm not), I would choose more modern means as tools of the trade.

That said, there still is the issue of quality. Useless or not, I much prefer to do my activities with quality. I strive for quality, no matter if it is a paid job, or a walk in the woods. I think we agree that quality in wado has something to do with the ability to employ internal power.

...internal power( as opposed to internal energy) is a simple proposition and very much like wado ryu kihon waza where again, you either train correctly and train sufficiently to attain, achieve or understand it to possess it or 'get it' and have it or you do not. It is part of the process - for some.

Then, what is 'to train correctly'? I suppose that is what most (or some?) of us are already doing. I guess my beef with the 'normal' way of teaching Wado is that most students are left in the dark. They get pointed into the right direction by the sensei (if they're lucky...) but have to proceed pretty much blindfolded in most cases. They're in the same position as the blind man feeling the elefant. The only difference is that the sensei tells them that if they touch enough parts of the elephant, they will 'get' the elephant.

I'm not sure if there's a way around this. I've been in martial arts long enough to know that some things are very difficult to put in words. The inability to explain something in a clear way does not always indicate lack of knowledge of lack of ability. Sometimes it just IS hard to explain certain things. My sensei always used to say that the only way to 'get' the taste of coffee is to drink the coffee. And I can accept that.

However, I also know from experience that some things could very well be explained more clearly. And for some reason, they are not. It is beyond me why a sensei would keep things from students. Sure, not all students are ready for everything. But so what? I tell things in class that are meant for a particular student because he is in a particular point in his journey. But I don't keep it a secret for the others. It's fine if they hear it, as long as they understand that they have other issues to attend to. At least, that way they all get a sense of the wider landscape they're all travelling in. It's not different from learning a language. Obviously, books 5 and 6 of the language course are readily available. But everyone understands that there's no point in attempting to learn them if you haven't first finished books 1 to 4.

And sure, not everyone will make the whole journey. In fact, I have to admit that I probably don't train enough and maybe don't have enough talent to ever 'get' internal power. But so what? Does that mean I have to travel blindfolded? Perhaps, if I can see the landscape more clearly, I will be more inclined to cover more distance to get somewhere.

So I see no point in secrecy. Maybe it's something Japanese? I think a couple of hundred years ago in Japan, such practices had merit. But maintaining secrecy today is a disservice to the art.

[wadoka]

Igor, I do sympathise with some of your points of transmission. As the first generation of Wado pioneers get older and pass on, is there a risk that what could have been transmitted just get lost in a void?

Is it worth trying to pass on a clone though?

Or is the value in the transmission of a continual probing mind and constant acceptance of not having "it" and so to always seek it?

[kyudo]

Is it worth trying to pass on a clone though?

Hardly, I would say. But passing on information to students doesn't necessarily constitute cloning...

Or is the value in the transmission of a continual probing mind and constant acceptance of not having "it" and so to always seek it?

I certainly see value in a continual probing mind. But if the previous generation passes on sufficient information, we might actually start probing some new stuff and move the whole art forward, rather than just ourselves.
Or is there value in spinning the same wheels, generation after generation?
Frankly, I don't know. I have more questions than answers, here....

[Gusei21]

Hi Igor,

When I was talking about blowing things up I was referring to the use of internal power.
Wado as an art form has a wider purpose than just blowing things up. Tai Chi has a greater purpose, so does aikido.
I was only referring to the use of internal power within the context of those various arts.
Wado is what you want it to be I guess and the scope of it certainly extends beyond blowing stuff up.
But when you utilize internal power if you don't have the potential to blow stuff up then I think you are just fooling yourself.

As for the transmission of this stuff...when I look at most Japanese koryu they don't seem to care and that's probably why some of them look as lame as they do.

I think there is enough in Wado to keep the average person occupied for their lifetime.
And as I look at Wado across the globe I think enough stuff is being transmitted and people are doing their best to perfect what they have.

You are wanting stuff that is above your current pay grade. You still have a ton of kihon to master before you are even ready to play in that sandbox.
As a point of reference I was with Takagi Sensei and lamenting the fact that many people in Europe were pretending to do tanto tori and idori.
Sensei just smiled and said that practically every time Otsuka Sensei held a seminar in Japan people asked him to teach them tanto tori and idori.
He never did. His response was always, 'your kihon is not good enough yet'. That's the reason tanto tori never was taught within the Wadokai.
The difficulty with tanto tori is that Otsuka Sensei did it with Shindo Yoshin ryu fundamentals. I think Otsuka Sensei (I am speculating) thought it was too difficult to teach the average person?

The bottom line I think is this. You don't need to know 'internal power' stuff to do Wado. Wado will survive just fine without it. Internal power is like a turbo charger. A car is a car. Without a turbo charger a car is still a car. Nothing wrong with a car. A turbo charged engine is only for the few that like to go really fast (blow stuff up).

I think in the Japanese martial arts model you are not meant to learn everything. That is why knowledge is separated in layers. That is why we have terms like shoden chuden okuden joden hiden kuden gokui. Layers. Levels. You are not meant to learn every thing. You have to earn the right to do so and if you are exposed to it before you are ready then the stuff is meaningless because you don't have the body mechanics or the mental fortitude to deal with it. Some of the higher level mental stuff from certain Japanese martial arts can lead to psychosis if you are not initiated in the correct manner.

Much of this so called higher stuff cannot be done unless you do the foundation work. (Correct structure, coordinated body, connected body, correct muscle development).

I know you want to learn this stuff as much as I do but the reality is that you are not ready yet and that is not speculation on my part.
You have plenty of homework now just trying to master basic kihon. You just learned to execute a correct maegeri a few months ago for crying out loud. It isn't your fault that you were never taught correctly but you have huge gaps in your general technical ability. So do a lot of other people. So just focusing on kihon, on the Pinans is enough for now if you some day have the desire to take a walk down the so called internal path. If that is not your goal then by all means continue to do what you do the way you do.

Again, this path is not necessary in my opinion. You can go far in Wado without it. Most people in Wado don't have it. I think what is more important is to learn what Sensei called 'Wado rashisa' In English it means 'Wado likeness'.
We had a test last week and a major Japanese international instructor failed not because he made a major technical error (we all make minor mistakes) , he failed because his karate was not Wado enough. So for that he will never advance any further until he reconsiders everything he is doing. The more I think about that the more I come to appreciate the old guard of the Wadokai. Reg said something to me the other day that really resonated with me. He basically said the old guard is protecting what is Wado and is making sure that the next generation stays on the correct path. I think preserving this Wado rashisa is more important than learning internal power. I'm lucky because Wado is all I know. Wado rashisa is all I have. For people coming from Goju or other styles this might prove to be difficult unless they let go of their past.

So in summary I think for most people - and using the analogy of koryu - shoden and chuden stuff is enough. Leave the okuden or joden for the experts and receive the kuden from your instructor when he gives it to you. As for the joden gokui and hiden - that is only for a select few who have done the necessary foundation work, are in the right place at the right time and have someone who can teach it to them.
The information is out there and is available but you have to be ready for it. And no I don't think anyone will ever write a book on the subject. The few who know perhaps realizes it is not possible to transmit this knowledge in that manner?

One of the biggest problems people have with coaching surfing is that it relies too much on feeling and balance. Every wave is different. There are too many variables that keep changing. If you can make a wave machine that produces the exact same wave every time then people would advance a lot quicker..... perhaps I am over stretching the analogy but I think the difficulty in transmission of knowledge is the same just in different ways.

[tkaneshige]

Hi all, greetings from the San Francisco Bay Area.

This is my first posting, as I'm inspired by such an interesting thread. I've been thinking about internal energy since taking Tai Chi (Yang style) in the mid-1980s and Wado the last four years. I also recently attended Kenji Ushiro's seminar on Ki in Seattle; yes, I know Bob Nash considers him somewhat of a trickster. It seems to me that we tend to get hung up on explanations, or lack thereof. But I believe the explanations by the masters are there and adequate. It's the lack of the depth of understanding in the moment of execution that torments me.

Here's a scenario that hopefully sheds some light on what I mean: The explanation of mushin is to let go of our emotional attachments, such as desire and fear. The image of a deep mountain lake with a smooth surface reflecting the moon is also a beautiful description. Sounds simple enough. But anyone standing over a golf shot that must carry 200 yards over water knows how emotions can creep into your backswing and ruin everything. No mushin. After such a shot, I often start down the path of analyzing all the particulars of my swing, explaining to myself what exactly went wrong, in order to improve my game. Truth is, it's not the explanation's fault, just the execution.

I once asked my Sifu how to extend Chi beyond my physical limbs, as he could do. I was hoping for a prescriptive explanation, a step-by-step mathematical formula.

"You must have love in your heart, intention in your movements," he said.

"But where does the power come from, how do you transfer it?" I asked.

"I just told you," he said.

Years later, I attended a seminar by Toby Threadgill. We wanted to know how to sense our opponent's center. His response was that you must touch someone with the same feeling as touching silk. That is a brilliant explanation. Just because it can be explained, though, doesn't mean I can execute it. But blaming the explanation in favor of a more technical explanation merely covers up my own failings. I just need to execute better, which gives credence to Takagi Sensei's response of "correct understanding and training."

Tom Kaneshige

[oneya]

What is of some significance here is that we are still battling with a differential where 'Wado rashisa' or its significant wado ryu identity being more the result of the Shu Ha Ri tenet in its true sense has not necessarily been the thinking or the practice of the western world over the last fifty years. Unfortunately there are some that think Ha and even Ri is something that arrives with a shodan grade or when they start a dojo and become a sensei , while there are others who are still peeling the same onion @ 7th dan and loving the continuing harvest. The fabric of wado is a very subtle thing but nevertheless clearly identifiable which makes your comment Igor:

if the previous generation passes on sufficient information, we might actually start probing some new stuff and move the whole art forward, rather than just ourselves. Or is there value in spinning the same wheels, generation after generation.

More than a little depressing.

oneya

[Gusei21]

I know Bob Nash considers him somewhat of a trickster. It seems to me that we tend to get hung up on explanations, or lack thereof. But I believe the explanations by the masters are there and adequate.
Tom Kaneshige

Hey Tom,

I have never mentioned Kenji Ushiro publcly on any forum.
I never mentioned I had ever met him or attended a seminar by him.
Let's keep it that way.....
If people think he is a ki master then that tells me a lot about the person making that observation.
He is a good karate guy who knows how to hit hard.

[kyudo]

Bob, Reg, Tom, thanks for your valuable comments.

Yes, Bob, you're right. Kihon should come first. I realize now that my point is more about learning methods and transmitting knowledge than it is about internal power. So perhaps this discussion should be moved to another thread, but I'll leave that to Gordon.

The thing is, I'm getting increasingly conviced that the methods of transmitting Wado leave a lot to be desired. True, I need to fix some of my kihon. But is that my fault? Is it my sensei's fault? Or is it the system's fault? I'd like to point out that my sensei was a direct student of Otsuka meijin, and he was endorsed by JKF-Wadokai. My lineage could hardly be any better. Yet, admittingly, I got more than a few things wrong in kihon over the years. How can that be? I'll give you one example of how some things come to be.

When I first learned wado kata (only after I learned some tens of other katas in other brands of MA), I learned to perform 'double' blocks. For example: the third movement in Pinan Sandan, which consists of a double gedan barai. It was actually taught to me as a double block. We even practiced using it that way.
Only much later (even long after obtaining my first dan grades) I learned that 'double' blocks in Wado should be interpreted as two single blocks, executed simultaneously. That made a lot more sense to me, but raised a new question too. Why execute them simultaneously? Till this day, no one in Wado has provided me with a satisfying answer. So I came up with my own answer, which I figured out in the course of years. Here it is, for free, a little piece of knowledge that took me decades to figure out:
Uke in wado kata (rather than 'blocks') are performed double because somehow the Okinawan kata were designed that way when Otsuka sensei incorporated them into his new Wado system. But more importantly: in wado we use meotode or 'husband and wife hands'. This means that two hands (and/or feet, for that matter) move differently, but in accord. One hand might perform an uke, the other a zuki (second movement of KK1). This means performing two single techniques simultaneously: exactly what we're doing in kata. Looking at it that way, the Okinawan kata were used by Otsuka sensei in a brilliant way. And BTW, I would say that performing meotode effectively has something do with employing internal power. And yes, doing proper kata then may lead to using internal power.

If this is true, how come it took me decades to figure it out? Am I that thick? Excuse me, but in this case I tend to blame the system, rather than myself. Had I known from the beginning what was expected of me, I would have been able to get much more out of my thousands of hours of kata training. I may need to fix my technique. But Wado may need to fix its ways of transmitting knowledge.

Or should I blame my sensei? But how could I? He was a top student at nichidai and a direct student of Otsuka mejin. Yet, he didn't appear to know. Apparently he spent his time kicking and punching, and beating up students of other universities. He was very good at that. Yet, he simply didn't know some very basic things and as a result, I missed out on it as well. Maybe it's good to point out that my sensei's knowledge of kata came mostly out of his travels with Otsuka sensei. For a while, my sensei was part of small band of students who accompanied Otsuka when he performed demonstrations all over Japan. The thing is: my sensei got the demonstrations and apparently Otsuka never bothered to inform him on the less exposed intricacies of Wado kata. Because being an old school budoka, Otsuka obviously didn't show everything to the general public. As a result, I learned copies of Otsuka's kata demonstrations, rather than kata content. I'm still struggling to fix that.

Is this merely a personal story? Is this due to the particular Wado bubble that I spent decades in? By now I have seen enough of the wider world of wado to conclude that this signals a flaw in the fabric of the system, rather than just being an exception. Let's face it: there's a lot of lousy Wado out there. But is it really the fault of all those thousands of students? Is it really only lack of training? Perhaps we should have the courage to empty not only our own cup, but also the cup of Wado.

Bob, I know that you spend a lot of effort travelling the world and spreading Wado knowledge, as well as fixing flawed knowledge. But you also know a thing or two about scuba diving, right? Does that field also include fixing flawed knowledge all over the place? I would expect not, because most of the scuba divers that get it wrong probably don't last long enough to spread their flawed knowledge. Perhaps the same was true for budoka in the olden days?

So what does that tell us about Wado today?

[oneya]

Hi,

Coming up with your own answer is not always the best way to work wado kata Igor... the 3rd movement of Pinan Sandan is not an example of two hands working together but more two hands working in opposition which is the antithesis of so called meotode - but who knows - maybe it was early in the marriage..??

oneya

[kyudo]

Coming up with your own answer is not always the best way to work wado kata Igor... the 3rd movement of Pinan Sandan is not an example of two hands working together but more two hands working in opposition which is the antithesis of so called metode -

You're absolutely right. I meant the 3rd movement in Pinan YONdan, offcourse.
Sorry...