Looking back

Writing this is not a mistake, but be warned this is pretty frank.

Five years ago this week I got kicked out of my dojo.  I had been there since 1986 (22 years), and I had been dojocho for fourteen of those years.  I organized practices (and extra practices, and special practices), invited guest instructors from Japan and parts of the US and managed the arrangements for their visits and the seminars they taught, collected fees, enforced rules (when necessary), taught classes (sometimes all of the classes) and paid bills.  I had (I thought) good relationships with the students, including at least one whom I thought was a friend, and a pretty good relationship with the daisempai, who became, in effect, the head of the dojo after my teacher's death in 2004. 

I won't go through the gory details - people who know me know the story.  People who were there at the time also know, but, in a way that I have come to understand is pretty normal, those who remained at the old place managed to excuse the chief instructor and at the same time drop a veil over what happened.  At the time I wonder what rationalizations they used, but I realize they had to use them - otherwise it looks pretty obvious that the chief instructor engaged in behavior that was both underhanded and dishonorable (I said I was being frank).  It's pretty hard to stay in a group if you acknowledge that to yourself.  So I understand.

When things came crashing down in 2008, I was left in the same sort of shape that I imagine some people feel after a bad divorce.  I gained a little weight (a result of a suddenly reduced practice schedule, as well as sympathetic friends buying me way too much beer a little too often), and went through a period of soul searching that was both damaging and revelatory.  And I learned a few things, like, who my friends were (and are) and that colleagues, just like after a divorce, decide to stay with one side or another, but are rarely sympathetic to both sides.  I also learned that even though the person left seemingly holding the best hand appears to be the winner (with ample supporting evidence ), the other side is not exactly a losing side, either. 

As I look back after five years, I realize that to a certain extent I have done something that seemed impossible at the time - I started over. 

It was slow.  At first, I practiced by myself, once a week, for one hour (which is a pretty good workout, actually).  Being caught sort of flatfooted, I rented space in the same place where my old dojo met - I honestly had no idea where else to go.  One time I was even on the floor above them, and I could hear their opening practice.  Listening to their thumping feet, I realized that they were not doing proper suriashi, because the chief instructor was not teaching them how to move properly.  I also realized that that particular observation, plus about $1.50, would get me a Smartwater in the studio cafe'.  As in big, fucking deal.

Eventually, with one student who left at the same time I was kicked out, along with a few other people, I began a practice in Queens, where I was living at the time.  Not surprisingly, I tried to replicate the formula that I had used successfully with the old place: I charged enough for each person to contribute to the monthly rent, including myself; I set up a twice per week practice; and I adhered, more or less, to the same curriculum. 

During this time, I also tried to keep a relationship with the teacher I had introduced to my old dojo from Japan.  But it was difficult.  To put it simply, he blamed me for getting kicked out, feeling, I think, that I had somehow spoiled his grand plans of some sort.  I also expect his feelings were being influenced by the chief instructor, though I could not say how. 

Things went along, awkwardly, for about two years.  Then, they didn't go so well.  While my own personal training was proceeding and expanding to different things, thanks in large part to a loyal colleague who put me in the way of some new connections in Japan, I was having Management Trouble.  First, the studio where I was renting closed down.  Secondly, the students, for various personal reasons, slipped away.  There were no new people.  How did this happen? I wondered.  I made postcards, developed a website, did pretty much the same things I had done when I was dojocho at my old place. Even now I am not sure - I think, by not differentiating my practice that much from my former group's, I did not distinguish what I was doing well enough.  Secondly, the noisier part of the budo scene, thanks to YouTube and other media, was seemingly outstripping traditional dojo.  On top of it all, the Great Recession ensured that many people did not even have an extra $60 a month for a dojo fee.  It was a tough time to fly solo.

I went back to my old space and rented at twice what I had been paying in Queens. Between my one student and myself, I was losing more than a hundred bucks a month, a situation I quickly could not  afford, so I stopped.  I was teaching once a week in a community college rec program, and that was it. 

Then, three years ago, one of my erstwhile students approached me about a cultural center he was opening.  He wanted me to teach, but with a caveat - he wanted to learn the original, traditional style my teacher had taught, not the newer, fancier stuff I had introduced, via the teacher from Japan, to my old group. 

Sold!  It's not like I was getting anywhere with the newer stuff.  The chief instructor had blocked me on practically every avenue of communication with the Japenese teacher.  How did he do that?  Myriad means, from misspelling my email address so I would not find out about events of mutual interest, even as it looked like I was in the loop, to forbidding my name being spoken in my old dojo by anyone who had known me there.  There was probably other stuff I never knew about as well.  So my relationship with that style was limping along at best anyway.  It was time for a change.  I reorganized my curriculum, and though I did not formally break with anyone, I quietly went back to teaching what I knew best, along with some new-old stuff I had picked up on my sabishii odyssey.  My student handled publicity and logistics.  Best of all, we had a nice space to practice in.

Things have still had their ups and downs in the intervening three years.  Ups included doing about seven demos and performances in the past four weeks; downs included solo iai practice last Thursday for the first time in months, because said demos seem to have tired everyone out!  The space is nice, but small.  The center continually hangs by a financial thread.  Classes are shorter than I would like, which means lessons have to be more focused and less improvisational.  But I have managed to bring in the occasional colleague for higher level training at the new stuff.  The first time, I lost my shirt.  The second time, I broke even. 

Things are better.  I'm better.  I'm a better budoka, I think.  I hope I am a better teacher. 

I don't think that much about my old colleagues, except when one of them puts out a relevant Facebook blast.  Last month, it was a party to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of my old dojo.  I was not invited, even though I probably did more to establish the place and keep it going (for nearly half of its history) than anyone except for Sensei himself.  That stung.  It did.  After five years, one would think things would have settled down, but nah. 

On the other hand, I have settled down.  And I believe (I hope) that I will continue to practice, and learn and teach.  And try to be a good student in honoring the memory of my old teacher, whatever else comes.

Combat effectiveness

People who see us demonstrate often remark that our budo is beautiful, but, they think, impractical.  I am generally more than willing to concede that in their estimation of "practicality" they are correct.  We don't carry swords and engage in duels anymore.  Some of my colleagues posit that the major and most important goal of the study of iaido and other budo styles is "self-improvement."  In previous posts I have taken issue with this idea - I don't discount that one who trains with a sincere heart and reads the right accompanying texts can work some positive transitions in her life.  However, I don't think budo (1) automatically confers improvement, or (2) is the best vehicle to gain self-improvement.  In fact, practice of budo wherein the point is simply to improve physical skill without considering any underlying personality issues can either leave practitioners kind of as they are, or, worst case, make them worse.  A violent personality is bad enough; arm that violent personality and there is potential for real trouble.

Recently I read an interview given by a senior koryu practitioner, an American who spent many years in Japan training in modern and traditional dojo.  His bottom line of training is that it be practical over every other consideration.  I give him points for not falling into the "make me a better person" trap, which I think is an over-used excuse for learning to enjoy the practice of controlled mayhem that is budo.  However, lurking in his commentary is the idea that kata-based budo (which mine is) somehow lacks practicality. 

As I said, when it comes to the idea of a technique being "street worthy," iai comes up as a big, fat zero.  In the first case, iai kata training is meant to introduce practitioners to hypothetical responses to hypothetical situations.  Naturally, at the time when swords were practical weapons, meant to be used, the kata was merely a training tool to a more practical end.  Its slow, meticulous nature was meant to train people in techniques that, in practical use, were neither slow nor meticulous.  Being able to analyze an opponent's attack and react with a counter while bypassing conscious thought is also considered a benefit of practice, though the evidence supporting this assertion remains somewhat anecdotal, at least for now.

As the practice evolved, and swords became less necessary on an everyday basis (and eventually disappeared as side weapons altogether), practitioners who wanted to continue to train had to come up with other reasons for pursuing the art form; hence the incorporation of aesthetic sensibilities into kata (I am talking about 200 years ago here, in case you wonder).  Eventually, health benefits and finally mental benefits were incorporated into training.  Modern budo became either a sport or an aesthetic or a self-improvement vehicle, or some combination of all three.  The perfection of kata performance became an end in itself, since, on a "practical" level, one did not need sword techniques to survive an encounter with another swordsman. 

But I can't get away from the practical - and I feel that my teacher would have agreed with me - that unless I consider the possible results of my actions in a practical sense, that the philosophical aspects of training, which he frequently mentioned but was never very explicit about, cannot be sincerely learned.  The controlled mayhem that we practice in kata should give us not only improved timing, and improved physical fitness, and an improved sense of concentration, it should also remind us of the fragility of humans when it comes to sharp objects and the speed with which things done in the wrong spirit (whether angry or just plain stupid) can go badly awry.  It also means knowing when to quit - realizing that staying in a fight when you know it will end badly is an error in judgment that will benefit no one. 

So perhaps iai is not as practical as free-sparring with a partner, or defending myself in a close encounter with a stranger, but learning enough to avoid the encounter altogether has to be considered the most practical application of all.