MASTERWORK

Yay, I remembered to look, and I found it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCEdrVqVkQs

Cassius Clay, AKA Muhammad Ali.  When I was growing up, Muhammad Ali WAS boxing, and a lot of other things besides.  He always will be.

This clip shows some of his superior footwork technique, the “Ali Shuffle”.  This is real black magic.  I’m not qualified to say any more about this one-of-kind champion.

Found a page of quotes from Ali.  Plenty of good ones but for me, this stuck out for some reason:

“A rooster crows only when it sees the light. Put him in the dark and he’ll never crow. I have seen the light and I’m crowing.”

 

TWO SIMPLE

A couple of days ago at work I was pushing a steel cart down aisles of publications, collecting samples for an upcoming trade show.  Not a difficult task, and I’ve done its like many times.  I was under average time pressure.  I felt average good, workaday version.  It was an average day and I was doing average things… but trying to be somewhat better than average, without stressing too much over life in general.

Just a fairly simple task that still had to be done correctly, and with dispatch.  And yet, around me hovered vague possibilities of anxiety, irritation, and physical unease, if I chose to let my spirit weaken a bit through lack of focus or simply catching an inappropriate mood.  I only have to pull orders a few times a year nowadays.  Most of the time I have other more specialized duties.  So here I was doing this infrequent yet totally familiar job.

And a corner of my mind observed myself with this choice of: in-the-zone perfection, or some form of disharmony.  And I was watching my movements a bit, to see if they were high quality, or careless and over-effort-ful.

And suddenly two simple words from taiji training rang in my being.  “Relax completely”.  And suddenly it really made sense for the first time.

We gotta do what we gotta do.  Stand up, work, cook dinner, whatever.  But most of us are reasonably lucky, no one’s shooting at us today.  If no true crisis, we can do best by relaxing.  Completely.  Mind, body, spirit.

My spirits rose a big notch when I finally felt the true truth of “relax completely”.  I had been a bit dense.  I needed to lighten up.  I saw that tension and effort had been hovering nearby me, ready to jump in and ”aid” me at a moment’s notice, if I started to sag a bit or conversely, get brittle.  I didn’t need these hangers-on dogging my footsteps.  I was perfectly capable.  And the way to be more so was to relax.  Completely.

It didn’t require me to flop down on a couch, or go get a massage, or take a nap.  I could stand up, move around, take care of business.  But in a sung way.

I felt some liberation.  People can laugh if they want.  I laughed too!  And though the next couple of days were bitchin’ hot and I had ten thousand things to do, I managed to stay more relaxed.  ‘Cause now I know what the standard is.  Two simple.  I always missed it before but now I might guess that relax is the yang, oddly enough.  “Completely” is the yin.

 

 

AN UNDERLYING FIRMNESS

In working with qi

The first thing to see is what

Holds us up at all.

 

THE SPAN OF EXISTENCE

Many, many thanks to Nosce te ipsum (”know thyself”) blog for finding and posting this clip.  I saw this short film a couple of years ago at the Exploratorium in San Francisco.  It was a temporary exhibit, they were projecting it on a wall in very large dimension.  It was riveting, and I never forgot it.

It is a journey outwards and inwards through our known universe, at the speed virtually of thought.  We are the launching point for the journey.  It graphically demonstrates us suspended between the microcosmic and the macrocosmic.

http://nosceteipsum.wordpress.com/2008/05/27/a-perspective-on-things/

 

CLOAK OF TIME

I am surrounded

By things about to happen

And/or not happen.

 

VIEWPOINTS

Water, Earth, and Air —

Fish, Man, and Bird each see what

They have learned to see.

 

THE SIMPLEST WEAPON

A while back I added Stickman’s Escrima Blog to my links.  Mostly because of my being an honorary Filipino (that’s an actual status, believe it or not) and as such I’m always looking to learn a little more about my adopted Bayan (homeland).  Plus it seemed to be a well-written blog.

Each time I check, which hasn’t been too often thus far, I confirm that assessment.  I couldn’t link to individual posts, but tonight I was reading “Dan Donzella Silat Seminar Review” on the front page.  I know nothing about Silat, never even picked up any info by accident.  But this piece caught my attention with all kinds of things that I AM interested in:

>>>”One of the key principles is taking the opponent’s balance. As Dan put it, a punch may miss but the ground never does. (An old Aikido teacher described throwing to me as “hitting the guy with an 8,000 mile thick punch!) Through the concept of triangles, the opponent is already assumed to have compromised balance. The Silat practitioner simply moves through the opponent to utilize that imbalance.”<<<

I went and took another look at the author’s “About Me” sidebar and it too was really good and interesting.  I actually do have two escrima sticks, cheap ones that my son and I bought at a Filipino-American gathering.  The stick… man’s oldest weapon (I don’t count rocks); and the simplest… beautifully simple.

 

FALCONRY IN CHINA

I’m reading a historical novel (takes place in 11th-century England).  One thing we sometimes hear about in historical dramas is the ancient practice of falconry or hawking.  Trying to find out a little more about this interesting subject, I located a good site by a native Briton named Alan Gates who has a lifelong love for birds (especially eagles) and their potential as co-respected working partners of humans.  Plenty of material here about traditional and modern falconry in China, other parts of Asia, and around the world.

http://www.avmv20.dsl.pipex.com/Photo%20Album/China/Chapter%20page.htm

 

THE INVISIBLE EGGSHELL II

Imagination, study, practice.  Three corners of the life taiji, that we hope will angle us onto the productive path — rather than fruitless tangents, or losing the trail altogether as time goes by.

I almost added “testing” and also “experimentation” to the primary recipe.  But we can include testing as a component of practice; and experimentation as an element of study.  And, imagination can cover needed “mental strength and flexibility” — one hopes!

So: a triangle method with a circle growing in the middle.  What circle?  Call it a circle of influence.  Say this is a circle that we want surrounding us.  Me influencing “taiji”, and “taiji” influencing me.  A circuit.  A cycle.  Like the Water Cycle in nature.

A circle.  A sphere.  An egg-shaped zone?  Perhaps egg is a good shape, broader at the base, taller at the top.  Or reverse that if needed, for changing situations.

But sphere is good, strong and perfect, and simple.  Containing the most of everything; especially nothing.  But shapes come and go.  So just call it a zone, zone of influence — and being influenced.  What am I talking about?  A zone that contains me; not too tightly.

Enough room to do things, to include the possibility of doing things.  Doing things now — as needed.  Wherever I am, if I’m awake, there’s a space surrounding me where I can do things at this moment; or the next moment.  It’s a here-and-now zone.  When I first “saw” this zone earlier this week, I came up with a descriptive name.  The is the Zone of Immediate Possibilities.  Or ZIP for short.

It’s my immediate time/space, mind/body localized neighborhood where I can do things now — or not.  It’s a little easier to “see” and has a more meaningful name than “the invisible eggshell”.  That’s why I’m happy with it.  If I can gradually make it more of a taiji zone, I’ll be happier still.

 

TRAFFIC COP

Last night sleep was a little slow in coming, and I used the time to consider the process of movement along the body axis, from the feet upwards; and also in reverse.

How do we move this apparatus?  Of course, we already know how to move around, and to do all kinds of things, so many things.  Why not just do them?  Well, I’ve explored that topic a little bit previously; I just can’t resist mentioning it again.  In one sense, the goal of our “meditative movement” is to make the moves unconsciously (assuming we can achieve that).  In another aspect, the goal is to make the moves employing full consciousness (assuming we can achieve that).

An overall aspect of consideration for me at least, is that I try to merge my “taiji training” with my “everday activities” as much as possible.  This isn’t specifically about avoiding regulation training.  Or even about enhancing my daily life.  In my mind, it’s just that I would like to eventually be good at taiji, and I’m pretty sure that that will require a major investment of time and energy.  So at the risk of kidding myself, I feel a need to be working on this stuff in some manner or another, pretty much full-time.

So…. a full-time hobby?  Interesting concept.  Doesn’t sound unpleasant.  And after all, isn’t the “hidden in plain sight” aspect, a big appeal of trying to become a gung-fu man?  (Or woman.)  One doesn’t wear one’s art on his sleeve.  But it is always there.  The rich man enjoys the feeling of carrying a thousand dollars in his money clip, as opposed to the ordinary man’s five, ten, or fifty.  But there are other kinds of riches.

So what the hell was I talking about?  Oh yeah, lying in bed, and thinking about… a line of automobiles.  Once in a newspaper I saw this feature where a high-IQ savant answers questions about this and that.  And the question was from someone who was frustrated by traffic delays and specifically, why can’t the “stoplight” process be faster?

Sure, we need stop lights at intersections.  And you’re not always the lead car, often there are several cars in front of you.  So this person had the feeling lots of us have had… you see the light turn green and it’s like, come on, let’s go.  But the car in front of you doesn’t move.  You look ahead, and see that each car from the lead car backwards, goes through this kind of recognition, hesitation, activation process before proceeding.  So it’s not like a group of race cars starting out.  More like a line of sleepy turtles, some times.  So you finally get to move, maybe even get some speed up… until the next red light.  That’s frustrating if you’re in a hurry.

Well, the answer-person very sensibly pointed out that when the traffic light turns green, what happens is usually reflective of good driving habits.  Even the lead car, with a green light, is smart to pause and check that it’s really safe to proceed.  The guy behind him, has to wait, and even then, does not follow him two inches off the rear bumper, but should allow a little gap to arise before moving out.  Same thing for the other drivers.  And that’s assuming everybody was actually paying attention and didn’t grow bored and distracted while sitting at the stoplight.

In short, this is a non-organized group of average drivers trying to function together.  It’s certainly not a precision team of air force fighter-jet pilots performing trained, tight-formation maneuvers in midair at high speeds.

But we want our martial arts to be more like the military air team. 

An iron bar moves all at once, if it moves at all.  It is all of one piece, and rigid.  We’re specifically told NOT to be like the iron bar, in taiji.

How about an iron chain though?  A chain can be a good model.  Its special qualities come because the iron bar has been cut up into segments, and each segment being formed to encapsulate an empty center.  And then these yin-yang units are LINKED in a chain, which is a line that can move in many different ways, can close into a mass, can open up again, stretching out, but only so far.  The chain can even go from straight to curve all the way to circle.  That is a very clever piece of metal.

Yes, chain is good and there are some other powerful examples available of things that can move, or be moved, and we wish we had more of their qualities in our own martial, meditative movement.

But last night I found myself fixated on the line of cars.  Because realistically, perhaps we are more like that traffic pattern, than we are like waves, chains, metal, wood, clouds, lava, tissue paper, or whatever model seems attractive.

One thing I realize now, those cars all have a different driver.  And the flight team, they have different pilots, but those have been highly trained to act as a unit, with coordination, understanding, and skill.

But maybe as I move my feet my hands and everything in between, I can even surpass those pilots, officers all though they may be, and top experts.  It’s work though.  I need not only their skills, but those guys don’t have to adjust and maintain and repair their own planes, they have mechanics for that.  I need to be the pilot, the mechanic, and the plane.

Kind of makes you realize why teachers are considered essential.  Every traffic cop has a sargeant, and a captain.  Otherwise he wouldn’t be very effective for very long.

Speaking of teachers, I did have a class on Tuesday night and Lord only knows why I didn’t blog about that.  Maybe next time!