Travis Eneix

Ukemi is, in Aikido, the art of receiving a technique and falling without harm. It means to fully attack your partner, continue the attack during the technique, and when thrown to fall well. One key to this is Surrender.

In the moment you are thrown, the other person is (hopefully) dedicated to the idea of getting the technique right. That may mean they are invested with their ego, or it may mean they love the art, or it may mean they honor your participation, or it may mean they are lost in the moment, or any number of other motivations. In truth it is more than likely a mixture of motivations. But, regardless of the motivation they are invested in doing the technique correctly, and that means you fall. Resistance at this point would mean being confrontational at the very least, it would certainly not be in the spirit of Aikido, and it may very well lead to injury. Those are bad.

But, if you do not resist, and instead actively participate you will not only sharpen your partner’s skill, but your own. And, at the very apex of the technique, that means Surrender. Complete flowing with the moment as it is. If there is the thought of, “okay, here it comes, now I am going to fall, okay I’m ready” there will be hesitation, non-participation and resistance. Resistance could also come in the form of, “they’re doing it wrong!” Or, it could be, “Hey, that cute person who came to watch class because they are interested in joining is watching me! I’ll show them how cool I am by not letting myself be thrown.” [Sidebar: That is the WORST possible reason to not take a fall, just an FYI.] Resistance could also be in the form of, “Yeah, yeah, here we go again, I have done this technique soooooo many times! I hope the teacher calls for another, less boring, technique soon.” If anything other than Surrender is present at the apex of the technique then your ukemi will be less than it could be.

For me, that is one of the key points of Aikido. That moment holds so much potential and power. When I Surrender, just at that moment, my fall is like a breeze passing on a hot day - it cools, it gently caresses me, and it reminds me of not only why I do Aikido, but it also reminds me of exactly why I am alive.

Of course, I knew she would. Last night was the last day of Kato Sensei’s most recent seminar at my dojo. As is normal for his visitis we had a group of students ready to take black belt rank tests. There were three shodan (first degree), three nidan (second degree), five sandan (third degree), and one yondan (fourth degree) tests. Busy night! There were also two godan (fifth degree) demonstrations by two of the teachers who got promoted this year. My wife was one of the sandan tests and she was amazing!

I had the honor of being her uke for the test. That means that I trained with her for several months before the test and took most of the falls during her test. It was great! The head of our school, James Friedman, wanted to see intensity during the exams, and judging by how my body feels today, the look on my wife’s face last night, and the reactions from the capacity crowd we had (this time we even had to have some of the friends and family members sit on the mat!) my honey pulled it off.  One of the highpoints was during the three person attack at the end of the test.  I was one of the three.  Her last technique was a straight extension to my face. I took a good fall, and she followed through.  Biunced my head right off the matt!  My head hasn’t hit the matt during a fall in seven years!  It was AWESOME!

A few months ago I joined the ARI Institute.  They offer a great many resources, and online classes for the study of Kabbalah, all for free.  They also produce some fun little videos explaining the basics of the Kabbalistic system.  On their blog today is an excellent argument for Sangha in the form of a discussion about free will - Do We Have Free Will or Is Everything Predetermined?  I hope you get as much enjoyment out of it as I did!

My relationship with food was skewed from a very early age. Rather than eating for joy, or pleasure, or companionship, I ate to get away with something. To sneak in too much. To have what I wanted. To steal. I was a thief of food. I would sneak a mouthful of chocolate the first thing Easter morning, and when someone asked, “What do you have in your mouth?” I would sheepishly reply around the mouthful, “nuffin.”

Not so anymore. I have taken on a structure to how I eat, and wrote about this a bit in the This is my Temple post. My life used to be one long gorging. Now, I get to have three meals a day for the purpose of continuing my life, and I get to be free from food stealing in between. Food has gone from being an anesthetic for me to being a celebration.

The Sanskrit word prasada has come across my path again a few times recently, and it reminds me of the proper place for food in my life. Food is an offering. It is provided by Being (God, Spirit, Brahaman, whatever) for the purpose of my life continuing. Food is fuel. Food is also a celebration and affirmation of life, and should be enjoyed. It is a direct message that my life should continue for another day. When looked on this way the act of eating becomes an act of communion and is a moment to remember the grace which gives me existence.

If you believe that Being is a distinct entity handing out the stuff of the universe and sitting above it all, then food has been provided directly and being grateful for the food you eat is the least you can do.

If you believe that Being is the totality of all that exists, seen and unseen, and the space in which it exists, then food is a taking into the body of a portion of that creation. Food is a redistribution of the basic stuff of what is into the form of continuing life.

It is when I forget the importance of food that I get into trouble, shove in volume and binge looking for something to fill the place of Being in my life.

I have recently re-taken a daily meditation practice. In line with my new method of being more gentle with the demands I make on myself, I have not dove in full bore. Instead, I am taking it at an easy, but consistent pace. I meditate everyday, sometimes in the morning, sometimes at night, sometimes both. My sessions are occasionally timed for 15 minutes, but sometimes I just “go until I am done.” I am trying to remind myself each time that there is a reason it is called a practice. It is the developing of a skill and the strengthening of a view point, it is not perfection.

There’s an old parable about meditation that I have always liked. It goes something like this: Imagine the whole of the universe as one mountain, impossibly immense. Once every millennium a bird flies from the edge of the cosmos, alights on the peak of the mountain, takes one peck with it’s tiny beak, then flies away. When the mountain is whittled down to dust, then will all sentient beings be liberated.

Each time we sit in meditation, the bird takes another peck. Some days the peck is slight. Some days the bird barely lands before skittering away. Some days the mountain reverberates like a colossal bell with the force of the blow. So it goes.

The particular style I am using is derived from The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. In a nutshell -

• Sit comfortably with back straight
• Focus on breathing for several breaths to quiet the mind chatter
• Actively witness my thoughts and turn attention inside to the inner body
• Breathe without focusing on the breath and Be

I find that as thoughts come up I can either stay in a watchful mode of my inner body and they pass by like clouds, or I can get swept along with them until I realize I am participating in thinking rather than witnessing, and then gently go back to witnessing.

In the interest of strengthening the practice I did some online research about meditation techniques and came across the Vigyan Bhairav Tantra. The Vigyan Bhairav Tantra is an ancient Indian text some 5000 years old. It contains a list of 112 meditations. I believe that the only way to get good benefit from meditation is to stick with one for a while to give it its full day in court. But, I also find it stimulating to compare with other methods.

With that in mind, I present the Vigyan Bhairav Tantra here for your enjoyment.

(more…)