KI POWER CULTIVATION, Part TWO

 

The Budo Secrets of Internal Energy from the Master Samurai Kaibara Ekiken

This quote from Lao Tzu is one that Ekiken himself quotes in the Yojokun.

Part Two
Controlling Inner Desires

In all things, if you are unendingly diligent, you will undoubtedly see an effect.  For example, if you plant seeds in the spring and nurture seeds in the summer, surely there will be a large harvest in the fall.

Similarly, if you make an understanding of how to care for your health and continue to do so for some time, you will definitely see effects: your body will become stronger, you will become free of disease, you will not only maintain your natural lifespan but lengthen it, and you will enjoy your life.  You should not doubt this principle. ~Kaibara Ekiken*

I begin this second part of the series with this quote from Ekiken, which occurs toward the beginning of his “ki power masterwork” the Yojokun.  I wanted to begin with this quote for the simple reason that it gives you a good overview of how to approach reading Ekiken, and then how to apply his principles.  In other words, you shouldn’t approach this work, and expect to reap the benefits, without understanding that you must practice daily, and do so for an extended period of time.  However, if you do this, then you will, eventually but sooner rather than later, begin to reap the benefits.  Just realize that it does take time to see results.  You must first plant what it is that you want to reap, and then you must nurture and cultivate these seeds after planting.  In the same way, you must first let what Ekiken writes seep into your sub-conscious—you must think about it, contemplate, ponder, and ruminate over it—and then you must apply it.  Once you begin to apply these principles, you have to keep applying them day in and day out; stay consistent, and the results will come.

If you have been a budoka (one who practices the martial arts) for any lengthy period of time, then you should see how this is analogous to budo training overall.  When you first entered the dojo, did you think that you would become a black belt overnight?  And you may have entered with this attitude, but if you stuck around, then you quickly discovered that budo training is a pursuit that—if success is to truly occur—must be practiced, nurtured, and cultivated over years of training.  The difference here is that Ekiken is asking you to take that same attitude and apply it to every aspect of your daily life.

The first principle of the Way of Nurturing Life is avoiding overexposure to things that can damage your body.  These can be divided into two categories: inner desires and negative external influences.  Inner desires encompass the desires for food, drink, sex, sleep, and excessive talking, as well as desires for the seven emotions—joy, anger, anxiety, yearning, sorrow, fear, and astonishment.

In the same passage, Ekiken continues to write about what encompasses “negative external influences” but we will save those musings for a later entry, since Ekiken doesn’t discuss many of those aspects of ki cultivation until later in the work.  For this one, I want to focus only on those things that Ekiken labelled “inner desires.”  In Budo Zen speak we could call these desires “sensory pleasures.”  These are often the kind of desires that are really nothing more than “short-term pleasures” as opposed to more lasting forms of happiness.  When my children were teenagers (and going through many of the things young men will go through as they are “coming-of-age”), I would often tell them, “Don’t trade long-term happiness for a short amount of pleasure.”  (As an older, wiser relative once told me, “Don’t trade a good woman back home for a fling at the beach.”)

You can take the same kind of attitude with regards to your body and physical health.  Of course, there is nothing wrong with indulging occasionally but you need to understand that if you are consuming or indulging in food, drink, or other things simply for pleasure, then you will most likely pay for it in the long run.  You may feel good now, but when you are older, your physical health will be in such a state that you will wish that you took better care of it while you could!

Let’s take a look at the specific principles that Ekiken stressed for controlling these injurious inner desires:

• You should eat and drink moderately, avoiding excess.

• You should not eat food that might possibly damage your stomach and intestines, thus making you sick.

• You should be careful with sexual desire, valuing your essential energy.

• You should caution yourself about sleeping for long periods of time; you should not lie down at inappropriate times.

• You should not sit at ease for long periods.

• From time to time, you should move your body and circulate your ki.  Especially after eating, you should take a walk of several hundred steps.  If you sit leisurely for a long time, sit still after a meal, or quickly lie down to sleep before digesting your food, you will become stopped up inside and bring on disease.  If you persist in any of these forms of inaction for a lengthy period of time, you will be unable to generate your own fundamental ki and you will become weak.

• You should always be unwilling to diminish your health.   Be sparing with your words and be moderate with the seven emotions, doing your best to diminish the emotions of anger, sorrow, anxiety, and yearning.

• If you are moderate in your desires, keep your mind level, keep your ki gentle and without violence, and remain quiet and unflustered, then your mind should always be at peace and harmonious.  Neither will you be troubled or distressed.

At the end of this section of the Yojokun, after Ekiken has discussed the “negative external influences,” he adds this: Observe these points with great care.

In many ways, you could sum up his “bulletin points” as keep the mind still and the body active.  This is important because, when you think about it, this is the opposite of how the majority of people live their lives.  Too many people keep the mind active but the body still.  How many people do you know who like to “veg out” after work by lying down on the sofa and watching television?  But this is simply injurious to good health—and certainly to ki flow—because it stagnates the body, and keeps the mind in a “hyperactive” state where it doesn’t come to rest in itself as it is.

Many budoka even take this same stance when practicing meditation.  When many sit zazen, it is common for them to think of it as a “mental” exercise.  The mind is to become “calm,” and in order to do that it’s erroneously believed that the body needs to be “overcome,” so whatever posture allows one to forget about the body so that the mind can become the central focus is the one that is used.  But true zazen is not like that.  True zazen is a much more physical activity.  Focus is put on the body, as opposed to the mind—body and breath, to be more accurate.  In doing so, it is the body that calms the mind down, and not the other way around.

For ki to be cultivated—and if you are to take the practice of cultivating your ki seriously—then the body must become your primary point of interest, not your mind.  Instead of letting your mind wander over a multitude of thoughts (as is its want), allow your mind instead to focus on the body as much as you can remember to do so.  Do this throughout the day, as often as you can remember, over and over.  When you do forget—and you will forget—don’t chastise yourself; just gently bring your mind’s attention and awareness back to your body.  Do this throughout all of your activities.  (Yes, I know I probably sound a bit like a broken record on this point, but the importance of consistency cannot be stressed enough.)

And be sure to move.  One of Ekiken’s constant refrains—and you see that even here at the very outset—is that movement is life.  At a later point in the Yojokun (and I’m paraphrasing here), he says that it’s best to walk as often as possible.  If one can’t walk, then it’s best to stand.  If one can’t stand, then it’s best to sit.  And the last thing a person needs to do is lie down.  Lying down for an extended period of time, Ekiken reminds us throughout the work, is always deleterious for one’s health.

As well as a mind that can rest in stillness, and a body that has strong ki through constant movement, Ekiken also reminds us that our inner desires must be controlled through what we feed our bodies.  When eating for ki development, he tells us that the first thing needed is moderation.  If we eat even good foods in excess—at least for too long a period of time—then our bodies will become heavy, and our ki will stagnate.  On the other side of that coin, you must not eat too little, either.  Without enough good, nutrient-dense food, there is no way that a budoka can engage in the hard practice sessions required to become a skilled budoka in one’s particular Way.

In addition to the amount of food consumed, Ekiken tells us to stay away from food that could damage our stomachs.  What kind of food does this entail?  “Heavy” foods and “junk” foods should not be consumed in large quantities.  For us in the “modern” world, this means staying primarily away from deep-fried food, especially deep-fried meats and deep-fried “potatoes” of various sorts.  (Almost anything thought of as “fast food” fits the bill here.)  And the budoka should also stay away from any purely “junk” food: chips, candy, sodas, cakes, pies, and the like should be rarely consumed, if ever.  In addition to deep-fried fast food and junk food, you should limit your “processed” food as much as possible.  Remember this (easy-to-remember) adage: The longer a food can last on a shelf, the longer it will last in your body.  Fresh fruits and vegetables, and grass-fed meats should be the “go-to” foods for both cultivating your ki and fueling your martial arts workouts.

By eating good foods, practicing regular movement, and focusing awareness on the body, your mind will become stilled in addition to your ki cultivated.  In many ways, the two (a calm mind and strong ki) constantly reciprocate each other.  Eating correctly, exercising regularly, and practicing various modes of body awareness naturally stills the mind, and makes it easier for the mind to be at ease, whether in movement or meditation.  A mind that is peaceful—truly peaceful, not a fabricated peace—will make for easier cultivation of ki.  Conversely, all these things (movement, nutrition, and body awareness) naturally cultivate strong ki in the body, and this ki in turn cultivates a peaceful mind.

It is an integrated practice.  To reinforce this, I will end with another quote from later in the Yojokun when Ekiken makes this same point himself.

The mind is the master of the body.  You must make this master peaceful and calm.

The body is the servant of the mind.  You must make it move and work.

When the mind is tranquil, it is replete.  It is joyful and without pain.

When your body moves and works, food and drink move through it smoothly, your blood circulates well, and illness is kept at bay.

*All quotes in italics are from William Scott Wilson's 2008 translation, "The Yojokun: Life Lessons from a Samurai."