C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

Fudo Myoo, the "Patron Saint" of Many Japanese swordsmen. Some History and Stories from the “Warrior Saints” of the Martial Ways      Looking back on my life, I often think of my first loves as a child.  Without a doubt, the first thing that I fell in love with was cinema.  In the ‘70s, my dad worked as a film critic for a local newspaper, so he saw everything that came out at the theaters—not as many movies were released back then—and often took me along with him if he thought it was something I would enjoy, sometimes for early screenings before the film was actually released.  I have the fondest memories of the drive-in movie theater only a block away from our house in the Ozark mountains of Farmington, Arkansas.  I can recall seeing Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars in 1977 there as if it was yesterday, along with every single Roger Moore led James Bond film to hit the screen.  It may be hated by critics, but Moonraker...

The Importance of Proper Breathing in Budo      I have been training in the Budo for more than 40 years.  In the last few years, I have been to a few dojos and I’m sad to say (or write in this case) that modern budokas don’t know how to breathe.  Most of them aren’t taught how to breathe in the first place, so they’re not even aware that there is a way that a budoka should breathe.  This is typically because the teachers in these dojos weren’t taught it themselves.  When they are taught breathing techniques, it’s only on a superficial level, such as to breathe in through their nose and out through their mouth when executing a technique in practice, whether it’s a block, punch, or kick.  But there is more to breathing in Budo than this, and that may not even be accurate, either.  There are different ways to breathe, depending on the technique and the art.      The one thing that I’ve noticed modern budoka a...

History and Application of Budo as an Other-Power (Tariki) Practice      In Japanese philosophy, the concepts of “self-power” ( jiriki ) and “other-power” ( tariki ) have always fascinated me.  Primarily a concept found within the Jodo Shinshu sect of Japanese Pure Land Buddhism, it has made its way into Japanese philosophical thought as a whole.  At first glance, it seems rather straightforward, but as one delves deep, you find that there is more to it than first meets the philosophical eye.  And as one practices , you find that the lines begin to blur, until eventually you cross over into a new way of seeing, of looking, and of being your Budo training that you wouldn’t have thought possible when you first took up the martial ways.  You come to realize that Budo training isn’t as much of a self-power practice as you had assumed.      At first, it may even seem absurd to think that Budo is a practice of other-power...