Learning from the Golden Era Legends of Bodybuilding’s Past I was sitting in my recliner, laptop where it should be, on my lap, typing away at a transcript for a talk I’m giving this weekend at a writer’s conference when I just decided I needed a break. I like giving talks, especially if I can help and inspire young or aspiring writers in any way, but writing a talk is not my favorite thing. Giving the talk, I enjoy. The process of actually writing the speech, not so much. Anyway, I decided to take a break and write what I most enjoy, an essay where I just start typing away and see what comes out the other end. There are times when I plan out an article in a lot of detail. Sometimes, I do quite a bit of research, especially if I’m writing something such as a historical piece on Japanese Budo, but other times, such as this one, I just come up with a title, or have a basic idea in mind, nothing concrete at all , and then I...
A Freewheeling “Translation” of the Hagakure with Commentary for the Modern Martial Practitioner Book One: An Introduction to the Way of the Warrior What follows is a somewhat experimental post that I hope to possibly turn into a book at some point down the road. I thought I would use my blog to post over the coming months what will essentially be the first draft of the manuscript, in between my more regular lifting articles and my somewhat irregular Budo essays. I want to discuss, primarily, the history, philosophy, and practice of the martial arts as they are practiced in the modern world. To do this—the subjects will be free-ranging—I am going to use The Hagakure as a springboard. The Hagakure in English means “In the Shadow of Leaves.” It's a popular bushido text written by the 18th century samurai Yamamoto Tsunetomo to the younger samurai Tashiro Tsuramoto. It is a great text, and for many modern martial ar...