Essays and Thoughts on The Dokkodo Part Fourteen DO Not Pursue the Taste of Good Food Apparently not everyone agrees with Musashi, as the Netflix tv show "Samurai Gourmet" is all about tasty food! As with the previous maxim, here we have another seemingly straightforward maxim that must be - yet again - an example of how ascetic Musashi was, and (of course!) asceticism is not something that we can abide by in our modern world. So that must mean that Musashi was a little off , right? And since he lived such a long time ago, it must mean that we should only "take what we find useful, but reject the rest" (to paraphrase Bruce Lee)? I think the criticism of Musashi's ideas, because they are seen as both (a) ascetic and (b) "ancient," misses a couple of key points. First, let's tackle his "asceticism." I don't think there is any reason to NOT follow an ascetic life in the modern world. In fact, the reason you may want to follow
Essays on Old-School Strength Training, Classic Bodybuilding, Traditional Martial Arts, and Budo Philosophy