A warrior knows that there is only one path.
In budo, there is a “one path” mindset which is called ichiro (一路) in Japanese. The further down the path we go, the more we realize that it is more like a monkey trap. Long ago, if a person wanted to capture a monkey, they would use a monkey trap which was a gourd or hollowed out coconut that was tied to down and that they placed fruit into as bait. When the monkey reached in and grabbed the fruit, their hand would become too big to pull out and then they would be caught. The monkey becomes caught because they aren’t smart enough to realize that they only needed to let go of their bounty in order to escape. Human beings have a similarly obliviousness because sometimes to have one thing, we must let go of another thing. In budo, the path begins as we train to fight. The more we train, the more understand that we are our own worst enemy and so training is really about mindset more than movement. It is here that we realize that the real the goal in training is the cultivation of inner peace. This is where it becomes like a monkey trap because if we focus too much on fighting, then we will never truly know inner peace. There is an old Japanese saying which supports this idea, “You cannot run and sit down at the same time.” Both are done with the body, but both cannot be done at the same time. One of the most difficult impasses to overcome is when we realize the that only true path was inner peace and so we must give up fighting in order to go further.
Today’s goal: What can you let go of in order to release yourself from your monkey trap?