I’ve heard it said that people who practise budo with a poor attitude either quit or change. When I look back (just a few years ago!) on my first days of iaido in Japan, I wince. Initially, my attitude was terribly poor; although I performed no worse than most beginners, I didn’t have the willpower to work really hard to overcome my problems. I was overly critical of myself, analysing my mistakes too much, when all I should have done was shut up and got on with it.
At some point, though, something clicked and I simply began training: no specific goals, no getting distracted by mistakes, no trying to pick apart the waza. Day by day, imperceptibly, I improved. It was only once I became aware of this gradual improvement that I began to grasp a little of the meaning behind the kakemono in my sensei’s dojo: 百錬自得 (Hyakuren Jitoku), or roughly, ‘natural acquisition through repetitive training.’ The meaning runs a little deeper than this (百錬 literally refers to tempering metal, and 自得 can mean ‘being paid back for one’s efforts’) but the translation above reflects the main sentiment. If you keep practising long and hard enough, the waza will naturally become yours.
This mindset became the basis for my incremental progress. I managed to let go of my distractions and got on with the task at hand, and my efforts were rewarded. Realising this also helped me come to terms with the fact that the longer I train, the more I have to work on.
The few short years I’ve spent training in iaido have completely changed my attitude, very much for the better. I know that even if I can’t see improvement, hard work will bring about a gradual shift in the right direction. And now I enjoy having difficult problems to work on – when I finally get something right that I’ve been struggling to do for months, it makes it all the sweeter.
When I entered my new kendojo this week, the first thing that caught my eye was the kakemono on the shomen. It read 百錬自得. My sempai told me that it was written by a sensei in his eighties, who had only recently passed hachidan. For such a kendoka, I can’t think of a more fitting phrase.
That’s one textbook piece of calligraphy right there. Luverly. Nice post too. b
Excellent post! Yes, just train and train, wholeheartedly, train. Once we get beyond goals and distractions, essentially getting beyond ‘ego’ we can truly begin to understand budo and ourselves.
“I was overly critical of myself, analysing my mistakes too much, when all I should have done was shut up and got on with it. At some point, though, something clicked and I simply began training: no specific goals, no getting distracted by mistakes, no trying to pick apart the waza. Day by day, imperceptibly, I improved.”
Thanks.
[...] phrase was hung on the wall of my original iaidojo. As I wrote about here some time ago, this phrase has come to mean a great deal to me. It essentially means, “by [...]