About three weeks ago I hosted my first Eikenkai session in almost exactly a year. The session was highly successful (I think!), and I realised (afterwards) that for the first time in while my kendo-life is better than I supposed it was.
My job transfer last year – after working for 17 years in the same place – was quite a jolt to say the least, causing me not a few problems… more about that below. First, let me start with a mini overview of the Eikenkai session.
EIKENKAI (February 11th 2026)
Over the weekend of the 6th-8th we had snow! In the two decades I’ve lived in Osaka I never saw snow fall as much, and even when it did flurry for a bit, the snow never stated overnight. This time was different. Unfortunately, however, the snow didn’t continue until the day of Eikenkai (Wednesday the 11th of February), instead we got cold rain.
Despite the rain, a fair number of kenshi rolled up for keiko in my new workplace – 45 – including three hachidan, a past WKC winner, a past All Japan Teachers competition winner, four university kendo teachers (two shihan, two proffessors, all different universities), some school teachers (including one principal), the odd policeman, a couple of university student (including one of my ex-students), a bunch of normal, “civilian” kenshi, plus my current high school club students.
Keiko was the standard affair of 40 mins kihon, a short break, and one hour of jigeiko before officially finishing the session. After which, we did some extra keiko (another hour) for those that wanted it. Good fun. I crawled home happy after all that!!!
Hopefully I will be able to host another session relatively soon, maybe in May or June.
MINI UPDATE
Yeah, so it’s been a bit of a trying year. I’ve had quite a few hurdles placed in my way, and somehow stumbled through them (not over) to the end of the academic year. My biggest low came after the summer 2025 Edinburgh Kendo Seminar, when I seriously contemplated quitting kendo. The problem wasn’t kendo per-se, but my life suddenly got overly-complicated rather quickly… not only due to my work life and a long commute (100 mins minimum one-way), but also problems related to running a new kendo club, plus a sad and unexpected family crisis.
“Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker.”
What does not kill you makes you stronger – Nietzsche
“Calamitas virtutis occasio est.”
Adversity is the opportunity of virtue – Seneca
「身体の痛みは起こる。だが、それに執着する苦しみは起こさなくてよい。」
Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional – A modern paraphrase of an ancient Buddhist teaching
At some point during the last few months I sat down and asked myself three things:
1) All the hard kendo trainings I did over all these years, all the beatings that were dealt out to me, all the loses, all the kirikaeshi and oikomi, all that talk of “Shugyo” - had it not made me mentally strong?
2) How did I cave so easily in such a short time?
3) What is kendo to me? (re-affirmation)
In my line of work it is fairly common for people to fall by the wayside – many, many people quit and some melt into mental collapse. I’ve seen it with my own eyes on numerous occasions. “Was it happening to me?” I asked myself.
So, as I contemplated these questions (and more) over the months, I realised that, yeah, I’m actually ok: kendo HAS made me stronger, both physically and mentally. I was stressed, for sure, but I wasn’t in any real danger of collapse. I just had to pick myself up off the dojo floor and get on with it. It was as if I was doing 100 kirikaeshi and had lost count somewhere around 40.
I did use the opportunity, however, to discard or dilute some extraneous baggage, notably social media related (= facebook) and, to an extent, this website. I’ve also given up trying to “be someone” in kendo circles and accept anonymity. I don’t think I ever really “tried” to tell you the truth … but I guess this was some sort of hang-up I’ve had for a while. Maybe.
Anyway, my new club is going mostly ok (I have a good core group) and I’ve decided to (finally – after thirty years of koryu study and nearly two decades of teaching) propery organise my own koryu group. I say “properly” but it will be invite only and only for kendo people. I guess this is kind of exciting.
Whether I’ll write another article on this website again, I have no idea. For the moment I’ll probably continue posting on instagram, because it’s easy, but that could stop anytime. Who knows!
