- Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be
extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness.
Thereby you can be the director of the opponent's fate.
- The softest things in the world overcome the hardest things in the
world. Through this I know the advantage of taking no action.
- He who knows does not speak.
Lao-tzu, The Way of Lao-tzu
- If training is hard, then winning will be easy, but if training is easy,
then winning will be hard. -Norman Harris
A Carrot, An Egg and a Cup of Coffee
A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how
things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to
make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling.
It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.
Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and
placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she
placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she
placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil, without saying a
word.
In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners.
She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl.
She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl.
Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl.
Turning to her daughter, she asked, "Tell me, what you see?"
"Carrots, eggs, and coffee," she replied. Her mother brought her closer
and asked her to feel the carrots.
She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the
daughter to take an egg and break it.
After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg. Finally, the
mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as
she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, "What does it mean,
mother?"
Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same
adversity ... boiling water. Each reacted differently. The carrot went in
strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the
boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile.
Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting
through the boiling water, its inside became hardened.
The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the
boiling water, they had changed the water.
"Which are you?" she asked her daughter. "When adversity knocks on
your door, how do you respond?
Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?"
Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with
pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength? Am I
the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat?
Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship
or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell
look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit
and hardened heart?
Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water,
the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it
releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things
are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you.
When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you
elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity? Are
you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?
- The Master said, "I am thinking of giving up speech." Tzu-kung
said, "If you do not speak, what would there be for us, your
disciples, to transmit?" The Master said, "What does Heaven ever
say? Yet there are the four seasons going round and there are the
hundred things coming into being. What does Heaven ever say?"
- To put the world in right order,
to put the nation in order,
we must first put the family in order;
to put the family in order,
we must first cultivate our personal life;
we must first set our hearts right.Power of the Mind
Confucius
- He who wishes to secure the good of others has already
secured his own.
- "What a gentleman worries about is to not leave a good
reputation after his death. If my proposal cannot be applied,
what contribution do I have to leave a good name for the
society?"
- In his youth, Master Moo Kwang was returning home one night
after practicing with his bow and arrow. When he approached the
entrance to the village at the South Mountain, he saw a huge tiger
waiting to attack him and his horse. The Master thought, "The tiger
is hungry and will kill us. Even if I run, the tiger will chase us down.
The only alternative is to shoot the tiger with my bow and arrow
before he attacks." He quickly pulled out an arrow and, taking
careful aim, shot straight towards the tiger. After shooting, he
turned and rushed towards his home. He arrived there safely and
concluded that because he didn’t hear the tiger chase him home
he must have killed it with his arrow.
The next morning, at sunrise, the Master went to South Mountain where
he had shot the tiger the night before. There he saw a large rock shaped
like a tiger with his arrow embedded in it. At first he was surprised that
his arrow had penetrated a hard rock, and then his mind became
arrogant and he believed that no one could match his strength and skill
with a bow and arrow. The Master tried to shoot an arrow into the rock a
second time, but it struck the rock and bounced off to the ground.
Last night, the Master was shooting from the level of the mind. In the life
or death situation, he determined that his arrow should penetrate into
the tiger’s bone, no matter how hard it was. The power of the mind was
what put the arrow into the rock. If the mind is in original mind, we can
display the whole power of our techniques. The ultimate aim of the
martial artist is to reach this level of the mind-world. When this level is
reached, we can truly be called Masters.
- Tzu Hsia said: “Someone who day by day gains awareness of his
deficiencies, and month by month doesn’t forget what he has
become proficient in, can really be called a lover of learning.”
- Mencius said: “People are eager to comment on something when
they themselves are not in the situation of doing it.”
- Mencius said: “Only when someone refuses to do certain things
will he be capable of doing great things.”
The Woodcutter
The following old story is one of the best examples to understand
harmony with nature. A famous thief escaped from jail and to escape the
authority he had to hide in the woods. As he was running, he stumbled
upon a lumberjack. This lumberjack had worked in the woods since he
was very young and was an expert with the axe.
The thief, feeling he had nothing to fear, let himself be seen by the
lumberjack. The lumberjack recognized the thief immediately because he
was so well known. As soon as lumberjack saw the thief, the lumberjack
thought that “If I kill him and bring his head to the authorities, I will get a
reward and never have to work in the forest again.”
But the thief, being so good, had trained in reading people's minds and
knew exactly what the lumberjack was thinking and told the lumberjack,
"You are thinking about try to kill me now."
The lumberjack was so stunned he did not know what to do. So he
started cutting a tree again. He thought "How can the thief read my
mind? I don't understand."
The thief again told him what he was thinking. "You have given up to
trying to kill me because you know I can read your mind now."
By this time, the lumberjack was so stunned he just could not think and
so he kept on cutting the tree. The thief started laughing, but suddenly,
the lumberjack threw the axe, catching the thief on his head.
The thief lived long enough to tell the lumberjack “I' could not I read
your mind?" Then he died.
The reason the thief could not read the lumberjack's mind was because
the lumberjack had lived so long in the woods cutting the trees with the
axe, that he had developed harmony between his mind, body and axe.
He had so stunned by the thief's reading his mind that he couldn’t
harmonize between his mind and body. But being in harmony with
himself and his axe, before he knew what was doing, he had thrown the
axe at the thief, killing him. The thief could not read the lumberjack's
mind because the lumberjack did not know he was going to throw the
axe until after he threw it.
- "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always
gotten."
- "In order to achieve victory you must place yourself in your
opponent's skin. If you don't understand yourself, you will
lose one hundred percent of the time. If you understand
yourself, you will win fifty percent of the time. If you
understand yourself and your opponent, you will win one
hundred percent of the time." - Tsutomu Oshima -
- "To spend time is to pass it in a specified manner. We are
spending it during lessons just as we are spending it now in
conversation. To waste time is to expend it thoughtlessly and
carelessly. We all have time to either spend or waste and it is
our decision what to do with it. But once passed, it is gone
forever." - Bruce Lee -
- By developing an upright mind and a strong body, we will
acquire the self-confidence to stand on the side of justice at
all times
- "Sword and mind must be united. Technique by itself is
insufficient, and spirit alone is not enough."
- Talk less than you listen. Say less than you know. Act as if
you are less than you actually are. Understand that what you
know is far less than what you don’t know and what you have
to teach is far less than what you have to learn. This will
enable you to appreciate your own true worth and the value of
others from whom you can learn. It is the first step to being
real.
- Information well practiced becomes knowledge. Knowledge
judiciously applied becomes wisdom.
- "A black belt is nothing more than a belt that goes around
your waist. Being a black belt is a state of mind and attitude."
- 1. Allow your opponent to walk away with dignity.
Phil Miano
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
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