A Harmless Man...


 


Remember Bruce Lee's famous movie Enter the Dragon? 


If you are a martial arts enthusiast and you haven't watched it, you have to check it out!  

Near the beginning of the movie he is traveling on a boat out to the infamous island where this secret tournament was held. On the way there one of the competitors was goading Bruce to fight him. 

After much taunting, Bruce finally told him he'd fight him, but not there on the boat, over on the shore. Bruce suggested they he get on this small dingy so they could row to shore and conclude their duel. 

So this guy got on the small dingy, however, Bruce didn't join him, rather, he pushes the boat off stranding the man on the small dingy tethered behind the main boat that they were on. 

Bruce laughed as the man yelled at him. 

I remember watching that when I was a kid. 

What I didn't realize back then is that story comes from a much older source. 


The "No Sword School"


Born in 1490, Tsukahara Bokuden is one of the most prominent figures in samurai history. Over the course of 19 duels and 37 battles, Bokuden went undefeated, garnering a reputation as the most deadly samurai during the Warring States Period.


Then, at the age of 37, Bokuden became convinced that the true challenge was settling disputes without combat. In one famous tale, Bokuden reportedly incurred the wrath of a young samurai while traveling on a boat. 

When the young warrior noticed how unmoved Bokuden was, he was enraged and not knowing who he was dealing with challenged the old master to a duel.

Bokuden told him,

 "My art is different from yours. It consists not so much in defeating others but in not being defeated.”


Bokuden called this method Mutekatsu Ryu meaning:

 "To defeat an enemy without hands."

The young samurai saw this as cowardice and demanded satisfaction so he told the boats-man to stop at an island so they could do battle there. However when he jumped into the shallow waters to make his way to the fight venue, Bokuden got hold of the boats-man’s pole and proceeded back to deeper waters minus a now irate young samurai. 

The wise old master laughed and shouted to his would-be adversary,

 "here is my no sword school!”

Take the Wind Out of Their Sails

This is a valuable lesson...


It's hard to to duel with someone who isn't engaged in the battle. 


Think of how this strategy can be used in your personal and professional life. 

Think of how you can use it when someone trolls you online. 

Think of how you can use it with your kids, your spouse. 

...Life!


The PeaceWalker Way

As you may have guessed, this is the PeaceWalker Way. 

It's an interesting thing to note...

Both Bokuden and Bruce were physically capable of defending themselves. They didn't have anything to prove to anyone, nor themselves, so they could choose a more Peaceful way of resolving the situation, knowing full well that if push came to shove they could take care of business so to speak. 

More?!

Check out my Free Home Study Course here:


Let me know if you have questions. 


Keep going,
~Craig

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

An Uncomfortable Situation

Image
  Funny pic (and movie) about a not so funny situation… In training as in Life, it’s better to treat people with dignity and respect. However… What does that look like in the moment? Being that I’m teaching a Women’s Assault Prevention and Response Workshop this weekend - it’s probably a good time to talk about… Uncomfortable Situations Let’s talk about training at the academy for a minute… We run open co-ed classes at the local academy. What does that mean? Men and women train together, but we don’t stop there. People of different skill levels, backgrounds, ethnicities, sexual orientations, careers, religious beliefs, political affiliations, ages, injuries, pre-existing conditions, life experience, training expectations etc. etc. train together! We ALL work together! Overall, I think it’s better this way. Of course sometimes there’s static, you know, conflicts, and misunderstanding. When something happens, most of the time it’s just that, a misunderstanding… Sometimes people ...
Read more

What'd You Say?!

Image
  You ever have a conversation with someone who really lifted your spirits? How about having a conversation with someone who’s a real downer?! We spend a lot of time talking to people. Matter of fact, talking is one of the most under rated and under trained aspects of protecting yourself. It’s much better if you can talk your way out of a bad situation, rather than having to resort to some form of physicality. This is why we spend so much time on sharing effective communication frameworks in the PeaceWalker course. But All of that Aside… When we think about communicating, we often just think about talking to other people. We forget how we talk to ourselves! You may have heard it called, “Self talk.” All day long we talk to ourselves. We carry on an inner dialogue in our heads that only we can hear. Unfortunately, this means it's very easy to be hard on ourselves. There's something about privacy which makes it easy to say the things you would never say out loud to another living...
Read more

Cracks in Your Foundation?!

Image
  Last night we had one of our weekly coaching calls for the PeaceWalker Evolution Course. What a great call! Rob and Jenn, a couple of the Level II - Momentum folks (people who graduated from Evolution last year and came back for the second Level.), were tasked to run the meeting as part of their training. I must say, they did a stand up job! The topic of discussion was building an Unshakable Foundation. WTH is that!? It’s basically the way you live. Your habits. What you do in your day to day life. How do you train your… Body  - Your physical health Mind  - What you’re filling your head with Mouth  - How you’re communicating Heart  - How you foster your relationships Why?! Without a solid foundation it’s difficult to remain balanced. When you are not balanced, it more difficult to stay calm, cool, and collected, (especially) under pressure. As I often say,  “You can’t hide crazy.” (It eventually comes out!) Regardless… You don’t have to be in the PeaceWal...
Read more