Let's Dance!

Let's Dance!

One of the greatest lessons my Sensei, Mr. Paul Dean, taught me was how to 'dance'...He used to always tell me it was important to dance, and or blend, with your opponent. This keeps your opponent off balance and easier to lead.

To be honest with you, I never really understood this when I was younger. To me fighting was about getting in fast, furious and full of flurry and loud noise...well, add a few decades onto my body and now "I get it"...

A Warrior knows how to have what I call 'blended engagement'...this is what Sensei Dean calls 'dancing'....In Budo, it is about 'Ceasing the Struggle"...the Struggle contains a combination of fighting and running. When we struggle we want the situation to end and so we tend to either fight it or run from it.  It's the basic fight or flight syndrome....sometimes you win sometimes you lose...mostly you lose, though.

I see people on daily basis who struggle with anxiety, depression, addictions and life in general. They are fighting and running all the time...no rest. This leaves them feeling out of control and generally very tired and more depressed than before.  Teaching them how to do zazen, qigong, daily mindfulness and hypnotic techniques takes them off of fight and flight. It suspends it long enough so they can Dance!

When you Dance, you are full of life. Blended engagement is neither fighting your opponent (whether in the seen or unseen worlds) or running from your opponent. It is about embracing your opponent and embracing the situation, pleasant or unpleasant. Embrace it and begin to harmonize and dance. Smile.  Blend and float...and lead your opponent.  Aikido is a great example of this philosophy.  It exists in Karate and most Martial Arts...Tai Chi is another great example...Kung Fu for sure...I have had many of my Fu Chen bros 'dance me around' quite well.

Working with your opponent takes 'getting a feel for it'...sort of like riding a bike. You can talk about it but you don't know it till you do it. Watch the older masters...they 'know it'...

We can do this with our emotions and thought processes as well...even physical pain. There are many great ways to dance with pain and reduce your suffering...(read my book Black Belt Healing).

Like most good things, practice is paramount...but it is Fun! Dancing,blended engagement and/or harmonizing brings forth the joy inherent in our spirit...bring it forth!

Hands palm to palm,
Shinzen

Let's Dance

Sensei Dean & Me...199?

Do you fight or do you dance?

Sensei Dean would always encourage us to learn how to dance...not ballroom dancing, chacha or waltz, but harmonizing in step with your assailant. He would show us over and over how to move in step with an attack. He would maintain mai-ai, or the gap, to his advantage always moving just out of range to be hit, yet remaining in range to smack the crap out of you.

To this day I still can't dance the way he does...well mostly cause I dance to the beat of a different drummer. Sensei Dean is Sensei Dean. Shinzen is Shinzen. I finally found my own dance! What I learned is that I can't copy the man who took a skinny teen kid and turned him into a man. I had to find my own way through the maze of kata, kumite, sweat, tears and lots of blood (mostly my nose...I had a habit of running into Sensei's fist). I had to find my own dance...I had to listen to my own music and move to it the way Shinzen moves...and it is great!

Keep practicing your Karate, Kempo, Aikido, TKD, Kung Fu. You will find your own dance. Just listen to the music it plays, the rythym that sways and you will begin to move the way you need to move. It's there. Just let it happen...let's dance.

Hands palm to palm,
Shinzen