JOURNEY - on Mastering Ukemi Daniel Linden (feel good novels txt) 📖

walking through mist and clouds and rain for the better part of the trekking day. We had yet to catch a glimpse of Everest. We sat at dinner that night talking about it and anxious to move on after our day of rest and acclimatization.

“The next three days are going to be the most interesting we’ve had since we started.” I looked at Christian and Curtis, Chris and the two ladies. “We are in better shape now, there’s no question, although I have to be honest, my knees hurt pretty badly. I can handle the kind of discomfort I’m experiencing, it isn’t new. I just need you to understand from here on things began to get serious. Tomorrow is a pretty good day and we will stay at a nice lodge on the river. It isn’t quite as nice in terms of the infrastructure – I mean here we actually have a shower we can use… but the day after tomorrow is a day that you will remember for the rest of your lives. The day after tomorrow we make that climb from the Dudh Kosi River all the way up to Namche Bazaar.

“I have only gone up that trail once. I have only come down that trail once. Look at me now, and believe me when I tell you I can remember every footfall, every switchback, every rock, every tree, the most amazing river valley I have ever seen, while wondering if I would actually be able to make it to the top. I mean that. I wondered at the time if I had the guts to go all the way.”

Curtis was amused. He was listening to me the way he listens when I lecture (or tell sea-stories) in class. He knows me well and is used to hearing sea stories and knew that this was a sea story. He played the willing participant and asked the expected question.

“How did you make it up the trail?”

“I watched a fifty year old barefoot woman who weighed about 90 pounds go past me carrying a pack that weighed about 90 pounds. Yeah, she was probably carrying her own weight. And she walked right past me and right up that damn mountain. How in hell was I supposed to quit then?”

Everyone laughed. They were supposed to. Just like they were supposed to remember the story two days from now when they couldn’t catch their breath, their muscles were on fire, and their knees were trembling with exhaustion. I wanted them to remember that old woman.

“Sensei, is this why you do what you do? Is this why you treat each of us individually and in such a way that we understand our limits because you test those limits? Remember when you decided to test Erik for third dan black belt?”

I thought back. Jesus, I’d forgotten. Erik was warming up one night in class and he seemed to be a little frisky, full of juice, so I sent him out to demonstrate some techniques from a straight punch. He threw one of the guys around until the uke started glancing my way and I knew he was getting tired. I replaced him and Erik kept throwing the next uke until that young man was tired. I replaced him and suddenly decided to make this Erik’s san-dan test. I have some standardized testing, but I am also known for impulsively testing how well one of my students can perform when the test is unexpected or unknown. Erik demonstrated techniques for one hour and forty five minutes without stopping or taking a break of any kind. When I finally stopped him I asked him to elaborate on the third principle of aikido. He started right in, without needing to catch his breath and after listening for ten or fifteen seconds I stopped him. That was it. That was the test. That was what Curtis was asking about.

“Yes, I guess it is. When you do aikido you should do it as if you are cooking in your kitchen or working in your wood shop. You don’t slam a pan onto the stove top. You don’t speed up turning from the refrigerator and going over to the sink. You don’t strike those eggs like you are cleaving a samurai in half with a sword. You just move at the correct speed and move in the right way. You can do this kind of activity for hours and not get tired out. Right? When you are doing aikido and uke comes after you with one attack after another, if you just keep your center and never let yourself get too excited and keep moving calmly you can do it forever. Uke, on the other hand is the person who is bringing the energy and consequently must give enough away that nage has something he can get a spatula or an egg beater on… so to speak. Uke has to expend enough energy for nage to experience it and guide it. It is why you cannot be uke for an hour, but you can be nage until the cows come home.

“This is why I keep referring to this journey as ukemi, not aikido. We are attacking the mountains every day and giving up our energy to them. We are sacrificing our power and life force to become one with them and to experience them. If we were doing aikido we would still be in Orlando waiting for something to happen.

“Aikido is not the act of a pacifist, but it is a passive act. It does not generate or add energy to an encounter. It only dissipates the energy that is contributed by the uke. We absolutely must bring everything we have to this encounter with the high Himalaya because it is not a forgiving place. It will do everything it can to dissipate all our energies and leave us collapsed and spent on the side of a trail or a deep ravine.