Well, my history was different. My siblings and I were subject to bullying as a young kids, and I don't know about J. Brown's history otherwise, but the point where a kid fights back is where the bullying generally stops. Like J. Brown, I too don't think of violence as the
first thing when in an altercation, and in the intervening years between the time I fought back against a bully and now I have learned very much about the proper applicatoin of
power.
Power, authority, and responsibility are a three-legged stool of a metaphorical sort; you can't have any two legitimately without the third, and to abjure any one of them, as
Rollo May pointed out, is inherently unhealthy for people. Understanding this and embracing it is an important key to healthy relationships, organizations, and societies.
And at some point the proper application of power may need to be the application of violence to eliminate the possibility of greater harm. That is the principle of budō (武道), and why for a very long time I've understood that there was an undercurrent of unrecognized hypocrisy or at least ignorance in the dogmatic pacifist. I too was a dogmatic pacifist once, one who thought he was "unlucky" to have been bullied as a young kid, perhaps as a means of rationalizing or forgetting the fact that real abuse had been done to me.
Somewhere along the line I realized that there were entire strains of human experience unknown to me in the manner that Henry Miller noted that where he came from, Brooklyn, the notion of
temperate climates was unknown. Long Island, my home region, borders Queens which borders Brooklyn. The notion that you can walk down any street, and firearms notwithstanding, nobody will mess with you and you have no need to mess with them is a very temperate climate indeed.
J. Brown, and
Nathan later in his post get to the point that there is aspects of harm to one's self that arise from a yoga practice from time to time. I had to really chuckle at this bit from Brown:
I remember a particular occasion when I was teaching one of my trademark
power vinyasa classes. I was barking out my well prepared sequence and,
instead of my usual attention to everyone’s alignment, I happened to be
noticing the facial expressions of the people in my class.
They
looked miserable. They were filled with struggle and strain, just doing
their best to get through and not enjoying themselves much in the
process. There was a distinct lack of joy.
Afterwards, several
students came up to thank me and tell me how great the class was. It
made me feel uncomfortable. Walking home, I kept thinking: “What am I
doing?”
One of the most temperate aspects of the martial arts training I've been receiving is just how very very different it is from the "regimented" types of martial arts practice (forms, uniforms, etc.) that's so common in other schools. But the thing that really hooked me on this way was not just that (though at 54, with my own Zen teacher, and with the forms of Zen, I don't need more excuses for forms). It was the
attitude of teacher and participants.
There was frequent from-the-belly
laughter. There's laughter because the old
sifu can take somebody twice his size and three times his weight and throw him across the room, everyone knows it, the guy is as gentle as a kitten, but in the course of showing one how and why a particular move should be done
exactly a certain way there's this weird mechanical magic that is just astounding. There's laughter because we're so much younger than he, and we're so incompetent at this (and I am among the most incompetent). And there's laughter because we incompetents occasionally see that we've had this power all along; we just didn't know how to use it, and when we get a glimpse of it, a glimpse of being able to practice this magic, it's knee-slapping funny because it makes a mockery of all the preconceptions we've had about ourselves all our lives, at least those regarding how we were physically present in the world.
In short, I have
fun doing this. And I don't know about yoga, but I do know that the only way to get better at what I'm doing is practicing, but practicing without expecting perfection in each attempt, just attempting an iota of improvement. I feel sorry for those Marine boot-camp yoga and martial arts ways. They have too much extra baggage, I think. But I do also think embedded into their harm situation may be a condition of a distorted notion of power, authority and responsibility.
I don't know, maybe I'm lucky; (see "unlucky" above); I think I am to have at least once in my life, found a teacher who can do this, and fellow students who are patient with my incompetence.
Update:
It's also interesting to read
Brad Warner's piece on juggling and Ken Wilber and prowess on the "Suicide Girls" site (
which I got from his regular blog). I share his displeasure towards someone "like Ken Wilber who does tricks — ones that nobody can
ever even verify he’s accomplished, by the way — [and makes] tons more money
than that street juggler down on Venice Beach who does something far
cooler." But I would part ways a bit with Warner based on what my Zen teacher's my the Wing Chun teacher's attitude towards the student, and heck, any good teacher (which, I think Warner may think he is). That is, the whole point of Rinzai
teaching practice - and Wing Chun
teaching, (that is, what the teachers
do in teaching) as I've experienced it is, physical and mental disabilities notwithstanding in the latter case,
you can do it too! That's why it's often very funny - because I never really thought it might be
possible to heave a big linebacker across a room with my hand. But today I realize it might not entirely be out of the question someday, given the right confluence of circumstances. And that's funny.
The juggler and Ken Wilber, and the yoga marine drill sergeant - imply what they do is way, way beyond your skill.
But it isn't. It's just likely that you never studied juggling, Wing Chun, or fancy electronic brain tricks.
You know, it's like magicians' magic. You don't have to kill yourself or make tons of money to do something, but you can have fun, become more mindful, and more psychologically whole. And you can laugh, too.
