July 2011
1 post
“It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the...”
– Mark Twain
May 2011
1 post
“Если бы люди заботились о достижении гармонии и во всем полагались на...”
– Хагакурэ
January 2011
7 posts
“A dress makes no sense unless it inspires men to take it off of you.”
– Francoise Sagan (via kari-shma)
“We were not a hugging people. In terms of emotional comfort it was our belief...”
– David Sedaris (via bbook)
“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in...”
– Marcel Proust
“Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they...”
– Anais Nin (via momopotato)
“It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.”
– Chinese Proverb (via quote-book)
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you...”
– Maya Angelou (via @johannal)
“[A]bove all let there be pleasure. Let there be textural delight, let there be...”
– Stephen Fry on not minding your language. From the same essay: “In life you have to explain wine. You have to explain cheese. You have to explain love. You can’t, but you have to try, or if not try you have, surely, to be aware of the astonishing fact of them.” (via bobulate)
December 2010
1 post
“We make a living by what we get but we make a life by what we give.”
– Winston Churchill
November 2010
2 posts
“All your anxiety is because of your desire for harmony. Seek disharmony; then...”
– Jalal-Ud-Din Rumi, Persian poet 1207-1293
“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in...”
– Marcel Proust (via toolkitsforuserdriveninnovation)
October 2010
1 post
August 2010
1 post
“[T]here are two kinds of purposes. The purpose of having a result, something...”
– John Chris Jones, Welsh designer and author of book Design Methods. Hurry off to read the full text. [via] (via bobulate)
April 2010
1 post
“The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
– Edmund Burke
March 2010
2 posts
“Its habit of getting up late you’ll agree
That it carries too far, when I...”
– The hunting of the Snark, by Lewis Carroll
“It’s not books you need, it’s some of the things that once were in books. The...”
– Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 (via colporteur) (via quote-book) (via ashalynd)
February 2010
1 post
“Everyone gets a certain look when I use that word. Moral. It’s a word with...”
– Synners, by Pat Cadigan
January 2010
18 posts
1 tag
“Junbi Taiso,” by Nev Sagiba →
In the equestrian world, non-riders, in a similar way like to think that horses are for sitting on and they can’t wait to hop on. They get dumped. If you don’t understand a horse from the ground up, you will never be a true rider, merely a bully with no understanding. In the few instances I’ve taught people to ride they do not get to sit on a horse until they are ready. If that takes six months...
“Life is like a gathering at the Olympic festival, to which, having set forth...”
– Pythagoras
1 tag
“Horse’s Prayer
To thee, Oh my master, I offer my prayer
My life and...”
– Equines in India
1 tag
On Writing Zen Combat →
“Zen ken shu!” my white-bearded painting and calligraphy teacher said to me one day. “Zen meditation is the sword is the brush! Understand one and you understand all. But you cannot come to understand one without the other two.”
1 tag
Three Techniques That Have Everything →
The three principles of aikido are kokyu-ryoku, tai-no-sabaki, and ki-no-musubi. Each of these principles is used to properly train and execute every aikido technique.
1 tag
“Aikido is for losers,” by Bruce Baker →
So if losing the attitude, losing the blindspot, losing the stupidity is what Aikido helps one do, sure, add it to your list of things to try out. Move it up on your “bucket list” you should have made when you were a kid realizing that you ain’t gonna live forever and there are things you want to do before you die.
1 tag
The Aiki Academy » Conflict and Conflict... →
When we can’t run away, aikido can give us another way to respond, a way that is neither fight nor flight. Aikido says: “Don’t fight. Don’t flee either. Let go instead. Let go of the whole situation. Go inside it. Follow it through. Use only your intuition”.
1 tag
“Long Term Victory,” by Nev Sagiba →
In most ancient cultures, lasting thousands of years longer than the stultified, limping histories we laud so much because of a few gadgets, their story survived all manner of attrition because of something that transcends all gadgets: Respect. In these true civilizations based on higher, more noble values of contribution, rather than mere fear of lack, it was mandatory to be a well rounded,...
“А с другой стороны, есть такие люди, шо у них душа как тот пацюк у подполе,...”
– Вернуться по следам, Глория Му
1 tag
Saving the Raja's Horse | Science & Nature |... →
The Hindu Rajputs resisted India’s Muslim conquerors for hundreds of years before accepting Mogul control in the 16th century. In that era of almost constant war, the Rajputs employed a legion of bards to chronicle their exploits—in songs of great horses as well as great men—tales so bloody they make the Greeks and Trojans of the Iliad look like Quakers.
1 tag
Thinking About "Dan" From "Dô(Tao)"
Endô... →
Grading is a means of objectively evaluating one’s capacity and progress by one set of standards. However, I believe that such a viewpoint has no relevance to seeking the Tao. For how far and how deep one has gone are internal questions that only the practitioner can answer. I have come to believe that it is impossible to measure each person’s depth in their pursuit using a fixed...
1 tag
“Кто не ездил галопом, тот ничего не знает о счастье. Галоп - это словно ты...”
– Вернуться по следам, Глория Му
Memorable quotes: Yukiyoshi Takamura on pacifism →
Some aikido teachers talk a lot about non-violence, but fail to understand this truth. A pacifist is not really a pacifist if he is unable to make a choice between violence and non-violence. A true pacifist is able to kill or maim in the blink of an eye, but at the moment of impending destruction of the enemy he chooses non-violence. He chooses peace. He must be able to make a choice.
Solo Training - Why Iai? →
Some practitioners of modern martial arts deride kata training, claiming that an adherence to form is inherently weak. They claim that one trains stereotyped responses by rote and repetition, thereby rendering oneself unable to respond with freedom to an unpredictable, random attack. On the other hand, one’s freedom is limited by one’s neurological organization — stereotypical patterns of action...
1 tag
“You Have To Understand With Your Whole Body,”... →
To “get” Aikido you have to understand with your whole body. This means DOing. Aikido is a DO so we must do before we can understand.
1 tag
Aikido (good summary article) →
Aikido is a Japanese martial art that includes techniques for bare-handed wrestling, using weapons, and dealing with the armed enemy.
1 tag
“The Rules and Limitations of Aikido,” by Nev... →
We live, for the time being, in a softened and protected society. This may not last forever. How you comport yourself in the face of more, shall we say, feudal circumstances, greater challenges the future is to bring, remains to be seen. Will we, under similar circumstances, have the moral integrity and far reaching vision to intend to BUILD a world, a family of humanity, as the ancients...
1 tag
Ki →
Ki means many things to many people. There are many ways of defining it, ranging from scientific and bio-mechanical explanations to extremely spiritual viewpoints, and people’s feelings about it run the gamut of complete disbelief to mystical adulation. O Sensei believed in Ki, and he apparently talked and certainly wrote about it a lot. He did take a rather mystical approach to it, which...
December 2009
3 posts
“Think you of the fact that a deaf person cannot hear. Then, what deafness may we...”
– Dune by Frank Herbert
“Suddenly, there was about Ford a sense of energy and purpose. “We’re...”
– Life, Universe and Everything, by Douglas Adams
“Every passing hour brings the Solar System forty-three thousand miles closer to...”
– Kurt Vonnegut Jr., The Sirens of Titan (1959)
November 2009
1 post
“Человеческая жизнь похожа на коробку спичек: обращаться с ней серьезно - смешно....”
– Акутагава Рюноскэ
October 2009
1 post
“The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has this to say on the subject of...”
– Life, the Universe and Everything, by Douglas Adams
August 2009
1 post
“Нет сомнения, что общее понятие совокупности людей обнимает собой различные...”
– А.Ф. Кони
July 2009
1 post
“How will you do that?”
“I’ll lie to him.”
“And...”
– Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card
June 2009
3 posts
“The world is all of one piece. He learned that the world is like an enormous...”
– All The King’s Men, by Robert Penn Warren
“Goodness. Yeah, just plain simple goodness.Well you can’t inherit that...”
– All The King’s Men, by Robert Penn Warren
1 tag
May 2009
3 posts
3 tags
April 2009
1 post
““The unknown,” said Faxe’s soft voice in the forest,...”
– Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula Le Guin