Confrontationality

Karate is supposed to make one more confrontational.  Not with others, though.  To others, karate is supposed to make us more tender, more generous, more curious, more compassionate.  Karate is supposed to provide the physical and spiritual strength to allow people to act without fear, to see things and beings as they are and not as our first inclination might lead us to believe.  We are more patient with others because we have the strength and luxury of being patient.  We can give others the benefit of the doubt because we are strong enough to survive a mistake, strong enough to learn from our mistakes, should our faith be misplaced and our good will be mistaken. 

No, karate is supposed to make us more confrontational with ourselves – more willing to take a hard look in the mirror and ask ourselves the questions we don’t want to face. Karate is supposed to make one less patient for self-deceit: the lies that people tell themselves and above all, the lies that we tell ourselves.  This is equivalent to a dodge or evasion in jutsu and karate teaches us quickly that an evasion alone is not true defense.  Evasion alone is only delaying; true defense is to confront the attack, to interact with the attack and to respond to the attack, not merely react to it.  There is an intimate directness that is explicit in the tenets of ikken hissatsu, of kobo ittai that leads to the severity of shugyou and shinken and vice versa and it would be a curious thing for a karateka to train hard to down an attacker at a stroke, or train with seriousness of life and death but then live a life of indecision and timidity.  No, a commitment to karate must also necessarily be a commitment to confronting the self: to scrutinizing the self, its habits and customs, its comforts and escapist tendencies. 

By making an accurate accounting of the self and in scrutinizing and reserving judgment for what happens inward rather than what happens outward there begins the establishment of the spirit that does not immediately think to run, to escape, to be comfortable, to be unperturbed.  The body that does not betray is forged with the mind that does not run, and ideally develops technique to penetrate obstacles – enemies, challenges – and emerge stronger on the other side.

Dirty hands

Is there any simpler mark of having accomplished something of worth today than to reflect upon the soot on your hands?  At a minimum, dirty hands tried.  At a minimum, they gave the effort.

Beyond the effort, though, dirty hands probably fixed something.  They probably cleaned something.  They probably built something.  They probably made someone's life easier or better tomorrow, perhaps their own, perhaps someone else's.

Dirty hands grasped the world.  Dirty hands engaged with the world.  Dirty hands pushed forward, made a difference.

Clean hands can make a difference, too.  But clean hands don't have to take things on personally.  Clean hands are washed clear of things and beings.  They eschew unpleasantness, and the things and beings that need the most attention are usually the most unpleasant.

Dirty hands are invested in outcomes.  Dirty hands understand that unpleasant things and beings today will become disasterous things and beings tomorrow.  Dirty hands make bad things better and are there to see it through.

Kiken, kitsui, kitanai...the other three K's of true karate.  Karate is meant to be dangerous, demanding and dirty.  But there are two meanings here.  Violence without rules has no reason to be 'clean' - subject to agreed upon behaviour.  Karate-jutsu teaches us to expect violence to be dirty and to be able to resort to 'dirty' tactics if it serves the cause of justice, protection and peace.  But there is that second meaning of dirty Karate: Karate-dou is the discipline that is invested in getting one's hands dirty.  Dirty hands that are clensed through hard work, washed by dedication, determination and sweat.  A karateka should wake with clean hands and go to sleep with clean hands.  But between those moments, a karateka's hands are meant to be dirty - to do the work that others won't or can't do, to face obstacles that cause others to squirm, to engage with the world head on, hands on, unafraid of the challenge and ever ready to pull your sleeves up and get things done.