27 - Three Truths
TO THE READER
A man decides he is ready to die, and instead of despair, what fills him is calm. Not resignation. Something closer to freedom.
We spend enormous effort avoiding the one outcome that is certain for all of us, and in the avoiding we make ourselves easy to move, easy to frighten, easy to defeat.
There is a different way to carry it, and it was shown to Hanshi in a single startling i...
25 - The Bubble
TO THE READER
There is a comfortable place you return to without noticing. A favorite technique. A preferred side. A distance where you feel safe. You have rehearsed it for years, and it feels like mastery.
It is not mastery. It is a bubble, and you are living inside it.
The trouble with a bubble is that it feels exactly like home until the moment it fails you, and by then it is too late to lea...
24 - Never Offend Another
TO THE READER
You can know a thing perfectly and still be unable to live it. This is one of the quiet tragedies of being human, and the martial arts are full of it.
There are men who can explain peace with such clarity that you weep, and who cannot get through a single afternoon without conflict. And there are men who could never explain it at all, who simply are peaceful, the way water is wet....
The Kosho Chronicles