“The real meaning of a grading is not showing off that you are awesome or showing off because you are a black belt. It’s for you to sharpen up your character by having short term goals and overcoming every obstacle, and also for motivation to go through a hard and long journey step by step with every grading.”
Toshi : We have been talking about S.A.W’s technique so far, but I think the best part of S.A.W is putting a big emphasis on improving the mind and mental quality too.
Aso : That’s right. I named S.A.W a Japanese name as well, and it’s called “Nihon Kansetsu-do 日本関節道” to remind all the students that we are not only doing a fighting sport. We are doing Martial Arts.
If you are doing Martial Arts, You must improve your mind and mental state as your fighting ability improves. That’s why we do gradings in S.A.W.
As your grade is going up, you will be getting mentally stronger, attaining respect, good manners, kindness, and responsibility, etc, so growing into a nicer person.
Toshi : Yes, I think that’s very important.
In the fighting sports world, it often goes the other way around.
People get rude, too arrogant, lose kindness, and become mentally weak as they are getting famous, higher ranking or a champion.
Aso : The real meaning of a grading is not showing off that you are awesome or showing off because you are a black belt. It’s for you to sharpen up your character by having short term goals and overcoming every obstacle, and also for motivation to go through a hard and long journey step by step with every grading.
Talking about the martial arts spirit, I’m going to tell you about this.
We call Martial Arts “Budo” in Japanese, and “Budo” is structured two different Kanji. “Bu 武” and “do 道”. If you look at this Kanji “Bu 武”, it’s like putting cross over two swords and then put another Kanji “止 (It means Stop)”, and “do 道” means “Way”.
Old Samurai used to carry two swords all the time, but they had to learn to control their reaction to people rather than killing people all the time. Samurais are not meant to be killing other people, but they should be making a peaceful society. So, “Budo 武道” means “Way of controlling emotions” or “Way of making peace”.
If you have two swords but can’t control your emotions, you would be using them all the time to kill people and become a murderer.
Sharpen your sword everyday, but don’t take it out from the scabbard, take it out and use it when you need to make peace.
Toshi : If you don’t improve your mentality, you will be hurting other people and become criminals even if you become a good fighter.
Aso : That’s right. Then when you think about improving the mind and mental quality, persistence becomes very important.
Whatever you do, if you keep doing one thing, usually a lot of obstacles come into your journey. When you overcome those obstacles and keep going, you get mentally stronger and you can learn a lot of great things.
Toshi : That’s very true. Most people get bored with one thing very quickly and quit, or give up and run away very easily when it gets a little bit hard, then using every excuse to justify themselves, so they never get mentally stronger or never learn something important.
Aso : As everyone knows, persistence is also very important to master.
There is a famous word “心技体” “Shin, Gi, Tai” “Mind, Skill, Body” in the Martial Arts world. It means you have to achieve a good balance of those 3 qualities in martial arts, but when I write my autograph, I usually write this word instead. “必技極” “Hitsu, Gi, Kyoku”. That means “Be sure to complete your technique”. I made that word, and what I meant is like this.
When you are young and still just learning, or still competing, “Be sure to finish by your technique”. Don’t try to win by points, make sure to win by submission. If it is an MMA fight, make sure to win by KO or submission.
When you try to get it, make sure to get it!!
Then, the next stage is when you grow older or when you stop competing, make sure to keep training, and “Be sure to complete all techniques”. Martial Arts techniques are so many, and some techniques are hard to attain. You can’t attain all of them in only a few years. if you go back to basic techniques, you can still learn something new all the time, so make sure to keep practicing and attain all those techniques, or “Try to master your mentality”, or “Try to master teaching other people”.
The older we grow, we should be getting better at everything.
So, to master something, we must keep going.
To be continued Part 3, “About when Shihan Aso was competing and when he went to train at different martial arts gyms.”
