Z A N S H I N
BY
Dick Morgan
The
Middle Aged Martial Artist
The martial arts are among the few activities that continue to
challenge the individual the
longer he or she studies. Regular
practice rewards the diligent student for many years, providing one receives
quality instruction. And, of course,
providing one survives.
Eventually, inevitably, the serious long-term martial
artist will one day come to that magical change-of-life called “middle age”, a
cruel euphemism for those of us who probably won’t reach the age of 110. There are a few subtle clues that one is
approaching middle age:
·
You get beaten in
the regionals by someone who hangs out with your kids;
·
You’re thrown
hard onto the mat, and it takes more than one person to help you up;
·
You have more
invested in back supports and knee braces than you do in your uniforms;
·
Recovery from a
party takes more than a week, and it was a dull party;
·
You’re winded in
class, and it’s only the end of the warm-ups;
·
People stop
saying, “You’re looking good”, and start saying, “You’re looking well”;
·
Tai Chi begins to
makes sense.
Certain kinds of change are
inevitable in people as they age; metabolism slows; fat utilization is less
efficient; the senses, such as eyesight and hearing, are not as acute. Limberness decreases, and reaction time
increases. Have I mentioned baldness,
wrinkles, and hair growing in weird places?
In our youth oriented culture, the average middle-aged person knows a
lot more about invisibility than the average ninja. As dreams become supplanted by memories,
goals become short term, such as surviving until payday. Some days, things just look, well, sort of
terminal.
But wait! That’s
really just an emotional reaction to an ongoing process with a lot of
variables. The next half or more of our
life need not appear so bleak. In fact,
life past the age of 40 can be the most fulfilling and joyous of our
lives. However, there are some rules.
1. Internalize your practice. No matter what the middle-aged person chooses
to practice—martial arts, golf, fishing, or painting—he or she will need to
seek goals which substantiate his own personal view of the world, and
himself. One eventually realizes that
happiness, fulfillment, inner peace, and vibrant health are all very personal
and subjective. One becomes less
interested in, and less vulnerable to, the unsolicited opinions of others. Which is very fortunate, because outside the
dojo, the middle-aged person is often ignored anyway.
2. Habitualize your practice. You should practice every day,
preferably at the same time
every day, so that it becomes automatic.
It becomes a priority. Well, hey,
it’s time for practice; sorry, you can’t stay and argue with your teenager, or
stress yourself out on one last business detail. Because, if you make practice a second
priority, that’s exactly what you’ll do—something else. And before you know it, you’ll be
someone else. Middle-aged people have a
predilection for ritual. Making practice
a daily ritual is a way of saying, this is who I choose to be. And being the kind of person you choose to be
is a central theme of the martial arts.
3.Take
control of your lifestyle. This is
possibly the most subtle and
yet the most difficult for the middle-aged
person to understand. When a person is
20, he can party one day and compete the next.
Not so, when you’re 45 or 50. You
either party, or you prepare for your next practice; not both. As you age, you either eliminate practice, or
you eliminate those activities which interfere with it; you quit smoking, quit
destroying your vital organs with rich foods, alcohol, or drugs. You eat less red meat, less sugar, less
caffeine, less of everything, actually.
You get your increasingly needed beauty sleep, try to reduce your stress
load, and you practice whenever possible.
Think about this: cigarettes
don’t kill young people; they start to kill people when they get to be oh, say
about your age. Also remember that while
drugs, alcohol, and rich foods only sometimes mess you up, they always take the
edge off your practice. It’s a matter of
choosing who you are outside the dojo as well.
4. Set realistic goals. All of us need our future dreams to help us
pull
ourselves through the crises
we face each day. For some, it might be
a long vacation. For others, it might be an accomplishment such as
publishing a novel, or a major purchase, such as a new house, or a big
sailboat. We all look forward to
something. But as we age, we need to
re-evaluate those goals. Just as over
time, we learn not to use sentences that begin with “When I win the
lottery…” we have to resign ourselves to
the fact that we will probably never compete in the Olympic Games. We probably won’t become rich or famous, be
the next Chuck Norris, Poster Man of the Year, or Playmate of the Month—unless
we have already. What we will become
is more comfortable with who we are now.
And our dreams will reflect more modest and attainable goals—paying off
the bills, kicking the last offspring out of the house, retirement to someplace
sunny, staying active and fit.
I
remember the story about the Taoist monk, who on his 90th birthday, looked
as young and spry as a man half his age.
Asked the secret of his longevity, he replied, “I always assumed I would
live to be 100, so I made plans accordingly”.
5.
Accept change (but you need not encourage it). Certain aging processes are inevitable; we
lose a small amount of our stamina, our quickness, our acuity. Our bodies settle somewhat, and become
slightly more brittle. But what most
people consider the debilities of aging are not in fact the result of
aging. Rather, they are the end result
of life-long bad habits. Actually,
studies show that after the age of 40, people lose approximately 10% of their
strength every ten years. That means
that a man of 80 could retain as much as 60% of the strength he had in his
prime! The same is true of his
speed. Moreover, what a martial artist
loses in speed as he ages can be more than compensated for by enhanced
awareness and good timing. An axiom to
remember is that we do not lose what we continue to use. If we exercise our bodies and our minds
strenuously and regularly, they will function admirably well past middle age.
6.
Retire from competition.
Competition is a way of gaining external recognition—providing you
win. Otherwise, it invites comparison in
an often unhealthy way. At a time in
one’s life when one should be internalizing who he or she is, competition
begins to make less and less sense. Who
cares if we are Number One, as long as we did our best? And is it smart to get into the ring with
some teenager who is bedazzled by trophies, and hasn’t shown respect to anybody
your age for years? Moreover, this kind
of comparison is extremely discouraging to the beginning student if he or she
happens to be middle-aged. It takes real
courage for the older person just to step out onto the mat for the first time,
especially if the dojo he has joined has advanced black belts about the same
age. These people need individual
encouragement, not potential for negative comparison.
I should mention that I have nothing against competition
myself. I have “retired” from the ring
more times than I can count, only to drawn back into it because there’s
something vital and wonderful about a good fight. Actually, I think it’s the waiting that’s bad
for you.
7. Develop your
spirit. This is a touchy subject with
some people. Certain words and concepts
are universally—well, controversial. I
sometimes suspect that’s why so many martial artists use the word “Ki” so much;
it’s a way of not talking about the inner energy others might call spirit, soul,
prana, or life-force. But however you
define that vitality inside you, remember that the joining principle is the
strengthening principle. Join in, teach,
lead others into strength and awareness.
Helping those around us is a way of paying back the universe for the
bounty we have shared. And anyway,
adding positive energy to the world is excellent for the coronary arteries.
8. Maintain your
sense of humor. Humor itself changes;
when we are young, we think defiance is funny and slapstick doesn’t hurt the
unfortunate victim. As we age, we gain a
fuller perspective. Humor is a way of
diminishing hurt, a way of maintaining our balance in a frantic world. It’s a way of ordering the world you’ve lived
in all those decades in such a way as to heal, instead of hurt. You remember that failure is temporary. You remember after a fall, that you’re still
alive, and hey, your body rolled out of it all on its own, just like it had
been trained. You remember that the
money you save by not dating any more is now available for the chiropractic
adjustment you now need. And oh,
yeah—we’re having fun. After all, if
it’s not fun for you, then get off the planet—you’re breathing up my air.
9. Remember to stop
every once in awhile and congratulate yourself.
You’ve done an amazing job to get this far alive.
10. And finally,
make sure everyone you hang out with knows C.P.R. My father once told me faith, trust, and
charity are wonderful qualities, but it’s a good policy to always cut the cards
anyway. Always maximize your chances
when your survival is at stake.
You’re going to age anyway; you might as well do it safely,
sanely, and with some semblance of grace.
And you might as well have a good time while you’re at it, so grab your
gi and go to practice!
* *
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