“Karate is not a game. It is not a sport. It is not even a system of self-defense. Karate is half physical exercise and half spiritual. The karateist who has given the necessary years of exercise and meditation is a tranquil person. He is unafraid. He can even be calm in a burning building.” — Mas Oyama

One of the things I’ve most enjoyed about social media is the opportunity to interact with people from all over the world whom I’ve never met, but who share many of the same passions that I do. I have thousands of Facebook friends from many different countries and on every continent except Antarctica who share my love of Kyokushin. One of those people is Mac Robertson, the UK representative of So-Kyokushin. We’ve chatted a few times on Facebook over the years.

He recently posed this question on his Facebook page:

Karate thoughts: How do you understand the first line of the Dojo Kun? “We will train our hearts and bodies for a firm unshaking spirit.”

I wrote a short response to his question, but decided a longer answer was worth writing. These, of course, are just my own thoughts. Others may interpret it differently.

Reciting the Dojo Kun (school oath) is something that literally millions of Kyokushin karateka around the world have been doing for decades. Sosai Oyama was a great admirer of Miyamoto Musashi, Japan’s most famous samurai warrior. He also became friends with Eiji Yoshikawa, author of the novel Musashi. It was Yoshikawa whom he turned to for assistance when writing the school oath for the style of karate he named Kyokushin — “Ultimate Truth.” There is little doubt that Sosai viewed martial arts as far more than simple fighting technique. For him, it was a spiritual path.

Today there are millions of us — it has been estimated that more than 12 million people worldwide have practiced Kyokushin — who have recited the Dojo Kun and continue to do so at the end of training. I’m sure I’ve recited it thousands of times myself over the years. But Shihan Robertson makes a very good point: how many people have truly taken the time to think about the words they are saying? We often claim that karate is about more than just the physical aspects, but how often do we genuinely stop and reflect on that?

When I read Shihan Robertson’s Facebook post earlier this evening, the first thing that came to mind was the Mas Oyama quote I started this article with.

“We will train our hearts and bodies…”

Figuratively speaking, the heart is the source of our spiritual strength. When the heart is strong, there is very little life can throw at us that we cannot endure. The heart and body work together, helping us face difficult situations, remain calm under pressure, and keep moving forward when others might have quit.

We train our hearts and bodies to become stronger so that no matter what life throws at us, we are capable of facing it. Through hard training, discomfort, failure, perseverance, and struggle, the spirit itself is strengthened.

I believe this strengthening of spirit was Sosai’s ultimate goal for all of us.

It is through hard training that we discover what is really inside ourselves. The spirit of OSU. Perseverance. The refusal to give up when things become difficult.

That spirit already exists inside all of us.

We simply have to do the work to find it.

I’d love to hear your thoughts and interpretations of the first line of the Dojo Kun as well.

Osu!

“It may seem difficult at first, but all things are difficult at first.” — Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings