Laughing & Leaping Through The Mountains

Keep up if you can!

That was the quick piece of advice given before we all took off running through the forest.

You picked your path running along-side sensei and the other students, using ukemi taihenjutsu to navigate around, over and sometimes through the rocks, trees, and bushes.

This wasn’t my first run, so there was an awareness of experience that some of the other first-time students did not have, which was an important part of the training. Being able to observe those around you, read the air so-to-speak and notice what was going on through body action as opposed to words.

Those that had danced before didn’t run at full speed, they kept up with sensei, but held a bit back- you never go one-hundred-percent, what if you needed to tap a reserve and had already spent it.

For those who’s first run this was they ran side by side, or even ahead of sensei, which wasn’t necessary, and nobody outside of him knew for just how long we would be running.

Body posture (kyu kamae) were also important in order to keep running and maintain balance. As one moved over the terrain, if your ukemi was off, and your kamae was off, each future natural obstacle became harder and harder to navigate. Eventually one either trailed off or got left behind.

It wasn’t just looking ahead for what was coming, it was looking beyond where one was going.

Eventually we reached a clearing half way up the hill, and one had a few moments, maybe a minute at most to catch your breath and refresh as sensei waited for those who get left behind to catch up.

You did your best to reset with the time you had, as the next lesson could begin at any moment.

Now it was different ukemi practice, dodging the incoming ring from the kyoketsu shoge and not getting tangled in the rope. There was a duality going on where one had to be able to keep the ukemi flowing without getting caught up in that, while at he same time catching the lesson of the kyoketsu shoddge, as it would be your turn in a moment to demonstrate with it.

Running, shoge practice, followed by running and shoge practice would continue until the lesson was complete.