In The Footsteps of The Past

Yesterday, the family and I went for a hike at the Nobscot Boy Scout Reservation in Sudbury, Massachusetts. For those who have been reading this blog for a while, you know this is the site of the annual New England Warrior Camp put on my friend Ken Savage, who runs his own dojo the Winchendon Martial Arts Center and is the senior student of my teacher, Mark Davis of the Boston Martial Arts Center. Every year for the past fourteen years, Ken has put on the camp and invited instructors from all over to come and present a teaching segment – sometimes based around a theme, sometimes not. Over the years, thousands of people have come to this 3-day event, held each Autumn, and “explored, challenged, and developed their warrior spirit.”

It’s always a fantastic event and ken and his staff do an utterly amazing job of making sure that the Camp runs smoothly. For most folks, the visit to Nobscot is a once-a-year event, but I like visiting the camp at other times of the year for the specific purpose of walking in the past.

For fourteen years, the Camp has been a fixture in my life; an event where I get to have scores of experiences, lessons, and opportunities. Fourteen years ago, I’d only been studying the art for about seven years and had only just earned my first degree black belt during a trip to Japan in 1997 with Ken and Mark. Back then, I didn’t teach at the Camp – I was simply another camp-goer eager to participate in whatever segments were available. The Camp – as created by Ken – delivered countless adventures that have a cherished place in my memories.

But as is so often the case with life, our focus is often only forward-looking. What’s coming down the road? What’s happening around us at any given time? What are our goals for the day, the next week, or the next year. And I’m fond of saying that once something is in the past, it’s no use residing there any longer because it can no longer be changed.

As much as I myself like to keep driving ahead, there is great value in walking in the past – if only for a few hours. And by walking the paths of the Nobscot Reservation, it gives me the opportunity to remember precious lessons that time may have obscured or rendered less potent. As I walked with my family, I passed the Fire Trail where my good friend Rich Borgatti earned his black belt by belly-crawling up the side of a mountain and then having to endure a particularly grueling series of attacks. But you can read Rich’s full account of that night here, because for me to attempt to replicate it from my perspective as his senior would be unjust.

We walked past the Chippanyonk Fire Circle, where on Friday and Saturday nights, the instructors field questions from camp goers on the essence of warriorship, walking the path, technical questions from the art, and so much more. The conversations that have taken place there are priceless, and even now, the words of those many nights still linger in the rustling of the trees that lean in over the long cold embers of many fires.

Beyond, we strolled into the Ellis Lands, where most of the teaching segments have taken place. It’s where I’ve taught the majority of my segments alongside my close friend Paul Etherington. It’s where Ken built a long fire walk during one particularly memorable Camp. It’s where we’ve practiced intention exercises while surrounded by the dark forest on all sides.

Every step that I took with my family yesterday brought back another moment – precious fleeting instances from my past riding on the wings of a lesson, an expression, a comment, a smile – and another realization of the legacy I’ve been ever so fortunate to be a part of. As I watched my sons run along the same paths, and their laughter echo through the same trees I’ve come to know so well, I saw glimpses of faces from my past running and laughing as well. Some of those people have chosen to walk another path; others still walk the path with me. But each has had a place in creating the treasure that is my past.

When Ken created the Camp, he’d recently earned his 5th degree black belt and the Grandmaster told those who passed the test that he had just given them a seed. It was up to them what they did with it. They could put it away, and every so often take it out and look at it. Or they could plant it and let it become something truly incredible. Ken selflessly chose to plant the seed and let it blossom into the New England Warrior Camp. For fourteen years, he has labored tirelessly to provide students with the chance to experience aspects of Ninjutsu training that you won’t find in the safe confines of a dojo.

But he’s done so much more than that. What Ken has created with the Camp is a living, breathing piece of history – much the way the art of Ninjutsu is a living, breathing, constantly evolving martial lineage – one that continues to teach long after the actual events have passed.

Yesterday, walking through the woods at Nobscot, I got a chance to relive many of those lessons, to remember the joys of hard training, the chuckle of shared camaraderie, and even the wafting scent of the ghost of Ed the Cook’s Gumbo recipe.

Living in the past is a mistake; but visiting the past every once in a while is a great thing. For me, it helps me appreciate the journey I’m on, the places I’ve been, the kindred spirits I’ve been blessed to walk beside, and the lessons – so many lessons – that I’ve learned in pursuit of some greater ideal. Thanks to Ken Savage and the New England Warrior Camp, I have a place I can visit where walking in the footsteps of the past is not only possible…

…it’s wonderful.

Thank you, Ken.

The Easy Way or The Right Way?

Today’s been a great day so far: I have a brand new nephew, Dylan James, who entered this world earlier this morning. I received a fantastic piece of fan mail from a Delta flight attendant who absolutely loves the Lawson series, which is always gratifying to get. And I also got an email from someone within the Ninjutsu organization asking me to come out and teach a seminar for them.

I was both honored and humbled by this request. It’s nice to get an email from someone who appreciates my perspective on this art to the point that they’d like me to come and put on a weekend seminar for them.

But I turned the request down.

And here’s why: if someone wants to hire me for a seminar, they shouldn’t: they should hire my teacher Mr. Mark Davis of the Boston Martial Arts Center. This is the man who has taught me virtually everything I know about this art; this is the man whose wisdom, experience, and guidance have enabled me to survive some horrifying encounters and emerge unscathed. It’s because of Mark that I am as far along the path as I am.

I enjoy teaching people and I’ve done it for a number of years now. I’m always honored to be asked to be a presenter at the annual New England Warrior Camp, I’ve taught many classes at Mark’s dojo, and I run my own informal training group most Sunday nights in my town. In the past, I’ve conducted training events for the State Department, Bureau of Prisons, Department of Justice, and other interesting places like that.

But I’m not studying this art to become recognized as a teacher or a guru or what have you. My motivation has always been to study what I consider to be one of the finest methods of self-protection available to anyone – and then be able to pass my knowledge down to my children so they, too, have the means and mindset to be able to survive any encounter they might find themselves in.

That’s it.

I know of people who would jump at any opportunity to teach a seminar – to try to prove that they have some sort of great insight into this art, or to earn a quick buck. But why would hire a student, when you can just as easily hire the teacher of that student? As I explained to the person who emailed me, I’m still learning to find my way in this art – even after more than two decades. This material isn’t easy; it’s complex stuff that demands constant study. And at advanced levels, this material gets even more challenging. It’s not about “put your foot here and do this” – it’s about a whole other realm of technique. And stuff that advanced can’t be taught over the phone or via the Internet or via Skype or by churning out silly notebooks filled with A+B=C type notes. People who do that are simply misleading others for the sake of ego or to make a quick dollar.

So as I wrote back to the sender, it’s important to get with my teacher and not me. Hire my teacher to come and show you this stuff – not me. If you hire me, you’re getting material that is removed from the source and therefore not likely to be as accurate and fulfilling as it could be. By hiring my teacher, you get to experience what I experience on a weekly basis. It’s better for everyone involved.

I’ve seen too many charlatans attempt to lead folks astray in some vain attempt to set themselves up as a “guru du jour” – people who think they can break things down into stupid catchphrases and marketing gimmicks. But the essence of this art – the essence of any real martial lineage – isn’t techniques written down in a notebook (or xeroxed and covertly handed out for that matter) – it’s experience.

Each student has their own experience. That’s the truth to this training that no one can ever take away from you.

But in order to get that experience, you need to get with someone as high up and experienced within this art as possible. That’s why I refused to teach this seminar and why I suggested hiring my teacher instead. He’s got oodles of more years in this art and his comprehension of the material dwarfs my own. How could I in good conscience pretend that I could be a better guide to this tradition than him? How could I claim to be an honorable representative of this art (knowing full well that my own comprehension of this material is far less than my teacher’s) by agreeing to teach?

I couldn’t.

It would have been easy to say yes. It would have been easy to go out-of-state and put on a show down south and then pretend that I’m some elevated teacher of this material. After all, I’ve got the license from Japan to do so, so it’s all good, right?

Wrong.

I’m fond of saying that ego is the number one killer of decent ninjutsu practitioners. It’s easy to drink the Kool Aid when people sing your praises. It’s easy to believe that you’re a gifted practitioner capable of leading others.

It’s easy.

But that’s the warning sign.

I’m not in this art for it to be easy. Come to think of it, I’m not in life for it to be easy. The warrior’s path is hard – and the difficulties we face are for a reason. It takes effort to see yourself objectively and to understand that you have so much to work on, that you have your own inner demons to cleanse, that you have many more steps to go even after walking so many already.

Too many get lost along the way. They believe their own hype. They pose and posture and pretend and they end up irresponsibly hurting the lives of others by depriving them of their own experiences and their own opportunities to discover the joys of this martial tradition.

They opt for the easy way out.

I made a vow a long time ago that I would never take the easy way out of anything. So as tough as it was to turn down the rather hefty paycheck, it was the right thing to do. And the people who end up hiring my teacher will have a better time and better experiences because of it.

I believe that’s what it means to be an asset to this art, instead of just another joke.

Training & Learning

Several years ago, I found myself in a position of having to deal with some distinctly unpleasant “stuff.” Dealing properly with this stuff necessitated me being away from my teacher, Mark Davis of the Boston Martial Arts Center, for an extended amount of time. This was the first time I’d ever been away from training with my teacher for such a long time, and it was unusual for me, to say the least. There was nothing formalized about my absence; my teacher and friends didn’t even know what was going on – just that I was no longer at the dojo; and for all intents and purposes, I was pretty much gone from everything.

I was determined, however, that I would keep training. Even though I was away from my teacher, I resolved to continue my training at any opportunity. I consoled myself with this resolution, thinking that I would be able to return to the dojo and pick up where I left off. So as I dealt with the situations in my life that mandated my absence from routine and normalcy, I found opportunities to apply a lot of what I had learned. I also found opportunities to visit several other dojo associated with the art I study. I thought that was a good thing. And again, I told myself that even though I wasn’t with my teacher, I was still training. And that would help my skills continue to grow and improve. I had, by this time, already earned my 5th degree black belt and felt pretty confident that I could uncover new things to learn and practice.

So I kept training as much as was possible. I honed certain skills, I had my own techniques tested in a variety of ways, and I kept trying to continue the practices that I’d learned under my teacher’s guidance.

Eventually, as do all things pleasant and unpleasant – my time away ended and I returned to the dojo. I still remember vividly the first night back, climbing those steps and smelling the familiar tang of sweat in the air as I approached. I was home. At last.

And I was ready to pick up where I’d left off.

Instead, I got a serious wake-up call.

Foolishly, I’d expected that my time away wouldn’t decrease my skill. That despite being away from my teacher, my skills would at least remain at the level they’d been when I left. And that I’d be able to pick up anything new that had been taught during my absence.

But time didn’t stand still just because I wasn’t there. My teacher had kept on teaching; my friends had kept on learning and evolving as practitioners; and flow of the art itself had never ceased moving through the universe.

I’d been training, yes. I’d learned some rather unique lessons as well.

And yet, I’d been left behind. Far behind.

I was angry with the forces over which I’d had no control for depriving me of the time that I could have spent training with my teacher. I was upset that despite my attempts to retain my training schedule, to retain my level of ability, it hadn’t seemed to matter all that much. I’d been out of the flow; I’d been away from the learning. And I was upset with myself because my ego had once again sabotaged me. I’d conned myself into imagining that as a 5th degree black belt, I was astute enough and accomplished enough to be able to teach myself what I needed to know in order to continue to evolve as a practitioner.

I suddenly learned there’s a HUGE difference between “training” and “learning.”

It’s possible, after all, to go out and punch trees for a few hours and then congratulate yourself afterward for all the hard training you just did. But despite the training, you didn’t learn anything (except perhaps how utterly stupid it is to punch trees). You can, after all, go to different dojo and work out with other individuals and different body types and practice techniques. But that doesn’t mean you learned anything (except perhaps that your technique either works or doesn’t work as well as you thought.) And you can, after all, spend your time away creating excuses and allowing your ego to convince you that you’re still training.

But you’re not.

Throughout the course of the history of this particular martial art system, there have been instances where a practitioner was forced to be their own teacher. The 34th Grandmaster found himself alone when his teacher passed on. He had to spend years trying to find his way through the maze of notes and scrolls and letters that he’d amassed. Eventually, he did. And some would say he is perhaps an even better practitioner for having to pass such a trial.

Not everyone is like the Grandmaster, however. And I wonder if given the chance, would the Grandmaster have preferred to continue to learn under his teacher’s guidance instead of being forced to go it alone?

The path of this particular budo is strewn with traps at every turn. Some of those traps are obvious. But some are so carefully concealed within the very essence of ourselves that only those who have carefully and painstakingly cleaned out every last bit of untruth and mastered their ego will even see them.

For me, coming back from being away was a profound lesson. Despite the amount of training I was able to continue during my absence, despite the things I actually did learn during my time away, I hadn’t evolved as a practitioner. I returned to my home dojo to find that my skills were no longer at the level that I expected them to be because I hadn’t been continually exposed to new training and new challenges from my teacher. I had to acquire a lot of new knowledge in a short span of time to get back to the level of expectation I set for myself.

It’s easy to imagine that after a certain duration in studying this art that we no longer require the guidance of a teacher. There’s something inherently romantic about the notion of going it alone, or being some pioneer out on the edge of exploration. I know. I’ve been there.

But the reality is this: why do you want to go it alone if you don’t have to?

My absence from my teacher was mandated by things in my life I couldn’t control at the time. I had to take that time and be away from him not out of choice, but of necessity.

What’s keeping you from being with your teacher? What’s holding you back from “learning” instead of just “training?”

A Fog of Fury: A Lawson Vampire Mission – FREE!

So, as part of my drive to find a huge bunch of new fans for all things Lawson, I’ve decided to make A FOG OF FURY, the Lawson novellas that was released in the first annual Supernatrual Ink. anthology, part of the Amazon KDP Select program for 90 days. Today & tomorrow, it’s absolutely 100% FREE.

That’s right, you can get a nearly 20,000 words of Lawson awesome for without spending a penny.

Nada.

Zilch.

If you’ve never tried Lawson before, this is your chance to get wrapped up in one of the coolest urban fantasy series around. Let his effortless lethality thrill you while his sarcastic sense of humor brings you chuckles. Lawson rocks and here’s your chance to see why.

Of course, if you’re already a Lawson fan, then this is a nice gift to start the work week back up with. And it’s also your duty to get at least two of your close pals to pick this up as well and get them hooked on the series. What have they got to lose? Only about an hour after which time they will promptly fall on their knees and thank you for delivering unto them the same Lawson awesome you enjoy on a regular basis. They might even buy you lunch. Or at least a pack of Twizzlers from the office vending machine.

So go forth and rejoice – A FOG OF FURY is yours free. Spread the word and help others find the radiance of Lawson as he dispatches bad guys with bullets and snark.

Have fun!

Get A FOG OF FURY here right now for your Kindle for FREE!

🙂

Day of the Ninja

I have to admit, this one caught me by surprise…

(Go ahead, laugh at the irony. I’ll wait, lol…)

Today, December 5th, is International Day of the Ninja. Seriously. I’m not quite sure what exactly is supposed to happen today, but perhaps it’s as simple as creeping up behind your co-workers and scaring the snickers out of them. Or maybe you’re supposed to create your own global intelligence network. Not really sure.

In any event, I’ll take today and give a huge load of thanks to my teacher Mark Davis at the Boston Martial Arts Center for passing down his knowledge, experience, and wisdom to me and the other students at his school. I’ve learned so much from Mark, it’s impossible to say thank you enough times. The techniques, strategy, and lessons he’s taught me have literally saved my life numerous times. And I don’t say such things lightly. It’s because of his earnest dedication to the art of Ninjutsu and his humble attitude that enables him to continually have such a successful school.

Back in Japan in 2003, I took my 5th degree black belt test. If not for Mark and his teaching, I’d never have passed it successfully. And the success I’ve enjoyed in learning Ninjutsu has enabled me to enjoy success in all other areas of my life.

So, being that today is International Day of the Ninja, I’d like to humbly suggest that people in the New England area give Mark a call at (617) 789-5524 and schedule a time to come check out a great, fun class at his school. The dojo is filled with some of the friendliest, most successful people I’ve ever known, and you can’t help but have an absolute blast training.

Also, you should buy some of my ebooks because I mix in some pretty cool advanced Ninjutsu concepts in my worlds of fiction. How many authors do you know who have actually studied authentic ninjutsu for over twenty years? Support the Ninja Author! 🙂

And you should also go over and back my new project ZOMBIE RYU which mixes NINJA and ZOMBIES! Check it out!