A Brief Background

This blog will be dedicated to my journey in martial arts. I will probably and inevitably jump around through various topics here and there, but I fully intend to try and keep these pages dedicated to reflections on my training, articles I collect, and things I may or may not ascertain from the Zen meditations available at the dojo.

I suppose any good adventure has to start somewhere. This particular chapter of my life, as most people who know me well enough to even want to read this drivel, started a number of months back in a VERY dark time in my life. I would say that it would have started when someone parted ways from my life for reasons that I STILL don't and probably never will comprehend. Ultimately, I think that she was the catalyst for my choices leading up to walking in the dojo for the first time, but this started long before then.

Most folks don't know the full extent of my journey through martial arts. I will never claim to be a master of any particular art, I have never trained enough to receive a black-belt, and over the past 8 years, I have let myself go in ways that are UNACCEPTABLE to me. Good place to start I think.

The art I am most well versed in was called Combat Karate. I am sure there is another more proper name for it, but it was never communicated to me. I studied Combat Karate under Seneca in the dorms at National-Louis. Those four years were an extraordinary time in my life, as college should be. I remember nightly working out for 2 to 4 hours at days end. I remember being in probably the best shape I have been in since I was wrestling and playing soccer in highschool. I also remember training with Seneca, Eric Reitow, Tyeda(now Seneca's wife), then later we added Jake, and several other people would cycle in and out, but only briefly. I was the only one who remained consistent though. I also remember at least three mornings a week Seneca pounding on my door at 5:30 am to go running... I HATE RUNNING... Let me rephrase that... I detest running with every fiber of my being. BUT, I did it anyways. The best part was that we lived very near the lake and the B'hai temple, so at least I had something to look at to take my mind off the... running. Time wore on, Seneca graduated a year before us, so my senior year of college I was no longer training.

There came a point where I decided after taking a wonderful stage combat workshop, that I wanted to learn Kung Fu. So I went to Championship Martial Arts on Fullerton for several months. Unfortunately money dried up and I never progressed very far... and to be honest as fun as it would be to say in my best Keanu Reaves voice,'I know Kung-Fu.' I am not the Ariel Flashy spinning jumpy type. I am a wolf. We remain grounded.

The last art I studied in depth was Chinese Kenpo. My time with Sensei Andy and Sempi Chris, I have to say were an interesting time in my life. While I was studying Kenpo, I was training 5 to 7 days a week and trying to push myself to my physical limit. I remember it all too well. I remember constantly challenging Sempi Chris knowing full well I was going to get my ass handed to me. I remember in particularly brutal display having my face pushed into the mat repeatedly as knee held a pressure point in my back How else am I supposed to learn? The thing is, Kenpo actually started to scare me. I know after a time Jake began to nickname it Fuk Yu as some of the techniques that were given to me were nothing short of brutal. I found myself actually harnessing my anger and using it to rain hell down on my opponents, rather than my current path of banishing anger to find a more grounded center. I think studying this martial art lead me to accept the more wolfen, gutural, animalistic part of me and use it, but I think that the way it actually increased my rage was VERY bad for me spiritually. I remember constantly sizing people up, wondering how many I could take on at once, or looking for people's weak spots in case something 'went down' constantly... this is not a good way for a Dustin to live. Ultimately I am thankful for those experiences as they helped get me to the place I am today, but I have NO desire to feel that level of rage anymore. Really, anger doesn't help anything and I want to be more centered, grounded, and to let my spirit grow once again.

SO that is the brief recap of my martial experiences. This does not take into account all of the stage combat work I have done over the years studying under Chuck Coyle and the SAFD. Those are a topic for another day. I do have some VERY interesting memories of that including a pit fighting class taught by the world champion Knife fighter as well as my many years at the Ren Faire swinging a sword for people's entertainment. Although I had a realization in class the other night, all the stage combat, NOT HELPING me right now... more on that later though.

So what really got me to return to the dojo?

Well... I am not wholly sure. I know I have been saying for a number of years I need to get back to it. My body was craving the movement. My soul was craving the spiritual growth. And my Mind needed the refocusing of my intentions. Every time I would get depressed over the past few years there would be a little voice, also know as a Liga, saying 'D' go to the dojo... its time or quit talking about it and just DO IT. For whatever reason, I just could not seem to pull myself out of my funks or tear myself away from whatever relationship I had at the time, or whatever excuse I wanted to give any day... Then... well... it happened. The one who I refuse to name here, left me. My world was turned upside down, flipped around, and I had my heart ripped from my chest. Now, you would think that to have such hard things happen to me...yet AGAIN, I would be angry, bitter, hating. IN truth I was sad for a time. I was and am still a bit hurt. But all in all I came through it with this profound sense of peace and love for the world in my heart. I see such beauty all over and I have to stop myself on occasion because I see things that almost bring a tear to my eye with how amazing and beautiful they are...

I cannot even begin to describe what is inside me right now. I know I always say I am full of light, or light is my life... and well, it is now more than ever, true. But something was still missing and I felt an ache in my soul for something... And Liga looked at me and said... 'Dojo, 'D'. Go!' Finally, it clicked inside me. It's time. So I investigated some of the plethora of schools in Chicago. I wasn't wholly sure which art I wanted to study. What I DID know is that I wanted a school that offered some sort of meditation as well as the physical classes. Beyond that... no clue. A friend of mine passed on a book about Kalarripayatu which is an Indian martial art famous for several of its weapons.(Yeah so I have a fetish for weaponry, I mean really, who doesn't?) The sad part is.. noone in the US teaches it. So that idea will have to wait.

I had had several brushes with Aikido over the years through Chuck and several other folks I know. So I set to check out a couple Aikido dojos as well as a Wu Shu school, kung fu, and tai chi. The Wu Shu school I went and watched a class and decided it wasn't for me. The beginners and even the advanced classes were not quite what I was looking for. It seemed to me that there was a whole lot of jumping about and not a whole lot of substance. The school also offered MMA classes as well, but honestly... the energy there was too 'health club' and I didn't feel really captured the spirit of martial arts I was looking for. I am sure it is great for the students there who want to learn such things, but not where I belonged. I checked out a Shoalin Kung Fu school really close to my apartment. I think I MIGHT have chosen this place if they had classes more through the week. They only meet three nights a week and it is very informal. I am craving structure. The first of the Aikido Dojos I went to was formerly know as Midwest Aikikai but is now known as The Chicago Aikido Akikai. They have a pleasent atmosphere, but again thier class schedule was not really what I was looking for and where they used to have meditations and such, those have been replaced by a Russian Martial Art that, currently, I have no interest in studying at least for now.

Last week, I found myself out of work early on Friday, bored out of my skull, and feeling like I needed to go run a marathon or SOMETHING to calm my brain. I had stumbled on Shinjinkai's website during my searches and remembered thinking I should check it out. So I re-found the website and looked up the schedule. Classes 7 nights a week as well as Zen-meditation and Aikido classes two mornings each week. Friday night: Aikido, Internal Training, and Intro to Zen meditation. I called the dojo and spoke with Sensei Meido. He invited me to come and observe or participate in a couple of classes as he didn't want to sell me on the school without knowing what I was getting myself into. Well, 'D', you got nothing to do tonight... go. So I went...