The Grandmaster's book of Ninja training

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42 Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi unpolished rice, and vegetarian food including tofu and natto. 1 I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I was really so fat, and I used to eat anything; I had a waist of about 44. inches and weighed over 200 pounds! I started getting ill. I'd really been foolish about my body, overestimating its capacities. But then I realized how much harm I was doing to it. After that, I started eating raw vegetables at the beginning of a meal, then unpolished rice, and finally, some lowcalorie food. In three months on this diet, my waist returned to about 35 inches. Anyway, with this rice and tofu, vegetables and so on, I had no salt, sugar, or other seasonings or flavorings. By avoiding such things, one can keep one's body free of most harmful substances, and one becomes sensitive to other toxic chemical food additives. If you always eat palatepleasing food with a lot of seasoning, you lose your sensitivity to these things. In the old days, I often used to visit Takamatsu Sensei's home, and his wife would always serve tea. Each time she did so, she would say where it came from: "This tea is one grown in Uji," or "This is the tea of Shizuoka," in her old-fashioned way. On some days, she would make tea fifteen or twenty times, and every time it would be a different kind. I really used to enjoy it, drinking her teas. One day, all of a sudden, Takamatsu Sensei challenged me, "Do you know what kind of tea this is?" I was quite taken aback by this. "If it were poison, what would you do?" he went on. Indeed, you can't protect yourself against every poisonous substance by tasting it and remembering the taste. It's a matter of the sensitivity of your taste buds, a matter of perception. And as you develop this sensitivity, you get to realize what should not be eaten or drunk. So, one lives in order to do this. Things that smell 1 Fermented soybeans. The Grandmaster's Book of Ninja Training 43 Jack Hoban, 6th dan Singer and guitarist, former Marine captain Jack Hoban seems to pick up the feeling that I try to teach through his musical sensitivity. strong are avoided as much as possible. The ninja practices an "odor-free" discipline: he avoids garlic leeks, all spicy foods, salty things, oily things, and so on. If his body gives off the smell of something he has eaten, for example, when in hiding, his adversary may become aware of him. On the other hand, if he does not eat such foods, he becomes far more sensitive
44 to external stimuli. As my teacher used to tell us, when in the mountains, the ninja is usually nowhere near women, and he eats only mild foods. As a result, my teacher said, the ninja becomes so sensitive that he can become aware of a woman who might come into his general vicinity, even without actually seeing her, and he can also tell her age and even her occupation. And fasting also is probably a useful part of the ninja's discipline, for the same kind of reasons. I had an experience of a really strict fast when I was ill, and for about eighteen months I had only a pot of yogurt every day—as some of you know. That was really amazing for me. I wasn't even in a fasting center. I feel that it was a kind of divine gift for me. Or rather, it was the illness for which I feel so grateful to the Almighty. J: Japanese people are structured differently than Westerners. Does that mean that natural taijutsu would look different for a^Westerner than for a Japanese person? H: Well, you know, in Japan people often say that Westerners are weak in the hip area. Our ways of life are quite different, right? Because Westerners use chairs, whereas the Japanese sit down on the floor, their hips are weak, according to Japanese people— martial arts people, judo people, everyone. It's become a cliche here. But it's quite untrue: people from the West have very strong hips. Their area of weakness is actually the knees. For anyone with long legs, the knees are bound to be a bit weak. The hips are strong. So when Japanese want to strengthen their own hips, it's their knees that they work on. What Westerners need to concentrate on is their way of walking, to improve that. I told you just before, when we were standing up, didn't I? You're standing with your knees locked; you should try keeping them a little bent. And every day, when you walk, Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi The Grandmaster's Book of Ninja Training 45 you should keep your knees bent and take only small steps. It's not so much for health that you need that, but for your training. Also, when I am sitting, like this—hmm?—I sit with my legs folded. The adductor muscles, which bring the knees together, are kept stretched, you see? This is good for strengthening kicks and for loosening up the hip joints. And then, Doron, you see, you sit with your back hollow. Is this from your Feldenkrais work? No? Well, I don't know why, but anyway, I suppose you sit like that naturally. Takamatsu Sensei used to sit like that. When he got tired he would always stretch his spine backwards. Then he would sit like this for a while, and then stretch back again, and he could go on like that for long periods of time. When people fall into depression, they tend to slump, like this, right? But when they're enjoying themselves, they open up their chests like this, perhaps with mouths open in laughter, too, hmm? Of course, in order to maintain one's balance, probably in some disorders of the autonomic nervous system, it's important—as well as pleasurable—to extend the spine from time to time. You should constantly watch things like this. And then, there's the big toe, which is related to the liver and spleen through the (acupuncture) meridians. These two organs seem to be the most strongly affected by the action of the nerves. The liver is the organ with the strongest capacity for regeneration— and this is one of its great strengths, I think. But I believe that strengths should be further reinforced, and to do this you can hold each big toe and revolve it round and round, or if you don't like moving it round, you can sit cross-legged and move the feet and the big toes. Stretch the back, too Takamatsu Sensei said that the legs—actually from the hara 2 down—must never be allowed to get 2 Belly
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The Grandmaster's book of Ninja training

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