The Void Book – Parts Per Billion

The Book of Five Rings – the Book of the Void

The final book from the Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi may seem like a last page reading with very few paragraphs but it gives deep insight into the knowledge that is yet to be gained by the person and the knowledge which lies beyond the limits of the humanity. The Book of the Void is the most concise treaty on the extent of our knowing, our ignorance and that knowledge which we would never know due to the mortal limitations. Miyamoto Musashi’s idea of the absolute wisdom through the concept Void transcends the boundaries of human life and time.

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

After disseminating his lifelong wisdom in a very systematic way through four books named as the Ground Book, the Water Book, the Fire Book, and the Wind Book representing the philosophies to fight the battles, wars and survive through the challenges of the life, Miyamoto Musashi concludes his learnings in last book – the Book of the Void. On the scale of writing, it is not even a book. The readers will feel like they are reading the last page of the book. This shortness of the last book – the book of Void is very intentional by Miyamoto-san. Again, as his suggestions go – one has to really appreciate what he is trying to communicate – the wisdom that which cannot be expressed, conveyed through words.

The main purpose of the Book of the Void is to make the readers aware of the things and the wisdom that they can never know. There is one danger in this process especially for those who learn only by themselves (-without a real teacher always in front of them) which Miyamoto-san was very well aware of. He tries to complete this cyclical process of gaining wisdom through self-learning in this Book of the Void.

“What is called the spirit of the void is where there is nothing. It is not included in man’s knowledge.”

First, he clarifies what this is all about. Miyamoto-san first brings out the elephant in the room that there will always be something that you could never know.

“By knowing things that exist, you can know that which does not exist. That is the Void.”

The Void thus represents the wisdom that lies beyond all that can be known by every human being. Now there is one catch in this idea. A normal person who has just started his journey on the path of wisdom will not know everything initially. So, whatever he/she does not know right now is new for him/her. Does this new wisdom which that person was unaware, which discovered during the journey represent the Void? The answer is – No. The Void is not the gap between your current understanding, current knowledge, and the knowledge you are yet to gain or understand. The Void is that which can never be known even when ‘everything that is there to know’ is known completely. And that itself is really humbling. It is about the limits of how we learn, understand the world around us. Miyamoto-san as the great teacher makes every reader aware of what the limitations of our understandings are. He wants everyone to understand that even when you know ‘everything that is there to know’, there still will be something left out because of the limitations of the ways we perceive the reality.

“People in this world look at things mistakenly, and think that what they do not understand must be the void. This is not the true void. It is bewilderment.”

Here, Miyamoto-san very smartly makes the reader aware of what they call the Void may be and mostly will be the knowledge they are yet to gain. Again, as I explained earlier, the Void is not the gap between what you know and what all there is to be known by you. For every learner, whatever they haven’t experienced before will be new knowledge to them (which literally is the definition of ‘new’!) That will create the illusion of Void for them but the path is way long for the pursuit of true wisdom. We have this tendency of treating every new experience we come across as a very special experience and there is nothing wrong in it, but also creates an illusion of knowing the special wisdom in the person. This instigates the illusion of knowing something extraordinary, of knowing everything in the mind of that person.

Miyamoto-san thus advises the readers to recognize the confusion between the common knowledge and the real Void – the knowledge lying beyond everything that can be known.

In very simple and short words, Miyamoto-san is trying to show the expanse of the true ‘wisdom of life’ to the readers so that they will be humbled by what very small amount they know and they can know throughout their limited lifetime. Miyamoto-san idea of Void is intended to remain on the path of learning throughout the life with the awareness that there will always be something beyond our current understandings of the nature.

Being aware of the infinite extents of that which can be never known, one creates the curiosity to know everything that is there to know; it also brings in the humility for what very little one knows.

The idea of Void by Miyamoto-san is about intellectual humility and the limitations of how we understand the world around us.

Let us keep the idea of the Void aside for now. The things that we can know, the wisdom that we can have themselves are so vast in their expanse that a single mortal life cannot be sufficient to learn and grasp each and everything that is there to know. This will easily overwhelm a new learner rather everyone on such journey. Miyamoto-san knew this hence he proceeds with the ways to clear this confusion and such overwhelming feelings.

“To attain the Way of Strategy as a warrior you must study fully other martial arts and not deviate even a little from the Way of the warrior. With you spirit settled, accumulate practice day by day, and hour by hour. Polish the twofold spirit heart and mind, and sharpen the twofold gaze perception and sight. When your spirit is not in the least clouded, when the clouds of bewilderment clear away, there is the true void.”

In simple words, the way to get everything big is to start small and build over it, follow the truest path step by step instead of getting overwhelmed by the length of the journey. Once the person becomes aware of the process, the things built over the time will help him/her to distinguish between the that which is known, that which is yet to be known and that which can never be known.

You will notice in every part of the Book of the Five Rings especially in the Wind book, Miyamoto-san suggests to learn the techniques of the other schools from a broader perspective. Even after being the greatest swordsman of his time, he was completely aware that there will always be something which can improve his existing techniques. There will always be some better ways to do the same thing. This newer, creative, and out of the box thinking is only possible for the person who understands the limitations of his mind, who is truly humble even after gaining all the wisdom in the world. Only the idea of the Void can show a complete scholar the extents of what he/she knows.

Miyamoto-san mentions the spirit of heart and mind which are emotional and intellectual aspects of personality. He further mentions the perception and sight which are the abilities to see beyond what is shown and to see the bigger picture. The journey for the true wisdom is about development of our emotions, intellect, perception, and vision. That is what life actually is! What a thought by Miyamoto-san!

“Until you realize the true Way, whether in Buddhism or in common sense, you may think that things are correct and in order. However, if we look at the things objectively, from the viewpoint of the laws of the world, we see various doctrines departing from the true Way. Know well this spirit, and with forthrightness as the foundation and the true spirit as the Way. Enact strategy broadly, correctly, and openly.”

Miyamoto Musashi holds the last but the most important (and the secret trick) in the journey for the wisdom of the life. Actually, he already hinted this secret in the early part of the Book of the Five Rings. Miyamoto-san explains that when the person on the journey for the wisdom will reach the ultimate spot (and not the end of the journey- the journey has no end – it continues in the Void) then he/she will realize that the vast expanse of knowledge that they were getting overwhelmed in the early part of their journey are actually created from the main true path of the absolute wisdom. The vast expanse of the knowledge was created due to many deviations from the ultimate path. The absolute wisdom will have that clarity as Miyamoto-san explains. That is the exact reason why he already said

“If you know the way broadly, you will see it in everything”

Once you get the absolute clarity of what you know then you will never feel the need to know each and everything. You are zero and infinity at the same time, you are nothing and everything at the same time. You will try to understand everything based on the absolute wisdom you already have as all the remaining knowledge is just a deviation from that absolute wisdom.

“In the void is virtue and no evil.”

The acceptance of that which can be never known will actually make the person humble. Many will think that the idea of not knowing everything will actually create maniacs due to that unsettling urge to know everything but the exactly opposite will happen. When one accepts that the journey for the wisdom is a never-ending, then the smartest choice is to embark on this journey with minimum possible baggage. The true scholar will get rid off every deviated knowledge from the path of the true wisdom to reduce their load in this journey, they will use their limited but ultimate wisdom in every possible and new way to understand the new knowledge and the knowledge which cannot be known.

You must appreciate how great thought Miyamoto-san put forward many years ago with close to zero resources. That is what is great about the Book of the Five Rings and especially the Book of the Void.

The Book of Void actually speaks about everything through the idea of nothing. This can be put down into some words only by the scholars like Miyamoto Musashi. That also the reason why the Book of Five Rings is not just a guide for war strategy and the ways of the warriors. The Book of Five Rings is more than that, it is about the ways to live a life full of true wisdom. True wisdom holds everything in the idea of the awareness of nothing.

The Spirit of the Void for the modern world

“Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance”
Confucius

The initial realizations of the idea of the Void are presented to make the readers aware of what small they actually know and what vast they are yet to know. When one accepts that there is still more to know and learn many things and even after knowing/learning everything, there will be something which can never be known due to the limitations of human life, at that exact moment the person becomes the container to the ultimate wisdom.

Void and the Incompleteness of the Mathematics

Modern mathematics and the development of completely new mathematical concepts are based on the world-famous Gödel’s incompleteness theorem. In simple worlds, certain truths in a system must be accepted true without a proof (and there are no contradictions to them till now) to prove all the remaining truths of the system. If in such system a new fact arises which cannot be proven by any existing truths and is never contradicted then such non-contradicted and unprovable truth will create bigger system of newer truths. (you can read in detail about this in my older post). The new uncontradicted, unprovable truth in the system lies out side the existing system of truths. It can be only understood by the person who is open to new possibilities outside the existing system.

The Void and The Dunning-Kruger Effect

Miyamoto-san even in his days was aware of this world-famous psychological effect now that we have a proper name for it. Miyamoto Musashi knew how half-knowledge – limited knowledge creates the illusion of knowing everything and can even blind the master of masters personality. He wanted the new learners to remain humble not get overconfident during the start of the long journey and he knew that the one who has traveled enough through this journey will have the humility for what great they have achieved. (see my older post to know more about the Dunning Kruger effect)

“The opposite of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge”
Stephen Hawking

The Void and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Modern Scholar

Miyamoto-san’s idea of the Void also highlights how we are only able to learn what we are able to grasp. This actually creates a biased learning process, which is dominant in those who learn things on their own. Even for people who are masters of their fields and have proper guidance available externally, it is impossible to learn something new and groundbreaking unless they are receptive towards it. Ralph Waldo Emerson in his world-famous speech The American Scholar explained how exactly this learning works. (read in detail about the American scholar in my older post1, post 2, post 3)

The Void and Einstein

Einstein’s idea of relativity was rejected by many scholar scientists in the early stages because they were unable to accept and understand the ideas of higher dimensions in the fabric of the space-time. (That is exactly why Einstein is known as a peerless genius!) So, you can only learn what you are able to perceive and grasp. Miyamoto-san’s philosophy of Void encourages to become open to that which cannot be known which lies beyond our grasp.

The Void and The Quantum Mechanics

While we are on the cusp on the quantum mechanical revolution in modern world, it was Max Planck in quantum mechanics’ early emergence when he quoted about the nature of the reality we live in and our inability to understand such quantum mechanical reality. Upon understanding the mind-boggling nature of the quantum mechanics Max Planck maybe got a peek into the Void – that which can never be known due to our physical limitations. For a swordsman as Miyamoto Musashi, the philosophy of the Void stood the test of the time.

It also shows how absolute wisdom remains consistent throughout the times, branches of knowledge and generations. (find more about how we have realized the existence of Void through one interesting concept in QM in my older post)

Conclusion

Thus, the Book of Void by Miyamoto Musashi is about remaining humble about the extents of the knowledge we have right now, the knowledge that is yet to be known and the knowledge that is beyond the limits of our understanding which is the real Void.

The concept of Void clarifies three main points:

– 1 –

What you know is very small compared to what all there is which can be known.

– 2 –

You can know everything that is there to know and when you will know everything that can be known you will understand that everything that can be known is just the result of the many deviations from the absolute knowledge.

Knowing everything is not about understanding everything individually like a memory bank, rather it is knowing a thing in its entirety and every perspective

This clears one fundamental doubt which everyone has in their own learning journey. We think that if we know many things then we will have knowledge of everything. For the same reason we think that a wise man has many tools in his bag to deal with every problem.

But it is exactly opposite when it comes to the concept of wisdom through Void.

A wise man knows single concept which touches all that is there to know, this single concept brings in the clarity. A true wise man never carries a bag full of different tools to solve different problems, he carries the distilled understanding of how to develop the tools according to the problem.

Thus, once you are able to know everything that is there to know you will find a single thread connecting to all such fields of knowledge. You will never get overwhelmed by the amount of information and expanse of the various fields of the knowledge. That single thread of your wisdom will bring clarity, will bring in virtue in your life, will calm down your mind

– 3 –

When you will succeed in knowing everything then you will truly understand the boundaries of how you understand the universe. This will be the moment when you will accept the existence of the true Void. This acceptance will make you humble and even after knowing everything that is there to know you will embark on the new journey of that which can never be known. That will be your transcendence.

One has to very deeply think and understand and appreciate how Miyamoto Musashi in his very short but important “Book of the Void” distilled the fundamental wisdom of humanity. No wonder this concept of Void is always peeking its head out in different events, different lives, different breakthroughs, and different eras of the humanity. The truest wisdom always remains consistent throughout and it never fears to upgrade itself based on the new learnings. The Book of Void is about what small amount we actually know, what vast ocean that is there to know and what massive expanse lies beyond that ocean as the Void – the world beyond our understandings.

Links for further reading:

The Book of Five Rings – The Wind Book

The Wind Book from Miyamoto Musashi’s The Book of Five Rings is about the changing traditions according to the lifestyle. The Wind Book focuses on multi-disciplinary ways of learning things and developing wisdom. Miyamoto-san through the Wind Book explains that there is no single secret way, no single formula, no single attacking style to solve an unconventional problem.

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Ever Changing Nature of The Wind

Our personality is the outcome of the surroundings, the society we live in, the people we interact with. Our family is the immediate society for us and in most cases has larger impact on our conscious and subconscious choices. The influences from our family, our friends, our heroes/ idols/ role models, the villains we hate create certain set of preferences towards everything. And when stuck in some thin situations, our preferences may become our limitations which surely make life difficult. Miyamoto-san knew this very well and hence in his Wind Book from the Book of Five Rings he tries to throw light on these ideas of obsession and liking towards certain ways of living life.

Miyamoto Musashi while discussing his ‘Way of Strategy’, ‘Way of Life’ through the Book of Five Rings makes sure that the person absorbing all his philosophy will not develop that subconscious bias, preference, liking to his philosophy. For Miyamoto-san, any type of favorite-ism, preference, polarization, liking is instant death when we are faced with the ultimate challenges in the battle of life. We have already seen his philosophy through The Ground Book, The Water Book and The Fire Book. The Wind Book is about how to not follow these ideas blindly.

The Wind Book is about the ways to actually solve the problems, especially the unconventional problems. Unconventional problems have this “unconventional” nature only because they do not fit the “traditional” patterns of our understandings and knowledge. The Wind symbolizes the change. Humanity has gone through many generations, eras to reach to the present modern stage. It is important to notice that the traditions we had before are changing according to the challenges presented to them. Even though we hold on to the traditions symbolizing their preferential nature, inherently orthodox nature but at the same time the adaptability of the same traditions to change themselves to the newer lifestyles indicates how nothing is permanent in our lives. (The word tradition itself points to that which is being done, being carried repetitively over the course of time, mostly mindlessly-mechanically) The Wind Book is about making necessary changes in our Ways of Life. The Wind Book thus demands to do that which is necessary instead of doing that which one loves especially in challenging times in life. It is about being multidisciplinary in the learning process throughout the life.

It is Miyamoto-san’s way of saying “Modern problems require modern solution.” (Apologies for the oversimplification)

“It is difficult to know yourself if you do not know others. To all ways there are side-tracks. If you study a way daily, and your spirit diverges, you may think you are obeying a Way but objectively it is not the true way. If you are following the true way and diverge a little, this will later become a large divergence.”

Miyamoto-san was very well aware that the wisdom he was trying to dispense through the Book of Five Rings is solely dependent on efforts the readers will take to implement in their own real, practical life. You will find sentences pointing to self-study, self-practice, self-realization scattered all over the book, rather in almost every paragraph he tells that “you must appreciate this”, “you must learn this on your level”, “you must understand this”. Miyamoto-san urges readers to explore his shared wisdom on their personal level. When a person starts to test and practice a part of technique on his own level without his master’s direct supervision, then there is high possibility that he will practice the technique he loves the most more and will not practice the technique which he does not like or finds difficult. This favor towards certain techniques limits the ability of the person thereby diverts him from the actual intent of the wisdom shared by his master. Many a times, when the pupil fails certain unconventional challenges even after fully practicing, he blames his master for not teaching him completely and properly. Miyamoto-san thus warns his pupil to not stick to a favorite technique, favorite philosophy. He knows that even a small preference towards a thing can drag the person completely back in the moments of challenge (just like the story of Achilles’ heel)

The story of Achilles heel implies that even a single insignificant weakness can cause downfall of great person in unconventional challenges. It is rooted in the myth of Achilles’ mother dipping him in the River Styx, making his entire body invulnerable except for the part of his foot where she held him—the proverbial Achilles heel.

The Wind Book

The Wind according to Miyamoto-san refers to the traditions- the old, the present day and the family traditions. The Wind book is about picking the best from the ongoing trends and not blindly sticking to certain favorite trends. For the trends, traditions keep on changing continuously like the Wind.

“Without knowledge of the Ways of other schools, it is difficult to understand the essence of my Ichi school.”

In simple words, this is Miyamoto-san’s attempt to convince how his philosophy works by using practical and effective technique of comparison. It is his way to point out where other schools go wrong.

“That none of these are the true Way I show clearly in the interior of this book – all he vices and virtues and rights and wrongs. My Ichi school, is different. Other schools make accomplishments their means of livelihood, growing flowers and decoratively, coloring articles in order to sell them. This is definitely not the way of strategy.“

Wisdom is free from the material gains. And the wisdom of Miyamoto-san is not meant for the material gains rather it lies above all materialistic things. Even in the Ground book Miyamoto Musashi make is very clear that the real way to live a life is not about extending yourselves to some material gains, it is about discovering different possibilities the life offers and remaining open to such experiences. If you already have preferences towards certain ways of life then you won’t be able to experience the infinite possibilities of the life.

Many of us have such early preferences in our lives, especially while transitioning from the campus to professional life. Education system has further amplified such preferences. It is not imperative if one is an engineer then he/she should only follow that profession for life. There are other and many ways to discover life, this also does not mean that one should blindly follow the trend to achieve what others have achieved.

Other Schools Using Extra-Long Swords

Miyamoto-san now focuses on how certain schools, idea of combat actually has a characteristic style, preferences towards certain move, certain weapon. This preference, this characteristic style actually limits the person in completely unconventional challenges which may lead to death.

“I expect there is a case for the school in question liking extra-long sword as a part of its doctrine. But if we compare this to real life it is unreasonable.“

Those people who consider themselves the expert of long sword will fall short when they are trapped and cornered in confined spaces – where free movements become restricted. The skills they practiced hard, the skills the bound their whole lives to – here the skill of long sword fighting will be of no use. Blindly following certain technique without an intent to understand it will be fatal in life altering scenarios.

“From older times, it has been said: “Great and small go together.” So do not unconditionally dislike extra-long swords. What I dislike is the inclination towards the long sword.“

Thus Miyamoto-san again makes his point clear. He has no problem with the people teaching these techniques, he has problem with students blindly sticking to these techniques and these techniques only because these are their favorite techniques. Your enemy won’t always see you your favorite moves and attack accordingly, rather he will attack with that moves which you do not like (obviously that is why he is your enemy in the end). Too much inclination towards certain things, certain ideologies, certain, styles, ways of thinking can narrow our field of perception and create biases.

“In my doctrine, I dislike preconceived narrow spirit.“

The idea is to keep you mind open while diligently practicing certain technique, skill. A true teacher always wants his pupil to follow his teachings but also to develop his own personal style, his personal touch.

The Strong Long Sword Spirit in Other Schools

When Miyamoto-san explained how long sword can be problematic in a confined areas he is aware that a blind follower will call long sword a bad choice. That is why make it clear that it was never about the weapon, it is always about the attitude of the warrior, the intent of the warrior which is to kill the enemy. Whatever weapon you carry, whatever technique you use – do it with the intent to execute the job instead of showing off the weapon or technique.

Miyamoto-san explains that when you think of using long sword strongly your cuts will fall short and ineffective also you could not attack with lesser strength as it is already a foolish move. What you are trying to do while attacking with strength is to execute the style and weapon in a style, you want that move to happen in certain stylish way – that actually won’t kill the enemy. This gets even worse when enemy recognizes the style you are trying to demonstrate, thereby predicting your attack. Miyamoto-san calls such techniques of blindly using strength to win the battles a foolish move.

He says:

“The strongest hand wins.” has no meaning.

Even in big battles if your enemy is as strong as you, then using strength will only consume your valuable resources and there will be no favorable outcome. This is time when a warrior must think with the intent of winning instead of focusing of small details of how to execute certain style of attack on an enemy. The warrior must think in an unconventional way when strengths are equal.

“The spirit of my school is to win through the wisdom of strategy, paying no attention to trifles.”

Use of the shorter long sword in other schools

Miaymoto-san again practically explains that for big people handling big sword i.e., Tachi will be very easy and for the same reason short sword i.e.; Katana will be least preferred to them. Big people already have such preferences. Some people will think that by using the Katana – Shorter Long Sword they can stab enemy by easily jumping over unguarded enemy.

Tachi – long sword and Katana – short sword

“To aim for the enemy’s unguarded movement is completely defensive and undesirable at close quarters with the enemy.“

Miyamoto-san makes it clear that even preference towards Katana s ineffective for those who think that Shorter long sword – Katana is better that the Long sword – Tachi. When a warrior will be surrounded by many enemies, he will have to sweep his Katana multiple times in fight which will be difficult when simultaneously fighting many people. He will get “entangled” with the enemy, meaning that his moves will be predictable to the other enemies around him.

“The sure way to win thus is to chase the enemy around in confusing manner, causing him to jump aside, with your body held strongly and straight. You must chase the enemy around and make him obey your spirit.“

So, Miyamoto-san says here that it is not only about executing a sword move or using either Tachi or Katana effectively in the battle. It is about confusing enemy to kill him and kill him only. Your enemy won’t fall for your technique and when he knows your technique it is already useless. You enemy will fall for the spirit of unpredictability you hold which cannot be gauged by certain techniques, styles.

Other Schools with Many Methods of Using the Long Sword

It is very interesting how Miyamoto-san in his times understood what actually urges a person to like certain move, prefer certain weapon, prefer certain style. It is because the student thinks that this is the formula, the ultimate way to dominate the enemy. He thinks that ‘this’ style he likes will bring something special out of him. He thinks that this template guarantees his victory, because following certain set of style a template calms his mind through the illusion of predictability in chaotic situations. It is only when things don’t happen the way this person expected, then he realizes the illusion of style, illusion of ‘attitude’ he was carrying with him.

That is exactly why Miyamoto Musashi explain that the best style is to follow no style. The best secret is that there is not secret. (Classic Kung Fu Panda moment)

“Attitude – No attitude“

“The Secret ingredient is that there is no secret ingredient”

Style brings in predictability which eases the mind of enemy and gives patterns t defeat you. By imbibing free spirit, a warrior becomes unpredictable and lethal. He dominates his enemy simply by confusing the enemy instead of using special technique, special resource or special weapon.

“Attitude is the spirit of awaiting an attack”

Attitudes are meant only when the warrior is practicing, when there is no enemy. Enemy will never wait for your style to get executed properly, rather he expects exactly opposite.

Fixing the Eyes in Other Schools

Miyamoto-san also explains how certain combat techniques teach the warrior to focus on certain parts weapons of the enemy. He knew that if the warrior only focuses on certain areas during the fight, then he eventually narrows down his vision. Narrowing vision immediately cascades into his own confusion if even a single move goes unpredictable.

“If you fix the eyes on these places your spirit can become confused and your strategy thwarted.”

In simple words, if one only focuses on certain zones, areas of the enemy he can be easily fooled of confused when enemy discovers his areas of preferences.

In modern times, we have so much raw data, information available everywhere that is has started overwhelming us. It has created those unbreakable reward cycles, short term pleasure cycles which are difficult to break. Very few amongst us are able to actually make sense of the information we are being fed continuously. Thus Miyamoto-san talks here about developing a sense of intuition, insights and understanding about the information around us. He does not want a mechanical fighting machine executing techniques seamlessly, reacting to the attack effectively; he wants a thinking warrior who can end the battle with minimum resources and minimum damage.

“When you become accustomed to something, you are not limited to the use of your eyes.”

When you perceive and feel surrounding around you, when you develop an intuition, you never react mechanically rather you react with an intent. When a seasoned musician is playing his instrument, he does not even feel the need to look at the positioning of his fingers, his limbs. He is so in-tune with the music that he can play certain improvisation even without physically looking at the instrument. That is what is the difference between seeing and perceiving.

When a warrior comes out of this mechanistic nature of styles, moves then he truly becomes visionary. He does not need physical eyes to understand the surroundings around him.

Use of the Feet in Other Schools

Miyamoto-san also talks about how a warrior should use his feet in combat. As his teachings go, there is no special way of walking to win any fight.

“In my strategy, the footwork does not change. I always walk as I usually do in the street. You must never lose control of your feet. According to the enemy’s rhythm, move fast or slowly, adjusting your body not too much and not too little.”

In simple words, if enemy notices that you are walking slow then you become predictable; you will again become predictable when enemy notices that you are running fast. So, the idea is to walk normally to demonstrate your calm spirit as if nothing is happening to you. This confuses the enemy who is so eager to understand your rhythm and attack accordingly.

Destroying the predictability in every possible sense is the idea of winning a neck-to-neck competitive game.

Speed in Other Schools

Miyamoto-san also clears one myth in combat that being fast guarantees victory.

“Speed implies that things seem fast or slow, according to whether or not they are in rhythm. Whatever the Way, the master of strategy does not appear fast.“

Whenever a warrior thinks that it is the speed that actually killed the enemy, he is wrong. It was the unpredictability, out of rhythm move that killed him. If the enemy would have been as fast as you then that same move would be useless.

Speed in every combat is always relative as Miyamoto-san goes here. He wants the warrior to be full of intent and not speedy or swift. He wants the warrior to make the attack at the right time, with full intent and with full clarity.

“Interior” and “Surface” in other Schools

Miyamoto-san exclusively wrote the Wind Book to discuss the shortcomings of having certain favorite style of fighting. On superficial level and for a normal reader, it will feel like he is trying to brag about how and why only his technique is the best technique in the whole world. But deep down when Miyamoto-san clarifies the shortcomings of the other schools and people of those schools blindly following such teachings then it becomes very clear why there is never such thing like a single formula to victory or a single weapon to defeat them all or a single style to kill an enemy. In a way Miyamoto-san actually identified the concept of Black Swan in his ancient days. There will always be something which you cannot gauge, cannot predict which will completely contradict to what your previous beliefs were before. It will challenge you to change all the previous assumptions, styles, preferences you had.

A Black Swan Effect is an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight-previous date to predict.
People used to think that there is no such thing as a Black Swan until they discovered one in Australia.

Hence, he instructs the readers about how to start learning something new. According to Miyamoto-san, the ways of learning are always changing like the wind, there is no style or no single style to achieve anything and everything in our lives. As a lifelong learner, you will start somewhere and build on it without having any prejudices, presumptions and keep your eyes open to everything beneficial in your knowledge building process. The idea is to start with what you like just to penetrate the topic but when you get the hold of it you must not limit it to your preferences, you should widen your perspectives to learn the new and unconventional.

“When I teach my way, I first teach by training in techniques which are easy for the pupil to understand, a doctrine which is easy to understand. I gradually endeavor to explain the deep principle, points, which it is hardly possible to comprehend, according to the pupil’s progress. In any event, because the way to understanding is through experience, I do not speak of “interior” and “gate”.“

Richard Feynman was one such person who was known such unconventional critical thinking and problem solving, Pablo Picasso who is known for creating such out of the world and unconventional perspectives through his art. These are some examples of people who truly rediscovered what their domains of expertise were.

“I could now continue by giving a specific account of these schools one by one, from the “gate” to the “interior”, but I have intentionally not named the schools or their main points. The reason for this is that different branches of schools give different interpretations of the doctrines. In as much as men’s opinion differ, so there must be differing ideas on the same matter. Thus no one man’s conception is valid for any school.“

Miyamoto-san here explains why his teachings do not include the best of all, the first of all technique to fight the battle – one-to-one or in masses. He also makes it clear that why he didn’t even number his teachings, techniques, chapters or the books. He knew that our human mind is so perceptible of the patterns, rankings, preferences in everything that it immediately develops a bias, a preference towards everything. Miyamoto Musashi’s the Wind Book thus is all about understanding the traditions, changing them by challenging the bad aspects for the ultimate gain of true wisdom. This process itself is never ending, hence it is not a job of single person or a single ideology or a single philosophy. It is very important to understand the greatness of Miyamoto-san’s teachings for being open to new ideas, being open to up-gradation/ renewal for that is how you can win over every unconventional challenge.

The true wisdom is innocent yet lethal; It is free from the biases, prejudices and preferences. A true wisdom never holds onto something, it is not mechanical rather it morphs according to the challenge presented. When the true wisdom fails to overcome the challenge presented, then it is also ready to reject its previous identity only to be born into a newer and evolved wisdom. Miyamoto Musashi’s the Wind Book is all about such continuously changing, upgrading spirit of the wisdom of life.

“You must simply keep your spirit true to realize the virtue of strategy.“

“You keep on learning and learning, and pretty soon you learn something no one has learned before.”
Richard Feynman

Links for further readings:

The Book of Five Rings – The Fire Book

Miyamoto Musashi’s ‘The Fire Book’ from the Book of Five Rings focuses on detailed one-to-one combat strategies and warfare tactics. But, it is not limited to enemy warfare and combat. The Fire Book dives deep into the true grit, the consistency and the perseverance required to fight and win the greatest battle – the battle of life, the battle of survival.

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Miyamoto-san in his ‘The Fire Book’ amongst the Book of Five Rings explains in detail about combat and war tactics. We already saw how he explained the importance of fundamentals, importance of managing skills and resources in the Ground Book; the importance of habits, behaviors, small steps and fluidity in the Water Book. The Fire Book explained hereafter is about the fierce attitude of living a life full of challenges. Although, initial reading gives the impression of clear fighting instructions but do not get fooled by the limited words/ sentence choices of Miyamoto Musashi. As he has already explained in the previous books, the reader has to see greater ways in the limited knowledge Miyamoto-san has presented in these books.

As the name goes, it is about keeping that fire of fierceness in you alive until you win your fight. On surface, it may seem like a set of clear instructions to adopt and implement combat and war strategies but it is important to understand that this is the wisdom to win the battle of life, battle of survival which the ultimate fight for every person.

“By using only their fingertips, they only know the benefit of three of the five inches of the wrist.”

Miyamoto-san make the readers aware that how some people think that they can achieve everything when they know some set of the techniques. He wants readers to appreciate the vast expanse and extents of the true wisdom. He expects everyone to not cling to their favorite techniques only. Miyamoto-san thus highlights the fact that one should strive to understand and imbibe anything and everything that is there to know in order to perfect the art of survival. This is only possible when one has urge to deep dive into the things happening around them. Miyamoto-san in some sense, abhors the superficiality of learning process and knowledge involved in it.

“In my strategy, the training for killing enemies is by way of many contests, fighting for survival, discovering the meaning of life, learning the Way of the sword, judging the strength of attacks and understanding the Way of the “edge and the ridge” of the sword.”

There is no single and only way to your goal. Going into the depths of the techniques gives the real advantage over the enemy and also in your own development.

“You cannot profit from small techniques particularly when full armor is worn.”

When you are at some disadvantage, only one technique won’t help. You need to have multiple skill set to confirm your victory.

“Any man who wants to master the essence of my strategy must research this diligently, training morning and evening. Thus, can he polish his skill, become free from self, and realize extraordinary ability. “

Becoming ‘free from self’ actually refers to overcoming the physical limitations one has as a person, as a human being.

Then one by one Miyamoto dives deep into each and every combat technique and explains wherever required. As already seen in his previous books the Ground Book, the Water Book, Miyamoto-san always instructs readers to study and explore the wisdom presented on their own level and words will fail to explain the intricacies of the wisdom.

Depending on the Place

“Stand in the sun; that is, take up an attitude with the sun behind you. If the situation does not allow this, you must try to keep the sun on your right side. In buildings, you must stand with the entrance behind you or to your right. Make sure that you rear us unobstructed and that there is free space on your left, your right side being occupied with your side attitude. At night, if the enemy can be seen, keep the fire behind you and the entrance to your right and otherwise take up your attitude as above. You must look down on the enemy, and take up you attitude on slightly higher places.“

For what is written here, the idea is to clear the corners while entering any hostile environment. Taking the light source behind gives clear advantage of not getting overwhelmed by the intense light thus immediately giving you an edge over the enemy’s attack. It will be difficult for the enemy to understand your strokes if he is already overwhelmed by the intense light behind you. Furthermore, keeping the dominant side – right side ready for attack with space on the left will help to execute clean cut, clean attack. Keeping entrance to the right will help to counter the surprise attacks. Remaining on the top means always try to have as many as possible updates about the enemy moves. Top location will also help to plan surprise attack on the enemy.

“When the fight comes, always endeavor to chase the enemy around you left side. Chase him towards awkward places and try to keep him with his back to awkward places.”

Keeping enemy on the left will help to strike with dominant hand effectively. Miyamoto-san very smartly instructs to get the enemy in awkward corners where his attacks, blows will definitely fail thereby crushing his confidence.

“In houses chase the enemy into the thresholds, lintels, doors, verandas, pillars and so on, again not letting him see his situation.“

Three Methods to Forestall the Enemy – 1) Ken No Sen 2) Tai No Sen 3) Tai Tai No Sen

Miyamoto-san very clearly establishes that when you will be in a combat there are only three possibilities. Either you will strike first or your enemy will strike first or you both will strike simultaneously. There is no other possibility. The idea is to forestall – to intentionally slow down and confuse enemy so that he can be dealt with easily. Miyamoto-san focuses on these ideas because one can win quickly by taking the lead. It’s like the first mover’s advantage.

Ken No Sen means to set the enemy up.

When you attack the enemy first, make sure that you have one more intent to strike next- which is called as ‘reserved spirit’ by Miyamoto-san. Your first strike will be powerful but the next reserved strike will overwhelm your enemy, thereby crushing his confidence.
Or strike continuously to crush the enemy
Or strike with a strong intent for once

The idea is to not let the enemy think of attacking you next, to overwhelm him

Tai No Sen means to wait for the initiative i.e., to let the enemy attack first.

When enemy attacks first, let him think that you are weak. Let him know that you don’t want to pursue this fight. When he becomes sure of such attitude from you then strike strongly on the moment the enemy relaxes
Or when he attacks at first, counter it with even more strength thereby disturbing his rhythm and crushing his main planned intentions

Tai Tai No Sen means to accompany him and forestall him

When enemy instantly starts attacking don’t stall in thinking the right attack; just attack strongly and then look out for the weak spot to attack
Or if enemy is equivalent to you then let go with the flow. Accompany him to understand his movements, timings – float with him. When the rhythm is set then attack him strongly.

The intention to specially focus on these techniques is because, Miyamoto-san thinks that once you forestall the enemy it instantly crushes his spirit thereby making victory quick and possible.

To Hold Down a Pillow

This means not allowing enemy’s head to rise.

Miyamoto-san establishes that it is bad for you if the enemy leads you, controls your moves. In order to win you must always lead on either side. On one side, you will lead your people to correct moves and on the other side you will lead the enemy by promoting his mistakes.

“The important thing in strategy is to suppress the enemy’s useful actions but allow his useless actions.“

There is one more beautiful line where Miyamoto-san plays the game of words to convey his message to the students.

“The spirit is to check his attack at the syllable “at…,” when he jumps check his jump at the syllable “ju…” and check his cut at “cu…”“

Simply meaning that if you see something wrong happening with you, make sure that you do something before it comes to its fruition, its completion. Try to predict things and get ready to respond at the moment they happen in a combat.

Crossing at a Ford

Miyamoto-san explicitly wants to give a life lesson here. He used the analogy of the vast sea and one’s journey through it. Even though you have your friends at harbor, even though you are aware of the travel routes, condition of your ship, you should go out to explore the expanses of the sea. The conditions will not be favorable sometimes but you should try to defeat the vastness of the sea to achieve that which nobody has achieved yet.

The vast sea can be easily crossed by crossing area where it narrows the area called “a strait”, “a ford”. “The ford” is the weakest, narrow part of the vast sea.

Similarly, when in combat against a far superior and stronger enemy, don’t focus on his capabilities rather focus on your capabilities and try to cross at his weak point by using your strengths.

“If you succeed in crossing at the best place, you may take your ease. To cross at ford means to attack the enemy’s weak point and to put yourself in an advantageous position.“

To Know the Times

The idea is to understand the mentality, the nature, the habits or the way of thinking of the enemy and his people. When you will understand how the enemy involuntarily behaves, responds, then it becomes very easy for you to gain the advantage of the predictability.

Even in duels Miyamoto-san urges to identify the fighting style of the opponent during the act of forestalling. Once his school of style is known, you can easily take over on his weaknesses. The nature or the habits of the enemy are the involuntary clue that even the enemy himself cannot control and they are the mirrors of his intentions, so the idea is to understand his intentions, find weak spots in them and attack there.

“If you are thoroughly conversant with strategy, you will recognize the enemy’s intentions and thus have many opportunities to win.”

To Tread Down the Sword

“The spirit is to attack quickly while the enemy is still shooting with bows and guns.”

Miyamoto-san very cleverly gives a warfare strategy here. When the opponent first attacks with the bows and arrows or with the guns and cannons, you should not waste your time in drawing the arrows or filling the barrels with gun powder to counterattack. Instead, you should react instantly treading down i.e., use your brute force to avoid your confidence from going down. If you waste your time in drawing the arrows and filing the barrels, most of the damage would already weaken you in the process. Treading down means using the swift reacting forces, you have to not let enemy come up with second attack. If he is unable to come up with second attack then definitely, he will count his first successful attack only as a lucky one and will start doubting himself already.

“You must achieve the spirit of not allowing the enemy to attack the second time this is the spirit of forestalling in every sense once at the enemy you should not aspire just to strike him but to cling after the attack.”

To Know “Collapse”

“Everything can collapse – houses bodies and enemies collapse when their rhythm becomes deranged.”

The idea is to spot the chaos among the enemy and let that chaos increase further to defeat him without investing many resources and efforts.

“Fix your eye on the enemy’s collapse and chase him attacking so that you do not let him recover.”

To Become the Enemy

Becoming the enemy is not only about thinking the way enemy thinks. Miyamoto-san wants the students to understand that if you see yourself as something you become that thing. So even if the enemy is practically strong and if you let yourself convince that you cannot defeat him then, surely you won’t be able to defeat him.

So, it is about your mindset to defeat the enemy.

“He who is shut inside is a peasant, he enters to arrest is a hawk.”

It is also one way to say that any type of confidence is good confidence in modern and more relevant sense.

“In large-scale strategy, people are always under the impression that the enemy is strong so tend to become cautious. But if you have good soldiers, and if you understand the principles of strategy, and if you know how to beat the enemy, there is nothing to worry about.”

Becoming the enemy is about considering the whole world against ourselves and then using all that you have to win over the world. It is a strong personal advice from Miyamoto-san.

“If you think here is a master of the way who knows the principles of strategy then you will surely lose.”

To Release Four Hands

“To release 4 hands is used when you and the enemy are contending with the same spirit and the issue cannot be decided abandon the spirit and win through an alternative resource.”

When you realize that the enemy you are fighting is exactly you or equivalent of you then think out of the box. Do things which you won’t do normally. Such abnormal and creative ways of attacks will break the rhythm of your equivalent enemy.

“Immediately throw away the spirit and win with the technique the enemy does not expect.”

So, “releasing four hands” is the indication to create some unfair advantage through unconventional practices.

“We must defeat the enemy by changing our mind and applying a suitable technique according to his condition.”

To Move the Shade

“When you cannot see the enemy’s position, indicate that you are about to attack strongly to discover his resources. It is easy then to defeat him with a different method once you see his resources.”

This is one cunning and smart advice by Miyamoto-san. When you are unable to gauge the moves of the enemy or the enemy himself doesn’t want to leave any traces, you should create some fake opportunities of victory for the enemy so that he will expose all his capabilities to you. Once he is lured into such fake victories then you can gauge the strategies and plan a worthy surprise counterattack secretly.

To Hold Down a Shadow

“When the enemy embarks on an attack, if you make a show of strongly suppressing his technique, he will change his mind. Then altering your spirit, defeat him by forestalling him with a Void spirit.“

The idea is to embarrass the enemy if you are going for a strong counterattack. This saves you resources in next attack because the enemy would never come out to counterattack because of the embarrassment.

To Pass On

Miyamoto-san makes a very smart observation on some involuntary human habits like sleepiness, yawning. These can be passed on human to human. Even today’s neuroscience agrees that these are the habits which are easy to pass on because of the herd mentality, group behavior of humans.

Miyamoto-san advises as follows:

“Make a show of complete calmness and the enemy will be taken by this and will become relaxed when you see that this. Has been passed on you can bring about the enemies defeat by attacking strongly with a Void spirit.“

The idea is to pass on your careless, weak attitude on the surface to your enemy and once he is relaxed the bring out you real fierce attacking inner spirit to defeat him.

To Cause the Loss of Balance

“Without allowing him space for breath to recover from the fluctuation of spirit you must grasp the opportunity to win.”

In simple words, not giving an opportunity to recover the enemy from last attack. The enemy can be made to lose his balance by bringing in danger, creating difficulties and bringing in the surprise. Miyamoto-san speaks here very clearly as an experienced and seasoned teacher.

To Frighten

“Fright often occurs, caused by the unexpected.”

Miyamoto-san knows very well about the basic human mentality. We don’t like uncomfortable situations. The enemy’s confidence, spirit can be easily crushed by making him uncomfortable, by scaring him. Scary, unnerving, unsettling and panicky battle cries/ battle drums/ battle horns are one great example of that.

To Soak In

“When you have come to grips and are striving together with the enemy and you realize that you cannot advance you soak in and become one with the enemy.“

It is simply remaining in touch with the enemy to understand his moves. The moment you draw apart from your enemy, you will lose the advantage of the predictability.

To Injure the Corners

“It is difficult to move strong things by pushing directly so you should injure the corners.”

When the enemy is big in size and strength, the best way to start is to injure his corners as in his extended and weak parts. Once you bring down his morale then, even the big things will collapse down.

“In large-scale strategy it is beneficial to strike at the corners of the enemy’s force”

In the same sense if the opponent has strong army, start attacks from the most beneficial and weak spots, facing the initial defeats from such “corners” can bring down the spirit of the remaining strong forces.

To Throw in Confusion

“Victory is certain when the enemy is caught up in a rhythm which confuses his spirit“

Creating confusion is all about not letting enemy think that he has understood you. When he will be confused about your intentions, he will be less focused and then it will be easy to take him down. Miyamoto-san smartly establishes this idea for both one on one combat and a large-scale war.

“Feint a trust or cut or make the enemy think you are going to close with him and when he is confused you can easily win.“

The Three Shouts

Earlier Miyamoto-san suggested to scare the enemy with voices. He again highlights how voice can be incorporated into the fights to create rhythm. He divides the shouts in three seemingly obvious but smart by implementations as shouts before, during and after.

“The voice shows energy“

The attitude you want to present to the enemy can be easily demonstrated to the enemy simply just by your shouts instead of deploying valuable assets and resources into the battle or fights.

Shouting before the fight creates the rhythm, shouting during the battle in low pitch projects the effectiveness of our attack and the shouting at the end of the war can build instant morale boost and an escalating defeat of the enemy due to downgrading spirit.

To Mingle

Mingling is all about sticking and advancing into the enemy forces. If you are continuously stuck with the enemy forces and see that they are defeated at certain position then you attack their remaining sides with same strength thereby making space to advance through them. Once you see crushing at a location you build upon that to advance ahead.

“What is meant by mingling if the spirit of advancing and becoming engaged with the enemy and not withdrawing even one step.“

To Crush

Crushing is all about not giving even single opportunity to the enemy to recover from the last attack. When you sense his ultimate weakness getting exposed then crushing will ensure the last blow to get the victory in the battle.

“When we see that enemy has few men or if he has many men but his spirit is weak and disordered, we knock the hat over his eyes crushing him utterly. If we crush lightly, he may recover.”

The Mountain-Sea Change

“The mountain sea spirit means that it is bad to repeat the same thing several times when fighting the enemy there may be not hell but to do something twice but do not try it a third time.”

Miyamoto-san knows that every person, every fighter has preferences, comfortable, favorite moves. Playing such moves again and again can make the person predictable thereby vulnerable. He thus wants the warrior to demonstrate the spectrum of moves, moves of contradictions to effectively confuse the enemy.

“If the enemy thinks of mountains attack like the sea and if he thinks of a sea attack like the mountains.”

To Penetrate the Depths

“If his spirit is not extinguished, he may be beaten superficially yet undefeated in spirit deeps inside.“

Miyamoto-san very well knows the psychology of revenge and coming back with more preparedness to avenge the last fight. Thus, he wants the warrior to not only physically defeat the enemy but also to defeat them in their minds.

“Penetrating the depths means penetrating with the long sword penetrating with the body and penetrating with the spirit.”

This shows how Miyamoto-san is serious about the mindset of warrior. He knows that you can easily defeat an enemy physically but if he is not defeated in his mind then surely, he will rise up again with possibly stronger counterattack.

“If the enemy remains spirited it is difficult to crush him.“

To Renew

““To renew” applies when we are fighting with the enemy and entangled spirit arises where there is no possible resolution, we must abandon our efforts, think of the situation in a fresh spirit then win the new rhythm.”

A great teacher with strongest techniques knows that there will be chances when his pupils may stand against each other. There may be chances when exactly same great techniques will be presented in front of each other. The great and smart teacher knows that such tie-making conditions will require new ways, new perspectives of thinking.

In simple words, when one feels stuck in repetition, the best way to solve such problems is to start from something new, unconventional and out of the box ideas.

This also shows how Miyamoto-san was open to accepting the idea that even his fool-proof, seasoned techniques will sometimes be challenged with equally potent different techniques. Thus, he demands creative thinking while solving such issues which is really smart for the times and personality he was.

Rat’s Head, Ox’s Neck

This is about leveraging the small details to bigger advantages in warfare. History has many examples where even a seemingly small thing changes the bigger course of the warfare, battles. Miyamoto-san here, similarly expects a warrior, a strategist to think with the ability of Rat to see at small levels and use that detail to strike back with the power of the Ox’s neck. One has to appreciate how Miyaomoto-san has distilled small-small details of everyday observations into his nectar of war strategies.

“Whenever we have become preoccupied with small detail, we must suddenly change into a large spirit, interchanging large with small.“

The Commander Knows the Troops

“Using the wisdom of strategy, think of the enemy as your own troops.“

Miyamoto-san explains this idea in very few words, because he wants this idea to be understood only by those people who actually have grasped the thought process behind his Way of Strategy. Miyamoto-san implies here that if you understand the troops of the enemies well, then you can direct those troops in your ways thereby saving your resources. The various ideas explained before in the Fire Book relate to the human tendencies, psyche, group dynamics, group behavior. Using this knowledge if one becomes successful in understanding the mindset of his enemy troops, then is is impossible to defeat him.

To Let Go the Hilt

“There is the spirit of winning without a sword. There is also the spirit of holding the long sword but not winning.“

Hilt means the handle – the grip of the weapon. Here again Miyamoto-san is limiting his words but the message to be conveyed is precise. He implies that having the greatest weapon in your hands does not guarantee absolute victory. You can win the fight without the weapon too. It is all about the mindset. If you have that mindset of the fierceness of the fire in your fights then, it is nearly impossible to defeat you. Don’t become too much attached to your lavish, expensive, sophisticated equipment and tools. Understand that you can be easily defeated in exceptions when you won’t have these tools. So, accept that in order to win – sometimes you may have to let go of your priced possessions. It should be always you deciding the fate of your battles and not the tools, weapons that you use to win those battles. Detachments from such tools will bring out the real fighter within you.

The Body of a Rock

The body of rock is implied to the feeling of not getting disturbed by what is happening around you. This mindset will not only defeat one on one enemy but will also build the attitude of fierce fire when the warrior will face thousands of enemies alone. Again, it is all about mindset.

Conclusion

Miyamoto-san in the Fire Book gives almost 27 techniques to win in a one-to-one combat, in a battle or in a long-term, large scale warfare. The consistencies of these techniques and ideas with some real-world examples and practical advises show the true scholar of Miyamoto-san.

Creating breathing space to fight aggressively, rising on the top locations in the battle places, to engulf the enemy even from small advantages, to have the ability to spread swiftly and influence immediately, to have the ability to begin again even from a small spark or embers, to remain unpredictable, to remain attached to the enemy are the tendencies of the fire. These minute behaviors of the fire are closely studied and imbibed into the real life by Miyamoto Musashi, they are the key to the Fire Book.

You must understand why this section is called the Fire Book. Obviously as the name goes the techniques are built around the behavior of the Fire. The important thing is that everyone would have seen a fire many times in their lives but it is the observant and thoughtful mind of the warrior like Miyamoto-san who extracted the wisdom of Combat and warfare from the Fire. Please bear in mind that these tactics are still relevant in modern warfare and battle strategies.

“Of course, men who study in this way thing that they are training the body and spirit, but it is an obstacle to true Way, and its bad influence remains forever. Thus, the true way of strategy is becoming decadent and dying out.“

Thus, the Fire Book is about the grit, the perseverance in fighting and winning the greatest battle – the battle of life, the battle of survival.

Links for further reading:

The Book of Five Rings – The Water Book

Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Water from the Book of Five Rings is about the ideas of form-ability, fluidity of water. The way we live and control our lives, the decisions we make, the actions we do are solely based on the behaviors and the routines we follow. It is really an understatement to call this book as a Guide for Sword-Fighters.

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Ancient combat strategies for the modern competitions

After understanding the Ground Book which builds the foundation of the Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi, we will deep dive into the next book called the Water Book. The general idea is to understand how water behaves, how it tries to bring in consistency throughout, how it tries to level even in disturbances, how a drop to drop creates an oceanic impact, how it flows and remains unobstructed of the challenges. The Water Book is about the the spirit of the warrior, the attitude, the way of looking at things and handling them, making decisions about them.

“The principle of strategy is to have one thing, to know ten thousand things.“

In short, know the ocean from single drop. Miyamoto Musashi wants to highlight the effectiveness of his strategy of Water by showing the consistency in these principles. Once a warrior understands a consistent idea, it becomes very easy for him to implement it everywhere effectively. Thus, by learning this consistent way of water if a warrior defeats his single enemy, he thereby also gains the ability to defeat the thousands of enemies singly. That is how effective these ideas from the Water Book are!

“Language does not extend to explaining the Way in detail, but it can be grasped intuitively. Study this book; read a word and then ponder on it. If you interpret the meaning loosely you will mistake the Way.“

This is exactly what has been already established in modern philosophy as the Language Theory of Philosophy by Ludwig Wittgenstein. An ancient, age-old warrior already understood this knowledge way ahead of his time. Miyamoto-san knew that a novice self-learner will take every word literally and hence will fail to actually grasp the depths of the wisdom he has shared. He wants readers to inculcate every word in their own lives. These are not ideas just for battling, killing and fighting. These are the ideas to handle any type of situations, people, systems in your everyday lives.

“The principles of strategy are written down here in terms of single combat, but you must think broadly so that you attain an understanding for ten-thousand-a-side battles.“

The wisdom is so distilled and ubiquitous that it can be used in any battle, any problem solving.

“If you merely read this book, you will not reach the Way of Strategy.“

Again, this Book of Water rather the Book of Five Rings is not to be taken literally.

Spirituality – The Way of Life

“In strategy your spiritual bearing must not be any different from normal. Both in fighting and in everyday life you should be determined though calm. Meet the situation without tenseness yet not recklessly, your spirit settled yet unbiased. Even when your spirit is calm do not let you spirit slacken. Do not let your spirit be influenced by your body, or your body be influenced by your spirit. Be neither insufficiently spirited nor over spirited. An elevated spirit is weak and a low spirit is weak. Do not let your enemy see your spirit.”

One has to now understand that Miyamoto-san even though explicitly talks about sword fights it is not only about sword fights. He wants readers to understand that the true greatness does not come from following special regime or following some trick or knowing some secrets. Actually, the secret to a great life is that there is no secret!

Miyamoto-san doesn’t want a warrior to force things. He wants everyone to be at their optimum, neither less nor more, neither in excess nor in scarce – just the perfect amount. Once this happens in a person’s daily routine then it becomes part of him, his way of life. Then even an extraordinary situation, a bad event doesn’t affect him. This is what discovering spirituality is!

“With your spirit open and un-constricted, look at things from a high point of view. You must cultivate your wisdom and spirit. Polish your wisdom: learn public justice, distinguish between good and evil, study the Ways of different arts one by one. When you cannot be deceived by men you will have realized the wisdom of strategy.“

Miyamoto-san though promotes his “Way of Strategy” in the Book of Five Rings, he wants the readers to expand their vision, their perspectives to different arts too. The idea is that when you become aware of many things, many arts it becomes really difficult to fool you, to trick you. That is also a superpower in a way.

Stance

Please mind that it is not just about how a warrior should stand in a fight. Stance here also means about your attitude in the situations of hardships and challenges. Here it goes:

Adopt a stance with head erect, neither hanging down, nor looking up, nor twisted – Don’t project yourself as too proud or too peasant and helpless. Be at peace with yourself.
Your forehead and the space between your eyes should not be wrinkled – Control and hide your anger and project it effectively when and where required
Do not roll your eyes nor allow them to blink – Don’t fiddle, observe your surrounding with a calm and focused mind
With your features composed, keep the line of your nose straight with a feeling of slightly flaring your nostrils – Be in the moment. Breath.
Hold the line of the rare of the neck straight: instill your vigor into your hairline, and in the same way from the shoulders down through your entire body – Concentrate all your energy to your torso, your vital organs in order to handle what is to come next
Lower both shoulders and, without the buttocks jutting out, put strength into your legs from the knees to the tips of your toes. Brace your abdomen so that you do not bend at the hips – Don’t tighten your body, don’t be stressed from the fear of your enemy. Loosen up your body to make it pliable to respond enemy attacks effectively.
Wedge your companion sword in your belt against your abdomen, so that your belt s not slack – this is called “wedging in” – Prepare yourself to attack, tighten your core body, your weapons, your tools/ equipment to face any situation

“In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and make your everyday stance your combat stance.“

Here you must understand that these are not the recommendations to warriors only. Miyamoto-san wants these to be the way of life. One has to really appreciate the depths of his wisdoms through these teaching.

Gaze – Don’t just look, have a vision

“In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things.“

While doing all of these stances Miyamoto-san suggests to not get fooled by the appearances only. He recommended these mentioned stances in order to project strong warrior in front of his opponent. But what if the enemy also projects the same stances nevertheless, he is strong in reality? At these moments, Miyamoto-san guides to understand the big picture and the details to decide effective strategies based on the enemy’s behavior.

Holding the Long Sword

Miyamoto-san beautifully explains the role of each finger on the grip of sword. It can only be experienced on personal level of reader and cannot be expressed in words only. But the overall idea is not just grab the sword with all five fingers rather make it an extension of your body which has its own reflexes.

“Fixedness means a dead hand. Pliability is a living hand.“

It is again a reminder to not blindly and mechanically follow the rule, tricks, or techniques. Become agile and formless, shapeless like water (..my friend!)

Footwork

“Whether you move fast or slow, with large or small steps, your feet must always move as in normal walking.“

Miyamoto-san here again says that there is nothing like “special technique” to defeat any enemy. When you are not forcing things to be there, you break the patterns, mechanical nature of your moves. Your moves, decisions become natural.

“You should not move on one foot preferentially.“

If you have preferences, then it becomes easy to defeat you by attacking on your preferences, your preferences will make you more predictable.

“If you try to wield the long sword quickly you will mistake the Way. To wield the long sword well you must wield it calmly.“

Any big responsibility, any big authority, any big decision, any big power should be handled wisely, calmly with a focused mind.

Way of the Long Sword

Miyamoto-san then exactly points out each and every technique to the student. The details with which everything is explained deserves great attention of every reader. The information is clear, concise and just enough.

a. The Five Attitudes

The great thing about a true master is that he is the ultimate simplifier. A true master knows how to teach complicated and intertwined knowledge points in simplified ways without losing the essence of the concept. Miyamoto-san thus incorporates his exact learning into small chunks of wisdom where every word is just enough to grasp the whole concept.

Miyamoto-san at the very beginning makes clear as to where exactly the sword is supposed to be used. The five attitudes he describes seem very simple. The five attitudes are:

The Middle attitude – it is about hitting (and killing) the enemy by striking on torso and vital organs with sword against his face
The Upper attitude – it is about exactly striking upper blow of sword when enemy attacks and when he escapes this cut Miyamoto-san guides to follow the flow on line and scoop from below
The Lower attitude – it is about hitting the hands of enemy from below, Miyamoto-san also suggests that this is the most encountered stance from enemy
The Left-side attitude – it is about hitting the hands of enemy from below and parrying the same attack to cut from his left side
The Right-side attitude – it is about crossing enemy’s sword attack from below and swinging it further and using upper strike from the right side

These are in simple and no-nonsense words, the five directions in which you can swing a sword to kill your enemy. You really have to understand that the reader of this book especially the pupil learning swordfight are supposed to have that innate natural excitement of learning something special from the great master – his tricks and secrets to become invincible. But the great Sword-master Miyamoto-san delivers his wisdom in the ways of common sense. And believe me it is not sarcasm, rather Miyamoto-san is very serious while discussing the five attitudes here. The whole idea of five attitudes is that, there are mere five vital regions where one has to focus to defeat his enemy. And in those five the Middle Attitude is the most vital. (Logically, the middle region, the torso of human body consists most of the vital organs in human body so it already makes more sense)

“To understand attitude, you must thoroughly understand the middle attitude. The middle attitude is the heart of the attitudes. If we look at strategy on a broad scale, the Middle attitude is the seat of the commander, with the other four attitudes following the commander. You must appreciate this.“

The attitudes are not there only to explain the parts of human body, it also represents the whole organization of the enemy’s battalion. All the vital weaponry, the best of the best soldiers, the best diplomats, the best strategists are the middle part of every commander on battle-field. Miyamoto-san suggests to focus on this middle part while defeating enemies in masses. Such hidden and smart instructions are hidden and scattered all over the Book of the Five Rings.

b. The “Attitude No-attitude” teaching

Miyamoto-san gives five attitudes to fight at first and then instructs to forget about them here. Please understand that the five attitudes are not just “A Guide to Basic Human Anatomy” for the sword-fighters. There is deeper meaning in Miyamoto-san’s advice.

“Whatever attitude you are in, do not be conscious of making the attitude; think only of cutting. Your attitude should be large or small according to the situation.“

One can understand it like this – Do not get overwhelmed by the thought of deciding which approach to select to kill the enemy. Actually, if one gets tangled and confused in selecting the right approach, he will immediately loose his life to his opponent as the enemy has already stricken him.

One should only focus on intent to kill the enemy and let the right attitudes come out of those attitudes. Even though five attitudes are defined that does not mean that they are supposed to followed mechanically. This way of mechanistic selection and confusion from it disappears when one does enough practice which is what Miyamoto-san focuses and instructs everywhere.

“Fixed formation is bad“

Again, Miyamoto-san suggests to be fluid, non-fixated, agile, flowable like water.

c. To Hit the Enemy “In One Timing”

The idea is to not hesitate to act on right opportunity with the full intent of killing the enemy

d. The “Abdomen Timing of Two”

Don’t spare your enemy even when you see him retreating, when you see him relaxing follow him up with a cut

e. No Design, No Conception

Go fully “in” when you see enemy going fully “in”. Use everything you have, don’t follow the structuredness and rigidity of some tricks you learned elsewhere. Again, be fluid in nature, respond accordingly.

f. The Flowing Water Cut

When your strike fails, when you fail (in anything in your real life too) widen your perspective, expand your spirit and this time strike your next blow slowly but decisively, thoughtfully. Miyamoto-san understands that when the enemy sees his strike winning, the true warrior must make a conscious effort to not let his enemy’s morale raise high with this small win. Miyamoto-san call it like “Stagnant water”, when you blow fails, pause-think-come back with full intent of focus.

g. Continuous Cut

When you realize that the enemy- opponent is equivalent to you and it is difficult to defeat (kill) him; then you should attack in such way that it will harm the enemy at multiple locations. Try to hit as many birds as possible in single stone when you are fighting an equal opponent. It is about effectiveness and efficiency of your single stroke.

h. The Fire and Stones

When fight goes one-to-one make sure that it hits different parts of the enemy.

i. The Red Leaves Cut

Force the enemy to lose his sword, his vital and important tools, weapons like a falling and dying red leaf of fall. Disable the enemy by capturing his resources.

j. The Body in Place of the Long Sword

Don’t just be too focused on your weapon, your sword, your tools and resources. Use your body to attack the enemy. If you can focus on getting the control of enemy’s sword, he can think of you similarly. So, with sword use your body too.

k. Cut and Slash

Miyamoto-san here clarifies that cutting is about cutting with full intent of killing but slashing is just touching the enemy, injuring him.

Be decisive about your moves before attacking and be ready to accept the consequences.

Miyamoto-san explicitly clarifies additional thing here:

“Even if you slash strongly, and even if the enemy dies instantly, it is slashing.“

I would like to highlight one very important bias that every learner every, student faces in their learning process, especially when they are leaning on their own which is the “Outcome Bias”. Many a times we make some hypothesis on the inner working of the things which we are trying to understand and it eventually happen in the end but in somewhat different ways- in a way we didn’t expect but it happens. Does that mean that we have completely understood everything? The answer is “No”. This is known as the “Outcome Bias” where you decide whether a certain action is right or wrong based on the outcome and the outcome might be just luck. So, it might be a possibility that your hypothesis is wrong.

The outcome bias is dominant in self-learners which Miymoto-san expertly points out here.

l. Chinese Monkey’s Body

Don’t extend yourself partially in enemy’s territory just like Chinese Monkey’s body in Miyamoto-san’s words. If you extend your arms towards the enemy, the enemy will grab you by your arms and pull you in completely.

m. Glue and Lacquer Emulsion Body

When you engage with the enemy make sure that you engage fully. As in do not lose the contact with your enemy when you are really in the fight. Otherwise, you will be unable to anticipate and react to your enemy’s next blows.

n. To Strive for Height

Once engaged with enemy in fight, establish dominance in every possible way, don’t let your enemy’s morale rise up and take the high ground. (That’s exactly what Obi-Wan Kenobi did)

o. To Apply Stickiness

When fully engaged, stick with the enemy; don’t lose touch of him and his sword. Reduce the strength of the strike but keep in touch with his blade, that will help you to gauge his moves immediately.

p. The Body Strike

Find the weakness of the armor and directly attack the body through that weakness.

q. Three Ways to Parry His Attack

When enemy blows attack, target his important areas first for counter attack. First way is to attack on his eyes-his vision; second on his neck, the part which connects the mind and the tools of any organization, any battalion; third on his face, on the image and perception of the organization, the battalion.

r. To Stab at the Face

Stabbing at face means to destroy the senses and the mind of the opponent. Face as in head is eyes, ears, nose, tongue, skin and mind all in single spot which is another vital region of the body. Once you drive the head, the complete body will follow thereby making enemy predictable to attack and kill effectively.

Try to control enemy’s moves by explicitly targeting his most important parts with full intent.

s. To Stab at the Heart

When you are tired, just blow single and focused strike on the vital part of the enemy.

t. To Scold “Tut-TUT!”

Make sure that your enemy understands that your counterattack was intended to hurt, kill him. Try to bring down his morale. Don’t let him think that he has won.

u. The Smacking Parry

If you develop a rhythm of attacks in your fight, you can still handle the coming blows from enemy and simultaneously hurt him with counterattacks. It’s about developing a sense of timing.

v. There are Many Enemies

When you are alone and surrounded by many, don’t hesitate and wait; attack with the intent to kill many in single strikes. Don’t attack and strike from front or head on; approach and attack from sides.

“Whatever you do, you must drive the enemy together, as if tying a line of fishes, and when they are seen to be piled up, cut them down strongly without giving them room to move.“

w. The Advantage when Coming to Blows

Go out, practice, and implement your truths, your learnings in reality.

x. One Cut

Become a master in such way that it looks effortless to others. (like Saitama!!!)

While actually reading all these ways to kill the enemy with sword, you will feel like you are actually witnessing these iconic sword strikes in a sword fight or like an intense sword fight in an anime. Miyamoto-san creates a live picture of strokes of sword in his writing while writing all this, which itself is a great experience for readers.

Closing remarks of the Book of Water

In the closing remarks of the Book of Water, Miyamoto-san instructs to make these ideas the way of life. He wants these ideas to become part of your habits. When they will get reflected in your habits the body will react naturally to the challenges as if these techniques are second nature for it. Miyamoto-san expects a flow, a harmony like water in the rhythm, spirit of the readers while handling sword or any situation in their life.

“Step by step walk the thousand-mile road“

Miyamoto-san is aware that the novice will get overwhelmed by the details and the number of the teachings from the Book of Water alone. He wants the student, the warrior, the reader to learn one by one, one at a time and imbibe it in their lives.

“Study strategy over the years and achieve the spirit of the warrior. Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is your victory over lesser men.“

It is about practicing, relearning and distilling down the wisdom over the period. This is only possible by discipline. Only discipline will bring out the best version of you from your personality of times gone, once you become something different and greater from your previous version nobody can stop you. Discipline is the way.

“Even if you kill an enemy, if it is not based on what you have learned – it is not the true Way.“

In the end of the Book of Water, Miyamoto-san explains the only way to develop wisdom. Knowledge can be transferred, can be taught from one person to another but wisdom always develops from inside. And as it develops from inside, there is very high possibility that it will be full of biases as these are self-truths. Hence clearing the biases in your learning process by continuously practicing them with reality is the way. One must be always be sure about the hypotheses in their knowledge building process in order to create the real wisdom.

Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Water from the Book of Five Rings is about the ideas of formability, fluidity of water. The way we live and control our lives, the decisions we make, the actions we do are solely based on the behaviors and the routines we follow. The ideas expressed in the Book of Water are can also be connected to Game theory, Corporate Strategies, Principles of War Strategies and Diplomacy, Human psyche, Competitiveness, Lifestyle, Resources and Manpower Management, Spirituality and nonetheless Philosophy of Life and Knowledge. It is really an understatement to call this book as a Guide for Sword-Fighters.

What is special about water? That it is so omnipresent that it is not that special. It is so formless, shapeless that it takes shape of anything. Water has ability to make impact even when it is in drop and even when it in the form of ocean. The specialty of water is that it is not special, or at least no specialty can be assigned to it. It is water’s fluidity, pliability to the situations which enables it to take their forms which is what makes water so special. That is exactly what Miyamoto-san establishes here for the ways to live life thereby with the battles and fights in it.

Links for further Reading:

The Book of Five Rings – The Ground Book

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Wisdom of the elders

Here is a short story. A young man heard some cracking noise in his car which was unexpected for him as he had taken good care of this car. After doing everything possible, visiting many of his mechanic friends, running tests, the problem was not getting solved completely. The noise would again start after some time. One of his friends suggested a senior mechanic to solve this problem. The senior mechanic came, asked the young man to start the car, listened to the noise for some time and tightened just a single screw on the drive mechanism and the noise disappeared. The problem was solved within few minutes and senior mechanic made sure that it will not happen again by revving to the extremes of the car with a test drive. The young man was happy seeing that the problem was solved instantly.

He asked, “How much for the job?”

The senior mechanic said, “that will be $200”.

The young man was shocked, “Who pays $200 for tightening single screw?”

Senior Mechanic, “$200 are for knowing exactly which screw to tighten which required the whole experience of my profession, tightening any screw is still free!”

The young man realized the value of the service from the senior mechanic, paid him accordingly and apologized for questioning his intent.

The story is contrived, but no one will disagree that we have faced such similar moments in our lives, especially in the times of youth. Some problems become unsolvable at a given moment. People try to implement the most modern of modern techniques to tackle this challenge but the efforts are futile, worthless. Then one “seasoned” senior and (obviously) old person enters the discussion and solves problem within few steps, rendering all the young and modern efforts useless. When the solution becomes visible to everyone, it becomes apparent that the answer was filled with such a common sense that any fool would have guessed that and still nobody could solve it.

The point of all this is that, wisdom of elders although remains less relevant with the current flows and fields of knowledge, they become of ultimate importance when any unconventional problem emerges. Because this wisdom is born out of many tests of such senior person’s knowledge in his/her life where every unnecessary part of the knowledge is stripped off to reach that point of true knowledge- the wisdom.

Today we will explore the ancient philosophy of one such seasoned person which has stood the test of the times, especially the modern times where the skill he worked with is on the brink of extinction. As the wisdom goes, it is still relevant and helpful for today’s generation and the generations to come.

Miyamoto Musashi and The Book of Five Rings

Miyamoto Musashi was the greatest Japanese swordsman that the history of humanity has ever witnessed. Miyamoto Musashi was known for his swordsmanship and remaining undefeated in 61 duels. He was so great and influential in his art that people call him Kensei, a sword-saint of Japan. Along with the greatest swordsman, Miyamoto Musashi was also a great penman. His writings, philosophies, strategies remained of great value in the respective times and are still important today.

Miyamoto Musashi wrote two books in the later years of his life – The Book of Five Rings (五輪の書, Go Rin No Sho) and The Path of Aloneness (獨行道, Dokkōdō).

Miyamoto Musashi put all his wisdom of a warrior’s life into this “Book of Five Rings”. The five rings namely Ground, Water, Fire, Wind and Void represent the five aspects of his philosophy of a warrior. The books are a collection of very limited paragraphs and believe me it is intentional. They are supposed to concise reflecting the focused intention of the writer Miyamoto-san.

The Ground Book

The book starts with the philosophy of the Ground. The book seems exclusively written for warriors and martial arts practitioners.

“Each man practices as he feels inclined”

Miyamoto Musashi establishes that there are many fields of knowledge, ways of living life. Anyone can learn any way he fancies.

“The Way of the warrior is resolute acceptance of death“

Even though every person has to face death in the end, for a warrior the acceptance of death as the ultimate truth creates that urgency for discipline, virtue and intent. Miyamoto-san intends a person to realize the limitedness of the life and the urgency to overcome the ways in which a common life lives the same life. He wants the reader, the warrior to have something that many commoners don’t have that is the victory at personal level and victory at a group level, in teams. And believe me it is not just about victory in sword-fight or a huge battle.

Even though Miyamoto-san clearly discusses the techniques of sword fight one must understand that they are the techniques of living the life, handling the situations in life, creating a fighter warrior’s attitude towards the challenges in life.

The Way of strategy

In simple words, it discusses the discipline to live a warrior’s life. For that Miyamoto-san starts with the function of major professions in the society – the gentlemen a.k.a. the warrior, the farmers, the artisans, the merchants. He clearly points out that these are just people extending themselves through some objects for living the life with some benefits and thereby their survival.

“If we look at the world, we see arts for sale. Men use equipment to sell their own selves.”

Musashi’s view towards life and world is still relevant and unchanged. Our jobs, professions, occupations are extensions of our personality. Some are doing it willingly; some are doing it unwillingly. Even when some people are hating their jobs that is still representing who they are.

Miyamoto-san also explains how some masters, so called “Gurus”, trainers brag that their technique is the best and try to mislead people with that to gain profits. He highlights that how techniques, the strategies to live better life are being traded objectively for profits. In this chaos of trade of knowledge Miyamoto-san establishes how the value of true knowledge always remains superior irrespective of the show off of the immature people using it for their profit.

Even in today’s times the situation is not drastically different. The mainstream education is already destroyed by the backdated education system, degrees and diplomas are still less relevant for the actual professions, unnecessary and highly profit driven coaching add more to that. You will find every possible type of motivational trainer in every direction you throw the stone. Very few of them are actually doing the job of delivering true wisdom.

“The teacher is as a needle, the disciple is as thread”

So, Miyamoto-san tells here that a true teacher only directs to the goal, the direction a needy disciple, true student follows that with proper faith and diligence.

The Carpenter and the Warrior

Miyamoto Musashi tries to establish that the basic ideas of wisdom are consistent everywhere. As every type and size of wood has its own characteristics, it makes sense to use those types and sizes of wood where they prove the most effective. It’s a common sense! Utilize things and manage people according to their type, size, skills and abilities. Not everything is supposed to fit everywhere, actually that withdraws the specialty of that object or that person. And thus Miyamoto-san delivers one of the most important management lessons, that is still relevant today.

“The foreman carpenter allots his men work according to their ability. The foreman should take into account the abilities and limitations of his men, circulating among them and asking nothing unreasonable. He should know their morale and spirit, and encourage them when necessary. This is the same a s the principle of the strategy.“

If we try to force the object to fit in, the people to do the jobs they hate we won’t be able to utilize them to their fullest potential thereby lowering the purpose of their existence and even failing in the pursuit of our goals. A good leadership advice!

Body of the strategy

Note that Miyamoto-san uses words “the Way of Strategy” everywhere to highlight his philosophy of living an effective life.

“It is difficult to realize the true way just through sword-fencing.“

This should again make clear that the book not just about sword-fighting. The ways Miyamoto-san refers to are to understood in bigger aspects of life which is limitless.

“Know the smallest thing and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things.“

The inclusive and impartial perspective to look at life is the true way of gaining true wisdom. Only by knowing the extremes of the life one can have a grasp over what is actually happening. Only then one can bring that objectivity in their thoughts, otherwise people become followers of one side, blind worshipers of some great books and great people. The real and true way in in appreciating and understanding the whole spectrum of life. Only then one can live the life to its fullest.

“This is a truth: when you sacrifice your life, you must make fullest use of your weaponry. It is false not to do so, and to die with a weapon yet undrawn.“

One must make every possible attempt in the challenging situations in life to overcome them. In today’s world we call it as living life without any regrets of not making any attempt to achieve goals. If you are going for pass the last punch in your fight, make sure that you punch real hard, with all your focused intent!

“It will seem difficult at first, but everything is difficult at first.“

Miyamoto-san again is discussing about how to avoid wrong choices of weapons at wrong places. How you cannot use long sword in narrow places, how short sword is swift, the practicality of handling multiple weapons, the practicality of using the swords of different length based on the confinement, time and location. It becomes very detailed, confusing and overwhelming at a moment, but please know that it is not just about sword-fighting. It is about the common sense of knowing your tools, your behavior, your intent and using them to your full potential according top the situations, places and events.

“If you know the Way broadly you will see it in everything“

This single sentence is the gist of the whole books of the five rings (But that should not restrict us from exploring the remaining books and philosophies further and it will be an injustice with Miyamoto Musashi philosophy) This sentence is the only reason why one can say that it is not just about sword fighting. There are many ways to live a life. Even though there are infinite possibilities to our lives they make sense only when we have a broader view, a wide intent to make sense out of this chaos of possibilities. Its like changing your perspective of life opens new possibilities and new learnings, new insights from the same thing which earlier made less or no sense.

Why is the strategy only about swords even when there are some other good weapons like halberd, bow, spear and guns? Swords are extension of the warrior’s spirit both theoretically and practically. He explains that further in detail to prove why sword is the ultimate weapon.

“Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative“

The intent of tool is to get utilized effectively rest is just unnecessary baggage. Robustness of the weapon, your tool is more important than its appearance. In simple words, things, techniques should be designed for the function expected from them (I know it is common sense, but we many times we unnecessarily over-complicate our lives with many things thereby hiding the solution which was in plain sight) It is also about having only those resources which are actually required otherwise you will be spending unnecessary time, capital for managing that extra drag, which itself is a good management lesson.

“You should not have a favorite weapon. To become over-familiar with one weapon is as much a fault as not knowing it sufficiently well. You should not copy others, but use weapons which you can handle properly.“

In two words – John Wick and in single word – agility. Miyamoto expect the true life to be full of possibilities not some preferences. For that one themselves should be open to experience instead of having a narrow-minded attitude. This agility grants that specialty to the person which justifies his existence and also enables him to handle situation in novel and effective ways.

Emphasis on originality – when one copies the other and by the chance of time if they face each other the one who has copied his opponent’s technique will not have any type of advantage of creativity.

Timing

“You win battles with timing in Void born of the timing of cunning by knowing the enemies’ timing, and thus using a timing which the enemy does not expect.“

Importance of surprise attack or surprise move can be only highlighted once the person has overall understandings of the distance timing and the background timing. Distance timing is the awareness of what is happening with you and background timing means what is happening around you. By distance timing you can only handle yourselves, your moves but in order to anticipate your opponent’s attack you have to understand what is happening around you.

This may seem far stretched but Miyamoto-san is actually referring to different perceptions of times for you and your opponent- it’s always relative and there is a rhythm to it. (here, goes Albert Einstein) In today’s competitive world, it is more important to understand and anticipate the competitors moves and ways of working to defeat him. Excelling yourself won’t always work in non-zero-sum games (and here goes Game theory)

The roadmap to an effective and focused life

The Ground book is about the outline of the discipline, philosophy and the path to follow it. These are the minimum basic requirements for any warrior seeking accomplishment and wisdom. Miyamoto-san is very specific here. This set of nine strategies/rules is the most discussed portion of the Book of Five Rings. (And yes, it is still relevant today)

Do not think dishonestly

Dishonesty removes the objectivity in the learning process. If you remove the objectivity from the learning then the comparison of the facts, object and the observations vary disproportionately with them. This creates wrong and biased observations and learnings thereby. So, if you are ready to call yourself fool when mistakes happen only then you can achieve good objectivity and real wisdom in the learning process.

The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.
Richard P Feynman

The Way is in training

Training builds the feedback loop in the learning process. Reinforcement of this feedback loop creates extraordinary outcomes

I hated every minute of training but I said don’t quit suffer now and leave the rest of your life as a champion
Muhammad Ali

Become acquainted with every art

Don’t have preferences because in order to extract synergy from even a single skill, single tool you must know how it works with every other skill or other tool. When you will understand the rules of their working with everything possible you will be able to create something truly new and original. (And trust me it is very difficult to create some really unique and original. That internet post you thought is really personal to you has been already liked and shared by millions of people)

Learn the rules like pro so you can break them like an artist
Pablo Picasso

Know the Ways of all professions

In order to become a true leader, one must understand the ways of working of different people and allot the resources to them accordingly to extract the highest possible extraordinary outcome.

Management is about persuading people to do things they do not want to do while leadership is about inspiring people to do things, they never thought
Steve jobs

If you pick the right people and give them the opportunity to spread their wings and put compensation as a carrier behind it you don’t have to manage them
Jack Welch

Distinguish between gain and loss in worldly matters

Have a sustainable decision-making attitude. A true leader considers the consequences of even a small decision based on the broad outcome it will generate. This leader understands that even a small decision can affect the system in a big way.

It is the smallest decision that can change your life forever
Gary Goodridge

Develop intuitive judgement and understanding for everything

Have your own perspective about the world, that is what justifies your existence in these infinite possibilities. Have an intent to connect he multiple and distant dots in your life, that is what will make you special and invincible.

Wisdom is not a product of schooling but of the lifelong attempt to acquire it
Albert Einstein

Perceive those things which cannot be seen

Understand that things are not what they always seem from their outside. This develops the sense of anticipation thereby an attitude to handle anything that is possible. It will also grant you the intellectual humility.

There are things known and there are things unknown and in between are the doors of perception
Aldous Huxley

Pay attention even to trifles

The secret to do things differently is to understanding every detail associated with them. Seasoned artists are best examples of this. They make things look really simple but when a commoner attempt to replicate that, people instantly notice something off in that performance. The secret is that the mastery is about understanding every nitty-gritty of your skill.

The difference between something good and something great is attention to detail
Charles R Swindoll

Do nothing which is of no use

Have absolute focus, clear intent in your efforts. (Even when you are having fun have complete fun) Learn to say No when it is of no use or value for you. It removes the drifts and deviations in your experiences.

It’s not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential
Bruce Lee

One has to understand what Miyamoto Musashi intends while writing the Ground Book. You will notice each and every important moment in his writing he suggests reader to use their own sense and experiences, he wants the reader to appreciate what he is trying to convey and not just read and follow it literally.

You will see sentences like this scattered throughout all five books

…You ought to think deeply about this.

…You must do sufficient research.

…I cannot write in detail how this is done.

…The essence of this book is that you must train day and night in order to make quick decisions.

…You must appreciate this.

So, the Ground book is not just about the plans and ideas to handle the weapons, their timings or some management lessons for a warlord or a strategist or some sword fighter. And believe me it is not a plan or roadmap to clarify his remaining four books. Actually, any superficial reader rather a fool will have the knowledge of things mentioned here.

The Ground book is the foundation of living a life of focus to its full effectiveness, full potential. When Miyamoto Musashi is saying that the Ground Book is like road mapped on ground, one has to appreciate and understand that it is actually the roadmap to our whole life. Again, it is not just about sword fighting and war strategies. The whole purpose of writing such a distilled and rather a short book is just to make the readers aware of the extreme and rewarding possibilities life provides. Exploring and experimenting them with focus and intent is all up to them and that is actually the beauty of an elder’s wisdom. One really has to try it on their own, experiment on their own, practice diligently on their own to appreciate what is actually getting conveyed by the wisdom of the elders.

There is more to such wisdom which will follow in the philosophies of the Water book, the Fire book, the Wind book, the Void book in upcoming posts.

Links for further reading:

The Spirit of the Void for the modern world

Void and the Incompleteness of the Mathematics

The Void and The Dunning-Kruger Effect

The Void and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Modern Scholar

The Void and Einstein

The Void and The Quantum Mechanics

Conclusion

– 1 –

– 2 –

– 3 –

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Ever Changing Nature of The Wind

The Wind Book

Other Schools Using Extra-Long Swords

The Strong Long Sword Spirit in Other Schools

Use of the shorter long sword in other schools

Other Schools with Many Methods of Using the Long Sword

Fixing the Eyes in Other Schools

Use of the Feet in Other Schools

Speed in Other Schools

“Interior” and “Surface” in other Schools

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Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21st century

Conclusion

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Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21st century

Ancient combat strategies for the modern competitions

Spirituality – The Way of Life

Stance

Gaze – Don’t just look, have a vision

Holding the Long Sword

Footwork

Way of the Long Sword

a. The Five Attitudes

b. The “Attitude No-attitude” teaching

c. To Hit the Enemy “In One Timing”

d. The “Abdomen Timing of Two”

e. No Design, No Conception

f. The Flowing Water Cut

g. Continuous Cut

h. The Fire and Stones

i. The Red Leaves Cut

j. The Body in Place of the Long Sword

k. Cut and Slash

l. Chinese Monkey’s Body

m. Glue and Lacquer Emulsion Body

n. To Strive for Height

o. To Apply Stickiness

p. The Body Strike

q. Three Ways to Parry His Attack

r. To Stab at the Face

s. To Stab at the Heart

t. To Scold “Tut-TUT!”

u. The Smacking Parry

v. There are Many Enemies

w. The Advantage when Coming to Blows

x. One Cut

Closing remarks of the Book of Water

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Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21st century

Wisdom of the elders

The Ground Book

The Way of strategy

The Carpenter and the Warrior

Body of the strategy

Timing

The roadmap to an effective and focused life

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Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century

Miyamoto Musashi’s philosophy for 21^st century