m y T r i L i f e

Mushin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kanji for the word Mushin. "Sword and Zen are same." quoted from Tsuji Gettan Sukemochi:^[1]

Mushin (無心; Chinese Wu-hsin; English translation "no-mindedness") is a mental state into which very highly trained martial artists are said to enter during combat. The term is shortened from mushin no shin (無心の心), a Zen expression meaning mind of no mind. That is, a mind not fixed or occupied by thought or emotion and thus open to everything. For the origin of the mushin concept, see Muga-mushin.

Mushin is achieved when a fighter feels no anger, fear or ego during combat. There is an absence of discursive thought, and so the fighter is totally free to act and react towards an opponent without hesitation. At this point, a person relies not on what they think should be the next move, but what is felt intuitively.

A martial artist would likely have to train for many years to be capable of mushin. This allows time for combinations of movements and exchanges of techniques to be practiced repetitively many thousands of times, until they can be performed spontaneously, without conscious thought.

I blog tonight about the concept of Mushin. I can't explain it better than the Wikipedia entry so I copied and pasted the first few paragraphs. Read the rest and make a donation to the Wikimedia foundation to keep Wikipedia available to the whole world.

I've received a funny email tonight from my buddy Kevin. Since my "triathlon is not my LIFE" post he accused me of getting soft and joked I was going to change my blog title to "myhusbandlife" HA! Yes, married life is awesome, but I'm far from getting soft, I assure you... although Christmas treats, and inconsistent training has not helped. ;-) I have just learned to appreciate and enjoy training and racing differently from before.

Today, I drew up a race schedule for 2009. I decided to skip a few races I have done before, and do a few new ones. I have no less than FIVE half ironmans on the schedule, plus various sprint, olympic and running races thrown in for good measure. Enthusiasm and enjoyment are my goals, performance an outcome. Even if it rains at every race this year, I will just put on more clothing, sport a big smile, and enjoy the day!

So, getting to the topic of Mushin....

I'll start with story about Great White North half-ironman 2005. I had just finished my final workout the day before, and was standing on the beach, relaxing, soaking up the sun. I remember talking with another competitor (Rosemarie?) about the race. She asked me a typical pre-race question... "how do you think you'll go tomorrow"? I remember being in the oddest mental state... I wasn't thinking about ANYTHING. I could only say quietly... "I don't know, I'll see what the day brings". The next day I went and executed what I consider my finest race to date.... and produced at that time, my best result. I was happy when I finished, but not ecstatic, I just had that same strange mental calm continuing from the day before.

I believe I experienced my first taste of Mushin. I didn't let my thoughts get in the way of my performance. I didn't think about what other competitors were doing, or what time goals I was trying to beat, or the weather, I just moved intuitively to the finish line at the fastest pace my body would go. Sure, I was in great fitness leading into the race, but it took me many years to realize that the strongest part of me that day was my mind!

Fast forward to 2007...

One of the things that I found so attractive about "the method" of training at ironguides, was the lack of gadgets, scientific testing and gimmicks. This was highly appealing from a sense of frugality, but I knew there was something more to it.

By training with a HRM, a powermeter, speedometer, etc, we are constantly engaging the mind, and training in a state of non-awareness. A common excuse from the gadget crowd is that they have no ability of Perceived Exertion (PE), so they need these gadgets in order to gauge their effort. Given that our society provides endless ways we can distract ourselves while we drive, eat, workout,etc... it's no wonder that athletes become addicted to the sensory overload.

I'm going to go beyond the concept of "Perceived" Exertion, and bring a new concept I'll call "Awareness of Exertion". Awareness being prior to thought, it is the inner space in which perception happens. By taking our thoughts and emotions (that are based on perception) out of the equation, we set our body free from our mind imposed limitations, and allow it to perform at it's highest level. One cannot be aware when staring at HR, speed and power output, or watching splits, etc. And sadly, I think that is also where we start to lose our enjoyment of the sport... our ego's are dependent on constantly improving numbers.

A great little article written by my coach Vinnie illustrates this point perfectly.

Naomi pointed out to me that the Mushin article defines warriors acting "without conscious thought". Correct she is. While we seek to live our lives in conscious awareness, race day is our combat... and is the time for Mushin.

See you at the finish line.

posted by Greg Nicholson @ 1/08/2009