Motobu Asaki's words: Lose 8 times out of 10

 

Translated with Bing Translate

https://note.com/motoburyu/n/nbc0b008cb022

Motobu Asaki's words: Lose 8 times out of 10

Motobu Ryu  October 28, 2023 20:28

 

According to Seiyoshi Uehara, Motobu Asayu used to say, "If you win with your right hand, lose with your left hand." In other words, it is important not to always go out looking for a win, but to lose at random in regular training or practice matches, for example, and let the opponent take flowers.

 

In fact, similar words were spoken by his younger brother, Motobu Asaki. According to Kenji Marukawa, who was a disciple of Tokyo Daidokan, Motobu Asaki used to say, "Lose 8 times out of 10 in practice." This includes the fact that you should not easily show your true skills and abilities, but it also means that you should not hurt your fellow trainees and injure them, or seriously damage your self-esteem.

 

Fellow practitioners are important to help you improve your skills, so don't easily injure them or damage your self-esteem unnecessarily. If the opponent stops practicing, it will be negative for the improvement of your skills. Therefore, in normal practice, it is necessary to take care to deliberately lose and let the opponent bring flowers.

 

I don't know if this was a family precept of the Motobu Goten, or if it was a universal idea among the samurai (martial artists) of Okinawa in the past, but in any case, this kind of teaching has been passed down in the Motobu style.

 

Needless to say, losing here is not a matter of type of game. It is usually in kumite practice or practice matches (kaketsu). In other words, they knew that this was important because they had been practicing kumite and kaketsu.

 

In the past, the opponent who lost the game would sometimes take his friends and attack them on the street at night. In other words, even if he always kept winning, it could end up costing his own life. Nowadays, you don't have to worry about that, and if you do, your opponent will go to jail, but in the past, martial artists had to assume that this kind of thing could happen in real life.

 

In addition, Motobu Asaki and Uehara Seiyoshi were merciless to disciples who would injure their training mates even in their regular practice. Teaching such people "hands" will not benefit the world, and may cause problems in the future. In the past, when such a disciple entered Uehara Sensei's dojo, he was excommunicated for hurting him in practice.

 

Martial arts aims to reach the way (truth) through "martial arts." Valuing one's fellow practitioners is a sense of respect for others, which is the basis of human morality. Those who practice martial arts must wear it.