When training in your mind, get into the habit of imagining yourself as the most powerful being possible. Concentrate, for example, on the light emanating from your eyes, on the brilliant white colours of your clothing, as you destroy and burn away the darkness, so that you begin to identify with this image and correspond to it in your physical gestures and bearing. This is a simple example to start with. Whilst it might do you some good to imagine winning a title and how great you look on television for example, this ideal is not high enough to inspire the greatest inspiration to surpass yourself1.
By aiming at something totally beyond physical possibility, you unleash the powers of the creative imagination. This is what fills the apparent gulf between reality and the unattainable. And you don’t ned to worry that this ideal can never be realised, because it will be realised in the mental world of ideas, which although invisible can have a real effect on the physical life. In this way the invisible reality of thought and imagination is an aspect of the physical reality, which although real, does not have a material existence. An everyday example should surface to illustrate this point.
Imagine, for example, that you are feeling ill and weak. Just by willing yourself to be in a state of harmony, through the intermediary of thought, you can to some extent at least, improve your health. Yes, because every physical reality starts with a corresponding thought which represents an ideal. And from there the effects of this ideal manifest physically, although not immediately. It is only in the imagination that space and time have not hold, so it is here that we can often do the best work. The results may be poor at first, but the more high the ideal, the more powerful the effect, particularly if you are accustomed to doing this habitually.
You might say “We’ve heard all this before, but the effects are so miniscule, it would just be a waste of time”. Whilst its true the effects are very minimal for many, this only proves how little effort is put into mental practice. Because most people think it is a waste of time, they give in to all sorts of immediate needs and neglect this longer term work of forming constructive thought habits. This is why so many people relate instead to misery and low expectation. Something else to understand is that thought itself cannot act on the body directly. However, the high ideal, which imagines a limitless reality can encourage feelings of inspiration and enthusiasm, and it is through these intermediary sensations that the physical effects manifest.
Simply thinking about light, darkness, and martial arts practice isn’t enough. You need to relate to though through the power of the will, which is responsible for directing our motivating energies. Otherwise your thoughts will likely just turn into listless daydreams. For example, imagine you are fighting the forces of darkness, with the weapons of light. By relating to the light and bringing these images to life by willing them into action, this can have an uplifting effect on your feelings and state of consciousness. Once this is understood, it becomes easier to use the will to concentrate your attention on only the most inspiring and evocative ideas.
Ideas inspire thoughts, and thoughts act on feelings, which act on the brain, and which in turn acts on the physical body. The reverse is also true. For example, by engaging in noble and inspiring behaviours towards others, this is a clear pathway to encouraging luminous thoughts and corresponding to the highest ideals, however dimly represented here and now physically. Whilst we are often unable to do much in the under immediate physical constraints, we are under no obligation to do so in the imagination, which can take any form, and represents an aspect of our high self2. The imagination can envisage the most diabolical things, as well as the most luminous.
Physical practice helps us make better mental representations. And Better mental representations help us to build an ideal model, which surpasses us and guides us. You could call it the God head, the higher self, the spirit, Prana, the infinite. Whilst a master or expert may also symbolise such a model, too often such masters are full of the same weaknesses and bad habits as those whom they have taken responsibility to instruct. To be sure, it is not a problem to have weakness, so long as our habits and behaviours are sound. We need a perfect model, an incorruptible model, with which to relate and feel so that it can act upon us and guide us. This solves the problem of our inherent weakness, common to us all. What this model example is will depend on the individuals subjective imagination, and can take myriad form. The important thing to remember is that the imagination is a tool to develop the most inspiring thoughts and ideas so that they can act and course through our every action and gesture.
Hopefully you are beginning to see that the realism of the mental representation does not matter. In fact, it should be deliberately unattainable and inspire the same sort of mimickery, love, and adulation that a super hero does on a small child. Once you have succeeded in imagining such a visualisation, the physical effects upon your health and well being, not to mention your enthusiasm and energy, will be so powerful that the reality of the idea will be unimportant. In fact, your own improvement will be the measure of reality. The objective results of exercises of the imagination, if practiced and developed over time with focus, will power, and attention, will become self evident. What started off as an unrealistic idea, ended up having very real effects.
I once travelled all the way to Taiwan, where I was invited to take part in a grading event where people from across the Country went to receive their 8th Dan black belts and International qualifications from World renowned Masters. Whilst there were some talented individuals there, I was surprised to find such poor role models, who were neither skilled, healthy, or inspiring. There were people breaking wind in the training hall, eating and leaving wrappers everywhere, lots of noise, and nowhere to practice and concentrate before the assessments began. I had come to learn from the Masters of the World and there I was in the midst of all this. I realised I needed to aim higher, rather than adjust myself to this kind of community.
It is often the case than when we try to pursue physical results directly, they allude us. The models aren’t their to nourish our urge to transcend ourselves. For example, by practicing a form over and over again in a technical and robotic manner, we often end confused and unable to perform with any real effectiveness. However, when we imagine ourselves in our minds eye as a great and powerful being, or even in the shoes of a great champion, we can feel we have the enthusiasm to be like them. We do not need to know how they do it, any more than we need to know how to digest food, we just follow their example and it nourishes us. This interplay between the imagination and our physical actions does not produce the same effect from one day to the next, unlike physical mechanical practice, even if our actions look similar.
This process of striving to surpass ourselves, to align ourselves to perfection, transforms and directs our instincts and desires, which are so often squandered on aimless activity, and this transformation can be used to sustain and develop our mental and physical practice. I’ve been doing this for years, and I entrust myself to this process alone, as a refuge from the seductive illusions created by many so called experts. I found early on that giving myself over to systems and icons weakened me by by making me too vulnerable and sensitive to the criticisms and praise of others. I needed to find this essential inspiration from an inexhaustible source within so that I could live it.
What you should remember is that appointed experts are often little more than actors, who have developed a certain allure and use their powers to seduce and encourage daydreaming in their students in a sense. However, by following a high ideal fuelled by the imagination, and perhaps encompassing aspects of genuine experts, you can then be content to move forward without fretting about what exactly you should be doing or learning, because of this strong sensation and guidance. Without this inner guidance you are obliged to simply fret and worry about the details. However, the details take care of themselves in this process driven model.
When we place this high ideal at the summit, our goal directed behaviour is given a much higher ambition than simply gratification of instinctive animal urges. Instincts are the fuel and are at the root of all behaviour. But why stop there? Gratification of instinctive urges, for example aggression, is not an end in itself for me. In the language of logic, instinctive behaviours are a necessary but not sufficient requirement of action.
Often instinctive reactions blind us. When we let anger take over, all we see are enemies and we want to destroy them. When this obscurity takes over this paints an illusory world that Hindu Philosophy calls Maya. This is our lower self, our emotions taking over. These are the real enemy and need to be fought and driven to into submission3. The meaning of Martial arts, for me, transcends mere perseveration of existence. It needs higher meaning. In any case, Killing the instincts is not the way, because they are vital for energy and action, and without them our behaviour is flat and dead. However, so many fighters are driven to waste their energies by simply supercharging their instincts without any high ideal or thought power to direct them intelligently. Personally, this truth has been the most defining factor in my my life and practice.
So, the high ideal inspires the imagination to create the most inspiring images and fills us with certain feelings which are indicative of truth. Our actions are then aimed at corresponding and orientating our energies towards striving to the highest standards if this practice is taken seriously. Obviously, it is up to each individual to decide to what extend this work is taken seriously. But if we concentrate on this, we relate more and more to it ( even imagining ourselves with others also doing this work), and eventually we are able to tell truth from falsehood merely by looking at others example and seeing to what extend their actions and words inspire a similar state within us. In this way the creative imagination is a key to truth.
References
1 The High Ideal https://harmanater.com/2020/07/26/the-high-ideal/
2 The Higher and Lower Self in Martial arts https://harmanater.com/2020/05/04/the-higher-and-lower-self-in-martial-arts/
3 The True Meaning of Martial arts https://harmanater.com/2020/05/18/the-true-meaning-of-martial-arts/