From: hurd@fraser.sfu.ca (Peter L. Hurd)
Subject: Re: Shoes in the dojo (gasp!)
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 02:15:42 GMT

robinson@cogsci.Berkeley.EDU (Michael Robinson) writes:

>In article <hurd.726181938@sfu.ca> hurd@fraser.sfu.ca (Peter L. Hurd) writes:
>>I've always felt that the main limiting factor in my karate training was
>>the blisters sloughing off the bottom of my feet,

    [Bit about this being true for first 18 months deleted]

>I really don't know how to relate to this.  Are you seriously suggesting
>that you would be a significantly better karateka if you didn't have to 
>worry about ripping apart your soles?

    yes, I think it would have been a lot easier to learn technique and
  approach had I not had the blisters on the bottom of my feet in my mind.
  Lunge punches on hamburger feet are an inherantly intimidating idea.

>Why not wear shoes, then?  I realize there is the Japanese thing about 
>wearing shoes indoors, and all, but which is more important, following
>customs or following the 'way'?  Outside of karate class, how often do
>you go around barefoot?

    I don't go bare foot, I rarely walk around without orthapedic boots.
  I'll admit that I train barefoot because that's just my seldom seen
  conformist side.  I don't see practically being able to train and asking
  to go barefoot.  I though that this was just the traditional karate way,
  so I am surprised to see the quote below, you say it is a paraphrasing,
  do you have the original wording handy (my copy of Funakoshi is packed for
  the big move)? 

    I never leave my house without my buck knife, and I see no point in
  training with it on my belt.  The positive effects of training are all
  manifest in my mind, not at the points of my knuckles or the balls of
  my feet.  I don't train in order to be able to reproduce excellent and
  devastating technique on the sidewalk (though if I have been training
  well I should be able to).  If I have been training well I should have
  the mental state, concentration, kime, outside the dojo, the physical
  training is the means of controlling my mind and emotions, that's 
  martial arts to me.

>Practitioners of non-Japanese arts wear shoes while training to no apparent
>ill-effect.  In fact, my biggest problem in this regard has been (to
>paraphrase Funakoshi) "to make my training shoes my everyday shoes, and make
>my everyday shoes my training shoes."  Or, at least, to find shoes suitable
>for both roles.
>I guess this is ultimately a question of whether martial arts are funny
>suits and bowing, or whether they are a significant part of your
>moment-to-moment existence.

    I hope that matial arts are a significant part of my moment-to-moment
  existance.  It's the menaning of what I'm doing, the funny suits and
  bowing should have meaning too, the blisters are just something to be 
  overcome.  Hopefully they are like the screaming zen master trying to
  bring students to an understanding.
-- 
Pete Hurd, hurd@sfu.ca| Q: Why did the Jungle Fowl cross the road?          |
Behavioural Ecology   | A: To maximize it's lifetime reproductive success   |
Dept.Biol.Sci., SFU.  | Q: Huh?                                             |
Burnaby B.C., Canada  | A: I guess it just needed to get to the other side. |