Daily Yamabushi

Today when I was in the pool, another person came into my lane. Now, normally I have zero problem with this, as long as the person can observe simple rules, sticking to the right side of the lane, and giving way to the faster swimmer, then there shouldn’t be a problem. But when people break this rule, i.e. by not timing the swim so that the faster swimmer has to wait for the slower swimmer to make a turn before they can even have a chance at overtaking them, then we have a problem. And that’s what happened today.

Granted, the person would have seen me warming up, when I was swimming relatively slowly, but after the first time I overtook them, they probably should have either changed lanes, or rethought their timing. They didn’t, and I ended up having to stop in the middle of the lane more than once (which is strictly not allowed by the way, but I had no choice). So my times got messed up a bit, but instead of stopping and complaining, I sucked it up and thought about during triathlons when this sort of thing is a given, and I gave myself a challenge of still beating the set time, which I was able to do.

If that person hadn’t gotten into my lane, I wouldn’t have known how to act when I was all flustered, so I think of this as a good opportunity to see how well I could respond to less than ideal circumstances.

I released my video about Semi Onsen and Kamewari-Yama this morning. Of my last ten videos, this one is doing the best. This isn’t saying much, I only get about 100 views on the videos, but I really like the style I was working with for this video. Instead of showing the hike up and giving an explanation at the end, I spend most of the video commentating or giving a background story.

Semi Onsen and Kamewari-Yama both have interesting backstories which really helps, and a lot of the mountains around are similar, so I’d like to work with this style I think. The problem a lot of the time is finding source material. A lot of the stuff on these mountains is very old, and is sometimes only available in print. I guess that makes having a video like this do well feel all the more better.

When somebody says that you’ve outdone yourself, be proud. Outdoing yourself proves you’re taking risks, you’re putting your body on the line, and you’ve pushed yourself to do something novel or daring.

But if you aren’t trying to out do you yourself, what are you doing?

I screwed up pretty badly over my drone. I had heard they were going to change the laws in Japan so that you had to register your drone, which I was OK with, but I didn’t realise that unregistered drones under 250g would in fact become illegal until it was too late. So, I now have a $700ish drone that is best used as a paperweight. My only option is to sell it overseas, say NZ or Australia, which I’m preparing to do at the moment (if anyone wants a cheap drone, reach out, I could mail it anywhere really and it would save me the hassle of putting it up for sale. I used it probably about 20 times altogether).

Unfortunately, I feel this is a symptom of stress. I’ve been under a lot of stress recently due to a whole number of things, and I haven’t been thinking as clearly as I’d like to. If I was a little bit more ‘with it’ I would have gotten with the program and registered my drone before the due date. I have been a bit flustered over various things recently, and it just wasn’t good timing.

The thing is, I’m now well and truly aware of the funk I am / was in, and so I’m trying to get out of it. My dad always said that when you find yourself in such a situation to focus on the basics. Eating proper, getting proper exercise, and probably even more important than that, getting proper sleep. Of course I would have to add the yamabushi meditation and getting out into nature to the list as well. I also think it is important to let yourself be creative, whatever this may mean for you (for me this combines going out into nature with making videos, and I’m working on one right now I’m sure you’ll love!).

Don’t celebrate your success prematurely, basically.

I’ve been helping with a number of projects in the past few years, some of which were very promising, but ended up just fizzling out. This makes me a bit weary when new similar opportunities come up, but I try to not let my previous experiences influence these new ones too much.

Of course there are red herrings and warnings that should be taken on board, but in some projects literally anything could happen, so it’s best to do your best until you have something concrete to work with.

At least that’s what I’ve learned over the years. Make it real before you get too excited about it.

I have an aversion to aspects of Japanese culture that just aren’t a thing in NZ. This is something I have to get over, as it’s part of living here and I always find myself procrastinating on these aspects and having to deal with them at an inopportune time.

Perhaps the most obvious thing would be that a passbook is still a very normal part of banking in Japan. Passbooks haven’t been used in NZ for at least 20 years, and I find it outright annoying to have to keep updating mine when I can do everything I need online. Then there are some forms of payments (usually when working for the City Hall in my case) where I have to physically print out something and use my Hanko to stamp it, otherwise I won’t get paid!

I have recently come across yet another problem. In Japan you have to register your car’s parking spot (if it is a ‘Futsu-sha’, or anything bigger than a ‘Kei car‘). This is because there is a limit of parking in Japan, and for us this is especially important when the snow falls because everyone needs to guarantee they have a parking spot! That’s all fine and dandy, but when you move you have to let the police station know so they can update your driver’s license (they actually print the new address on the back), and updating your car’s parking spot is a separate issue. It would make sense for these two things to happen at the same time, but since when has anything made sense in Japan. Anyway, I didn’t update my car’s parking spot, and so when it comes time to pay tax on the car, it gets sent to my old address. I now have to drive to a place about 20 minutes away just to fill out a form. Computers be damned!

But it’s part and parcel of living here. If you’re choosing to live somewhere, you’re also choosing to live with its quirks, I guess.

If you want a real Japanese test, do what I did over the weekend; a three-day mountain first aid course entirely in Japanese. Of course the Japanese used throughout the course is difficult, there was quite a bit of doctor jargon to contend with (Cerebral Edema anyone?), but the real test came in the written test.

To pass, we needed to get 70% of the questions right. I got 75% so I just passed, but to be honest I don’t think it was because of a lack of knowledge of the content. Rather, it was because they purposely write questions to be confusing to decipher, in what I would consider a rather mean way.

Unfortunately they take the test from you so I don’t have the questions on me, but this is a common theme in Japanese tests. I should have been more cognizant of this when taking the test, but I passed anyway so can’t really complain.

One of the things about testing is whether you’re really testing what you’re meant to be testing. In this case, a lot of the test was your ability to read between the lines and find where the tester was trying to trick you. That is not what it means to test what you’re meant to be testing. Don’t worry though, I let them know this (in a non-confrontational way of course).

I was thinking about how I had never articulated this before, but the low lying mountains in Japan and the high mountains historically have had very different meanings, well from what I have noticed at least.

Generally speaking, the lower mountains were closer to where people lived, so they were a source of food, at times shelter, and a place to collect wood or things for daily life.

In contrast, taller mountains were basically where only the really serious mountain worshippers ventured.

This is reflected in the sorts of things you find and the stories of both types of mountains. Taller mountains are easier to explain, usually a shrine (or temple) built to withstand the elements at or near the summit.

Lower mountains are where all the folk tales happen. They still happen on the higher mountains, but this is where they really come to the fore. An example would be on Kamewari-yama, which was an important part of Yoshitsune’s journey to Hiraizumi (check out Kanjincho, the subscription list, it’s an interesting story that set the basis for a Kurosawa film).

Either way, that the 100 famous mountains of Yamagata list includes both I think is a really good thing. If the list only included taller mountains, I wouldn’t have found as many stories to tell. Sometimes the description is as much as ‘this mountain was used for ascetic training in the past’, which isn’t exactly exciting.

It’s easy to feel a bit down if right before you start your hike, it starts to rain. This is especially true for people who have never hiked in rain, or people who do all they can to avoid it.

Embrace it. Rain is yet another side of the mountain you get to see. It also feels really great once you’re off the mountain after going through some rough patches.

(If you’re not prepared for wet weather, or if there is a risk of landslides, thunder, and the like, don’t go on the mountain or get down as soon as is safe. Never ever underestimate a mountain!)

For whatever reason, if someone is indecisive, often the best thing you can do is pose questions. Often the framing of different questions is enough for the person to find the right answer and act appropriately. It also does the job of reminding them of things they may have forgotten due to overthinking the problem at hand.

Indecisive people can be really tough to deal with. But if you can help them make decisions, for example through the right questions, then it’s much easier to make progress.

This basically. When things can be said in less words they should be. Aim to chop at least a third of the words you’ve written when it comes to editing. This forces you to keep only the important details, and helps the reader get to the point.

If you’re confused as to where to start, ie you have a whole lot of ideas but aren’t sure what you should do first, try starting with something with easy to set goals.

Easy to set goals means the hurdle is lowered by definition, and it means it is easier to get the ball rolling.

I can drink and blame the world, or I can do something extraordinary

Saia Latu, TROW Group Founder CEO and Managing Director

Saia Latu went through a very traumatic ordeal, losing his brother to a car accident, and this is what he came up with after. Inspirational to say the least.

This is how I feel a lot of the time. You can blame the world until you’re blue in the face, or you can put your effort to good use by getting out there and showing the world what you’re made of.

It’s your choice.

There’s so many things you learn during the process, that you can never learn before you start. It’s weird. It’s like if you have a project in mind you know what you’re going to learn, or you have something in mind that you’d like to learn, but until you actually try it, you realise you had no idea what you were going to learn!

If you have an inkling to do something, my suggestion is to start doing it before you think about it. Take the steps to put things into motion as soon as you feel the urge to do so. Try it before you buy it, so to speak. That way you learn way more than you could ever have imagined.

If you let your thinking get in the way, it often has a negative effect that makes it harder for you to get started, or it makes you get started in a way that is unnecessarily cautious. If you try it before you buy it, your brain doesn’t have the chance to have a negative effect!

If there’s a lesson to be learned, you have to learn it. Don’t shirk responsibility for things you had a hand in no matter how small or how new you were at the time. That’s how mistakes are repeated. Learn from what happened, and move on. Just don’t let the mistake repeat itself.

Stuff happens. Let it. There’s not much you can do about it. Dwelling on the past is a fool’s game. Dwelling on the past is something that can hinder your future progress. Accept it, embrace it, move on, don’t let it get to you. If you’re constantly thinking about it, you’re letting it get to you. Try to focus on being in the now. View your surroundings with intent. Feel the weight of your feet on the floor, your bum on the seat, your clothes on your back. Just enjoy and embrace being in the moment. Soon enough, you’ll find that you’ve stopped letting things get to you.

Mountains are all-knowing.

Mountains are the ultimate test.

Mountains are salvation.

Mountains are reassurance.

Mountains are peace.

Such is the meaning of the mountains to the yamabushi.

Where am I being naive? If you do any type of consulting work, or anything where people are asking for advice really, this is the question that needs to be answered. If someone’s coming to you for advice, it means that they have either exhausted their own ideas, or they are unsure as to how to proceed. Often this is because we get stuck in our own heads, and we need some different perspective to get us to move forward.

This question provides that perspective.

If we are able to tell people where they are being naive, we are able to show them where there may be some discrepancies in their thinking. We are also able to point out things that they were too blind, or too ashamed, to see for themselves.

Where am I being naive also works on yourself. Try it.

Conventional wisdom says when you’re learning a new language that you first copy what has come before you. This is of course true for the basics; the sounds, the words, the grammar. But once you know how to produce these, you have all you need to create language. As soon as you know the basic structure of the language, you should practice it.

There’s no point in learning grammar pattern after grammar pattern and word after word without the chance to actually use what you’ve learned. If you’re not learning a language to use it, what’s the point? What are you learning it for? (there are of course exceptions to this, but they are few and far between)

The same goes for learning an instrument. As soon as you know how to produce sounds, you should get to creating music. Of course it’s good to copy what’s come before, but that’s not the only reason to learn a new instrument.

Create. Emulate. In that order.

Slow is steady, steady is fast, so the FBI saying goes.

One of my favourite things to do in pool is to hit the cue ball ever so slightly but just enough that the ball rolls into the pocket. There’s something to be said for a steady hand, and it’s the same for swimming and camera work too.

For swimming, take things one stroke at a time. Focus on getting the most out of your current stroke. Not the next one, and not the one after that. For swimming, it may look like your legs are kicking fast, but your kicking is designed to keep your core up and to get the most out of your stroke. How do you do that efficiently? Slow and steady.

For photography, well mainly videography, most of the time you want just slight movement. A slowly moving drone shot over a field, a slowly curving shot of a building, slow slow slow. No need to rush things.

Slow, but steady. Therein lies the challenge. But therein lies the answer as well.

You’ll never be ready. How do you truly know when something’s good to go? How do you truly know you are ready?

You can’t.

And that’s the fun part. If something is completely predictable, there’s not much fun in doing it. If it isn’t completely predictable, the sooner you put it out there, the sooner you can get feedback, the sooner you can ‘be ready’.

Don’t wait until you’re ready, wait until it’s launchable.

Yet another reason why you should err on the side of action is that it helps take your mind off things. If you just sit around, your mind has a way of making you think too much, but that can be counteracted by taking action, any action. Therefore, it helps to have some sort of project or thing to work on no matter what.

Is it about the process? Or the product?

As much as possible, it should be about the process, and the process should be about producing the best product.

For me, the process of making coffee is much more meaningful than the product. Every morning, I put the kettle on, grind up the beans (by hand), and then proceed to pour the boiling water over the beans in a way I find produces a great cup. This process is now a form of meditation for me. The way the bubbles come up through the beans and form a dome, the sound of the coffee dripping into the carafe, the temperature of the handle of the kettle, only just cool enough to touch, it all adds up.

And then there’s the product, a perfectly crafted cup of coffee.

While this is nowhere near the same thing, I really feel for TJ Perenara and Brad Weber. They did all that they could to make it into the All Blacks, but just didn’t make the cut.

I was in a similar situation in my waterpolo playing days. I think it was my position in my team that meant I wasn’t selected for the NZ team in my last years at high school. I was seen as the suitable person for what is called the hole position, or perhaps centre forward, depending on who you talk to.

Until then I didn’t have much experience in the position, but I’m sure of two things. One is that if I was in a different position, my chances of being chosen for the team would have been much higher, and two, that if I had continued playing, I would have eventually made the team.

I felt rather dejected at the time, and coupled with moving to another city, I gave up on the sport I had dedicated 10 good years of my life to. Needless to say, it’s one of my biggest regrets (along with quitting the piano at 12, and not taking up Spanish at high school).

These days I’m completely fine with the decisions, I have a good life in a great place, and still enjoy swimming. I do dream of playing waterpolo every now and then (this area doesn’t have a pool deep enough for waterpolo, so I have to settle for swimming).

However, yet again I am reminded of regretting things I did not do. It’s much better to at least give things the college try before giving up on them. Your desire to do that thing in the first place is coming from your subconscious, which is as powerful a motivator as anything, and should be listened to. You owe it to yourself to see if there’s anything to what your subconscious is telling you.

Which is to say that TJ and Brad need to just keep doing what they’re doing. They’ve already proven that they have what it takes, now all they need to do is keep working at it and there will be other chances. Feeling dejected is natural, but it doesn’t have to be that way, and that feeling can be turned into motivation to do well.

I’ve watched Master Hoshino give hundreds of interviews over the years. Actually, I’ve interpreted them. So I have a pretty good idea of what his speaking style is like. One thing I’ve noticed, and I’m not entirely sure if this is true but it seems to be the case, is that he is very good at only answering what was asked.

What I mean to say is, he does of course go on tangents, it’s where all his good ideas come from. But once he’s finished, he sort of just stops. It’s like it’s the end of the conversation.

I’ve actually tried this technique myself, of only answering things you are asked and then just being quiet. It takes a bit of getting used to, I’m pretty good at adding my two cents to everything, but I’ve tried to stop doing that. And I think it works fine. The interviewer has their own ideas of what they want to hear, or what information they think will be useful, anything else is superfluous, so to speak.

Of course you can go on tangents, as long as its somewhat related to the question at hand, but there’s actually no need to go on if it’s not called for, especially if it’s an interview.

This is a question I sometimes ask myself. Of course if something is tough because it’s tough, then you just need to get on with it. However, sometimes it’s our expectations of ourselves or others that is the tough part. Sometimes it’s because we’re comparing our situation to others that we are finding things tough.

In those situations the answer is obvious. Forget about it. They don’t have the same experience as you, they don’t know what you know, and they certainly don’t understand what it feels like. And that’s fine. But all this is to say that comparing with others is a waste of time. Best to put your head down and get on with what you’re doing, not with what others think.

Today I was very pleased to be featured in Transit Magazine. I have been featured in magazines before, and even BBC travel, but I think a lot of these come from just putting yourself out there.

I’m fine if people just want a private life, if that suits you fine, then great! But if you have something the world can benefit from, I think you owe it to the world to share it. That for me is the Yamabushi culture and philosophy.

Either way, it wouldn’t have happened had I not been doing things like writing this blog, making YouTube videos, or working with the Yamabushi, so I for one am very happy to get some attention to what I think is a very unique part of Japan the world can benefit from.