I did something wrong today, which proves how much faith Japanese people put in each other, as well as their passive aggressive nature. I was searching for a car park for the longest time, not realizing there was a festival on until I had got into town. So, naturally, I park the car in the […]

Create, meditate, move. These would be my top steps to living well. Create means you use your brain to get your ideas in the world. This could be anything. A blog. An artwork. A new program. A class even. When it comes to creation, we often try to talk ourselves out of doing things, usually […]

Mr. Kato is a 72-year-old dude who I always see at the pool. His catch phrase is ‘Koe-‘ which is Shonai dialect for ‘this is really tiring’. Well, I have a lot of respect for this man. He comes at least five times a week, and swims half of Mt. Chokai, so about 1100m. That […]

As a teacher, I learned quickly that when you don’t know something, it’s best to say you don’t know, rather than trying to fake your way to an answer. Students are curious beings, well at least they should be, and they will always question the things they want to learn. If they find out that […]

The further someone's culture is from your own, the greater the impact you can give them. Of course this goes back the same way, and it's important to remember that both cultures are different, and neither are wrong. There may be a better way to do things, which naturally means the other way is worse, […]

Time management is so important on days when things pile up, like today. I was busy the whole day, but thankfully I got a lot done. The only thing I didn’t do, ironically, is this blog post. It’s funny how life events throw you out of whack. Just got to keep on keeping on, I […]

I finally got round to translating Master Hoshino’s first book, ‘Live as you feel: The way of the Yamabushi’. Master Hoshino had originally asked me to do this a few years back, but at the time I only had rudimentary knowledge of the Yamabushi. I could have translated it then, but I know it wouldn’t […]