I don’t know how it’s been for you, but my 2020 already has been a wild ride. So, I’ve been thinking a lot about balance, and about what it means to be centered.
This brings me to a concept I know from my ninja training: tanden (丹田). It is a Japanese term also known as hara (腹). Tanden simply means center. Literally, abdomen. It’s the body’s center of gravity at least three finger widths below your belly button. In many martial arts, including the one I practice, all movements are supposed to start from tanden — from your center. Because “everything starts at the center.” It’s an adage I’ve repeated to myself ad nauseum in my ten years of training Kyokushin karate; every time I’m wobbly in a stance, or feeling exhausted during class, I’ll mumble it, take a deep breath, and tighten my core. That simple ritual can help when I’m feeling stressed in other areas of my life: it’s a mindful reminder of physical stability.
The physical concept is easy enough. But like most aspects of martial arts, tanden is also spiritual. Finding your spiritual center isn’t a matter of straightening your shoulders and tightening your abs. It’s something else entirely. I haven’t mastered it. In fact, I feel like I’ve only gotten worse at balancing myself as I’ve added more complexity to my life.
I’ve experienced a lot of change in the past few years, and the idea of a center has become an illusion. In ways large and small, most aspects of my life have changed dramatically since 2015. You might be thinking, “Of course they have! That was five years ago.” You’d be right. Change is an inevitable thing. Nothing stands still. Some changes have been good, like moving out onto my own, and some terrible, like the death of my four-legged partner-in-crime who I’d experienced all of adolescence and early adulthood with (RIP pups). Neither of the two events I just mentioned are even recent. But once you lose your center, it can be hard to find it again. As things kept changing, I never re-discovered balance, if I ever had it at all.
I still haven’t gotten my groove back, to be honest, even though I’ve started to embrace some passions I’d tried hard to write off in the first few years of my post-college “adult” life.
It would be wonderful if I could tell you the inspirational story of how I found my tanden again. I can’t. This story hasn’t had its resolution yet, and in the midst of inspirational platitudes and self-help articles, I want to offer something different: a snapshot of ground truth. And here at ground zero, I mostly feel like Sam Porter Bridges from Death Stranding, trying desperately to maintain a semblance of balance as I navigate the uneven terrain of daily life. Some days, all my cargo tumbles down. (Most days?)
And that’s okay. That’s what I keep telling myself, anyways. Some days when the cargo tumbles
down I sigh and pile it back up again. Other days — okay, I said I would be honest — most days I hide in books, Netflix, naps, and work. It’d be great if I could consult whoever’s writing the story arc of my life so I know how much more struggle I have to get through before the next montage of self improvement that leaves me feeling on top of the world.
Wait, I’m the one theoretically in control of that?
Well. Shit.
Silver lining: the struggle might be part of the plan. There’s another concept I think of when I contemplate balance that supports this, one you’ve likely heard of: yin and yang. While tanden is bound to martial arts, yin and yang finds its origin in the ancient Chinese philosophy of Daoism (alt. Taoism). Most who discuss yin and yang focus on the duality the symbolism represents, but the classic symbol has a simpler truth than you may realize.
The “Dao” of Daoism literally means “the way.” The way is the balanced middle path. It is the ideal, where everything is balanced between the complementary qualities the yin and the yang represent. The path is created where the light and dark halves of the symbol meet. You’ll notice it winds and curves; this path is not meant to be straight and easy. It meanders through the center. I think this is a more artful way of thinking about maintaining balance. Center and balance are not as rooted and bound to physicality, to one central point, like the ideas of tanden and hara are. To terribly summarize ancient Chinese philosophy: for Daoism, intent to stay on the meandering path is a goal in itself. You probably will get lost, and often. Keep on keeping on. Balance will come.
Back at ground truth, I’m still fumbling to make sure my cargo stays balanced day to day. Thinking about these concepts I’ve learned from my martial arts training and my past (shout out to college philosophy professors and “The Matrix” 😊) might help me tread into the rest of 2020 with surer steps. Or maybe not; the story is ongoing. I wanted to share my thoughts in case it helps someone else out in the wild, wonderful, web, too.
There is a lot of year left and I’m sure 2020 has more curve balls in store for all of us. But with these concepts in mind, I’m going to keep trudging along with the hope of finding my way back to my path: or perhaps I’ll realize that I’ve been on my winding version of the middle way all along.
-M