One Arrow, One Life

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Kenneth Kushner. One Arrow, One Life

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TUTTLE PUBLISHING

Tokyo · Rutland, Vermont · Singapore

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In Zen they say that when you are ready for a teacher, the teacher finds you. In 1977, I was ready. In retrospect I was experiencing a life crisis. For as long as I could remember, my energies were focused on establishing myself professionally. Through four years of college and six years of graduate school, I imagined that when I received my degree my life would fall into place and that I would have no worries. In 1977 I had obtained my PhD, got a good job and began to have articles accepted by professional journals. Yet, for some reason, the fulfillment that I anticipated did not accompany these successes. I was left with a growing sense of uneasiness, a feeling that there must be more to life than professional prestige. For the first time, Zen interested me. I saw Zen training as a way to find the fulfillment that was lacking in my life. Zen became the way out of my existential dilemma.

As I trained in Zen, my attitude towards the martial arts changed. Where once I saw the martial arts as means of self-defense or physical conditioning, I now saw they also afford the opportunity for spiritual growth. Soon, pursuing a black belt became yet another meaningless goal in my life; progress in the search for one's true self cannot be measured by a piece of colored cloth.

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