Div.5 Chapter 31

Knowing the Sameness of Mind and Body

“What is it my hard training does not improve my skill?”

“Because you train your body but not your mind.”

In Taekwondo there are three types of incomplete subjugation that you can attain over your opponent. The first is when you subdue your opponent with power but not with skill; the second is when you subjugate with power and skill but not with spirit; the third is when you subjugate with spirit yet lack morality. If you fail to have your opponent follow you in the morale sense he will surely turn his back on you in the end; if you fail to have him yield to you with a higher spirit he will surely prepare for another challenge; and if you fail to subdue him with skill you will be subdued by him soon thereafter.

The primary reason behind all such incomplete subjugations is a failure to have one’s mind in order, which means a failure to arrange one’s life in good order. If you cannot regulate your own life in accordance with Do you cannot overcome your opponent with morality; if you cannot arrange both your mind and your body in harmony you cannot surpass him in spirit; and if you fail to think with your entirety, owing to a division of mind and body, you cannot subdue him with skill.

All of these converge in one, which is the problem of mind use. This is why a Taekwondo-Een is actually more concerned with training the mind than physical movements, though he may seem to devote himself only to the latter. Thus it is said that the essence of Taekwondo is mind control. When one regulates and concentrates one’s mind one’s breath is naturally regulated as well and along with it one’s physical motions.

The mind and the body are ultimately one, thus the body depends upon the mind and the mind cannot exist without its body. The mindless body is nothing but a lump of flesh while the bodiless mind is mere illusion. Therefore, no one has difficulty subduing an opponent who is careless of the attacks against him, nor is there anyone who fears the anger of an opponent whose body is weak or tired.

A man who has reached the ultimate of Taekwondo does not possess the least doubt of this fact, for he has experienced transcendentally through hard training the fact that his thought is his motion and his motion is nothing but his thought. When he has obtained the oneness of the entirety his word can move another’s mind without rhetorical device, his behavior can lead others without any self-exaggeration, and his pose leaves nothing to be desired to oppress the opponent’s spirit without appeal to skill. Only an unwise man, with attachment to luxurious rhetoric, worries that he might fail to impress others and, with attachment to technique, worries he might fail to subdue his opponent. This is due to the fact that trivial avarice in the mind sticks unconsciously to the wrong distinction of mind and body. What is required to overcome this is to cease immoderate attachment and to empty the mind with acceptance.

In this way the principle of controlling mind and body can be summed up thus: possess your emptiness and fullness as one and erase and picture yourself at the same time.