Discover your WHY

Based in Simon Synek and the importance to Find your WHY, I decided to run an experiment with some of my Budokas and asked them, WHY do they train Bujinkan?

Discover your WHY clear your thoughts about what motivates you to reach your goals, it let you meditate about your passions, why them inspire you? and leads you to a superior purpose.

Everyone has a WHY. Your WHY is the purpose, cause or belief that inspires you. — Simon Sinek

Knowing that WHY will help you face new challenges that inspire you, Discovering your WHY in Budo will help you wake up every morning and make you ready for what may come, It deletes your ego and encourages you to open your heart to learn and share around Budo.

when you’re powered by a clear purpose, there is little you cannot do.

Here are the WHYS of my Budo Friends:

Richard

“The reason why I train … It’s curiosity, seeing that I can learn about myself, about how I move, others move and how I respond to that, it may seem like a routine, but it’s a routine that I do willingly, due to that I always learn something from my friends and colleagues, as well as from myself.”

Gabriel

“Since I was little boy I really liked martial arts and oriental thoughts, the more I read or saw about the subject the more it called my attention. In a difficult moment of my life with a lot of anxiety and worries in my head I decided to look for some kind of samurai martial art, it was a moment in which I said I want this and I will look for it once and for all, I do not know why that happened or why that feeling came to me, maybe I was looking for child dreams, but at the end I discovered the Bujinkan, at the time I entered I found that discipline, way of thinking, studying and learning. I found what I was looking for, what I wanted in that time. Now the Bujinkan for me has become part of my life, it fills me as a person despite the fact that sometimes I have moved away or stopped, I always have it in my lifestyle and I try to apply what I have learned all around me … I believe I am and I will continue in the Bujinkan because I have made it part of me, of my way of thinking, of my way of living.”

Nelson

“These are the five reasons that motivate me to live the experience of ninjitsu:

1. THE COMBAT AGAINST FEAR
The combat situation induces in the participants the strength to overcome a frequent sensation in society: fear. In this case, fear is represented in the physical pain that an opponent can inflict; But at a psychological level, he poses a special question: Am I capable of accepting that I will receive blows, and still persist in the contest?
In a deeper sense, the ninja apprentice understands that pain is part of life and learning, that without pain there is no evolution of the technique. Consequently, combat mitigates fears because it gives tools to overcome pain and this condition is applied at different times of life.

2. THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY
Through the whirlwind of daily life, work activities and the academic system, our humanity tends to privilege mental development and separates the body. We become stiffer, heavier and slower. The art of the ninja reconciles the body and mind with agility, dexterity, flexibility and balance.

3. ADAPT TO LIVE
In ninja philosophy, adaptation for survival is essential. The ninja improvises, uses the environment in his favor and sees tools where others only perceive shadows. This attitude is not only useful in a fight, but in the daily development, in relationships with others and the problems of daily living.

4. OVERCOMING YOURSELF
In the ancestral combat, the one that remained static, died. This principle, applied to personal development, implies that learning must be stimulated so as not to become stagnant as a professional, student, lover or father. Ninjitsu training raises the need to look to the future, to build the best version of oneself.

5. A SERIOUS FUN
Beyond the techniques, the blows and falls, training also goes hand in hand with the game, smiles and friendship. That’s why it’s fun, and where there’s fun, there’s learning.”

Special thanks to Richard, Gabriel and Nelson for leaving me make public your answers.

And for you, what are your WHYS? WHY do you practice Bujinkan?

Felipe Garzón
Crystal Tiger
Student of Komyo Ryu