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Old 01-31-2004, 03:54 PM   #26
Anders Bjonback
Dojo: Boulder Aikikai
Location: Boulder, CO
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 129
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I'm rarely jelous of other people, but for some reason, I think that with aikido, I have to deal with jelousy a lot more than I do with other things. Because it's important to me, there's a lot more attachment, hopes and fears, going on.

I tested for sixth kyu first, rather than fifth kyu. Then, in my second three months of taking aikido, one of my kohai (if she could be called that at my early stage of training) tested for fifth right away as I tested for fifth. Now, she's testing for third, while I have decided to wait three months.

Like me, she's really into training, so I generally get along really well with her. But she's really good at things I'm not, like talking to people and being socialable. While I make a big deal out of things, she seems to go into them with ease. So there are times when I'm really jelous of her, and sometimes I'm jelous of or don't like the fact that she's going to be higher ranking than me despite having a few months less experience than me.

Mixed in with this jelousy, of course, is admiration. Without admiration, without recognizing qualities I wish I had and see in her, there would nothing to be jelous of.

Taking an aikido sort of approach to these sort of inner emotional workings, I guess I could ask myself how I could enter into harmony with them, or preserve my own center and not allow them to overtake me. To deal with them without supressing (killing) them, or indulging (losing my own center) in them.

I meditate, focus on the breath, and try to allow whatever comes up, to come up. In doing this, and through events in life, I discover things about myself. Whether positive or negative, I try to just allow them to be. I remember that whatever emotional responce I have to situations and people, they are due to uncountable causes and conditions--there is no effect (in this case, jelousy) with just one cause. I also remember that whatever negative stuff is going through my head, it does not make me a bad person.

Last edited by Anders Bjonback : 01-31-2004 at 04:03 PM.

"For peace and happiness are presences, not objects we can grasp and hold onto."
--Lilian Smith
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