My first experience with karate was observing a class as an eleven year old. I still remember to this day what I saw and felt that inspired me to begin a practice that has now endured over five decades. Perhaps unlike others, it was not the physical movements but rather something else that caught my imagination. There was a feeling that permeated the space that had what I can only describe as a sacred quality. It was apparent from that first day that what really defined a practice was not necessarily what you were doing, but rather how you were doing it.

The transcendental quality of a practice can extend far beyond physical movements of self-defense, instead focusing on enriching the quality of one’s humanity. Somehow from this felt experience, this quality of inquiry, I found a hint of the possibility of tremendous transformation, as if it were a song to the human spirit.

The context in which we frame a practice has everything to do with what we ultimately find, and this paradigm is established the moment we set foot in the dojo. If done correctly, when we enter the dojo space, we bow, but it is important to be mindful about the meaning behind the gesture. What is it that we are actually acknowledging? From the onset, we affirm an intention, that in this space we invite a transformative experience. To find the sacredness of all life, we must pick a starting point and fill it with an expectation. When we engage within this contextual frame, all subsequent action is imbued with meaning, and our investment of time honors and celebrates the moments of our lives. Perhaps there is no better “defense of the self.”

In order to find meaning in life, to be fulfilled, to be joyous, there needs to be a cultivation of the human spirit. Like the Phoenix rising up from the ashes, each day we place our foot down in an ambition of transcendence led by hope and effort. Some steps in life by their very nature have greater significance, and through a unique perspective, define our trajectory. In the things we forge ourselves against, we define our possibilities and in so doing find our renewal. In my first observation of a karate class as a young boy, it was in the felt possibilities that the energy of inspiration was found and an arc of a lifetime practice established.