Forget Oneself

Aikido Founder, O-Sensei Morihei Ueshiba, taught the late Hirokazu Kobayashi Sensei. Kobayashi Sensei taught Hanshi. Hanshi teaches Ishibashi Sensei and me. Aikido is the selfless path. Aikido is freedom – freedom of oneself.

Kobayashi Sensei said, “Aikido is the path that leads to forgetting oneself.”

That is a meaningful crystallization of life. Well, at least for me.

Through my own trials and tribulations, abusive childhood, depression, and self-hating, I get that: The world works, when it’s not all about me. The world is about others. The world is about them.

The possibility of a meaningful life lies in the selfless path, of being of service to others. Kobayashi Sensei said, “… the path that leads to forgetting oneself.” In the bigger picture, I try to make difference in some way.

In that bigger picture, I forget myself. I discovered on my own less traveled path: The world isn’t all about me. I just train. I make myself work. I grind it out. I heal myself. It’s not like I have to get somewhere.

Like my spiritual twin brother Actor and Martial Artist Dolph Lundgren, I grew up enduring an abusive childhood. We were both terrorized by our fathers. Arising through it all, Dolph said, “You have to love yourself.” Amen.

Along the path, I took my baby steps, learned to hate on me a lot less. I couldn’t just love myself from my zero, from the get-go. I practiced kindness to others and being kinder to me. I loved myself for who I am and forgave myself for who I’m not. In grinding it out, I could make a difference for others. In healing my own self, I forget myself. I’m no longer the concern. I free me.

I choose who I’m going to be in any moment. Making a difference for others becomes my authentic selfless expression. The possibility of making a difference arises in the service to others. It’s about others. It’s about them.

I was one of them, too. For over 25 years, the late Mizukami Sensei taught me Aikido. More importantly, Sensei taught me what it is to be a good man. He became the Father I needed to become the greater man who I’m proud of.

Sensei taught Aikido for over 50 years. He dedicated his life to service, of making a profound difference for those like me and Ishibashi Sensei. Mizukami Sensei was the humblest man I knew on Planet Earth. He taught me to open to life, to continually invent my greater-than versions.

Years ago, I attended Aikido Seminars on occasional weekends. When I saw Sensei in Sunday morning Aikido practice, he asked, “So what did you learn, Jon?” Often, I’d complain that the instructed techniques were bogus: They weren’t gonna work for real. Sensei smiled and laughed. He said, “Show me.” I did. Then Sensei showed me how to make the technique work. He never made the other Sensei or the technique wrong.

Sensei always said, “Make it work.” Years later, I got that he was really saying, “Make your life work.” On the selfless path, in forgetting myself, there’s always something to learn, greater spaces to expand into, something to give up.

In forgetting myself, getting that the world isn’t all about me, I can give away all that I’ve been gifted. I can authentically serve others. I can make a difference.

Whenever I don’t feel like practicing Aikido or when I dismiss learning the new software application at work, I hear Sensei, “Just train. It’s not like you have to get somewhere.” Then I just do what I need to do. I help train the next generation of black belts at the Dojo. I pass on whatever wisdom I’ve gained in my 30 plus year career in Satellite Systems Engineering to the young engineers like Enoch and Trevor.

In Aikido, Ishibashi Sensei reminds, “Apply the technique to yourself.” Just train. I work on me. I don’t work on others. I really have nothing to do with what goes on inside them. As I work on myself, I open the possibility for others to work on themselves as well. It’s about them.

I forget myself. Yet, I acknowledge how far I’ve come from where I started, from my zero. When the world isn’t all about me, perhaps I can leave the world a little greater than when I came into it.

I won’t define my legacy. That shall be determined by those I’ve shared the journey with after I’m gone. Still, it would be cool that others might say that I wasn’t all about me. That for the most part, I was about them. What a cool legacy to have. Just saying.

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