I’ve noticed lately that many people interested in learning Shibari Kinbaku ask the Sensei questions like “How long would it take me to learn Shibari/Kinbaku?” In other cases those people join some expedite training or “intensive workshops” where they are promised to master this art in only a few days. After that they come out and are convinced they’re able to tie and suspend anyone who is willing to let them do so, or even they dare to teach what they supposedly learned.

Fact is that those who care enough to spend the needed time to start that learning path, despite the urgent anxiety they feel to learn this mainstream practice, are learning it within a real understanding of what the Shibari Kinbaku essence is, and not only learning the mere technique of where the ropes are placed in order to get a defined pattern.

There are many other important things to learn besides the back and forth of the ropes that make a pattern. A learning path also means sometimes being able to allow ourselves “a controlled mistake” in front of the Sensei. In that way we will be able to know what we did wrong, and why it shouldn’t be done that way. Moreover, it would help us understand how our mistake might affect that rigging pattern in general, and our model in particular. The pacing, the rhythms, the true control of how the person who lets us use her as a model experiences the rope, are things that take some time to understand. It’s in the first approach to the model, when the rigger uncoils and uses the ropes for the first time with the model, where sometimes we can see who has devoted time to succeed in fluently using the ropes, to achieve confidence, and most of all “consciousness” of what is he provoking. We would hardly be able to control our energy exchange with the model, even if we’re touching her “energetic points” or not, if our mind is focused on the rope, or if we haven’t taken our time to experience those energetic points in our daily lives. These things, and many other things, can hardly be learned over a weekend, a week, or even a month of intensive workshops. There is a slow internalization process for this kind of knowledge. You would be able to pass it from the conscious level to the subconscious only after having done it over and over again, until it becomes part of your soul.

That’s why the Shibari Kinbaku learning path is made of perseverance, effort and dedication.  The good part of this is being able to enjoy this journey with the same humbleness and accepting mind that we often praise. The good part resides in feeling that the important thing in this is not arriving to the finish line. In fact there won’t probably be a finish line at all. The important thing is knowing that we bring our best effort at every moment, and feeling as Shibari Kinbaku attitudes, consciousness and philosophy turn into part of our daily life without us even noticing it.

No better way to understand all this than a Zen tale that I found shared in many martial art pages:

Once upon a time there was a young man coming to town because of his will to learn a martial art. He was told that in that town there was someone who taught it. He asked and was guided to a Sensei. He met him and told him he wanted to learn Tai Chi Chuan

The Sensei wanted to ask the traveler what his real intentions were by listening to him first:

– I was told you are a Sensei. How long it would take me to learn Tai Chi Chuan art?-

– Three years.-

– It’s OK.-

– And what if I work twice as hard as any of your students? –

– Well…  it would take six years then.-

The young man was puzzled and wondering. How could it be that if he worked harder it would take longer?

– And what if I work thrice as hard? –

Sensei thought for a while and then he answered.

– Well… then it’ll take nine years. –

Completely astonished the young man couldn’t understand a thing. That old man had probably gone insane.

Sensei then saw his bewilderment and took him to a garden, then he said:

– Go to the end of this garden and come back.-

The traveler went by and crossed all the garden. As he came back the old man asked him:

-Did you see the rocks that decorate the way on both sides?-

Still astonished the young man couldn’t understand what was he talking about. Before he could answer the old man replied:

-They were there. Weren’t they?-

-Go to the end of the garden again, and this time you may see them while you walk.-

The young man went again and this time he payed more attention to the rocks. When he was back Sensei asked:

– How many flowers where there over the left and the right?-

He walked again and this time he counted them.

– There are 250- he replied
– OK. and how many of them were yellow, blue and pink?- Sensei asked
– Oh!! that you hadn’t asked.-

After a while he finished counting them and came back to the old man. When he was approaching the Sensei he asked him again without letting him talk:

– How many of this, and this, and this height? Have you been able to smell them? Did you come close enough to appreciate them? When you went by that tree, did you see the birds on its branches? They were watching you from up there. Did you happen to feel the wind in your face and where was it blowing from? Did you hear your steps while you walked? –

The young man was astonished and unable to say a word.

The Sensei continued asking him and by the end, when seeing his utter confusion, he explained:

Tai Chi Chuan is like the garden. You have to unveil it slowly, one step at a time, so to be capable of feeling it. You have to practice while you live your present, here and now, and without searching for a finish line. You have to respect other’s training and persevere to improve yourself every day.

That day, that young man had received the first of many teachings in Tai Chi Chuan.

It might be difficult for some people to understand the essence and philosophy behind martial arts and many other oriental arts learning paths, and why they are so different to what we, as westerners, are used to. Other people would still try to learn Tai Chi Chuan by mail, by reading books, in intensive workshops, or by watching Internet videos and tutorials.

Fact is that, as in any other oriental art, the way you chose to learn it will not change its essence. It will only change how far you will be from understanding what this is all about.

Haru Tsubaki