Some of the best philosophical and psychological writings on sport come from the ancient masters of Asian martial arts. One of my favorite books is The Unfettered Mind: Writings from a Zen Master to a Master Swordsman,
and it was written by a Zen monk named Takuan Soho in the 1600s. The lessons one can learn from this short (about 90 pages) book are applicable to all sports, especially those with a highly mental aspect that can cause a physical lapse in times of pressure (fighting sports, baseball pitching and hitting, golf, football kicking, etc.). While this book is short and in many parts very straightforward, it isn’t something most people would pick up and get much out of. Philosophy readings are difficult, and this is no exception, so most athletes are not going to find this an easy read while sitting in the clubhouse. But, I’m here to give you the Americanized version that you can take out onto the field with you today…

“The Abiding Place”

Soho calls the place where the mind stops “the abiding place.” The goal of a sportsman is to prevent his mind from ever stopping and becoming “detained” in a single place. Soho says when your mind stops in your hand, your mind will be lost in your hand. If the abiding place is your opponent’s sword, the mind will be trapped in that sword, and as a result of this, Soho claims, your movements will falter and you will be cut down. If your mind never stops, then it can flow freely around your body to produce or counter any movement.

Translation

You cannot let your mind stop on anything; it must flow freely among your entire body to be useful to you and perform optimally. We’ve all been here: when you’re on the mound and you think, “don’t leave the ball over the plate to this guy,” what happens? Your mind becomes detained in that thought, and you can’t execute the pitch. I thought those exact words in a start this season, and I walked that hitter on 4 pitches. Because my mind was so paralyzed by the thought of leaving a ball down the middle, I became unable to throw a strike at all. When you keep your mind completely clear, you become able to execute whatever action you want without your mind clouding the path.

“The Thousand-Armed Kannon”

Kannon was fabled to have 1000 arms on his body, yet he could use them all flawlessly. How could he coordinate such a movement, when we humans can barely use two hands dextrously? Soho says that because Kannon’s mind flowed freely throughout his body, being nowhere and everywhere at the same time, each arm could be useful. Yet, if Kannon’s mind dwelled on a single arm, the other 999 would become useless.

Translation

How many times have you seen a pitcher who could throw pitches in to a paper cup all day long, yet when he fields a ground ball, throws it into the stands? Why does such an accurate thrower suddenly lose complete control of the arm that makes him great? His mind stops.

Maybe it stops on his arm. Maybe it stops on the first baseman’s mitt. Or maybe it stops in the thought of him overthrowing the first baseman. Either way, his mind becomes trapped, and he loses the normal functioning he is accustomed to.

Soho compares the mind in this analogy of Kannon to the eye: look at one single leaf on a tree and you cannot see a single other, but look at the tree with a blank mind, and you can see ten thousand leaves all at once. It is with this approach that he claims you can twart multiple attackers – by not focusing your mind on a single attacker, you are able to seamlessly counter the blows of each one. By thinking of any one aspect of one’s windup, be-it the leg lift, the stride, or the hand separation, it becomes difficult to put the whole motion together and throw an accurate pitch. But by keeping a clear  mind with no abiding place, the pitching delivery becomes seamless, organic, repeatable and accurate.

“The No-Mind-No-Thought”

Although it does not

mindfully keep guard

In the small mountain fields

the scarecrow

does not stand in vain     – The Buddhist priest Bukkoku

What does this poem mean? To Soho, it explains perfectly the state of being in No-Mind-No-Thought. No-Mind-No-Thought is when the mind is allowed to move freely and without any physical place or thoughts to trap it. When one enters competition with a mind that is without thought and without an abiding place, it allows the body to simply perform the movements that it has practiced. Any high-level pitcher has performed his motion enough times to do it perfectly in the dark – the muscles, when allowed to, will simply take over and do what they have been programmed to do it. The difficult thing is getting to this state of advanced consciousness. When one performs with No-Mind-No-Thought, his movements can be said to exemplify…

“The Action of Spark and Stone”

When one strikes a flint, there is no interval between the striking and the spark – no gap between the strike and the light. When one can train his body and mind to reach No-Mind-No-Thought, his actions become this same way. If a hitter has to tell himself to swing while a 98 mph fastball is on its way, he will swing and miss every time. The reason major league hitters can hit such an impossibly fast pitch is that there is no gap between their eye’s recognition of the pitch and their body’s decision to swing. “Swing now” does not exist in such an elite hitter – the body just swings, because the body and mind do not detain each other. Likewise, if a pitcher wants to throw a curveball, requiring a turn of the wrist at a very precise moment before release, there is no time for the mind to tell the wrist to turn – it just happens without any interval whatsoever. When an athlete lets his mind get in the way of these actions, then his actions fail, and he loses. Or, in the case of the samurai, he gets cut down by the sword.

What To Take Away

The mind needs to be clear, to flow freely wherever it is needed; when it can do this, your physical body will be allowed to perform as it is intended. Anytime you let your mind dwell on something while in the midst of competition, your performance will suffer as a result of your mind being taken by that thought, and the intentional object of that thought.

The Samurai had to meditate a tremendous amount to build the mental conditioning necessary to fight effectively for their lives. Letting their minds stop anywhere often led to their death, as Soho preached. Fortunately we modern athletes are rarely fighting for our literal lives; yet, everyday we fight for our lives in sport and for the right to continue to take the field and carry on with a career that is life to most of us.