The Accidental Martial Artist

A few years ago I had this idea for a novel with a main character who is a former swordswoman. When I started planning the novel I imagined it would have a couple of fight scenes. Problem was, I had never done anything more than swing a light saber around a few times with friends. So I thought, "Hey, here's a chance to learn how to sword fight and call it research!" I considered different styles; the European broadsword wasn't the right feel, not for a swordswoman who was part of a cadre of other swordswomen. Then I considered fencing, but again, the European style didn't have the right feel for what I wanted, although fencing was closer. And then I remembered kendo, which was something I'd first heard of about years earlier.

I had just moved to the Portland, OR area. I searched for kendo in Portland and found a club. They offered a beginner's class three times a year, and a new class would be starting soon. So I signed up, thinking I could take the beginner's class and have enough experience to convincingly write a couple of fight scenes. I had no desire at the time to go any further because I never thought of myself as someone who would enjoy martial arts, and I assumed that all I needed to understand were some basic mechanics and sensations so I could describe the fights realistically. Little did I know...

I was pretty content with my life when I started kendo, but I soon realized that it filled something that I didn't even realize had been missing. It was more than just sword fighting, or a sport, or exercise. It was a way of thinking, of analyzing myself and the world around me, of challenging myself, of coping with anxiety. I started reading books on martial arts and articles on kendo and watching videos of shiai, or matches. What I thought would be a temporary activity became something that boosted my confidence and changed my way of thinking. And that, in turn, changed how I thought of my main character, a lot. I realized I had her, well, not all wrong, but incomplete. Shallow. There were many more depths to her than I had realized. So I scrubbed what little I'd written and went back to the drawing board. And I continued in kendo.

My involvement in kendo ended up helping me create a detailed backstory for my main character, which led to a lot I could draw upon in the present while writing from her point of view. I picked up quite a few books on martial arts to learn more about kendo, and they gave me more insight into my main character as well. Some of the most helpful ones include The Unfettered Mind by Takuan Soho, translated by William Scott Wilson; The Zen Way to the Martial Arts by Taisen Deshimaru; and Zen in the Martial Arts by Joe Hyams. The Unfettered Mind, in particular, has a lot of wisdom tucked into a small volume. And perhaps you can see that there's a pattern to these books, namely, that they all have to do with the mind, and not with raw strength or fighting skill. That was the first lesson I had to learn, and I have to keep learning it over and over. My original fight scenes? Gone. But what I have now? It's much better, in my humble opinion.