The world appears in a multitude of layers of perception, yet the one who experiences it all remains unchanged. Without deeper understanding, the practitioner – consciously or unconsciously – follows a semi-automatic script shaped by unconscious imprints from early childhood.
The first goal on the path of martial arts – and the reason this path was often linked with Zen in Japan and Chan in China – lies in perceiving the silence at the center of experience. It is about becoming aware of the emptiness within oneself.
This is the practitioner's first threshold – and few who encounter it manage to pass beyond. The emptiness takes away all illusions, lays the person bare, and confronts them with an existential helplessness, while their previous self- and world-views dissolve in a shattering clarity. The reactions of the ego, which they mistakenly regard as themselves, are often extreme.
To comfort themselves, the practitioner flees into illusions: fantasies of power, images of control and superiority – or even notions of self-denial and annihilation. All these are mental traps that prevent them from continuing the path.
The inner “enemies” appear overwhelming, impossible to overcome – and so the practitioner increasingly loses themselves in the countless layers of perception. The silence eludes them.
Having pierced the first veil of illusion – the shattering encounter with emptiness, the formless and attribute-less center of their being – a new phase of training begins: the integration of vision. In Japanese martial tradition, the term zanshin (残心) is preserved for this – “the lingering mind.” But what lingers?
Zanshin does not merely mean attention, but a quality of awareness that neither grasps nor flees. It is the ability to remain present amidst chaos – not through tension, but through the relinquishment of all fixed forms. One who cultivates zanshin learns not to be torn back and forth by stimuli but lets perception happen without reacting. This is not a passive state, but a highly active listening into what is – without judgment, without escape.
Zanshin is the archer’s eye after the arrow has already been released – the presence that does not end with the act but continues beyond it. In martial arts, this is the moment when the true fight begins: not against the opponent, but against the need to be something, to mean something, to prove oneself.
Only when this need has ceased can the mind transform into a deeper form: mushin (無心) – the “mind without mind.” Mushin is not a state of thoughtlessness in the trivial sense, but the absence of egocentric agitation. Neither greed nor fear, neither pride nor doubt clouds the action. What must happen, happens – without resistance, without hesitation.
In mushin, the practitioner is neither doer nor victim, neither victor nor vanquished. They become a conduit for what acts beyond the ego. This is not a metaphysical metaphor, but a concrete experience manifested in practice – whether in the moment of an attack, in the breath between two movements, or in letting go of a form that once promised stability.
The path of martial arts does not end with technique or efficiency. These may be necessary on the surface, but they are only preparation for something deeper: the silent acceptance of what is – and awakening from the dream of the separate self.