Hello!
Seiiti Arata.
Do you know those films about martial arts where the teacher is so focused yet so relaxed
that they can take down several enemies at once?
This mental state in which you are completely focused on the task you are performing is
called Zanshin - 残心 in Japan.
If we were to translate it literally, Zanshin means something along the lines of “a mind
without the rubbish”.
Zan 残 means “whatever that remains”... and 心 shin is “mind” - meaning, a mind
absolutely focused on the task, without any other thoughts distracting our attention.
But besides the literal translation, Zanshin has a deeper meaning.
You can see Zanshin as a way of living your life with intention, acting with a purpose,
instead of being carried away like a victim of circumstance and other people’s desires.
The secret to achieving Zanshin is to be alert and relaxed at the same time.
When we say that someone should be on alert and relaxed, it seems like a contradictory
statement, right?
But in reality, those are complementary qualities.
The opposite of alert is distracted.
The opposite of relaxed is tense.
Most of the time, those who have trouble focusing are always distracted.
People who get carried away by current events.
At one point they are studying something at college, the next they want to become an entrepreneur,
then they want to become a programmer.
In order to not be distracted, you need to be alert.
But it is not enough to be alert.
You could be on alert, and tense, which is what happens to most people who overcome distraction.
Or you could be alert and relaxed, which is the ideal Zanshin state.
To be alert and relaxed, you first need to put your mind into the present moment.
You need to concentrate on what you are doing in that exact moment, not letting your mind
roam free about a past event or dreaming about an imaginary future.
But this type of concentration should come naturally, relaxed.
It’s no use to be tense, being hard on yourself, forcing your mind to stay focused.
This kind of tense alert is not sustainable.
You will get tired in a short period of time, you will end up giving up and labeling yourself
as a distracted person.
Now that you understand what you need to do to achieve Zanshin…
The question is: how can you do it?
In order to achieve Zanshin, your mind should be focused on the process, not on the result.
The word Zanshin became popular in the West in the middle of the past century, thanks
to a book called Zen in the Art of Archery [source: https://arata.se/book-azen].
In this book, the German author Eugen Herrigel tells us about how he learned Zanshin when
training bow and arch with a Japanese teacher.
While he was only focusing on the results, on hitting the target, the teacher insisted
on focusing on the process.
The teacher was so focused on the process that he made the student train with a very
close target for four years.
Shooting from a short distance, hitting the target was not difficult nor was that the
goal.
The training goal was to learn the process: how to place your feet, how to grab the arch
and how to breathe when releasing the arrow.
Eager to get some “real” practice, came the surprise: when the student tried to shoot
from longer distances, he did not hit one single target.
He was disappointed and told the teacher that he had a terrible aim.
The teacher then taught him that the issue was not the aim, but the process, which was
not perfected yet.
That is the moral of the story.
If the archer would have focused on the process, if he really tried to master each of the steps
before releasing the arrow, the result would have been an arrow straight to the target.
But if he was tense and worried only about the result, with no focus on the process,
he would not be able to shoot a straight arrow.
Zanshin is a choice.
You always have the option to live your life with intention
Your mind works in the way it was trained to work.
If you are always acting distracted, checking your phone constantly, with many tabs opened,
trying to do a thousand things at the same time, you are training your mind to be a distracted
mind.
But the same way you trained your mind to be distracted can be used to train your mind
to be focused.
Living with intention sounds like an abstract thing, but it is just a choice.
You choose to live in a more alert and relaxed way, putting intention in everything you do.
For example, it is really common to find people who want more fitness, or they want to own
an entire bitcoin in cold storage, or that they want a great romantic relationship.
The problem is that usually these people are focused on the results, and want to find the
shortest and quickest path to get that result.
Since they are just focused on the final result, these people forget about the process.
It is similar to an archer without the patience to learn the process of holding the bow without
shaking, and then jump to the final result of releasing the arrow at a long distance.
If you do not have the basics first, it is impossible to do things that require the basics!
And since the results take time, they end up jumping to another goal, or changing the
strategy from time to time, always looking for a shortcut to reach their goal quickly.
Zanshin teaches us to do the opposite.
To focus on the process.
Instead of the athletic body, focus on having a good meal the next time you eat.
The next spoonful.
Even the next bite.
With this type of attention on the process, by focusing on doing the right thing, on the
task you are performing, you will inevitably reach your desired goal.
It may not be as fast as the shortcuts that promise miracle results.
But think about this: has any of those shortcuts ever worked?
Or have you lost so much time looking for shortcuts that you would have reached the
result if you just had focused on the process?
Follow the Japanese saying that “after winning the battle, adjust your helmet”.
Eugen Herrige even complained to his teacher about how the training was so slow.
He told him that it would take him centuries to become a good archer.
The teacher replied: “the journey towards your final goal is not to be measured.
Why does it matter if it takes weeks, months or years?”
This thought changes the way we see our goals, especially the greater goals.
Going back to the example: why does it matter if it is taking so long to have a healthy
body?
Is that person going back to their eating habits once they achieve their weight goal?
To stay healthy, the attention should always be on the process: the next meal, the next
spoonful, the next bite.
The Japanese saying “after winning the battle, adjust your helmet” says that the battle
does not end once you win.
The battle ends - and with defeat - when you get lazy, when you lose your sense of commitment,
when you stop paying attention.
That is why Zanshin also means to stay alert and relaxed even when you have reached your
goal.
Back to our example of a person who wants to have a healthy body.
Their battle does not end when they reach a specific number on the scale.
The battle ends - with defeat - when they think they have reached their goal and start
to miss one or another workout session, when they break their diet constantly, when they
become too lazy to move their body.
This is why achieving a goal is bad for your process of constant improvement.
You could get distracted and lose everything you have achieved.
To avoid that, anytime you win a battle, tighten your helmet.
Did you achieve your goal?
Great.
Celebrate it and then set a new goal to improve even more.
Even better: set the process of always improving as your goal.
Most of us focus mainly on the results.
The old oriental wisdom of Zanshin teaches us to put all of our focus into the process,
into the task we are doing at the moment, alert and relaxed.
If we do that, the result will just be a consequence.
You could choose to live like this, setting your intention in everything you do.
You just have to train your mind in order to act more openly, without many distractions.
If you want to learn how to train your focus, I invite to check FOCUS, an Arata Academy
course, by checking out the link https://arata.se/focuscourse