#210 | Life Lessons from a Japanese Samurai Who Never Lost a Duel in over 60 Battles

episode SUMMARY:

Douglas Vigliotti explores the powerful wisdom of legendary samurai Miyamoto Musashi in “The Book of Five Rings," a philosophical work on combat strategy that offers profound insights applicable to life beyond the battlefield. Uncover Musashi's teachings on both the physical and mental aspects of swordsmanship and discover how his Zen-like approach to understanding one's opponents can unlock new levels of empathy in your life. Prepare to be inspired as this ancient Japanese text unveils timeless lessons on efficiency, adaptability, perspective, and the power of unlearning.

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Welcome back to “Books for Men”, a podcast to inspire more men to read and bring together men who do. So I have another ancient book to share with you. I feel like I've been on a kick with these lately, and that's mostly because, one, I read a fair share of them, but also because they're fun and they're interesting, at least to me. So I hope you guys find it interesting to listen to. So today's book is “The Book of Five Rings” by Miyamoto Musashi, and it's sort of hard to classify what the genre is. I would say probably philosophy. It's a shorter book around 192 pages. The addition that I read came out in 2005, and it was translated by Thomas Cleary, who is a translator of many classic Japanese texts. But before I jump into any more about the book, first let me just remind you that if you are a regular listener of this podcast, the best way that you can support it is by clicking the subscribe button on whatever podcast platform you're listening to this on.

(01:17)

By clicking that subscribe button, it lets the podcast algorithm know that people are indeed enjoying the podcast and then it puts it in front of more people. So if you want to inspire more men to read, the best way for you to do that is click the subscribe button. The second best way is to leave a review or rate the podcast. Also, I did just want to quickly remind you that this podcast does have a companion newsletter, which goes out at the end of every month and it rounds up all of the episodes from that month. It's complete with full book and author information, all the best quotes, episode summaries, and newsletter-only book recommendations. So if you're interested in that, you could sign up for it on the website BooksforMen.org. Okay, so now let's jump into the episode for the week. So who is Miyamoto Musashi?

(02:09)

He's a famed Japanese swordsman, a samurai, a master list samurai, and I think that's important to his story, he was born in 1584, and based on legend and stories and firsthand accounts, he never lost a dual in over 60 battles and he would take on groups of people at once, and this made him very unique in a lot of ways. So prior to his death at the age of 60, he died of cancer. I believe he wrote the book that I'm sharing with you today, “The Book of Five Rings”. And what is “The Book of Five Rings”? So quite simply, it is a detailed account of his school or philosophy on combat. On a technical level, it is different because he uses two swords versus one long sword. So it's a technique that has a sword in each hand, one long, one short. The long sword is called a katana, and the short sword is called a wakisashi.

(03:09)

I believe that's how you pronounce it. My Japanese probably needs a little brushing up, but as I was saying, the more traditional method uses just a katana with two hands. But I don't want to get bogged down in the technical aspect of the work because if you're interested, you'll learn that when you read it. The more important part for me is the philosophical element of the work or the strategy or the school of thought, I should say. As Cleary, the translator writes in the intro, the book shows you how to approach life with shin-ken, and the literal translation of that is “real sword”. So whether you're using one sword or two swords, what is real sword? And real sword is a Japanese way of treating things with a life-or-death approach. So treating things as deadly serious, although Musashi's school is slightly different, mostly because as I alluded to earlier he was masterless and a practitioner and someone who fought in a lot of battles.

(04:17)

And so he probably thinks about things differently than a teacher would think about things. But where there is a lot of commonality is in that more general Japanese philosophy of shin-ken, which is a good overlay to the school in general. So why is the book called “The Book of Five Rings”? That is because Musashi's philosophy has five scrolls or rings, and that's how the book is laid out. So I will go through each of those five as the big takeaway that I want to share with you. But before I do, I want to draw attention to a quote from Thomas Cleary in the introduction of this work. And if shin-ken is the general overlay philosophically then there are two essential principles to the school, more specifically Musashi's way of thinking. And I think that this quote really sums it up.

(05:20)

Cleary says, “The first of these basic principles is keeping inwardly calm and clear, even in the midst of violent chaos. The second is not forgetting about the possibility of disorder in times of order.” So while that is definitely a good general look at the school, there are actually nine principles that go a little bit more detailed into those two. And that actually is in the first scroll, the earth scroll. And I'm not going to share those nine principles with you, but they're in there. And if you want to go into more detail, that's one reason that you might want to pick this book up. But what is the earth scroll? So the earth scroll is an outline of the science of martial arts and his school. One of my favorite quotes from that scroll is, “The long sword is to be wielded in spacious places, the short sword in confined spaces. This is the basic idea of the way to begin with.”

(06:26)

And then another one I love in that scroll is: “When your life is on the line, you want to make use of all your tools.” And the reason why I love both of these quotes is metaphorically in life, it's important to use the right tool in the right situation. Quite often something that works somewhere might not work somewhere else or it may work well somewhere else and not as well in another place. So on having an understanding of your resources and your tools and all of that is really, really important. And I found a lot to take away in that scroll based on some of these ideas. The next scroll was called the water scroll, and that's about how to be or the mind and the technique in his school. And some of my favorite quotes are: “Fixation is the way of death, fluidity is the way of life.”

(07:29)

Or another one, “Be very sure not to step with one foot alone.” And then finally, something a little bit longer is a quote that I really love. “It is essential for those who are physically small to know what it is like to be large and for those who are physically large, to know what it is like to be small, whether you are physically large or small, it is essential to keep your mind free from subjective biases.” And that brought us to the fire scroll, which is about how to conduct yourself during battle. One of my favorite quotes from that scroll is: “Becoming the opponent means you should put yourself in an opponent's place and think from the opponent's point of view.” I think you could see a lot of similarities between some of the philosophy and the quotes, even though he's talking about combat, there is a very zen-like approach to the philosophy and a very empathetic approach to the philosophy, always putting yourself in the shoes of others to understand how they think and what their point of view might be.

(08:57)

Nobody is going to look at any situation in the same exact way because nobody comes at life with the same set of compounded experiences, even if you were born in the same town or to the same family or have the same friends. Everybody has a very unique point of view. And so I love this idea of always trying to understand other people's points of view. And this brings us to the wind scroll, which is about style or different styles from other schools. Again, more of putting yourself in the shoes of others. But my favorite quote from this scroll deviates a little bit from that idea. And it just reminds you, “When you master an art or science, your performance does not appear to be fast.” I love that because it reminds me a lot of golf. When you watch professionals who are amazing, people always say it doesn't even look like they're swinging, but in reality, it's just because their tempo and flow are so flawless that it doesn't appear like they're moving fast.

(10:13)

I think that that is similar in a lot of specialties and skills in life. When people make something look easy, it doesn't look like they're moving fast, but most times they are. And they are doing it in such an efficient manner that it's not noticeable to the eye. Now obviously in combat, this is a big benefit, but again, I feel like there is a way that this transfers into our lives that can be really, really impactful. And then the final scroll is called the scroll of emptiness. And this is about detaching from learned principles to spontaneously enter into the true way. I love this concept. It jives with things that you've heard me talk about on this podcast before in the true way means the way of nature. So what the world gives you, we heard this when we talked about Stoicism and the logos, and definitely when we talked about Buddhism. My favorite quote from this scroll is a little bit of a long one, but I will read it slowly.

(11:29)

“Everybody may think their path is sure and is a good thing, but from the point of view of the straight way of mind seen in juxtaposition with overall social standards, they turn away from the true way by the personal biases in their minds and the individual warps in their vision.” I love the idea of unlearning. That quote to me puts a capstone on that idea and says, if you don't unlearn and allow the world to teach you the lessons and the way, then your vision is going to become warped. You are not going to be looking at things objectively in life, perhaps, or a battle in this sense is going to be much more difficult to win. Not that you could win at life necessarily, but you get the point that I'm trying to make, hopefully. Alright, so I think that's a good place to wrap this episode up.

(12:36)

I really enjoyed reading this book. I think there's a lot to take away from it. I think where it really excels is how transferable so many lessons are to modern life and perhaps the things that you are trying to learn in your life. Unless of course you're trying to learn how to use the samurai sword, then it might be directly applicable. So thank you so much for listening, and if you enjoyed the episode, I did want to remind you to subscribe on whatever podcast platform you're listening to this on because that's the best way for you to support the podcast and inspire more men to read. Remember there is a newsletter companion to this podcast and you could sign up on the website if you want to connect with me. You could do so on Instagram @douglasvigliotti. It's the only social media that I have. Or visit my website, DouglasVigliotti.com. Lastly, if you're interested in listening to my 2021 poem collection, it's titled “mini heartbreaks (or little poems about life)”. It's raw, it's unorthodox, it's a mini-memoir about women, alcohol, writing, artistry growing up, moving forward, and missed opportunities. So if that sounds interesting to you, you could listen to it on the podcast “Slightly Crooked: Good Stories, Told Well”, and the link for that will be in the show notes. Thanks again for listening. And if you want more information on this podcast, you could always visit BooksforMen.org.