Awareness

Today I tried to focus on awareness in the dojo. I first got to say that awareness is difficult to train. At least it seems so to me, because it is so fast to forget the surrounding environment when doing a technique. During the class we were a lot of people so you always had to watch or sense around you when falling or enabling someone to fall. This is all good practice, but sometimes you just get so caught up in what you are trying to accomplish that you forget the world around you.

After the class it was a bit easier to keep track of everyone in the dojo without having to stop the technique because we where less people. Even then it is hard to have an awareness of both in front and behind you. If you bring in left and right as well it is even harder. At the same time that you are aware your surroundings you should also be aware of yourself. Are you relaxed. Is your stance good? Where is your center? I have a long way to go to accomplish this kind of awareness for any length of time. Seems like when you turn a corner and learn something new, you also see more of the landscape that you do not know. Meaning that what you just learned is even less of all than what you thought it was before. That is of course if learning something to the fullest can ever be done.