Musashi's opening within the gorin-no-sho simply states that to be a fighting person one must "always work at reading, writing, martial skills, etc. ... Hold literary skills in your left hand, martial skills in your right. This is the law (kenpo gokui) from ancient times. Never neglect it."
Musashi Sensei even with a larger than life reputation/legend was admired for his art of fighting and as a seeker of the Way. Once again his writings show the need to balance out martial arts with academia.
If this is not enough to sway a person on the path then once again in the opening of the book he states, "A samurai must have both literary and martial skills. To be versed in the two is his duty."
In a recent post where I ask someone to explain what is meant by spirit of karate I find that "the true spirit of martial arts (karate) requires you train in ways to be useful at any moment and teach men so that they may be useful in everything." To me this is practicing "wholeheartedly!"
Element One, Water: Turn our mind into water. The reference explains how water forms to the square and the round which if you study the ancient classic of the I Ching you find the square and round to represent both Heaven (round) and Earth (square). It is thus explained that water is representative of supreme good. It benefits everything for life is composed mostly of water. Water does not compete and its noncompetitive nature is evident due to its nature in fitting and forming into any shape, i.e. container be round, square, etc.
Those who know of the ken-po goku-i from Tatsuo Sensei will recognize the Wind chapter saying, "Without knowing the others well, you can hardly know what you are."
Element Air: He professes a truism that to master the art of fighting you must seek its true nature. Once you can comprehend the true nature of the fighting arts you must then let it go; it has its own freedom as air is free to go everywhere and water seeks all in any place it goes. The true way is to take hold of the true nature then let it go. This is like kata. Know it exactly to discover its true nature then let it go to find the true way.
As has been spoken all martial arts through the knowledge of its fundamental principles will find that it has a rhythm. As he speaks of a variety of rhythms we can extrapolate that to mean each technique also has its own.
Many speak of taking on other martial systems yet Musashi does speak of this but in a manner that one must have knowledge (familiarity) of various professions. He simply wrote, "Try all the arts to experience what is sought in each field." To me he states one must become familiar with all systems to ensure that the one system is capable of dominating all systems in fighting. I understand this to mean, in conjunction with the above statements, that one must first gain a full understanding of the systems, primary system of training, true nature and then let it go to assimilate/familiarize other systems to make the one true personal system complete.
This is my understanding as to the Gorin-no-sho in a fundamental fashion in understanding all the fundamentals of the martial arts.
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