Okay, I’ll try to explain this with a kind of allegory. Say you have a bird. You know, with the long neck. A looong necked bird. I can’t think of what it’s called, but you know what I mean right? The bird with the long neck. It just ate a fish. But you didn’t want it to eat the fish and don’t want it to swallow it either. So you grab the bird fast by the neck. And you squeeze and pull up to squeeze the fish out. But if you squeeze too hard you’ll break the bird’s neck “crack”. And it’ll die. You don’t want to do that so you squeeze just enough to get the fish out but not so tight you break the bird’s neck. You get what I’m saying? So now, imagine this type of situation when holding the bow. Apply and you can hold the bow correctly for kyudo allowing it to move freely after a shot.
Roughly translated from Japanese, this was said by one of my teachers in kyudo class. At times like these I remember how priceless life experience truly is. Never in my life shall I forget what he said as an example for gripping the bow. I will hereforth imagine a duck hanging by its neck and gagging as I set up my shot.
Writing from Koganei, Tokyo, Japan | June 13, 2009
