Awareness in the city

A big reason why I haven't posted much over the past year is that I've moved house. And city. And, in fact, country. No reason not to let my martial arts practice slip, but I need to prioritise get involved in a club I like with a teacher I respect and I think this takes some time.

In the meantime I've been thinking a lot about perception in the city: physical awareness and personal space in an urban environment teeming with people. Can you feel another person's energy, or intentions on a packed tram (By energy I mean stance, intent, strength…)? City life requires a different level of awareness; I remember seeing something by anthropologist Desmond Morris (Human Zoo) who says that the amazing thing about human city life is not that occasionally people come into physical conflict with others, but that it is so rare! After all there are a lot of emotions, egos and agendas walking around being surpressed in isolated cocoons amongst crowds of commuters.




So I've noticed something rather cool walking around and commuting in the City and that is I can be amazingly perceptive. I can feel people approaching from behind, I can see who I need to avoid and I can hear aggressive noises even above the normal hub-bub. I find that in itself quite startling in itself as there is so much to distract me such as other people's conversations, the muzak, adverts, the trams, the traffic…The rub is this though: I need to pay attention. If I don't and am not 'aware' (or awake if you like) then this ability diminishes. It doesn't disappear but I may perceive someone behind me when they're much closer than I would if I were calm, centred and aware.

I'm not advocating walking around in a constant state of alert like an urban Bruce Lee or a Buddhist monk, but knowing this can help us turn on our sensitivity when it's needed such as when it's darker, when you're alone on a tram or when you're walking through a ropey part of town. Maybe it's natural and we tend to switch on anyway at these times, in which case: all the better. If you have to work at it, here's a good technique which I read about in Dead or Alive by Geoff Thompson. If you want to stay alert in any environment make a running commentary in your head about what you can see and perceive around you (hear, smell, feel), thus 'switching yourself on'. For example it might go something like this, "pavement on left is broken, man walking dog coming towards me (big build, small dog), noise of jet overhead, I can hear a car approaching from behind and I can see a bus at the stop in front of me. Another pedestrian comes into view down the street; a woman with a buggy…." And so on.

Evidently you can't do this all the time but if you're feeling like an awareness switch-on in the big City, this might well be a good place to start.

The first enemy

"It was a troublesome scramble...because I momentarily behaved like a bad tempered boy who is apoplectic with his toy-train. The straps were a fuddle, the engine was recalcitrant, and ...I ...noticed someone had altered the setting of the rudder bar. Ugh-urrr!

'Oh, Jesus , this is it, this is it-just time to get above...Where the hell!'

Momentarily I panicked, my mouth became so dry it seemed I had been licking thousands of stamps.

Then my thoughts raced with a hare's rhythm. Battle had commenced!"

Once Kenneth Hemingway had attacked some enemy bombers with his Hurricane in this, his first enemy engagement he, by his own admission, was quite calm: "my nervousness had gone".

When I read this story (taken from Wings Over Burma, 1944) about a fighter pilot in the Second World War who flew alongside the AVG I was intrigued by his pre-combat 'nerves' and it reminded me much of something I'd read by Geoff Thompson who wrote comprehensively about the fight or flight phenomenon. I was also interested in the clarity or calmness that this pilot achieved in the midst of combat.

In Thompson's book 'Dead or Alive' he identifies aspects of adrenaline in order to understand, to know what the body undergoes in stressful situations. This way we can better face it when it actually happens. There is a huge section on adrenal reactions and I'd recommend getting hold of the book. Besides if I reproduced it all here Geoff Thompson would kick my head in...

As a taster here is his list, some of which can be seen in the above story.

Adrenal reaction

- Pre fight shakes

- Dry mouth

- Voice quiver

- tunnel vision

- Sweaty palms

- Nausea

- Bowel loosening

- Adrenal deafness

- Time distortion

(edited list)

As Hannibal Lecter said in Red Dragon, "Yes, that's the fear. It takes time and experience to master it..."

The second idea relating to martial training that I was minded of was 'mushin no shin' or mind of no mind. This is the state of mind open to all senses without being transfixed by anything. this freedom from extraneous 'clutter' enables the warrior to act and react without hindrance. A calmness just like the hurricane pilot felt after his initial adrenaline squirts.