Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

Great news! Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation is back in print with a new publisher. Michi Publishing is starting to release new copies of this landmark book to the public, and you should be able to order a special signed edition from www.senninfoundation.com very soon. 

The Sennin Foundation Center for Japanese Cultural Arts is scheduled to receive Japanese Yoga on June 11, 2012. Check the website after this date to order your own personal copy of this meditation classic. Paypal and major credit cards will be accepted, and international orders are encouraged. 

Based on the eclectic Western-Eastern teachings of Nakamura Tempu Sensei, this step-by-step introduction to Japanese yoga (Shin-shin-toitsu-do) presents stretching, healing, and meditation exercises designed for mind/body integration. It is the only book in English to detail the life and teachings of Mr. Nakamura. In Japanese yoga, which is based on mind and body unification principles, the ultimate goal is enhanced concentration, calmness, and willpower for a longer, healthier, and fuller life. Author H. E. Davey Sensei also shows how Japanese yoga relates to various classical Japanese arts as part of a tradition of spiritual practice with spiritual and aesthetic roots in India, Japan, and the West.

Developed by Nakamura Tempu Sensei in the early 1900s from Indian Raja yoga, Japanese martial arts and meditation practices, as well as Western medicine and psychotherapy, Japanese yoga offers a new approach to experienced yoga students and a natural methodology that newcomers will find easy to learn. After a brief history of Shin-shin-toitsu-do, H. E. Davey Sensei presents Mr. Nakamura's Four Basic Principles to Unify Mind and Body. These principles relate the meditative experience to the movement of everyday living and thus make it a "dynamic meditation." Each of the Four Basic Principles is illustrated with step-by-step explanations of practical experiments.

Readers are then introduced to different forms of seated and moving meditation, health exercises, and self-healing arts. All these are linked back to the Four Basic Principles and can enhance performance in art, music, business, sports, and other activities. Readers learn to use Japanese yoga techniques throughout the day, without having to sit on the floor or seek out a quiet space.

Included at the end of the book are simple but effective stretching exercises, information about ongoing practice, and a glossary and reference section. Amply illustrated and cogently presented, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation belongs on every mind/body/spirit reading list.

Japanese Yoga was initially published in 2001, and it was the first and only English language book on the mind and body unification teachings of Nakamura Sensei. It still is, and Mr. Davey will personally sign your copy of this milestone work. Drop by www.senninfoundation.com after June 11 and order Japanese Yoga for yourself or your friends. 

"Will make many yogis feel right at home...

Davey's readable, friendly guide is definitely worth a look." - Yoga Journal

Kindness

Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again. ~Og Mandino

From Japanese Yoga . . .

"A positive attitude is most easily arrived at through a deliberate and rational analysis of what’s required to manifest unwavering positive thought patterns. First, reflect on the actual, present condition of your mind. In other words, is the mind positive or not? We’ve all met individuals who perceive themselves as positive people but don’t appear as such. Since the mind is both invisible and in...tangible, it’s therefore easier to see the accurate characteristics of the mind through a person’s words, deeds, and posture.

For example, if we say, “It’s absolutely freezing today! I’ll probably catch a cold before the end of the day!” then our words expose a negative attitude. But if we say, “The temperature is very cold” (a simple statement of fact), then our expressions, and therefore attitude, are not negative. Sustaining an alert state in which self-awareness becomes possible gives us a chance to discover the origins of negativity. In doing so, we also have an opportunity to arrive at a state of positiveness, so that our words and deeds are also positive, making others feel comfortable, cheerful, and inspired."
— H.E. Davey, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

Review

Ashwini Aragam reviewed Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

Leading Life in a Positive Way
April 8, 2007

One of the key principles of Japanese Yoga or shin-shin toitsu do is being and staying positive. When you stay positive, the ki or the energy starts to flow in you. When you turn negative, the ki stops flowing. It is as simple as that! H. E. Davey writes in a simple and most effective manner to instill in one this simple principle.

If you are practicing Yoga for some time, you will know that Yoga is not all postures. Living life to its maximum is yoga; letting that universal energy flow through you uninterrupted is yoga. The author writes about the teachings of his master - Nakamura sensei. While acknowledging the roots of Japanese Yoga lies in the ancient practice from India, Nakamura sensei went on to form the foundations of Japanese yoga through his own interpretations and experiences.

As with staying positive, concentration of the mind is a big part of the book. There are several exercises/techniques (candle gazing, listening to the fading of the ringing bells to eternity) explained in the book and how, with such exercises once can connect to the universal energy. The exercise with a pendant is a simple and profound way to illustrate the effects of the mind on the body. You will find the many gentle stretching and ki stimulating exercises easy to learn and practice. This is one of the yoga books that I could read through without the express need to 'know' the steps of postures, the sequences and combinations of different categories of postures, etc, etc.

I found the book to be simple and devoid of the numerous asanas that one needs to learn to 'practice' yoga. You need to read quite a bit of the book to get a sense of what Dynamic Meditation is. That's how this book is different. If Yoga were to be condensed into a two-page booklet readied for a crash course, then there wouldn't be so many books on the subject. Each author and each way of yoga uses a different and often unique way to get the message across. H. E. Davey speaks from his own experience and practice in writing this book and in it you will find a different and welcome way of practicing yoga. This book will be a unique addition to your Yoga library.

SAWAI ATSUHIRO & H. E. DAVEY NEWS

Sawai Atsuhiro Sensei, Sennin Foundation Senior Advisor, has become the Headmaster of the Wakuwaku Hoshin Juku in Osaka. He was appointed to this position by the President of the new group Ikeda Hikaru Sensei. Wakuwaku Honshin Juku is devoted to the exploration of meditation and spiritual disciplines, with an emphasis on the teachings of Nakamura Tempu Sensei, the founder of the Shin-shin-toitsu-do system of Japanese yoga and meditation. Sawai Sensei was one of Nakamura Sensei’s closest students, and he has over 50 years of training in Japanese yoga. He is also the author of more than one best selling book on this subject in Japan.  

H. E. Davey, Director of the Sennin Foundation Center for Japanese Cultural Arts, recently received the highest level of teaching certification from the Wakuwaku Honshin Juku. He has studied Japanese yoga and meditation in the lineage of Nakamura Tempu Sensei since he was a teenager, and he is the author of Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation, the first English language book on the original methods of Nakamura Sensei. (You can read more at http://japaneseyoga.blogspot.com/. ) 

Nakamura Sensei lived in India, where he studied the art of Raja yoga, the yoga of meditation. After studying medicine at Columbia University, he blended Indian meditation and health improvement with his background in medicine, psychology, Japanese healing arts and meditation, and Japanese martial arts. He taught for many years in Japan, authored best-selling books, and counted among his students a large number of Japan's top executives, politicians, fine artists, athletes, martial artists, and people from every walk of life. But few Westerners have yet been exposed to these extraordinary teachings. One of the goals of the Wakuwaku Honshin Juku is to rectify this situation.

Einstein

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
― Albert Einstein

“Realizing that our minds control our bodies while our bodies reflect our minds amounts to understanding the most fundamental aspects of ourselves. It further equals a comprehension of the relationship between our “tools.” And since the mind and body are interrelated, this understanding makes it easier to see why coordinating them is a practical way of using these tools to greatest effect—a way of using the mind and body to live our lives as art.”
― H.E. Davey, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

Quote

“While we can learn or study techniques for almost anything we might want to accomplish, real understanding is not the mere accumulation of knowledge. Understanding cannot be realized by listening or reading about the realization of others. It must be achieved firsthand via substantive, direct perception in the moment.”
― H.E. Davey, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

No art takes places without inspiration. Every artist also needs effective knowledge of his or her tools (e.g., does a certain brush function well with a particular kind of paint?). What’s more, artists need effective techniques for using those tools.

Likewise, to express ourselves skillfully with maximum efficiency and minimum effort, we need to investigate the most effective ways of using the mind and body since, in the end, they are the only “tools” we truly possess in life.

H. E. Davey, Japanese Yoga: The Way of Dynamic Meditation

The Japanese Way of the Artist

The Japanese Way of the Artist is a collection of three of H. E. Davey's most popular books. It's published by Stone Bridge Press (www.stonebridge.com). Included in a single volume are:

* Living the Japanese Arts and Ways: 45 Paths to Meditation & Beauty
* Brush Meditation: A Japanese Way to Mind & Body Harmony
* The Japanese Way of the Flower: Ikebana as Moving Meditation
The three works anthologized here are essential to understanding the spiritual, meditative, and physical basis of all classical Japanese crafts, fine arts, and martial arts. Living the Japanese Arts & Ways covers key concepts—like wabi and “stillness in motion”—while the other two books show the reader how to use brush calligraphy (shodo) and flower arranging (ikebana) to achieve mind-body unification. Illustrated with diagrams, drawings, and photographs.