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FROM THE ALASKAN WILDERNESS
Author: Dino Karabeg
It was due to bears and an unusual play of circumstances that our hiking trip to Denali, Alaska, was brought to a premature end. But two days later, quite unexpectedly, I felt happy for what had happened. As a hitchhiker in the back of a pickup truck, on a narrow dirt road in the vast Wrangell-St. Ellias National Park, I knew that I was about to do exactly what I had wanted all along-to go into the majestic and wild Alaskan nature alone.
I thought about the years that had passed since I arrived from Yugoslavia, to San Diego, California, for graduate school. The move away from the security of family and friends to this country, where possibilities seem limitless, offered an excellent opportunity to strengthen and mature. I took advantage of that opportunity by working diligently on my studies and training in endurance sports.
Graduate school meant more than just getting a degree. I strove to be a tnle, creative researcher. Being one of those active, bright people meant to be saved from stagnation and decay.
Tae Kwon Do teaches us to follow a path of continued self-improvement. This path seems to have been mine always, although it has never been straight. Frequently I stubbornly tried to leave it by closing my eyes to some important realizations, and each time circumstances would develop which would force me back.
In San Diego, I learned how to strive, how to stretch my limits, never get tired and never be defeated. But that was not sufficient. As I was apparently successful, I knew that I was still far from my best. While I was trying to be a success in my career while trying to perform and to conform, something essential in me was suffocating. And as I tried to ignore it, most of my undertakings were coming to a dead end. Like many times before, I realized that I had no choice but to let it happen.
Let "what" happen? I knew that true creativity, true clarity must emerge from the inside and that I had to somehow open a way for it. So I reduced my research and training, did a lot of drawing, weakened my body and my will.
During the first several days of my Alaskan adventure, I spent most of my time wrestling with the bushes (there are no maintained hiking trails in Wrangell-St. Ellias) and singing loudly to avoid surprising a bear. As I sang, different voices came out, some primitive and harsh, some tender. I passed through rain and snow and icy glaciers, slid down silt slopes and climbed over foggy mountain crests. The most challenging, however, were the river fordings.
Because of their glacial origin, Alaskan rivers are usually very cold and muddy. Stepping into a cold, fast river, whose bottom cannot be seen, makes one feel quite dependent on one's good fortune. It was during one of the more eventful river crossings in my first day in the backcountry that I started feeling fully alive again. I felt my own power responding to the power of nature. This power came spontaneously and effortlessly. My strength, to be sure, was insignificant compared to the overwhelming natural forces in full display all around me. Since I was not trying to control those forces but merely to interact with them, my strength seem sufficient, I felt confident and secure and all went well.
What I understood in the mountains is difficult to express because it is contained more in feelings than in words. I found a better, a truer place in myself from which to function. I was somewhat apprehensive of whether I would be able to continue in the same direction 5 back in the "real" world. I felt clearly, however that Tae Kwon Do would play an important roll in that process. Even as I was going to my first-class I did not know what exactly to hope for (it was my wife's interest that originally brought us both to an interview with Master Sang Kyu Shim of Detroit, Michigan). I was quite surprised when I found myself reciting a citation from Lao-tze's book after the class. I was even more surprized when, by reading THE MAKING OF A MARTIAL ARTIST, I found out what United Tae Kwon Do was all about.
When I was in my early twenties, I picked up a book with Lao-tzu and Chaung-tzy's writings from a library. "That the weak overcome the strong, and the soft overcomes the hard. This is something known by all, but practiced by none," writes Lao-tze. and "under Heaven nothing is more soft and yielding than water. Yet, for attacking the solid and strong, it has no equaL" That had a strong impact on me. At that time I was beginning to depart from the simple ideas and ideals of adolescence. I understood the Taoist writings as a metaphorical presentation of a different, superior style of thinking that allows apparent paradoxes and ultimately makes one able to see reality as it is.
Now, through Tae Kwon Do, I have learned that Lao-tze's words can be understood in a more literal, practical sense. Self-defense is an excellent metaphor for that side of life where there is rage and fear for survival, where a lot of rough, aggressive, antagonistic forces are there to potentially destroy us. If even in such circumstances we can remain like calm water, persistent and clear', with strength and inspiration unhindered by fear or tension, rooted deeply and firmly in our own virtue, haven't we thereby won life's major battle? For, at that point, the life force within is released and spontaneously finds expression. To prepare body and spirit according to this ideal is my primarily goal in Tae Kwon Do practice.
Also, I enjoy Tae Kwon Do. The practice of its techniques combine the breathing, stretching, concentration and relaxation-tension of yoga with aerobic exercise. It combines the artistic elegance of dance with the poise and courage of warrior. It can be as mentally challenging as chess with an infinite number of moves, when trying to understand how the techniques
should be used in sparring, or simply destroy us. If even in such circun1stances we can remain like calm water, persistent and clear, with strength and inspiration unhindered by fear or tension, rooted deeply and firmly in our own virtue, haven't we won life's major battle? For, at that point, the life force within is released and spontaneously finds expression. To prepare body and spirit according to this ideal is my primarily goal in Tae Kwon Do practice.
Also, I enjoy Tae K won Do. The practice of its techniques combine the breathing, stretching, concentration and relaxation-tension of yoga with aerobic exercise. It COIllbines the artistic elegance of dance with the poise and courage of warrior. It can be as mentally challenging as chess with an infinite number of moves, when trying to understand how the techniques should be used in sparring, or silllply automatic and relaxing. r hope I will be able to practice Tae Kwon Do continuously, grow in it and contribute to it.
I was fortunate to begin my training with a very good class instructed superbly by Mr. S. Washington, which added tomy early enthusiasm. And lastly, an opportunity to learn from Grandmaster Sang Kyu Shim would make it attractive to stuch even something I do not enjoy. Mastery, regardless of what, is an art form in itself, the most difficult
one to learn.
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