Kenjutsu and Taiji

I went to watch the movie "Love and Honour" (武士の一分) and saw the similarity between taijiquan and kenjutsu (Japanese sword fighting). In it, the main character was told that for him to win, he must be ready to die while his opponent is fighting to live. What this means is that to win, you must be willing to give up everything, including your own life. The way to lose is to cling on to life, to be afraid of losing everything. When you are ready to lose what you have, you will find victory.

This is very similar to what my teacher has always been saying about taijiquan. When we are afraid to lose, we become tense whenever we sense that we are going towards a situation that is disadvantageous to us. We start to struggle and use brute force. That is when our opponent is able to use our own brute force against us. But when winning is no concern to us, when we are ready to lose, even when we are in a position of disadvantage, we can continue to remain calm, remain relaxed, and from there try to find a way to turn it to our advantage.

When we are no longer focused on winning, our view is not obstructed by victory, and we can see the bigger picture (the full situation). And that is when we are able to find a solution to our problem.