I would also search for the hidden school that Socrates had challenged me to find. I picked up the 10-inch bronze samurai statuette that I’d found off the coast of Molokai-a sign pointing me toward Japan, a long-sought destination where I might gain insight into Zen arts and bushido, the way of the warrior. My running shoes rounded out the minimalist wardrobe. I pulled my well-traveled knapsack from the closet and dumped my belongings onto the bed: two pairs of pants and T-shirts, underwear and socks, a light jacket, a collared sports shirt for special occasions. I could mail the card later from the airport. I slipped the postcard into a leather-bound journal I’d purchased a few days before to record notes of my travels. I missed my daughter the decision to travel all these months was not one I took lightly. So I sat down and wrote her a note on the back of a picture postcard, punctuating it with Xs and Os, acutely aware of their inadequacy during my absence. Once again I dialed the number she’d given me, but no one answered. Will I one day resemble my old mentor, Socrates?Īs soon as I’d arrived on Oahu a few days before, I’d called my seven-year-old daughter, who excitedly told me, “I’m going to travel like you, Daddy!” She and her mom were going to Texas to visit with relatives for a few months, maybe longer. Only the eyes gazing back at me seemed different. So did my tanned face, long jaw, and customary crew cut from the day before. My muscular frame, a carryover from my college gymnastics days and recent labors on Molokai, looked the same. Walking across the carpeted floor, clad only in my underwear, I stopped and glanced at my reflection in the bathroom mirror. Now I had a nine-month leave of absence before resuming my teaching duties. My summer on Molokai with Mama Chia had raced by. Dark clouds matched my mood as I floated between heaven and earth, rootless, drifting through the in-between. It all began on a rainy September morning …Ī shower of leaves in the gray dawn drew my gaze out the rain-spattered window of my motel room on the island of Oahu. That was before a chance discovery changed everything and proved the saying “Whenever you want to do something, you have to do something else first.”
Having completed the first leg of my travels in Hawaii, I’d now set my sights on Japan. This book, which narrates a journey across the world, opens just after my adventure in Hawaii (recounted in Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior) and concludes just prior to the climactic ending of Way of the Peaceful Warrior.
#PEACEFUL WARRIOR SHIRT PROFESSIONAL#
I could combine professional research with my personal quest. This opportunity reawakened those memories and the possibility that now I might find the people and places Socrates had mentioned years before. Then I was awarded a worldwide travel grant from the college to research martial arts and mind-body disciplines. Meanwhile, my wife and I had agreed to a formal separation. But I was haunted by the feeling that I was missing something important-that real life was passing me by while I played pretend in the shallows of convention. To the casual eye, my life looked as good as it had during my college years as an elite athlete. Time to learn from your own experience.” In the years that followed I married, fathered a child, coached gymnastics at Stanford University, and then taught movement arts while on the faculty of Oberlin College.Įight years had passed since I first wandered into Soc’s all-night service station. Later, when I graduated, my old mentor sent me away with the words “No more spoon-feeding, junior. He also told me about a book he’d lost in the desert, and a school hidden somewhere in Asia, but the details soon drifted into the recesses of my memory. During our time together, Soc spoke of a woman shaman in Hawaii with whom he’d studied many years before. In 1966, during my college years, I met a mysterious service station mechanic I called Socrates, described in Way of the Peaceful Warrior.