Flow Experience in Japanese Traditional Bodily Arts

with Geido in Focus

Abstract

Csikszentmihalyi names “geido” of Sado (tea ceremony) and Kyudo (Japanese archery) as examples of Japanese traditional cultural activities in which a “flow” state can be assumed to come about. However, almost no study has been carried out on the “flow” experience in Japanese traditional bodily arts.
The objective of this paper is to clarify the features of the “flow” experience in Japanese traditional bodily arts, which is called “Hana, ” “Mushin, ” “Mushin-Mune, ” or “Muga”. The analysis is based on comparing with the flow experience in sports, and by making use of “affordance” theory and Borgmann's views on “commanding reality” vs “disposable reality.”
According to the model of the “flow” state devised by Csikszentmihalyi, the state of flow is felt when the actor's capacity is in balance with opportunities for action. However, as Csikszentmihalyi himself is aware, “flow” experience has a paradoxical aspect; when actors are in deep flow, they perceive both an ability to control the environment and a feeling that seems to make the sense of control irrelevant. On the other hand, in Japanese “geido, ” what is aimed at from the beginning is, not the control over the environment, but the state in which the sense of control disappears.
The significance of such features of “geido” will be grasped more clearly in terms of “affordance” theory which has thematized the “coupling of perception and action” and Borgmann's notion of “commanding reality” which has thrown light on the reality's recalcitrant aspects which require active involvements from human beings.
In brief, some forms of Japanese “geido, ” which seek the state of so-called “mushin, ” or “muga, ” consist in the training process of waiting single-mindedly for the advent of the “flow” state, namely, the ideal coupling relationship between the acting body and the environment, while paying minute attention to what reality commands and offers as possibilities for action.