Belief.

Why should it be that Kendo Nagasaki, an Eastern spiritual guide, should express himself in the West? Well, firstly, the man behind the mask, Yogensha, was born in the UK, so this became his native culture, but as he travelled the world, he always believed that he was meant to impart his message from within the UK, and this gives a strong hint regarding the “big picture” of what Kendo is all about.

If there is a fundamental quality to what Kendo does, it is to build bridges between worlds, and his original belief has found form in the way his website shows many examples of how Eastern mysticism can be seen at work in the West. Entertaining these aspects of “mystical” things from a Western perspective involves taking an alternative viewpoint to the rationalism and reductionism we are taught in the West, and suspending – if we can, if we dare – the disbelief in other-worldly things that seems to be a requirement of our common-sense, down-to-earth, exquisitely-planned lifestyles.

The way that illness turns our well-ordered lives upside down is certainly a powerful reminder that we can’t rationalise everything in life, but find ourselves instead having to have faith that healing will take place, and our freedom to plan and act as we wish will be restored.

Illness is one of several forces in life that challenges our Western immersion in – and reliance upon – reason alone, either by taking away our control of events, or revealing something beyond rationality, such as love, or the appreciation of beauty, to name but two, but there are many more powerful life forces which soar beyond mere rationality.

Those who follow a religion tend to be comfortable with belief, but for the agnostics, atheists, and die-hard rationalists, belief is a problem, one that is made even more unpalatable by the ever-more shiny and mechanistic allure of scientifically-justified reasoning. Why bother with something “irrational” like belief?

Kendo would say that life without belief is but half a life – reliance on reason alone is not enough. There is a vast myriad of things beyond our “ken” which become far more accessible with a nod to belief. For example, as Kendo has pointed out before, we know all the neuroscientific processes involved in how and even why birds sing, but such cognizances are completely beyond the birds themselves. It is by no means unreasonable to suggest that a parallel exists to ourselves – we still do not know how the mind fits into the brain, but this does not mean that it is unknowable – we may yet catch a glimmer of understanding of such mysteries by setting pure rationality in its place, and inviting our intuitive selves to have a say.

Why not? Reason has hit the buffers, and it is a process that we can easily believe in because it is a self-evident fact, so some intuitive suggestions certainly deserve consideration. Would you believe (!) that this is the process that those denizens of reason, mathematicians, rely upon? Until science can prove the ideas that they come up with, they must believe in them; reason itself states that until it can be proven, what they have come up with is not even a theory – it is a philosophy, or even a belief. They are to be congratulated for allowing belief to guide their reason.

In the rationalistic West, much more consideration should be given to what belief can show us. At the very least, we should definitely suspend an active disbelief in things beyond rationality, as such an attitude involves blinkeredness and prejudice, and deprives us of myriad possible insights. The mind is by no means a bad thing, but it needs to know its place.

Those who need healing have been granted a head-start on contemplations involving belief; if the reason for the illness seems unfathomable, if the compromises it has brought seem unreasonable, if the outcome seems uncertain, the bald facts themselves are not the limit of what can be appreciated. Every aspect of every experience has something to reveal, and only when this process is begun can the extent of the rewards of contemplation be appreciated – all that’s needed is to believe that the wisdom will come, and it will; Kendo’s mentoring is always available too.

Kendo has a great deal more to say about belief, including how we all can benefit from Bushido, the Way of the Warrior, a code of life and set of beliefs which are completely empowering (watch the website). In the meantime, remember that a preparedness to believe in forces beyond the grasp of the intellect is immensely empowering.