Self, Identity, & Flow | Eran Junryu Vardie

What happens to the sense of self when practice becomes deeply embodied?

Aikido begins with a very clear structure.

There is me.

There is you.

There is an attack.

There is a response.

There is uke and nage.

There is technique.

But as practice deepens, these distinctions can begin to become more fluid.

The experience of Aikido is no longer simply one separate person applying a technique to another.

There can be moments when movement becomes more continuous, relationship becomes primary, and the usual sense of “me doing Aikido” becomes less solid.

This is where questions of self, identity, and flow begin to get interesting.

Aikido And Meditation

I explored these questions in a conversation with Aikido teacher and Zen Roshi Eran “Junryu” Vardi.

Eran and I share several interesting parallels.

He is an Israeli who has lived in the United States.

I am an American who has lived in Israel.

We both spent years apprenticing under Japanese Aikido teachers—Eran with Yamada Sensei, and me with Saito Sensei.

We are both Buddhist meditation teachers—Eran in Zen and me in Vipassana.

And we have both taught Aikido in spaces where meditation is also part of the practice environment.

That gave us a natural common ground for exploring the meeting point between contemplative practice and Aikido.

The Self In Practice

In ordinary experience, the sense of self feels obvious.

There is a clear center of identity:

I am here.

You are there.

I am doing something.

Something is happening to me.

This structure is useful.

We need a functional sense of self to move through the world.

But meditation shows us that the experience of self is not as fixed as it appears.

Thoughts arise and disappear.

Sensations arise and disappear.

Emotions arise and disappear.

Even the feeling of being a separate observer can be examined.

Aikido gives us another way to encounter this.

The inquiry happens through movement and relationship.

When Technique Becomes Flow

At the beginning of practice, technique requires a great deal of conscious control.

Where do the feet go?

Where are the hands?

What is the correct angle?

What happens next?

This is necessary.

Form has to be learned.

But with enough repetition, something changes.

The movement becomes less deliberate.

Less mentally controlled.

The body begins to respond more directly.

Awareness can widen.

Instead of thinking through each step, the practitioner becomes more available to the movement as a whole.

This is one doorway into flow.

Flow does not mean losing awareness.

Quite the opposite.

It can involve a more immediate kind of awareness in which action is no longer constantly interrupted by self-conscious thought.

Beyond “Me Doing The Technique”

One of the deeper possibilities in Aikido is the shift from:

I am doing a technique to you

toward something more relational.

The movement begins to emerge from the interaction itself.

Your movement affects mine.

Mine affects yours.

Timing, distance, direction, balance, attention, and intention all become part of one dynamic field.

The technique is no longer something that belongs entirely to one person.

This does not erase individuality.

But it can loosen the assumption that the separate self is always the central organizer of the experience.

Identity And Practice

This raises another question.

What happens when we begin to build an identity around practice itself?

“I am an Aikido practitioner.”

“I am a meditator.”

“I am a teacher.”

“I am advanced.”

“I understand Zen.”

“I understand Dharma.”

These identities can be useful.

They help organize commitment and community.

But they can also become limiting.

A practice that originally helped loosen identity can gradually become another identity we defend.

This is one reason contemplative practice remains important alongside martial practice.

Meditation continually invites us to look at what we are identifying with.

What am I calling “me”?

What happens when that identity is challenged?

Can I practice without constantly reinforcing the practitioner?

Flow And Non-Separation

Experiences of flow can give us a taste of what practice feels like when self-consciousness temporarily relaxes.

There is still function.

There is still movement.

There is still discernment.

But the constant mental commentary of “me” can recede.

In those moments, there may be a greater sense of immediacy.

Movement simply happens.

Relationship happens.

Response happens.

This does not automatically amount to awakening.

But it can reveal something important:

Our normal sense of separation is not the only way experience can organize itself.

Aikido Beyond The Self

This is where Aikido can become genuinely contemplative.

Technique gives us the form.

Relationship gives us the field.

Awareness gives us the possibility of seeing beyond our habitual identity.

And flow gives us glimpses of action that is less dominated by self-conscious control.

The deeper question is not whether we can eliminate the self.

It is whether we can become less trapped inside a rigid version of it.

More responsive.

More connected.

More fluid.

More available to what the moment is actually asking of us.