Musashi's Dokkodo (The Way of Walking Alone)

Teacher:
There are several paths that flow from this precept if one were to
really take it to heart. These paths can lead to the life of the bold
innovator, the rebel without a cause, or the psychopath.
The bold innovator looks at customary beliefs or common knowledge
as challenges instead of barriers. The smartphone that is never far
away from you is a result of people who looked at the possibilities
instead of the difficulties, expense, or customary beliefs regarding
what was possible to accomplish. The four-minute mile is another
example of a customary belief which fell away after the conviction
that a person could not possibly run a mile in four minutes was
proven to be wrong in 1954 by Roger Bannister. So, we can see that
in one way of looking at this precept there is the possibility of the
type of bold innovation which has the potential to really change the
way people look at or experience the world. It can be a good thing.
The rebel without a cause is the person we all know in our modern
time. These are the people who have dropped all standard or
customary beliefs. For instance, their parents were religious so they
have decided to not be religious. In place of religion many of these
folks substitute causes, movements such as social justice by way of
example. While it sounds good, there is the factor of not examining
why they are deciding these things that comes into play.

---

In the case of the modern day “social justice warriors,” for instance,
most of them do not have the gumption to follow through with their
stated beliefs. For example, on the day that the U.S. Supreme Court
decided that there was a constitutional right to gay marriage, the
social justice warriors were all over social media with a hashtag
campaign of love always wins (#lovealwayswins). What viscerally
demonstrates their true lack of conviction, however, was the fact that
on that very same day the terrorist group ISIS executed hundreds of
gay men by throwing them from the rooftops of high-rise buildings
and posting videos of their atrocities on social media using the exact
same hashtag. Despite this, the terrorist’s actions were ignored by
the social justice crowd.
If they really believed in gay rights this should have been a major
problem to them, but it wasn’t because they were more interested in
the social media aspect of what they were doing. In other words,
they were all about making a statement without taking action.
Actually taking the fight over there would involve work, so nothing
was done and the horrific murders were ignored. If these social
justice warriors truly cared about gay rights, or women’s rights, or
freedom of religion, or ending discrimination, or virtually any of the
major causes they claim to support then ISIS would be a fruitful
target. After all, ISIS terrorists wantonly kill and oppress the very
same folks these warriors for justice are ostensibly fighting for. But,
there would be hard work involved, as well as the risk of becoming
unpopular with ISIS, a group that enjoys killing everyone who
disagrees with them.
This lack of action is the end result of wanting to have a cause,
needing to stand for something, but not being willing to do any of
your own thinking or even honestly caring about the very thing you
claim to be fighting for. No terrorist group will ever change their
behavior based on some silly hashtag campaign, or a colored
overlay on somebody’s Facebook profile picture, or anything else for
that matter that falls short of extreme force that makes them stop
killing people. It would take effort and endanger the lives of those

---

dedicated to the cause in order to stop them. Which, of course, is
why the rebels without a cause won’t get involved in such things.
Lastly we have the psychopath. The psychopath is going to ignore
customary beliefs because these beliefs are for the benefit of the
tribe, not the individual. Doing what is good for the tribe is in large