Martial Arts were they once more Spiritual?

Over the years I have studied several martial arts and come across many concepts that are very Spiritual.

It seems to me the root of Martial Arts is a Spiritual one.

My old Karate Club, Golden Cobra has a little history of Martial Arts which, every student learns, it go’s something like – in 70-543 BC and Indian Buddhist monk called Bodhidharma travelled to China to teach Zen Buddhism. When he arrived after travelling across India and china Bodhidharma saw that the monks were incapable of withstanding the severe physical and mental discipline required. He introduced some breathing exercises and forms based on animal movements… From there it moved into Japan…

The Japanese have many single words which describe the Spiritual; in English we use many sentences to describe the same thing…

Zanshin which, I first learned about while practicing Aikido. It is also very important in Karate and Iaido or the art of drawing the Japanese Sward.

Zanshin means to do each thing completely. Doing this does not mean to stick and hold. Sometimes, in sitting, you find yourself lost in a thought and then you wake up and cut the thought; then you find yourself going back to check if you've cut that thought. But that thought is gone and you are only trying to find a definition of yourself, you are only trying to become someone who has “cut the thought.” Instead, when you wake up from the thought, that's it. What now? Zanshin then means, a mind of continual readiness, like a mirror ready to reflect whatever is shown to it.

In the martial arts, Zanshin means having no break in our activity, because there is no time to take back a stride or block and fix it. It also means going beyond technique, because we cannot force the situation to conform to the technique. The angle of the strike and the force of the strike must be adjusted immediately to the energy of the partner.

In practice we must go beyond strategies of defense and hesitation. We must open up to the energy of the senses/mind itself as it expresses itself as seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling and thinking. Penetrating into this energy, we must go beyond all barriers.

Another word is Mushin which again I came across in Aikido…

Mushin: Literally "no mind." A state of cognitive awareness characterized by the absence of discursive thought. A state of mind in which the mind acts/reacts without hypostatization of concepts. Mushin is often erroneously taken to be a state of mere spontaneity. Although spontaneity is a feature of Mushin, it is not straightforwardly identical with it. It might be said that when in a state of Mushin, one is free to use concepts and distinctions without being used by them.

In modern Gnosticism we Practice bringing our attention the the present moment not letting any thought or feeling distract us from the experience of the moment. this seems very close to Zanshin.

We also strive to experience the world as it is objectively free from the machinations of the mind free from its drives tis desires... it could be Mushin.

what do you think?