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up guys this is such an interesting
episode with mr. Steven Hayes and we
really just get into the strata of how
brought ninjutsu into the West really
cool really interesting story quite
honored to have mr. Hayes lend us his
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the human experience is entering the
shadows of ego as we explore ninjutsu
with my guest mr. Steven Hayes mr. Hayes
thank you so much for being here sir
it’s an honor it’s great to be here so
mr. Hayes if you could briefly tell our
audience who you are and what you do for
those that don’t already know that would
help to preface this conversation well
in a nutshell in the 1970s I went to
Japan to find the last training hall of
the ninja this is before there were
turtles or anything else like that you
know and I was the first American to
become actual disciple of the Grand
Master there and for several decades I
stayed in Japan went back and forth from
America it was a very different martial
art from the 1980s the idea of being a
protector as opposed to being a champion
somebody who fights for his own name a
very different and I developed from
mid-1990s a modern version of the ninja
fighting art I call it talking doll and
I’ve been promoting that since the
mid-1990s and here we are 20 years later
I was inducted into the black belt hall
of fame in 1985 I’ll get the martial art
industry association Lifetime
Achievement Award this July wrapping up
a career here very interesting i’d like
to get more into I mean black belt
magazine calls you a legend one of the
most 10 influential martial arts masters
alive in the world today if you could
just kind
go into more story about how you got to
Japan and met Natsume sensei I think
that would be interesting well um got to
travel back you know almost 40 years to
a time when hatsumi sensei was a
relatively young guy in his early 40s
his teacher takamatsu sensei had just
died takamatsu was the guy from the
1800s um he witnessed a lot of radical
change in Japanese culture I went
through the war and had found in hatsumi
sensei a worthy heir and so he had just
finished transmitting all of this
ancient cryptic lore and had died in his
80s I arrived on the scene there were 15
people training in the dojo at that time
you know it’s kind of funny to think now
when you look at all thousands of
thousands of people around the world
involved in this but there were 15
people and I was the non-japanese and I
was amazed that they allowed me to train
they were very welcoming brought me
right into the training hall training
was brutal very very rough rougher than
I was used to later I found out you know
I was so honored that they would allow
me to train with them years later my
what my japanese wife was talking with
one of the Japanese seniors and you know
she had expressed
that you know I was honored that they
had accepted me and he looks at her and
he says all he says is that what he
thought happened she said what do you
mean oh no we thought he was a big guy
from America we try all the techniques
out on him he’d get sick of us after
about a week and want to go back home
and we could continue on where their
training he just never went home so I
was I guess supposed to be discouraged
but you know what i learned there was so
different from anything I had
encountered in the US and it just
steeped my desire no matter how rough or
discouraging it was I was determined
that i was going to learn this i was
going to get this i was gonna be the the
ninja martial art yeah yeah very very
interesting in your book i’m not sure
which one uh there I think I mean didn’t
you write to me sensei and there was
kind of no reply and you just showed up
in Japan haha yeah this is you know way
before the internet or emails or
anything like that and I managed to find
an address I just sent a letter to
masaaki hatsumi in notice city and I
sent several letters actually running
three didn’t get any reply um but it
just you know I was obsessed I had to do
it and I got there and they were very
welcoming um for the you know for the
reasons I just went into and I said well
didn’t you get a letter from me oh yeah
yeah we got three letters from you
nah Asuma sensei said he knew you were
coming over so there was no need to
reply Wow ok so i guess i was that
obvious in my determination to to get it
or he knew psychically that you know
this was going to be an important
relationship for the ninja martial art
I’ll never know I’ll never know yeah
very very intriguing with that story why
why do you think ninja 2 has survived
for so many thousand years I think it’s
a couple thousand years well um that’s a
really good question obviously political
situations in Japan of the 1500s the
1600s you know no longer exists this
isn’t an underground resistance movement
but you know modern times there are
different very different but equally
perplexing difficult times you know
people have so much more than they’ve
ever had before and yet it seems that
you know people aren’t so happy they
have plenty of free time and certainly
the Internet has allowed people to be in
touch with each other and yet you know
there’s there’s a lot of discord and so
when we look at what ninjutsu really is
it really is not a martial art as such
that’s just one aspect of it it really
is about how to fit in
how to adjust oneself so that we don’t
make a target out of ourselves people
don’t notice us as much as say you would
notice a MMA champion or somebody like
that and so as the ages go by different
challenges arise for human beings and
there’s something that’s timeless about
this ninjutsu that causes it to continue
to change its form a little bit and be
very be very valid to study in the
different different times since world
war two what do you think what do you
think it is about ninjutsu that makes it
so different than other martial arts
well I can say pretty quickly um you
know a lot of in the West in the West
anyway a lot of martial arts are set up
really on a sport model two people go
into a ring and you know the better man
wins and this guy who comes in second
place you know he vows to train harder
and he’ll get another chance and
ninjutsu is so old that it goes back to
an older time an older age where you
either one there was no second place you
know you were killed or maimed and and
it was used as a way to preserve peace
to encourage peace the summer I warlords
were you know vying with each other for
power and the ninja could subtly
persuade these people
peace was was was was better and so to
this day the reliance on rescuing other
people um and escaping just defend and
then disappear makes ninjutsu a very
different kind of a martial art than one
where a 28 year old champion at the
height of his you know physical prowess
is temporarily the guy that everybody
celebrates yeah um I mean this might be
a little bit of a controversial question
you can elect to not answer it if you
want but what was what happened between
the Bujinkan system and the the toe
Shindo cyst I mean there was kind of a
split where you decided to open the
quest centers and move away from natsume
sense his teachings what caused that
well what happened over the years the
1970s until the early 2000s I wrote a
series of books that are still available
to this day and it made Dineen jitsu
quite famous so there weren’t 15 people
studying for very long uh everybody
wanted to everybody wanted to be Steven
Hayes you know they all wanted to be the
guy and when you can’t be the guy I’m
the guy you have to create a new role
but people wanted to have that old days
kind of a situation so that was going on
there were a lot of people that didn’t
particularly like me you know they were
tried to criticize the way I handled the
early days of publicity and so forth
they wanted to be important so that was
one aspect another aspect was that
hatsumi sensei was changing and he was
adjusting the art to fit what Japan was
looking for what Europeans were looking
for it wasn’t the same art that I had
studied in the 1970s it became kind of
like a abstract art strange funny kind
of situations how would you defend
against guy with 26 foot bows you know
things that would never happen in real
life they were just fun to explore but I
was not ready to go there I really
believed in the way we had trained
originally so finally there were some
individuals that were so obsessed you
know really with me and my role they
wanted to all cause a little trouble and
so I fine I felt I had gotten my start I
had 30 years of training with Hudson me
sensei it was time to take the ninja
martial art and really make it
appropriate for an American base hmm
okay fair enough thank you so much for
answering that what do you think is the
most esoteric thing that you’ve learned
about ninjutsu would be in all of your
years of training well the way I use the
word esoteric it means something that is
not obvious it could even be explained
to somebody
and there’s is not going to get it it’s
a truth that exists but without certain
experiences nobody’s going to understand
that truth so I would say the most
esoteric thing that I’ve learned is the
reality behind why ninjutsu exists the
the subtle way in which the training
effects changes a person and again I’m
going back to my 1970s training that way
you can’t stay in this martial art and
just get stronger you have to change as
a human being as you’re learning these
lessons and that changes were not always
easy changes were very heartbreaking
sometimes but those were necessary in
order to develop a kind of warrior
wisdom at the end of the path hmm why do
you feel like there are I mean you don’t
really see any ninjas in combat arena
such as the UFC and other fighting
stages why do you think that is well you
know the Brazilian jiu-jitsu rulebook is
pages after pages of all of these rules
and PFC the same thing you can’t attack
the groin you can’t attack hinge joints
they’re all is so-called no-holds-barred
but there’s an extremely small window of
applicability and so athletes train how
to fit into that window and overcome
somebody else and it’s just not what
we’re interested in doing
I’m 66 years old you know what if I had
to fight some 28 year old who has 50
pounds of muscle on me I still have to
win by submitting myself to these rules
and attitude MMA is big business now I
mean mega big business and so they play
two people against each other and you
know one steals the other guys belt and
they’re about to get into a fight on the
stage and you know it’s all planned a
big business this is philosophically at
great odds with real ninjutsu where what
we’re trying to do is confuse an
opponent into not seeing us as an
opponent can you can you get into some
of the differences between toe Shindo
and the Bujinkan systems well one of the
things that is different is the way that
people attack bujinkan attacking method
is kind of a standard from an old age
where people had very short limbs and a
long body you know genetically the
Japanese of 300 years ago 400 years ago
and so a lot of that all of the attacks
are initiated with a right foot moving
forward and a right hand striking so see
if you know the listeners can picture
that right foot and right hand going
forward at the same time nobody fights
like that today nobody fights like that
they project the left foot forward and
throw a left hand or a right hand and so
that was the first thing that we changed
we made the attack
is more like what an individual is going
to experience in the real world of
attacks today the second thing that’s
very different is in ancient Japan ninja
would get into a fighting situation very
rarely and it was almost always an
escape how to escape so there were
certain kind of spirit training we could
say that was just unnecessary in those
days everybody knew each day you go out
we’ve got the possibility of physical
run in today a lot of people don’t
really know what violence looks like so
we have to teach them what violence
looks like how it sounds there are
certain things that people say when
they’re trying to confuse a victim and
so there’s a heavy reliance on verbal
combat as well as the more realistic
attacking method so that’s just the
beginning that’s the beginning of what
of what pushing dolly is how it’s
different from the Bujinkan method you
know I saw I saw you on the Discovery
Channel and your kind of tasked to go in
there and kind of take this guy’s hat
off or something and which I found very
interesting but how what do you think
the best way to defuse violence would be
or is oh wow that’s a very broad
question are we talking about violence
among strangers violence among angry
people all violence among people to know
each other take quite a long time to
answer that so I think the best thing to
say you know where we start in is trying
to understand where this other person is
coming from you know somebody
be they got a bad day bad lifetime you
know and they’re just mouthy and saying
stuff that they shouldn’t and it’s
offensive and we need to put a stop to
this well is to the law doesn’t allow us
to punish people for saying things no
matter what they say if they’re just
talking we can’t stop them from talking
that’s the way the law is if a black
belt in ninja martial art poaching
though were to physically go over and
stop somebody from talking oh gee yep
you’d be arrested and understanding
where a person is coming from so
somebody’s you know shooting his mouth
off you know I might say something oh
man not you’re the third person I’ve
hacked off today and I’m getting in
everybody’s way let me just get out of
here I get in the truck I’m taking on if
you get in your truck you go your way
I’m apologize to you I’m sorry whoa
that’s kind of a strange way a slightly
humorous gives the guy away out his save
face my friend knows I just say that
guy’s life and you know so that is I
would say you know the beginning
understanding where this person is
coming from and then fitting in allowing
ourselves to fit in to that exchange is
there is there a personal way that you
deal with injuries because I know that
with training there’s usually a lot of
kind of wear and tear injuries that come
about from that well there’s not really
that much um we’re much safer than
basketball can we lose a lot more people
to basketball leagues and we do martial
arts I think because it’s so dangerous
that when people are training they’re
totally aware of how far to take
something you know for themselves for
their
training partner you know where’s with
basketball or skateboarding or something
else you know they might be injury prone
a person has another challenge oh I’m
going to make this ramp I’m going to
dunk this basket things that you
distract away from how dangerous the
activity is I guess we really don’t have
that many injuries in our training so
how do you think this this training toe
Shindo can improve your everyday life
well we start with the most scary
possibility known to human being and
that is what if I weren’t alive you know
what if this person had their way and
I’m gone and there are all kinds of
considerations you know maybe this
person is just too big how do I fit in
there maybe it’s not worth fighting how
do i get myself away and out of there
without making a target for myself maybe
because the talker is not the problem
the problem is his cousin over there
who’s real quiet who’s just going to
sneak up behind you and hit you over the
head it demands absolute a complete
attention and I think that in our busy
times you know busy lives you know that
feels good it feels zen-like you know
many is the time will be training along
it was they okay well we’re done for the
night and people do a double-take they
look at the clock they can’t believe
that 45 minutes has gone by there that
rapidly involved in physical training
the mental training trying to get better
letting go of bad habit
trying to pick up a new good at it I
think that’s really the key to you know
how this works why it works why people
continue to train for years and years
what what can you say I know you’ve been
training for many years but what can you
say has been the most difficult lesson
that you’ve had to learn through your
training well physically when I started
back in the 1970s you know I was in my
20s I was very used to a kind of
aggressive style of movement charging
forward and knocking limbs out of the
way and hitting and that’s just totally
the opposite of the ninja way of winning
we engage the limbs we let the person
think they’re winning for a half a
second we fit in and that took me a lot
of years I would get it and then under a
test or whatever I would you know be
thrown a loop and go back to the old way
just standing there trying to slug my
way out and these guys had become
phantoms and that but yes I think that
was probably that the toughest thing you
know and it was good that i had the
teacher that i had asuma-sensei is a
very different person for me very
different person and that’s good if
you’re studying with a person who’s
exactly like you it’ll just reinforce
your bad habits um so I had to learn new
ways of doing things and sometimes I
wondered if he was kidding me you know
this can’t be real but I’ll just go
along with it and sure enough it turned
out you know that’s one of the aspects
of growth
that I experienced in there okay well I
mean you’re you’re credited with being a
Buddhist and it seems like serendipity
is major famine you you have to be the
most lucky person in the universe just
because you were a security adviser for
the Dali Lama how how did that occur how
did that happen well I had visited with
the Dalai Lama in 1986 when I was in
India and just as you say very lucky
very lucky he had a brother who lived
just a few hours away from me back in
the US he was the first one to escape
Tibet to 1951 and he had worked as a
professor at Indiana University so I
went over to see his brother and you
know find out a few more things from him
and that vary so 86 87 the Dalai Lama
came to Indiana to see his brother
brought all these monks with him and so
I got to see him again there and he
remembered me it was a very amazing
memory that he has he remembered me and
then 88 I got to see him again 89 I was
in Los Angeles at a conference where he
was and they announced that he had won
nobel peace prize and immediately the
sleepy little california coastal campus
just went wild reporters and people
showing up people who didn’t even you
know think about the Dalai Lama take him
seriously suddenly were pouring in and
by then I had gotten to know the the
Dalai Lama’s family and
good to know his political staff and so
I jumped in and helped them with some
security security at this little sleepy
California University was you know some
old old duffer with a time key walking
around you know Leo they had no security
at all really and so after that he was
coming to ohio and the staff had by then
gotten to know who i was and asked if i
would help with the ohio visit and then
it just went on and on from there
whenever he would visit the US and be in
the Midwest I would organize a team that
lasted until Oh 1999 that’s when the
federal government got involved we just
we couldn’t keep doing this with you
know volunteer work and finally talked
the federal government into supplying
State Department dignitary protection
team and so like 70 guys would show up
and three bomb sniffing dogs and you
know intelligence briefings every
morning at that point I can I mean they
were only protecting the Dalai Lama and
I mean there were a lot of people at the
events that you know needed security and
so I continued as a liaison officer kind
of working with the State Department and
even played the role of the MC a couple
of times to introduce him to the to the
crowd as the years went by yeah I’m too
old to be a bodyguard now they have guys
one-third my age you know yeah wow wow
very very interesting mr. Hayes I I do
really appreciate your time and you have
to be one of the most interesting people
that I’ve gotten a chance to read about
and here
out is there is there a place that
people can find out more about your work
yeah the best place probably is the web
Stephen quejes you just write that out
like one giant word ste phe my is
Stephen quejes dot-com and that gives
them a way to find out about my training
school here in Ohio find out about our
we have a massive library of techniques
that are online now people can subscribe
and basic lessons to intermediate
lessons to some pretty exotic techniques
some of the weapons some of the psychic
you could call it psychic type of work
that we do all available online so
Stephen quejes calm would be the best
place to go just to check it out perfect
we will make sure that we link that in
the comments section below mr. Hayes
thank you so much for being here this is
the human experience my name is Xavier
we’re going to get out of here thank you
so much for listening