Reflections from Auckland: On Seminar, Grading, and what comes after go-dan

Reflections from Auckland

On Seminar, Grading, and What Comes After Go-dan
Sean Dunne - Nanseikan

There are some weekends in kendo that feel larger than the calendar space they occupy.

The Auckland Summer Seminar and Godan examination now feels like one of those occasions for me. It was, on one level, simply a weekend away: travel, training, grading, conversation, return. But, in another sense, it felt much more than that. It felt like one of those moments that gathers together many years of work and then, almost without announcement, points toward what must come next.

I wanted to try to put some of those reflections into words for our dojo. I also wanted to allow a short period of time to reflect properly before writing this piece, while ensuring I committed these thoughts to paper so that I can return to them and reflect on them again in the future.

The Seminar

The first thing to say is that the seminar itself was excellent.

What impressed me most was not only the quality of teaching, though that was certainly very high, but the quality of balance. The weekend seemed to strike exactly the right proportion between explanation and practice, between learning and effort. There was no sense of endless talking, and equally no sense of being physically flogged for the sake of it. There was plenty of hard work, but it always felt purposeful. The instruction illuminated the training, and the training tested the instruction.

That is not easy to achieve.

A seminar can easily drift too far in one direction or the other: either into over-explanation, where energy drains out of the room, or into sheer physicality, where fatigue overtakes learning. This seminar did neither. It was disciplined, well-paced, and deeply worthwhile.

It was also exceptionally well organised. That matters more than people sometimes realise! Good organisation creates calm, and calm creates the conditions in which people can train well. From the moment the seminar began, there was a strong sense that everything had been carefully and generously put together. That atmosphere stayed with the event all weekend.

When I returned to Nanseikan the following Wednesday night, several of our members immediately expressed interest in attending next year. That, in its own way, is perhaps one of the clearest endorsements I could give. I believe that the enthusiasm I felt travelled home with me.

The People

Just as memorable as the seminar itself was the chance to encounter the New Zealand kendoka as a whole.

There was a spirit to the weekend that is difficult to describe precisely, but easy to recognise when one feels it. Across clubs, people were welcoming, open, and generous. There was seriousness in training, but no coldness. There was commitment, but also warmth.

Auckland Kendo Club, in particular, made a strong impression on me. Their kendo struck me as honest and committed. They fight hard, but they are also remarkably welcoming people. That combination says something important about a dojo. It suggests that the culture is healthy, that strength and generosity are not being treated as opposites, but as qualities that can and should coexist.

I came away feeling not only that I had trained hard, but that I had met people I genuinely hoped to train with again.

The Feeling of Time

One of the earliest questions I was asked afterwards was whether the grading felt fast or slow.

The best answer I can give is that it did not feel rushed.

That may seem a small thing, but I do not think it is small at all. I did not feel hurried in jitsugi. I did not feel frantic, and I was not breathing heavily.

I was aware, watching some of the earlier gradings, that certain candidates seemed to be labouring after only a short time. My own view is that this often reflects anxiety more than fitness. Under pressure, breath becomes shallow, movement tightens, and energy is spent wastefully. The body reveals the mind very quickly.

That was not my experience in the grading.

And I do not mean that I was casual or detached. The pressure was real, but there was space within it. There was enough composure that exchanges could unfold without me trying to force something. Looking back, I think this matters greatly. At higher dan levels, examiners are not simply watching whether someone can move or strike. They are watching whether body, technique, and mind remain integrated under pressure. Some specific feedback, which I received from one of the examiners after the grading, was that I clearly demonstrated what the panel was looking for: an expression and understanding of ki, no “fancy tricks”, and understanding “the space”.

Calmness in this context should not be confused with softness. Often the deepest intensity appears outwardly the calmest. The effort is not absent; it is simply organised. 

Not Hunting for Waza

Before the grading, one thing was very clear in my mind: I did not want to enter with a shopping list of techniques.

I wrote a Post-it note, 2 weeks before the grading, with these simple focus points – it’s still on my desk:

·       Enzan no metsuke

·       Control the centre

·       Simple: Men, Kote

·       Kaeshi dō (“get out of jail”)

·       Suriage when it happens

 

I was not trying to decide in advance what I would do. I did not want to go in thinking, “I’ll try this waza, then perhaps that one.” That approach seemed wrong to me. Instead, I wanted to concentrate on controlling the centre and on maintaining enzan no metsuke - broad, distant seeing. Seeing the whole opponent, the whole exchange, rather than narrowing myself toward a target.

That was especially important for me, because I know something about my own tendencies! I have a competitive nature which, if used properly, can be useful. Used poorly, it can narrow the mind. It can create the urge to hunt, to accumulate visible success, to behave as though the task is to score or win rather than to express correct kendo.

I did not want to bring that mind into the grading.

Enzan no metsuke, for me, was not merely a technical point. It was a discipline of attention. It was a way of resisting the temptation to become small in my seeing - to collapse toward a target, a cut, a result. I wanted to remain broad in awareness and settled in the centre.

Looking back, I suspect this was one of the better decisions I made.

The Waza That Appeared

A few moments from the jitsugi stand out to me now, though not because I went in seeking them.

In both rounds I completed kaeshi dō successfully (in my mind, at least). In each case I tried to pattern Ben Sheppard sensei’s teaching and used the hips to turn and create space without over-moving or fleeing. I was conscious of not running away from the exchange, and of maintaining clear zanshin. In both rounds, the head examiner called yame immediately after that exchange.

Against my second opponent I also attempted suriage men. The cut travelled a little deeper than I intended because she closed distance more quickly than I expected, but I do not consider it a poor attempt. It was a genuine response to the moment, and it carried proper commitment. I also did not pre-plan that waza. It simply emerged in the moment.

And, to that end, what seems most important to me, now, is that the strongest actions did not feel manufactured. The final kaeshi dō, especially, did not feel like a deliberate choice in the sense of conscious strategy. It simply appeared. The attack came, the body responded, and the technique emerged naturally from the exchange.

That distinction has stayed with me.

At lower levels, one often thinks in terms of “doing” a technique. At higher levels, it seems more accurate to say that one should create the conditions in which the correct technique can appear. Centre, pressure, distance, broad perception - if these are right, then the waza need not be dragged into existence. It arrives by itself.

With all of this being said, there is no denying that training your techniques is what allows them to emerge. If you never train suriage, for example, it cannot be expected to “emerge” in the heat of a grading examination. Ultimately, you do not rise to the occasion in a grading - you fall to the level of your preparation and training.

Two Opponents, Two Different Exchanges

One of the more interesting parts of the grading, for me, was the contrast between the two jitsugi.

My first opponent failed. My second opponent passed.

That fact alone is not remarkable. But the feel of the engagements differed, and I only really appreciated that afterwards.

With my second opponent, there was a stillness to the encounter. At one point I was asked later whether the hall had felt quiet during the grading. My answer, on reflection, is yes - but mainly in that second exchange. The room seemed to settle. The noise receded. The engagement felt clear, balanced, and significant.

The first jitsugi did not have that same quality.

It was not that one person was obviously stronger in a crude sense. Nor do I think the real difference lay in technical foundation. By Godan, people should already possess the technical base: one cannot realistically reach Yondan without it. The more I think about it, the more I believe the difference was one of presence, intention, and mindset.

My first opponent later responded to the result in a way that stayed with me. His essential reaction was: “I fought you, so how could I fail?” That comment seemed to reveal quite a lot. It suggested a comparative mindset: if one has fought someone who passed, then one must have shown the required level. But gradings are not awarded comparatively. They are not a matter of who stood opposite whom. Each person is judged on the kendo they themselves express within the exchange.

There was another comment he made that also struck me. After our round, he said he did not think either of us had “got a good cut in”. I do not say this boastfully, because I am quite critical of my own kendo, but that was not my experience of the exchange. As it developed, I know that I landed a good men uchi, a debana kote, and then finished with kaeshi dō. Equally, in my second jitsugi, I was very aware that my opponent landed an excellent men uchi on me. I noticed it, respected it, and moved on.

That difference in awareness seems important.

It is not a matter of scorekeeping. Quite the opposite. It is a matter of perceiving what is actually happening within the exchange without becoming attached to it. To be aware without fixating. To recognise the moment without clutching at it.

The more I reflect, the more I think that the first opponent’s difficulty may not have been technical at all, but was brought about through a lack of clear intention and a lack of broad awareness of the exchange itself.

I later learned that this was his sixth attempt at Godan, and I do not say that with judgement. On the contrary, I respect the spirit required to keep returning and persevering. But I think that perseverance alone is not enough. At some point, honest reflection must accompany persistence. One must ask not merely, “How did I compare?” but, “What was the quality of my kendo? What was absent? What was unclear?”

Without that kind of reflection, it is difficult to change.

Intention and Presence

If I were forced to identify one of the main things the grading clarified for me, it would be this:

At Godan level, a lack of clear intention is deeply exposed.

One can be energetic, technically capable, and active - and still fail because the kendo does not carry conviction. Attacks may occur, but they do not seem to arise from real pressure. They feel reactive, opportunistic, or somehow disconnected from the true flow of the engagement.

That is different from the presence of a technique that seems inevitable.

Two people can perform what appears to be the same waza. To the untrained eye they may look identical. But to an experienced panel, one will seem alive with purpose and the other hollow. One will emerge from the pressure between two kendoka. The other will appear added onto it.

This has made me think that the real dividing line at this level is not technical range, but clarity of intention, composure, and presence. In truth, my sensei and other senior teachers have said this to me before. Only now do I feel that I am beginning to understand what they meant.

Centre, Breath, and Broad Awareness

When I look back over the grading, the same small constellation of things keeps returning to mind:

·       centre control

·       broad seeing (“enzan no metsuke”)

·       calm breath

·       no pre-planned technique

·       letting the moment appear rather than forcing it

These things seem to belong together.

When they are present - and at the risk of straying into the esoteric - time seems to behave differently. Or perhaps not time itself, but one’s relationship to time. There is less grasping, less internal noise, less of the desperate impulse to produce something for the sake of appearances. The exchange seems to open. One can perceive more. One can do less, and yet do it more fully.

That, I think, is one of the reasons the grading felt as it did.

Godan as Milestone and Obligation

Passing Godan has certainly been a milestone, and I have celebrated it deliberately. I think that matters. It is right to acknowledge important moments. Kendo is full of long stretches of unremarked effort, so when a genuine milestone arrives it should be honoured - just as we would honour such moments in life.

But almost immediately, celebration gave way to something else: obligation.

My response has been a simple one - that it is now my responsibility to help our members pursue their own goals in kendo, whatever those goals may be.

That thought has not left me.

Godan does not feel, to me, like an endpoint. It feels like a turning. One continues to learn upward, of course, but one also becomes responsible downward. One is no longer simply receiving kendo; one is expected to help carry it.

That, to me, is one of the deeper meanings of the rank.

 

My Sensei, and What It Means to Come Through One Dojo

My sensei’s reaction to my passing was characteristically understated. There was a brief acknowledgement, and then training continued as usual.

I am the first person in our dojo to have come all the way through from the beginner’s course under him to Godan. That fact carries weight for me. It means I am not someone who arrived at Nanseikan with much of the journey already done elsewhere. I began there. I learned there. I was formed there.

In that sense, this rank is not mine alone. It belongs partly to the dojo and partly to the teaching lineage that shaped me.

We had one other Godan in our club, a man we all loved and respected. We knew him simply as “Stilts.” He achieved Godan at this same Auckland seminar in 2024, but sadly passed away not long afterwards.

Returning to that same place for my own grading was therefore not lost on me. While I was there, I found myself thinking of him often. In a way, it felt meaningful to follow the same path he had taken, in the same place where he had reached that milestone.

Moments like that are a reminder that kendo is never only about individual achievement. Our training unfolds over time, shaped by the people we train beside and the places where those shared experiences occur.

 

What Has Changed - and What Has Not

What struck me, returning to the dojo, was how little changed outwardly.

Yes, I now sit on the high (kamiza) side, as is appropriate. Yes, there was some excellent humour at my expense, with Nick (Sandan) and Soon (Yondan) carrying my equipment as a pisstake (that’s a technical term…). I enjoyed that immensely. It was exactly the right kind of response: an acknowledgement without fuss.

And, to that end, almost nothing has changed.

Members had already been asking me for feedback after keiko for quite some time. That does not suddenly begin because of the grading. If anything, the rank merely formalised a responsibility that had already begun to take shape.

That feels healthy to me. In a good dojo, rank should recognise a role that is already being lived. It should not create an artificial sense of importance.

 

Where I Want to Put My Energy

This process has also clarified where I believe I want to contribute most over the coming years. I do not feel particularly drawn to running beginner courses. I have done that several times in the past and I believe beginner teaching is an excellent developmental responsibility for our Shodan, Nidan and Sandan members. They often learn as much from teaching as beginners do from being taught.

That is certainly not to suggest that this task is “below me.” Rather, it simply reflects that my own interests and focus now lie elsewhere.

I care deeply about foundations. I care about reiho being properly conducted. I care about dojo culture. I care about kata, which in my view is neglected or inadequately practised in many clubs.

And while I am not opposed to competition - far from it - I do not especially want our dojo’s centre of gravity to become “sport” kendo. Those who wish to pursue that path can, and should, do so through the appropriate channels that already exist, such as state squad training. Competition has value, and Nanseikan should absolutely support members who wish to pursue it by helping them prepare and perform at their best. Indeed, the recent increase in interest in competition among our members has, in my view, strengthened the quality of the club’s kendo.

But I do not believe the whole life of a dojo should be organised around it.

What matters more to me is the cultivation of something deeper.

 

Kigurai

The word I keep returning to is kigurai. I first touched on this term in my Yondan grading essay.

It is not an easy word to explain, and it is probably not a word to overuse with juniors. It can easily become abstract or self-conscious if spoken about too much. But the quality itself is unmistakable.

To me, kigurai is a kind of composed dignity. It is presence without arrogance, authority without performance, nobility without self-importance. A kendoka with kigurai does not need to announce themselves. Their bearing does the work. Their posture, calmness, and seriousness create a field around them.

That is the quality I most want to cultivate in myself as I look toward Rokudan in the far distance.

And it is something I would like to help foster within our club. Not through force or pressure - that would almost be the antithesis of kigurai - but by trying to embody it myself, in the hope that others might recognise it and gradually cultivate it in their own practice.

Our members already bring a certain humility to their approach to kendo. It is one of the reasons our club is so often described as welcoming. I have even had one visiting sensei describe us as something like a machi dojo - a “village” or “town” dojo - which I think supports that view. What I would like to encourage, alongside that humility, is a sense of nobility in our collective bearing. I do not believe those qualities are opposites. In budo, they belong together.

Interestingly, I suspect my own natural tendency is still toward a more visibly forceful style of pressure. If I think of my sensei, his kendo seems to me more calm, subtle, and quietly unavoidable. So perhaps my own road now is not to abandon my natural temperament, but to refine it - to let strong internal spirit remain, while reducing unnecessary external force.

Strong intent, quieter expression.

That feels like part of the next stage.

 

What Auckland Gave Me

If I were to say, very simply, what I brought back from Auckland, it would be something this:

·       a renewed appreciation for correct principles over visible activity

·       a deeper trust in centre, pressure, and broad awareness

·       a clearer sense that technique should emerge rather than be hunted

·       a stronger understanding that Godan is tied to responsibility, not merely achievement

·       and a sharpened sense of the kind of kendo - and the kind of dojo culture - I want to help preserve and build.

I came back grateful.

Most of all, I came back with the feeling that something meaningful had closed, and something equally meaningful had just opened.

Passing Godan is a milestone, yes.

But it is also a beginning!

 

Sean Dunne – Nanseikan
8^th of March, 2026.

cover image: the garden at Ginkakuji in Kyoto. photo (c) Sean Dunne