Humans frequently describe themselves as the cultured people. It is our talking, they say, which has allowed us to build experience upon experience, up to our mighty cultures and civilizations. It is what make us be able to teach, they say. Who knows? it might be that talking and teaching are tied together for some humans, it might be. All the same, Bear sensei allowed herself a smile at the thought. Her pupils, seeing her smile, tried again, and tried harder. It’s not the talking, she knew. It’s not the talking at all.
Bear sensei wasn’t only a teacher, coming down from a long tradition of keepers of ancient and yet alive knowledge. Walking with Fenix sensei, Bear sensei was an explorer, ranging far and wide, across sea and mountain, discovering forests unknown to her kind. In the way of ancient bears of legend, she meet others beings in forests -and rivers and skies- far away from her own. Bear sensei mustered the flame in them, the flame that they themselves knew nothing about before. As she did with her own cubs before, she repeated a motion, an emotion. Slowly, and clumsily, they tried to repeat. And then again, and again. Bear sensei travelled visiting her many students in their many dwellings again. So they did keiko together.
Keiko… the mere idea of keiko was not understood by most of her foreign cubs. Yet teaching, as Bear sensei knew, was about the endless repetition of sequences and movements, of rhythms and intentions. Understanding would come some unexpected day, perhaps. So, just as the flame brought by Fenix sensei and cared by Bear sensei flickered for a second, brighter at some unknown wind, now and then a student did see what keiko could be. The togetherness, the harmony that stem not -only- from the self, but from those doing keiko together. Then and there the flash, in the eyes and the sword of that student comprehending, even if only for an instant, keiko.
Bear sensei knew that she need no word. Their eyes meet, and she rejoiced. So her foreign cub trained on, harder. It’s not the words at all, Bear sensei though, smiling.
