Try not to localize the mind anywhere, but let it fill up the whole body, let it flow throughout the totality of your being. When this happens you use the hands where they are needed, you use the legs or eyes where they are needed, and no time or energy will go to waste.

-Zen Master Takuan, instructing a samurai warrior

When first beginning martial arts, most people think the goal is to punch and kick as hard as possible. It’s about brute strength, about the force of impact. People look at a stack of wood and think only Jean Claude van Damme kind of strength can break through it.

But this is totally, totally wrong.

When you are truly strong, you are efficient with your strength. Your technique is far more important than your muscle mass. It’s not just about how hard you hit a stack of wood; it’s more precisely about where and how you hit it. Like Zen Master Takuan said, when you’re in the flow, no time or energy is wasted.

Once, when my master was demonstrating technique for a kids’ class, he joked that they would need to break five big boards. While showing them how to do it, he accidentally made gentle contact with the wood, and all five blocks just cratered in two.

When your technique is solid, you can practically break five boards in two by accident.

But it’s not an accident at all, of course. It’s years of practice and precision. It is an impressive demonstration of efficiency.

In my first few months of learning taekwondo, I brought along my typical “give 110%” attitude, which I thought would be of benefit. And it was, in many ways. But what I quickly had to learn is that flinging my arm or leg out with passionate fervor (which I mistook for strength) was not remotely helpful.

I’ll always remember the words of one of my instructors, Jeremy, who is much bigger and stronger than me. We were sparring, and he said, “You are never going to last if you keep going like that. I’ll just wait it out until you’re tired and finish you. You’re small; you have to be really smart about how you use your energy. Don’t waste it.”

Master Lee regularly corrects my punching technique with this same purpose in mind. He will tell me that I am using my energy all the way through, instead of waiting to use it at the very last moment for impact. Again, this is wasteful. And it’s not good form. It’s sloppy. It looks like mud instead of steel.

Efficiency is strength. Use strength where it’s needed, to the degree that it’s needed. This is so wise, and often so very hard to do.

The more I read about skillful means, the more I think about these lessons of energy and impact and strength in martial arts. In so many areas of life, we bring the hammer when a tap will do. Or, we bring a hammer and hit something fifteen times when one solid tap will do. We can be so wasteful in the way we apply ourselves- our drive, our ambition, even in things like our pursuit of justice or our practice of patience or compassion. We can be so forceful, and not realize how inefficient we’re being in our efforts.

What if this week, we sought to be efficient in our delivery? What if we used just the right amount of energy, no more, no less?