The Story Behind the Birth of KaradaNaoru (Part 7) ーDon't Let the Tool Use You

Yesterday, a client came to my studio carrying a CS60.

The CS60 is a metal device,

sold with the promise that "hold this, and anyone can become a god-handed healer."

I used it myself, from 2018 to 2022.

So I know its strengths and its weaknesses.

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But there was one thing that always sat wrong with me.

It was a person doing the work —

and yet, whenever results came, the story became,

"The CS60 is amazing."

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And there was something else.

The treatment is only a matter of stroking the body, yet when I used it, for some reason it brought on intense pain.

The pain was so extreme that, before long, people had started calling me

"the most painful practitioner in Japan."

Honestly, it wasn't a name I was glad to carry.

I had no wish to cause anyone pain.

I only wanted to bring about better results.

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So I began to ask myself:

how could I produce results without producing pain?

Searching for an answer, I came to the hypnotherapy of Milton Erickson.

I studied it on my own, through endless trial and error,

and went further still — learning how to use my own consciousness.

And then, even when the same changes occurred in the body, the pain all but disappeared.

In the end, I could bring it down to almost nothing.

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That was when I understood it clearly.

What had changed the result was not the tool.

It was that I myself — my way of being — had changed.

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Of course, tools have value.

Without a knife, cooking is hard.

Without needles, there is no acupuncture.

Without a computer, even writing is a struggle.

So it isn't that I want to dismiss tools.

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Quite the opposite.

Tools are wonderful.

The question, I think, is simply this:

does the person use the tool,

or does the tool use the person?

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I have worked as a practitioner for many years.

And what I feel most strongly is that, in the end,

one person cannot heal another.

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A practitioner can create an opening.

Can point to a direction.

Can stay close, alongside.

But whether change actually comes is always,

in the end, decided by the person themselves.

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So what truly matters, I believe,

is not the tool,

but the way of being of the person who holds it.

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And this is not a story about the CS60 alone.

The same thing, I suspect, has repeated itself

again and again throughout human history.

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In one age, it appeared in the form of religion.

Believe this teaching, and you will be saved.

Believe this god, and you will be happy.

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In another age, it appeared as thought, as ideology.

This doctrine alone is right.

This way of thinking alone will save the world.

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And now, in our own time,

it has begun to appear in the form of AI.

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AI will give us the answer.

AI will make the judgment.

AI will predict the future.

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It is, without question, convenient.

I use it myself, nearly every day.

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But that is no reason

to stop thinking for ourselves.

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No matter how fine the religion,

no matter how fine the philosophy,

no matter how fine the AI,

none of them will take responsibility for your life in the end.

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Because the final decision, after everything,

rests with the human being.

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You could just as well call it freedom.

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Freedom is not doing whatever you please.

It is to think for yourself,

to choose for yourself,

and to bear the consequences yourself.

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The moment you let that freedom go,

you may feel lighter.

But at the same time,

you lose your own agency.

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I think of myself as a religious person.

I feel the presence of things unseen.

I hold dear such things as connection, prayer, and intuition.

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And yet —

I don't believe in religion.

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To believe in something absolute,

to stop thinking for oneself,

to give up living as the author of one's own life —

that, I believe, is wrong.

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There is so much in this world that cannot be neatly resolved.

And that is precisely why we think.

We agonize.

We waver.

And we choose.

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Perhaps that is what it means to be human.

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Use the tools.

Study the religions.

Make the most of AI.

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But never hand them the wheel of your life.

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Keep your own hands on the wheel — always.

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That is agency.

That is freedom.

And it is, I believe, the one thing

we must protect to the very end.

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I am fortunate to be surrounded by companions who share this same spirit.

People who worship no one,

but who seek to learn together,

think together,

and grow together.

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And with companions like these,

I hope to keep walking —

on my own two feet.