After my haircut, I think I finally began to understand what Fukasaku meant about finding my center: not going deep inside yourself where there's empty space to hide, but anchoring yourself to what gives you strength. I've certainly lost touch with that over the last few months…
Even so, my training has still been difficult. The "breathing" practice by the oil-fall today was hardly peaceful at all like it had been when I first started. Not once was I told or able to slowly draw in natural energy, but instead sharp pulls. Fukasaku set targets for me, briefly touching on the natural energy where I was supposed to draw from. At first the points were close by, jumping around like a cricket, then they moved farther and farther away.
"No!" Fukasaku says out loud, startling me out of my trance.
"W- what was the problem, sir?"
"You aren't taking in the natural energy. It is commendable to keep the pace, but that is not the whole exercise- you must take it in." I think I was doing that(at first, at least) when drawing from close by, but breathing in from farther away is harder. There's a kind of resistance to pulling in natural energy at length: it's relatively easy at first, but the resistance increases the more you draw it out. "Remember your river walking, and coming up the waterfall? It must be done in that way. Now get ready to start again..."
It takes me a few moments, but I regain my calm. Almost immediately, Fukasaku begins directing the spots for me to breathe from, starting far out and jumping to random points. I try to stay centered and not over extend myself, but unlike with the waterfall run, I dig in deep and can do it right away… until Fukasaku directs me to breathe in from multiple points at the same time. The first couple I get, and the next few, but I start to fall behind on the single breaths. Fukasaku doesn't stop though, so I keep hope that I'll do good enough.
I'm not sure if I did do good enough when the session stopped. And, though it wasn't restful, I feel refreshed when it's over. "Well done. Are you ready to practice skipping through the forest?"
"...Is it like river walking?"
"Yes, actually; good comparison." Fukasaku nods, smiling. "First, I shall show you. Throw your fastest attack at me." I hesitate for a second then launch my best low kick. It of course doesn't connect, and I can't sense Fukasaku. "Up here!" He calls helpfully, sitting on top of one of the statues. "Start your meditation again," He says, hopping down. I nod and sit down again, a little excited and nervous for the exercise. Once I am calm, and able to sense the natural energy around me, Fukasaku again skips through the forest. I can briefly sense him drawing in natural energy, but then he appears in a different spot, back and forth across the clearing. "There. Now, breathe in, and keep it in balance, as you would normally when kneading chakra…"
I'm not quite sure of this, as I'd thought I wouldn't be training as a sage like Naruto. But I go ahead and do so. I don't feel any sort of empowerment from having the natural energy in me, but an odd sort of full, instead. I sharply pull in as I have before, but nothing happened. "You cannot skip and stay on the ground, Hinata. You must jump." He has to mean this in the same way as he told me to breathe, so once more I sharply pull in the natural energy, this time "jumping" as well. In an instant I get the feeling of coming up over the waterfall again, and when I open my eyes I'm on top of one of the toad statues.
"But… I…"
"You've already seen how. Nature is resilient, and reforms and grows and stretches."
"I- I wasn't in sage mode, was I?"
"No, that is not necessary for skipping through the forest, though I'm sure you can see the drawbacks of stopping to meditate frequently." I can, and I'm not quite sure what the use of learning to skip through the forest is if I can only do it once. Hopefully it will be leading to something...