Daily practice

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[trailbuster530]

Hi all,

I am new to Aikido as a pure art form. I wrestled thru high school and practiced Tae Ku Muk Sul and Judo for a couple years. When I was involved in those I had a daily routine of stretches and practicing of the basics.

I would spend about 1 hour a day focused on what I knew from past experiences and tried to focus in on the challenging areas.

I have had 4 classes so far in Aikido and am loving it. I want to focus in on making sure I get the basics down before moving on.

Part of the class has been jo training which I really enjoyed in Tae Ku Muk Sul as well.

I am lucky in that my wife had decided she wanted to join me this time and once school starts and we get that schedule worked out my two daughters will be joining.

The unlucky part is with having 2 daughters 10/13 and a busy wife we don't have an opportunity to practice together much at all.

What would everyone here suggest as a routine to start up with?

Any suggestions on what basics I should focus in on?

Thanks in advanced for all your incite and ideas.

[Budd]

Practice the wam up drills (often excellent solo body conditioning and visualization drills for your structure) as well as the jo kata/waza, with an emphasis on moving your whole body through the jo patterns, rather than trying to fight with the jo (helps for smooth body placement). Many repetitions of sword cuts every day are also lots of fun.

[Mark Uttech]

Keep your main focus on your family. If you go to class once or twice a week, that will keep you busy enough, and your family may see likeable changes in you. In a word, aikido practice should make you better, not worse!

In gassho,

Mark

[gdandscompserv]

I train daily cuz I'm old and I'll seize up if I don't.
:eek:

[trailbuster530]

Ricky - I can understand the getting rusty part. It's been 10 years since I have done any serious stretching so I am trying to break thru that rust now.

Mark - Thanks for the suggestion. I am going 2x/week now and will continue that program as it fits with the rest of the family so that we can all go together. Family is my #1 priority. I have found martial arts in the past to do wonders for me overall along with wrestling. I used to have a pretty bad temper but once I got schooled on what happens when you don't think thru what your doing I started trying to figure out ways to keep calm. When you let anger take over you have already lost.

Budd - Thanks for the tips. I will look into trying to encorperate that into my routine.

Thanks again to all so far!

[SeiserL]

IMHO, footwork and form.

[Dirk Hanss]

Hi Erik,
it is fine if you and your family want to practice together.
As the other posters mentionned (implicitely) you should be very cautious with partner/contact training at home. You can do everything, one does alone, just all together, and none of you should correct the others. One can help each other, but only if asked for.
Anything for light stretching and fitness is helpful, except muscle building exercises. Muscles are fine, but the first idea is to do it relaxed and feel the movement.

The only partner exercises I would recommend are standing kokyu ho exercises. Probably you do only one in class, but one can do nearly every (basic) throwing technique (shihonage, iriminage, tenchinage and even kaitennage) and also ikkyo as kokyu ho exercise. You might ask your teacher to assist on how to do them. They are done very slowly and relaxed, focus on breathing and stretching, no throwing at all. But only do them, if all of you have fun with it. The minute you try to force someone, you might have lost her interest. (At least with my wife, I ghave to be extremely cautious here) ;)

Best regards

Dirk

[dalen7]

I want to focus in on making sure I get the basics down before moving on.

ah...yes...
that is what kyu level 1-6 is...getting down the basics. ;)

[RoyK]

IMHO, footwork and form.

I used to do allot of footwork and form training at home, then about two years into my practice we had a sensei change and suddenly all the footwork and form I drilled became "wrong footwork and bad form".

I suppose that I wasn't wrong to practice what I was taught at home but then it made it hard for me to adapt to new ideas.

[SeiserL]

suddenly all the footwork and form I drilled became "wrong footwork and bad form".
Don't you hate it when people ask us to flow without resistance? LOL

[tedehara]

Find some type of breathing exercise and meditation that suits you. These two activities separates the martial arts from athletics.

[tedehara]

I used to do allot of footwork and form training at home, then about two years into my practice we had a sensei change and suddenly all the footwork and form I drilled became "wrong footwork and bad form".

I suppose that I wasn't wrong to practice what I was taught at home but then it made it hard for me to adapt to new ideas.Shouldn't be easier for you to pick-up new forms and footwork after all that practice?

Just like a good dancer should learn new steps faster than a beginner, shouldn't a trained martial artist learn forms and footwork quicker than a newbie? Or has our training created another habit that we find hard to break?

[RoyK]

Shouldn't be easier for you to pick-up new forms and footwork after all that practice?


If it's different, then yes. I find that training Aikido helps me with learning new movements faster. However, the analogy of a 'new dance move' isn't exact in my opinion, it's more like a move that replaces an old dance move I grew accustomed to. Suddenly I have to waste brain cycles on things that I'm used to do effortlessly or else my body goes back to the familiar form.