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The problem is me. This is a strain of thought that I've been mulling over for a while. So often in Aikido I see people doing things wrong not because they haven't learned the right way but because they don't like the right way; it doesn't mesh with their personality.
One guy I see occasionally on courses and such can't just make yokomen uchi or shomen uchi with a weapon. He has to be unusally expressive in his movements, presumably he thinks this makes him look cool or something but the guy is so off balance that he's in danger of falling over. This is true of all his Aikido from what I've seen.
There is too much him in the form and it is creating a blockage in his Aikido. His cup is too full of how he thinks it should be. So often in Aikido we make things a vehicle for our personality rather than a vehicle for traveling the path.
And this is where I am. There is a way the world works and I am doing things to suit my personality rather than in harmony with the world and I am stuck. I'm trying to drive a dog sled down a railway track albeit with some success; I'm swinging away like mad and I am off balance.
In Aikido I impose myself on the kata rather than listening to what the kata has to say. I feel I impose myself on life rather than listening to it. There is a path to everything. Want to be a lawyer? There is a path. Want to be a Doctor? There is a path there is a form to follow. There is the form of a student, the form of a doctor, etc.
I see so many people who never achieve their full potential, myself included. So often it's because they'd rather cling to their unsucessful habits and avoid the path they often really want to be on rather than embracing the form they need, making it part of themselves and succeeding.
11-23-2010 12:06 PM 