I Don't Care That Much
I was recently watching a video of a class led by a very famous aikido instructor. In the course of teaching the class, he told the story of how his instructor had corrected students by whacking them with a shinai (a bamboo sword used in kendo). When, for instance, his elbow was out of place in the middle of a technique, whack! The elbow felt it. He called this practice a very effective method of teaching, and blamed "treehuggers" for the fact that it is no longer in use.
I was recently part of an online discussion with an aikidoist who had just joined a new club. He was frustrated by the club's different way of doing things, and wasn't sure whether to continue with them or to try the next-nearest club, which was an hour's drive away. One person, a devoted aikidoist who had immigrated to another continent to follow a particular instructor, responded harshly, telling him that his interest in aikido was merely "superficial" if the distance to the dojo mattered to him. It's worth noting at this point that both the hardass instructor and the intercontinental traveler probably know more about aikido than I ever will, and are probably better at aikido than I will ever be. Their devotion and sacrifice are undoubtedly keys to their skill and knowledge. Here's the thing, though: I just don't care that much. I don't care enough about aikido to endure being regularly beaten with a stick while I practice it. I don't care enough about aikido to pack up and move across the ocean so that I can train with a particular instructor. In fact, I don't even care enough about aikido to drive a two-hour round trip every night I want to train: I would barely get to spend a waking moment with my wife on those days, and two or three days a week of that would get old quickly. Maybe that makes me a "treehugger"; maybe that means I'm only "superficially" into aikido. I can live with that. I have nothing against people who are willing to make great sacrifices for their arts. In fact, I'm very glad there are such people; they often become great resources for the rest of us. I certainly don't want to disparage that kind of devotion. I just don't have that kind of devotion myself -- at least not to a martial art -- and I'm not particularly interested in listening to people tell me that I should have it. I used to have an aikido instructor who told me that aikido should be the third most important thing in my life, after God and my family. I nodded to him politely when he said this, but I knew it would never be true for me. My priorities are not his. I'd rather be a great musician or a great writer than a great martial artist, and my martial arts interests are not limited to aikido (though the time and the money I budget for martial arts training currently are). By telling me how important aikido needed to be to me, he wasn't helping me; he was alienating me. The veil over the martial arts is being lifted. As more and more information about them becomes available to the general public through the internet and sports like MMA, more people see through the myths. The martial arts are not a shortcut to enlightenment. They do not offer us supernatural powers. They are not inherently moral or noble. Only a few of them are trained in a way that really prepares practitioners for the rigor of combat, and even those are virtually useless against modern weapons. We are running out of reasons for the martial arts to be important. The increasingly obvious truth is that the martial arts are only as important as the people who practice them choose to make them. To be sure, some people really get into the martial arts and make them into a way of life, just as others do with cars, basketball, or writing poetry. But we aren't all like that. In fact, I suspect most of us aren't like that. The people telling us that we must endure this hardship/make this sacrifice/rearrange these priorities for the sake of our martial arts aren't trying to help us get what we want out of the martial arts; they're trying to convince us to want the same things they want. I have a different idea: what if we all just tried to help our training partners achieve their own respective goals? (Find the original piece here.) |
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Thanks for your honesty. I'm pretty committed as a budoka. It has changed my life in many ways and led me down paths and made connections that I could never imagine. I found myself just this afternoon by chance of luck helping to introduce jiu jitsu to Senegalese in Dakar. Tomorrow I am going to their national judo dojo to teach. I am excited to help provide opportunities to others. I hope it changes their lives and is as helpful to them as it has been to me. All I can do is give what I have received.
I have no expectations on what others may or may not receive. I teach a 6 am class to beginners in Germany 3 days a week for free. Whoever shows up shows up. I have several regulars and they work hard when I am not there. They grow slowly but we have a good time. I don't prostelyze or do I really care what they do or don't do. Only that they give their best. However I don't really desire to waste my time with those that really are not committed and only want to come to entertain themselves. I think the way we train though prevents this. Anyway..I'd say train or don't train...u get out of it what u put into it. |
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Excellent post Kevin, as usual! :)
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Let me quote again Kevin here: "u get out of it what u put into it. ' |
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Hi All,
I agree with the OP but... My problem is when that same person asks me how to get better and I tell them to train more. They always nod enthusiastically and then go on doing same stuff as before.If you are not willing to dedicate yourself to training that is OK, just don't expect to get better. I also agree with Kevin. I take my budo seriously if you are a person who does not, just train with like minded individuals because you are pretty much wasting our time. I would much rather train with someone not very talented but dedicated to getting better than someone who is not. Have a great weekend, Eric |
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I actually identify and agree with all the comments so far to one degree or another.
The OP brings an interesting point that I think is one of the by-products of the over-reach of aikido as a budo practice, where everything and anything nowadays can be called aikido, and which will invariable attract a huge variety of expectations and opinions, ranging from the extremely dedicated to the casual hobbyist. I am currently not nearly as dedicated to aikido training as others so I definitely identify with the OP. I hope to reverse this situation in the future, but for now I do not expect anybody, especially the teacher, to adjust to my own personal goals. I'm conscious of not getting in the way of anybody's progress, especially those in line for leadership roles. This is an important point from Nagababa: Quote:
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I think our society is one that has grown to be very transaction or contractual based. that is, I pay the same price as the guy next to me, you are obligated to provide me with the same service. This mentality removes the obligation of the payer to participate in the relationship. Unfortunately, budo doesn't work that way. You have to pay to play, and you have to...well...play!
Not everyone should get a trophy, and not everyone is equal....some will be better than others, and some or worth spending more time with than others....some will be worth showing things to because they have both the willingness and the capability to benefit from training. I spend alot of time on willingness and capability in my job working in Africa with militaries. We talk about this alot. It is not enough to have one and not the other. You have to have both. As a few have pointed out...if you don't care "that much" then you lack willingness. why should your instructor invest anything at all in you? or maybe he simply should care "that much" which probably isn't alot.. |
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That's a pretty naive list of reasons to study aikido. I certainly wouldn't agree that if you take those three away then we are "running out of reasons". It sounds you were looking at aikido through that veil and now that you have a little bit of experience the veil is gone and you're not sure what you're looking at. I think it is common to begin aikido with certain idealistic assumptions and then become disillusioned after a period of time. The question is whether you give up or keep going. For those that keep going, the deeper reality becomes fascinating and inspiring. The loss of the original naive view, looking back, is just an inevitable part of the natural growth process. Good luck to you. |
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I will say, though, that I think there is some area for compromise here. A person doesn't have to make aikido the most important thing in his life to be good at it and to be a good training partner for even the most devoted aikidoists. |
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Hi Matt,
Aikido or (anything else) does not have to be the most important thing in your life for one to be dedicated. :) I don't know why an instructor in anything worth being taught would waste their time teaching someone who did not care about getting good. Best, Eric |
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But what i find surprisingly annoying is the fact that you refer to some kind of veil being lifted off martial arts. You don't have enough dedication to get hit or drive far for your martial art, yet all of a sudden you have a strong opinion about the shortcut to enlightenment, super powers nobility and martial effectiveness just because you read it on the internet or some kind of silly new fashionable trendy sport such as MMA advertises so. Martial arts are not a shortcut to enlightenment, they are a huge journey to it. If there was a shortcut, it wouldn't be enlightenment but a mere sunday walk. As for martial effectiveness, let people who really practice have an opinion, whether they agree with me or not, because it takes a lot of hitting, a lot of long drives a lot of weekends without your family and millions more of things that you wouldn't do, as you say, to know what really works in a fight and how to make it work. Aikido training is my number one priority. I respect every opinion in this world, but some things sound very insulting to me. I have spent years on the mat doing what i love most and now someone who "doesnt care so much" is claiming to know about the new found truth that exposes martial arts as ineffective, in order to find an excuse for his lack of dedication... You simply added another drop in the vast ocean of ignorant information that people like you love to read and write about instead of walking to blocks down and enter the dojo. |
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'true budoka', ' silly new fashionable trendy sport such as MMA'....
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A person must train for their own reasons. Listening to others can be informative but in the end we all either show up on the mat ready to train or we don't. That is all there is to it.
All the talk in the world will never make that different. |
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Now you have told everybody that you dont care that much about aikido, why not just get on with your life?Do your own thing bet it art, music or domestic chores or a bit of aikido or whatever?For my part how you perceive aikido is your business.Nobody [i think ] minds one way or another what you do.Have a nice day, cheers, Joes By te way some people would pay loads of dosh to be beaten with a stick .That tingle up /down the spine can get quite addictive. |
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In the martial arts, though, I think there are a lot of people who, perhaps because of the pseudoreligious way some martial arts are taught, come to imagine that their activity is objectively, universally important rather than just important to them. And once that illusion has a hold of you, it starts to seem reasonable to insist that everyone value your particular activity exactly the same way you do. I like aikido. It's fun, it's interesting, it's challenging, it's a good workout, and it has taught me a lot, including things that apply to life outside the dojo. I acknowledge that it requires time and effort. A select few take aikido further than that, and that's cool. I just take issue with the ones who think I need to be exactly like them. |
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Do I get the feeling you are a bit sensitive and a tad tetchy?You just take issue??with people who thinks you should be like them??Why the last statement?Cannot say I have noticed anybody saying your wrong or whatever in your choice to be a student who has other priorities in life apart from aikido. Psuedoreligion, illusion, universally important, these phrases alone make me wonder where you train.I can tell you that in my own experiences most of my aikido has been hard work physically .If I had wanted a religious flavour I would have went to a monastery or whatever.Like I said earlier why not just get on with your life as you see fit?Is someone trying to pressgang you into a dojo???Go when you feel like training in aikido, do something else if you are so inclined.Cheers, Joe. |
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I think, Matt, that you like to argue and also might get off a bit on feeling like you have been victimized. I don't mean that disrespectfully. I don't think... you are aware of it yet. Aikiweb is a excellent place to see how we come across to others.
For me, aikido training is about deciding how to respond. Sometimes it is okay just to side step the sho-men or duck under the yokamen. When I put an idea out onto Aikiweb I can watch the responses and then notice what reactions I have to the responses. If someone agrees with me it matters as much as if someone disparages my ideas. The practice is to participate and then learn about myself. |
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Hello,
Actually I am not angry. Just don't expect people that care and are dedicated to aikido to care about training with you. No big deal to me, we have plenty of people that aren't dedicated to aikido training where I practice I just train with them as little as possible. Best, Eric |
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