A short burst of practice again after class tonight. Class incidentally was about kokyu and aiki (sensei's words, not mine).
Partner this time was less experienced than me, sankyu I think. She needed some encouraging hitting me at first, but got quite enthusiastic as we went on.
Writing stuff down afterwards seems to be a good way to do this, I don't have time to observe when I'm in the middle of it. This time it was all easier, I guess partly because my partner just wasn't as experienced. I kept to turning slightly off-line for a while. For some reason I was blinking a lot, maybe because she was mainly aiming for my face... but still, I could sort of welcome it in and almost feel comfortable, like when it's raining hard and finally you just accept that you're going to get wet. I could prevent some of it landing just by turning appropriately, something I wasn't able to do last time.
Deflecting also felt more ... obvious, like I didn't have to try that hard. And then, suddenly I just slipped through to her back.
It felt really nice, not clashing.
Actually the more interesting thing of this evening was that I was watching myself a bit in class before this. And indeed, I can observe myself going into different modes when we do our normal kata practice. Even with something as predictable as a pre-agreed shomenuchi, I can see that reaction in myself of not really wanting to accept the attack. heh.
Well, that's all for tonight.
kvaak
Pauliina