Quote:
Stan Baker wrote:
it is the lack of understanding of spiraling energy and internal center
that is the main reason present day aikido is not at the same standard
of old.
stan
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Hi Stan.
True. Those type of things are dismissed by many as with other aspects whichO'Sensei could do yet others couldn't understand.
Take the word soft or non-resistance or love or spirit or essence or concept of spirit of loving protection etc.etc. How many Aikidoka actually know and can demonstrate in action these principles?
When I came into Aikidothere apparently was a rift going on in the Aikido scene. Back then my teacher explained it simply as those who wanted to carry on emphasizing and practicing with non-resistance, Ki etc. and those who weren't interested in that but were interested in the 'old school samurai' way as he put it.
It's actually down to people not understanding and many not wanting to understand for they can't 'logically' see the relationship.
Just take the word softness. Every single person in various martial arts and unfortunately this one who I have met who has told me that soft doesn't work etc. hadn't got a clue what it
actually meant. They have many explanations and stories and ridicules of it but cannot do it and by demonstration cannot 'defeat' or stop it.
Thus we get beliefs that its about shooting Ki and Ki balls and nonsense. Ridicule from those who cannot do or understand.
When a person is 'completely' relaxed and do something with 'softness' this is how it is to them the doer. Yet the person who receives comes out with statements like 'what the hell was that it felt like you hit me with a hammer' or 'that put me through the mat' or 'I felt like I ran into a brick wall'
These things are hard to understand for both parties for the person who did it feels like he did nothing and yet the person who received it knows he has been completely 'defeated'. Both new, easily disbelieved yet amazing experiences. They don't fit into the persons 'logical' reasoning.
Now when someone can do this anywhere, anytime, with anyone, (like O'Sensei could) it's just as confusing to the recipient for he usually cannot see how the teachers explanation fits those words. He cannot see how soft can mean something else or indeed that it's true meaning is almost the compleat opposite of what he believes, be he an uchideshi or beginner.
Thus it's dicussed for years.
Each concept when finally understood is more like a realization. Whether it be non-resistance or budo is love.
There is no secret technique or bad O'Sensei teaching, there is only a failure to duplicate those type of principles he repeatedly told everyone he employed.
I used to put down and ridicule those who used computers and joke about them as geeks etc. Once again just my ignorance at play and yet in reality those I ridiculed were just silently laughing at me.
No difference really to the current Aikido scene in many parts.
It's all good.G