Quote:
Joe Curran wrote:
Dear Jason,
Thanks for your input here,First let me say I meant no disrespect when I asked Mr Streckel about his aikido pedigree.It was simply to find out whether his critique was based on sound foundations.
In my experience the Japanese method of teaching is not exactly in line with what we in the West consider to be 'Good teaching methods'
.People in the West want to know the Whys/wherefores/reasons etc of everything.In a word they want Aikido in a plate.People of my generation rarely if ever asked questions, we simply did[action orientated].Doing was the name of the game .Now people try and analyse things to the nth degree.Whole reams of internet mail are written and theories are expressed .Sometimes I just blank out when I read some stuff on this forum.Do we need to know reasons?Can we not simply practice under a competent teacher and find our own way?
Maybe I am being too simplistic here.Theory is no good without practice.
Cheers, Joe.
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Hi Joe,
I think you've hit the nail on the head with some of the issues with the transmission methods - most of your generation trained directly under the 1st / 2nd generation Japanese teachers and learned the way they themselves were taught but with obvious language barriers - Japanglish if you will. They were possibly telling you how they can do what they can do and how to do the exercises but I'm guessing most of it went over most people's heads... Mind you, don't forget most of the direct students of O Sensei thought the guy was nuts.
If this is a good teaching / learning method then why are so very few people better than their respective teachers or indeed anywhere close? Could it be because they have no idea how to pass this stuff on? Maybe they don't have the skills to pass it on, maybe they're not interested in passing it on either
. The answer is probably a little of both.
Yes, you can practice under a competent teacher and find your own way, but I think if you want to be able to do what the founder did and what his teachers did then you need to look outside of most aikido teachers around today. I'm not saying none of them have it, but I am saying very few can teach it. I'm not convinced I'd want to spend my entire life looking for something I might only just get a glimpse of if I'm lucky and only then if I screw my body up from 30 or 40 years of hard physical practice and abuse. Nothing wrong with being ready to drop and be exhausted after a long training session mind you, but not so sure it should be all the time and no need to get damaged.