First of all thanks for all the replies!
Also appreciate if the replies are kept non-derogatory...some seems to be leaning in that way.
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Rupert Atkinson wrote:
I have gone through exactly the same thought process as you. For me, now, Aikido is The Way of Aiki. It is about developing aiki, not just learning a bunch of semi-useless kata style waza. The waza will not work if you put them to the test (beyond Aikido, like, try katate-dori Ikkyo on a Judoka trying to throw you and see how far you get). And yes, you could put aiki into anything, Jujutsu, Judo, whatever. But for me, the aim of Aikido is to develop this aiki whereas Judo has turned into a system of scoring points.
Now you may think your Aikido has improved due to your other training but I would say it can only improve if you aim at developing aiki. So if it really has gotten better, maybe your other training has given you a few aiki insights you are as yet unaware of. Or perhaps you have just found a better way of wrenching Ikkyo on someone ...
I say, keep your Aikido pure and use what is there to develop you aiki, then take that aiki and try to apply it in your Jujutsu. Don't make the mistake of bringing your Jujutsu into Aikido to try to improve your Aikido. You will just end up where you started - running around in circles to nowhere.
Just my 2c.
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I agree that to understand Aikido, you need to practice Aikido and not a mumbo jumbo of things. I am not bringing jujitsu into Aikido to improve my Aikido but sometimes it's the more efficient technique (when it presents itself).
To quote an example, from a certain position a kaiten nage and also a guillotine presents itself. I pick the guillotine because it's an 'end' position similar to a pin and arguably safer too both in a self defense situation both for me and the attacker (since a choke offers more control and is non lethal while a fall is harder to predict).
To me the most difficult and technical part of Aikido are not the throws the pins etc etc...it is those initial moments when receiving the attack and breaking the balance, what follows after is just a matter of preference.
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Tony Mills wrote:
I echo the previous two posters.
I rember a teacher when I was starting describing the progression of Aikido. First you think about techniques, then you do the techniques without thinking, finaly forget techniques. How's that relevant? I think the aim of aikido is to develop Aiki so you can apply it spontaneously without regard to technique, this mean unfortunately while we are learning through aikido techniques they often seem ineffective. The temptation is we can supliment with these percived effective techniques from other arts and still call it aikido. To me this can be a distraction from the higher goal of learning Aiki because we are not using those techniques towards developing Aiki but to fight better in the short term, and that becomes our goal
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Don't get me wrong I don't think we shouldn't be martial, fight well, or train other arts. Just we need to know what we are aiming for and not get so side tracked that we head off on a different path. Of course we all have different goals  |
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Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
If you make your technique -- whatever technique you choose -- more effective by incorporating aiki, then it's still aikido.
If you don't know what "incorporating aiki" means, or if you're just adding techniques from other arts, then it isn't still aikido. But then, it may not have been aikido in the first place.
I think if your technique collapses under pressure, that's an issue with your training and may or may not have anything to do with the limitations of the art itself.
Katherine
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Yes I believe early in development, I think trying to supplement and mix things up doesn't help things. When you do it too early on, you're just stunting your understanding and growth and going the 'easy path'. There are many techniques in which I do in Aikido now that I didn't have the technical skills 10 years ago and didn't get it. However I've been doing Aikido since I was like maybe 10 years old...and I can say that I am reasonably competent in the fundamentals of Aikido and have gone around training in different Aikido dojos to also expose myself to it. I wouldn't call myself a master but I would say I know when a technique is working and when it isn't.
My point is that rather than viewing 'pure' Aikido as the end solution to everything, what's wrong with increasing your repertoire with other techniques as long as it fits into the whole economy of movement and do no harm principles of Aikido?
I really disagree that we should only stick to training in the 'traditional attacks' like shomen, tsuki etc etc and that it would be better to have better methods/techniques while still following Aiki principles in dealing with modern attacks that involve combinations and strikes we don't see in traditional Aikido practice.
Case in point, I think tsuki kote-gaeshi is really not practical if someone is properly punching. It works if uke continues to hold his hand out, and i think it's more designed to be against something like a spear thrust as opposed to just a punch to the stomach (and that's with you anticipating it). And frankly, who attacks like that outside there?
Why is it wrong to learn and adapt techniques to deal with more common attacks like a jab/cross/hook/haymaker etc? Why aren't these incorporated into Aikido's standard repertoire?
As to collapsing under pressure, I think Aikido training does not prepare u for that. Even when you do get hit, it's going to be just one hit, it's hard to deal with a persistent attacker that's going to keep attacking you unless you can get him everytime he makes that first attack. I have NEVER seen anyone achieve this level. You need a different kind of training, some type of 'stress innoculation' which allows you to keep calm when under pressure. This I got it through sparring. I'll be very surprised to see a pure Aikidoka that has trained in nothing else deal with a determined attacker that's not going to just attack with one attack and has a genuine intention to land solid hits. How can you train for stress situations when you've never been put under stress?
I've been dealing with this by introducing more proactive randori by having an attacker come in with an attack but continue to attack in rapidly in combination if nage fails to perform a technique. Strikes of course have to be light (and open handed) but grips will be full force and with an intention to take down if possible. The Aikido then may be sloppy but it is hoped with time, more and more effective techniques can be pulled off (which still happens now and then).
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Ashley Hemsath wrote:
Reuben, I am actually with you on most of those points, but I would look to training in terms of bad technique. In the beginning, the uke has to be compliant, because nage has never done the technique, and needs to understand how it is supposed to feel to start with, and move on from there. But as students progress, compliance needs to start going away. I'll never remember the first time my uke took an actual swing at me. I performed the technique, a bit sloppy, but I did it, and after I pinned him I was in shock. "Dude! You swung at me!" "Yep, and you did it right. Good job."
If you have anyone who has achieved any kind of rank without the occasional "real" attack, that is what needs to be remedied.
--Ashley
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Totally agree. I also now incorporate a form of 'play resistance' which allows students to give a lot of resistance without bringing ego into play and keeping it playful. For example, i'll tell uke, ok go grab nage's hand and if you can establish a grip, grip as hard as you can and you can fight it, condition is that you have to hold on to the hand and do nothing else. I find that in that case nage can experiment against a fully committed grip and feel the switches and adaptation of an almost fully resisting uke but within controlled parameters. This I feel controls the gap between full on sparring and just being compliant.
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Cliff Judge wrote:
"Compliant uke" has been a fairly consistent complaint for as long as people have been arguing about Aikido on the internet. It seems to come most often from people who like wrestling. In my experience, as long as the instructors foster neither a "you must never resist technique and must always take the fall" nor a "never take a fall unless the technique works" attitude, things just work themselves out.
Beginners get on the mat, people take a fall of them so they can get the feel for what the results of the technique are supposed to be. Then when its their turn to be uke, they take the fall to learn to take the fall.
When they get more advanced, you are basically always willing to take a fall, but if they aren't giving you anything to work with, you don't. When it's their turn, you dial it up a bit if they can take it.
Then when advanced people work together, sometimes you show each other that such and such a thing doesn't work on you. Sometimes you give each other time and space to innovate.
If you look at the antecedent systems of Aikido, uke may not be "compliant" but he is certainly cooperative in general practice. To the extent that uke will allow you to apply a painful join lock or choke. There is no other safe way to train moves that are meant to cause serious injury. In regular practice you can't just decide to break someone's neck - even if you teach counters, if uke doesn't know what's coming, accidents will happen. Aikido has softer techniques that allow for practice to involve spontaneity without lots of injury.
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I always hear that oh in Aikido we never apply techniques full force because it may be lethal or cause serious injury. There is no move that is meant to cause serious injury cause if it is, it's not Aikido. I think that's really against what Aikido is about. The point is that Aikido should be an art that gives you the control and option to not do harm. Which is why I think incorporating other techniques that gives you that control should be in line with what Aikido is about.
Totally agree with you on advanced students being free to experiment and not afraid to look bad though. it takes a lot of experimentation to know what works.
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Jon Reading wrote:
For me, aiki do is a study of the application of aiki. The kata we find in aikido are derived from the early movements often demonstrated by O Sensei. The intention behind them was to create common vessels in which practitioners could express aiki. There is commonality to sister Japanese arts, especially those arts shared by some of the earlier students who lead the kata curriculum. The kata are a "paint by numbers," approach to helping reduce the stress of manufacturing a proper martial shape when also trying to express aiki. The curriculum of kata we have is kinda a "starter kit" of a larger set of martial movement that exists.
I think that it is difficult to express aiki. I think when you are referring to those who argue about limiting the formal kata of aikido, you are talking about an argument based on a limit of knowledge. To some extent, I can sympathize with this perspective because probably most of what we do is not expressing aiki, so the number of kata that we proclaim to comprehend does not change our inability to express aiki. The converse to that argument is that everything we do is aiki, and there is no limit of knowledge. To some extent, I can sympathize with this argument because that is the intended purpose of our training, to transcend the need for a model that solicits proper aiki movement.
Kata is a tool to help reduce the stress of remember what to do - it creates an outside shape that is reproducible and transferrable. There are some aikido people who will never really move beyond that phase of their training. For those who do, they invigorate their kata with aiki. For those who are good, they move with aiki without a need to put that movement into a outside shape.
This brings us back to shu ha ri training. Aiki is a basic body skill. You can use it for many things, but only if you learn aiki, not a shape that solicits aiki-like movement. The kata in aikido are designed to preserve the movement to express aiki, not fight. If you have built a body of knowledge that lets you expand your kata knowledge and still express aiki, great.
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I guess you're saying that Aikido is a form of somatic training then?
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Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
While an overly compliant uke can certainly be a problem, I think people who say that it's unique to aikido aren't paying attention.
The first time you spar with a live partner in a karate dojo, does the senior student beat you bloody? No? Then I guess he's being "compliant," huh?
And as pointed out up thread, it's kind of hard to train lethal or crippling techniques any other way: you run out of partners really fast, and local law enforcement tends to get involved.
The question is how to ramp up the intensity and the "resistance" (not really the right word, but it'll do) so that students learn to handle progressively more realistic situations, while keeping the stress level low enough to allow learning. It's a hard problem, and I don't think aikido instructors are alone in struggling with it.
Katherine
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Yup been working actively on devising on how to do this...
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Karl Arant wrote:
Yeah, that's about what I'd pay for that too. So what is "aiki" exactly and how do you know if you, or anyone else is doing "it" correctly? Does your magic aiki meter go "ding" when you're in "the zone", or does a little indicator light appear? Do you have some sort of ESP which allows you to detect this invisible, non-corporeal force in others as well? Give me a break!!!
OP is absolutely correct. Aikido is either a MARTIAL art, or it is not. If it is, then it should behave as such. MARTIAL literally means "of the military" which means life and death, nothing more and nothing less and certainly not "spiritual practice". LOL!!!!! That means real training, real intent, real speed and real power.
Lest we forget that Osensei himself was a deeply militant man who knowingly and willingly trained and associated with known war criminals of a caliber that would make Goebbels blush. Oh yeah, the ol' Japanese military made the Nazis look like the Peace Corp. (Pearl Harbor anyone?) and Osensei was best friends with ALL the brass and proud of it too. How's that for "spiritual" awareness and enlightenment?
Training without true life or death/martial intent is nothing more than a waste of time, money and effort for all parties involved. To do otherwise is cruel farce which will leave a hapless aikidoka in for a rude awakening should they ever need to use their "spiritual" skills to protect themselves or a loved one. If there are people practicing Aikido simply as a "spiritual practice" (whatever that is), then those people should stop. Instead, they and their communities would all be better served by them volunteering at a soup kitchen, or homeless shelter in order to better fulfill their "spiritual" needs rather than rolling around on a mat in a manskirt using archaic Japanese terminology to describe said movements.
The saddest irony of all is that Aikido didn't become as popular and well respected in such a relatively short amount of time because its techniques and practitioners weren't martially effective. On the contrary, Osensei himself was an iconoclast who did away with many of the old conventions to bring forth a new approach to the MARTIAL arts and soundly handled challengers. His students also spread the word when they willingly took on any and all comers and won, thus allowing the art to speak for itself. Sadly, this aspect has been greatly diminished in favor of the "Lets all be morbidly obese senseis who can't even touch our toes (you know who you are) and/or hold hands and talk about our "spiritual feelings" and/or you can't handle a BJJ guy, so don't even bother " crowd. What a shame. Just goes to show you how precious the essence an art really is and how quickly it can disappear without proper nurturing. If Aikido is going to endure as a true and well-respected MARTIAL art it desperately needs to get off its "spiritual" high horse and get back to goodness with some HONEST demonstrations of talent and ability. Who knows, we might just like what we find.
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Yes we really need those real masters now who are willing to put their reputation on the line. If we're talking about Aikido as just a spiritual movement or an exercise that promotes harmony fine. But if it's going to be called a martial art, then challengers are to be expected and Aikidoka often go proudly "O-Sensei defeated all who challenged him", "Gozo Shioda took on etc etc" and all these legendary stories to show how awesome Aikido is. But when we talk about challenges now it's all frowned upon and not in the spirit of Aiki. I have not seen a single demonstration which is convincing in showing a proper attempt to nullify an attacker (even untrained). If Aikido is all it's panned out to be we should be able to neutralize an attacker as hard as he is trying to defeat us all the while without having to injure him or resort to violence.
I worry that without these, we lose sight that Aikido is a martial art (or if it isn't then let's not pretend). If accepting challenges is not "Aiki" then why did O-Sensei engage in them? He was confident enough of his martial ability in showing them that it worked and that there was another path besides destruction and converted many of these challengers into his students. Why is this wrong today? Is it because we lack the confidence? Also note that O-Sensei was dealing with a very different breed of challengers and therefore his techniques may be catered towards the arts of the day. Why has there been no innovation to update these techniques to modern attacks? I wondered what techniques would O-Sensei have created if faced with a modern challenger.