Mark Raugas

The first question is an important one and full of its own complexity:

Is there only one kind of internal power? What types of internal power can be cultivated?
Are they all equally relevant to what Ellis calls arms length grappling?
If you find internal power and integrate it with your practice, are you doing it in an optimal manner?
If you power your taijutsu with internal power from another source, is it still Aikido?

I used to practice a form of modern jujutsu that was a combination of Karate, Judo, and Aikido reworked with content from Kodokai seminars Yonezawa held in the 1970s. Unfortunately, my teacher in his naivite focused on hard bone crunching locks and not anything more subtle until much later in his career when he invited a qigong teacher to or dojo. I remember the qigong person, who had tremendous stability, say if we could learn to work with qi we would vastly improve. He was fine with the external nature of our locking and throwing, it was a bit beneath him but would be improved if we practiced neigong. It would have been a good thing if he had kept his class going there. I think we would all have benefited.

I wound up leaving that group later on and focused my time on Bagua, Xingyi, and Taiji. I now focus on them as separate arts taught in the same school, taught in a way that is compatible.

When I hit someone, is it Xingyi or Bagua?
When I throw someone, is it Xingyi or Bagua or Taiji?

Sometimes it is clear, sometimes it is less so.

I remember an admonition about how once you get kuzushi and hit someone, the result will depend on your body development. That development can happen in a variety of ways. It is your body.

The broader community is very lucky there are people willing to share their body methods (shen fa) with others, outside of a closed group (particular Aikido organization or ryu).

I wince a bit when I hear Daito ryu traditionalists talk about the propriety of Aiki, when Ueshiba and Takeda taught so many many people. Even though I am friends with one or two of them and think some of them are good martial artists, there are others, however, who put the name of their art and lineage as something to distract from their own level of skill.

I think all of this falls back on what each individual can actually do. This is why inter group sparring and pushing can be very useful. Is that Aikido?

For me, when I do something that looks like ikkyo, is it Aikido, Xingyi, or kodachi from Jikishinkage ryu performed without a weapon in my hand? If Takeda studied Jikishinkage ryu for a while, is that closer than Bagua, which he likely never encountered?

Does it matter, if someone cannot stop me?

I guess a question to add to your list is whether given the benefits of internal power and stability to taijutsu, is important to seek Ueshiba's specific methodologies or alternatives?

Is it important to be able to do what he did how he did it or just be able to do what he did?

Can this be done by most people in the context of Aikido or is understanding Daito-ryu necessary?

If you practice other approaches and they influence your Aikido, is that acceptable?

At what point are you no longer doing Aikido?

I am writing this as someone who did what is probably fairly low-level Aikido for a time and then did internal martial arts for some time. I don't think I do Aikido any longer. If I do something that looks like irimi nage, is it just Bagua or is it good Aikido now that I know internal ideas, or is it bad Aikido because the form doesn't look quite right?

Anyway, I have enjoyed reading everyone's posts and though I would contribute some random thoughts.

Mark Raugas
innerdharma.org