My Sensei recently told me that truly effective aikido isn't the ability to make shihonage work on somebody trying to kill you with a knife or broken bottle. Applied aikido is the
principles being applied in any situation, no matter what that might end up looking like.
- diffuse the situation
- run away
- enter and atemi
- go around and unbalance
- et cetera
You're not going to execute a beautiful yonkyo on someone weilding a machete at your face. That's just crazy.