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Old 12-28-2006, 10:29 AM   #376
Erick Mead
 
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
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Re: How to teach and train relaxation

Quote:
Mike Sigman wrote:
To cut to the chase, this basic Kokyu exercise is meant to develop kokyu, the middle, and the hips/upper-thighs to some extent (suwari techniques are meant to do this last even more). ... There are a number of versions of "the right way to do Kokyu Ho", but you have to always ask yourself, "What is the main intent of this drill or technique?". ... The main purpose is to teach someone how to use kokyu force, the essential method of movement/power in Aikido and most other Asian arts when done beyond the amateur level. Anything other than that practice is extraneous to a basic Kokyu-Tanden-ho.
There we go, agreeing again.
Quote:
Mike Sigman wrote:
For all practical purposes, I could kneel in front of a wall with one of those large inflatable exercise-balls on top of my hands which are resting on my thighs, and then lift up and into the wall slowly, keeping a pure kokyu force (not strength) going from my hips throught the ball to the wall. It's the same basic practice, if you cut to the heart of the exercise.
Ah, disagreement. Conflict.

Dynamics is not statics. Isometrics does not give dynamic feedback and so is limited in its abilty to provide the first issue in kokyu dosa -- which is musubi, the connection that must be established to provides both "feel" and the route of control.
Quote:
Kuroda wrote:
To state my conclusion first, I can win as long as my opponent strikes first. ... When I practiced this with my students, the speed of the attack was irrelevant, and I could win easily. This was only because I had developed the eyes to see the movement of the opponent's spirit. This inner vision is, in Kono Sensei's words, a spirit of technical dimension called rapport or telepathy or the working of the brain--I can't find the appropriate words for this.
That dynamic is missing in an isometric exercise. The orientation of the attack and required musubi changes constantly throughout the kokyu dosa exercise. Just as you cannot tickle yourself, any sense of applying kokyu between you and the wall is merely a reflection of yourself and not the same as partnered kokyu exercise.
Quote:
Mike Sigman wrote:
Is it "resistance"? Sure. ...
And thus the problem. Train for what you do. Do not train to do what you do not wish to do.
Quote:
Mike Sigman wrote:
Actual waza should avoid resistance; exercises are not waza, even though some people try to make them so.
Why avoid resistance? Why make the distinction? Kuroda seems to disagree with a distinction that wouold allow kata (exercises) to depart in principle from waza (tehcniques).
Quote:
Kuroda wrote:
I take a common sense viewpoint with respect to these kinds of kata. In other words, I believe that kata are not substitutes for actual fighting. If there were such a thing as kata that can be used in a real situation, I would like to see them. I think that it was in this sense that Morihei Ueshiba O-Sensei used to say that one should not attach too much importance to kata. However, this is something that only a man of his stature, who has already reached that level, can say. We ordinary people would lose all clues about how to execute real techniques if we were to reject the kata.
...
However, from the standpoint of someone who has trained with a complete understanding of techniques from the beginning, everything will seem natural. It will simply seem to be the result of accumulated training and the degree of training. The kata are what lead one to this level.
O Sensei's point, which Kuroda gave due credit, was that adherence to set form can obscure principle, especially in a dynamic art, and he was more concerned with innate principle. Kuroda's point is that kata or exercises have an continuing evolutionary relationship to techniques, and at every level of development. If the exercises are, in principle, different from the techniques, there is a serious problem.

Cordially,

Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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