Lee Crockett

Thanks for your comments guys.

Hannah Bjork stated
:
Lee Crockett wrote:
as O'Sensei stated repeatedly to M. Saito, hard, solid training (Kotai) should be taught up to at least 3rd Dan.

Is this a fact? Being concerned with pedagogic stuff doesn't really sound like the Ueshiba Morihei I've learned about.

Source?

I have all the M. Saito Lost Seminars on DVD and Saito states that this is what O'Sensei told him.

Many of the comments on this board relate to individual Aikido, but this is where there is confusion. There cannot be MANY forms of Aikido, there is only one. Creation of harmony with the universal.

These arent my words, but words stated by Arikawa.

If this is the essence of what Aikido is, then what people are talking about is their own interpretations, which is not Aikido.

Aikido is only achieved if harmony with the universal is created in accordance with the 9 elements. Anything outside of this is not created.

As a student who has trained in the UK for almost a decade, my observations are that we dont train Aikido, not even close. We have a Jitsu form which relies on movement before contact, and then momentum. How is this Aikido? Anybody can move and then apply something. The key is to use the "body", taijitsu, and i simply do not see this. I see arm movements and momentum where the strongest and fastest will win, and this is not the principal of what we are trying to achieve with Aikido.

I saw the Doshu in the Cardiff last year and he does what he does well. But if it is really correct that the first Doshu "changed" O'Senseis techniques, then we are not really doing the Aikido O'Sensie left to the word are we? And if this is the case, why are we calling it Aikido?