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Old 02-17-2012, 03:09 AM   #12
Alic
Dojo: Sokushinkan Dojo, Vancouver
Location: Richmond, BC
Join Date: Feb 2012
Posts: 64
Canada
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Re: "The trouble with aikido" by Wayne Muromoto

Not very prevalent in Shodokan (Tomiki),Yoseikan, Iwama-ryu and Yoshinkan. It's really mainly the Aikikai and Ki Society that has this problem. Frankly, if you focus so much on the philosophical aspect of Aikido, you are gonna run into this problem eventually. Not everyone is there for the martial art, but rather for the martial art. You can't really understand the philosophy without training, but not everyone realizes or even cares that in order to truly understand the Aiki, you must master the art as a budo first. This is why you have folks that only understand a bit of the philosophies, but none of the techniques and skills.

I'm a firm believer in the basics and the power of the skills. Without good technique, no one will believe you anyhow. O-sensei arrived at his revelations through hard training, and all the other famed masters gained prominence from their Aikido, not their speeches. If O-sensei could only talk of Aiki, but couldn't show it to the people that challenged him, then he would've been forever labelled as "the crazy old man that trains on the mountain". It is because of his divine techniques that caused so much attention to be placed on him, and thus the art grew larger than himself alone.

This kind of Aikido isn't really true Aikido, and will not help to spread O-sensei's message. I would love to see these Aikibunnies go up against some of Shioda's or Tomiki's students. Maybe that'll teach them to train more and talk less
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