Quote:
Tenyu Hamaki wrote:
There is no reason to hide one's public training history. I won't be baited into debating private matters though.
I wish you the best in your training. I've read many of your posts here so I know your dedication to Aikido is sincere and exemplary.
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Private matters are best left private... but you've put yourself forward as a teacher of a Bo style. I have trained off and on with Tom Read for 30 years. I have watched him evolve his Bo style over that time. He first showed his stick work at the Aiki Expo ten years ago at which he was the very first demonstration in the whole event,
Tom's use of the staff is unique in execution and conception. While he does have rank from Hikitsuchi Sensei in Bo, his own work is totally different from the Shingu Bo work. It is his and his alone. It is not "public domain" stick work. Anyone knowing Tom's Aikibojitsu will recognize, as Jeremy did, where you got what you are doing. You have taken something someone else developed and was kind enough to teach to you and have set yourself up as a teacher in your own right, not only without permission, but in actual opposition to the wishes of the Founder of this style. Furthermore, you received no rank or teaching certification in Aikibojitsu. So, now you have repackaged something which, in my opinion, only a creative genius like Tom Read could have developed, and given it a new name and made yourself a teacher of it.
There are a number of people who have undergone strenuous and lengthy instruction in Tom's Bo style. They have been granted rank. We have one certified teacher up here in Seattle at Two Cranes Aikido. For whatever reason Tom Read Sensei chose not to give you rank and you did not receive permission to teach what you were shown. Doing so under another name, as if you developed the style yourself is simply an end run around a systematic teacher certification process which Tom designed to ensure proper transmission of both the technique and underlying spiritual foundation which is central to practice of Aikibojitsu.
As the English would say, "bad form". Since you have now set yourself up in the public arena, I think people should know what you have done and decide for themselves. If they think what you are showing has merit, I would advise them to go to the source because I guarantee that anyone else's imitation of his lifetime's work will only be an ersatz version, lacking in the real depth of Tom's conception.