Quote:
George S. Ledyard wrote:
You are absolutely right that it's ridiculous that most folks doing Aikido can't even tell you what Aiki is much less do their technique with aiki. I'm still looking at the various people whom I believe have the goods and trying to see what they have in common. You seem to have a very detailed descriptive set of terminology to outline the various elements of ki, internal power, aiki etc. I haven't directly encountered anyone in Aikido who has that.
|
There is a reason for this. In Chinese thought underlying the aspects of Ki we address, yin knowledge and yang knowledge are understood in certain ways. In our culture, our most powerful yang knowledge is (for lack of a better summary) -- rocket science -- the hard sciences are the yang aspects of what we know. For most people, they read what is written and hear what is said about aiki in traditional terms and it sounds very yin in our terminology. So they end up applying it that way, Of course it isn't: it is balanced knowledge, in-yo ho. And because it does not key into our quintessential yang sensibilities -- voila -- you get oodles of aiki-bunnies.
So, to avoid that problem, either one gets to the point of having a sufficiently in-depth knowledge of Eastern culture so as to be able to see the yang knowledge in balance with the yin knowledge, sans the Western cultural bias, or we find a way to transmute portions of the knowledge into Western hard science terms, making the yang aspects explicit in our terms.
Mike has done the former, it appears, and bully for him. I did my undergraduate thesis on Wang Yang-ming. So I see the value in that. It is not really approachable for most people since they have no foundaiton to work from. That is a problem.
The only other yang mode apart from hard science in our culture is the competitive one, which judo and jujitsu have adopted to great effect. Mike's approach does not lead there, Dan's I am not so sure, and Rob's is unclear in that regard. But some strains of thought in this debate do tend that way. That is fraught with problems, or so says the Founder, and I tend to agree. So that really leaves only the other two as working options. I am pursuing the latter.
Quote:
George S. Ledyard wrote:
And maybe then it won't take 25 years for someone to start having a clue.
|
Or, maybe it will simply take that amount of time, no matter what one does ...
Quote:
|
Sagawa: 'Clear Power' wrote:
...Even if you train everyday all the while innovating yourself, it will take at least 20 years. Ten years or so isn't nearly enough time. Your body has to truly be ready; otherwise no matter what you do you won't be able to do "Aiki."
...
|