Quote:
Ludwig Neveu wrote:
I think he exposed a little of his praying routines in a text titled Accord with the totality of the Universe (Aikidojournal aritcle). And Hikitsuchi sensei definitely stated that chinkonkishin no ho ( http://www.cs.ualberta.ca/~mckellar/aiki/1999/0.html ) was transmitted to him by O Sensei and was a daily practice of his. |
Great source. It may be interesting to compare among readers here which portions (if any) they do as a part of their practice.
As to the quoted source I will excerpt the synopsis here for that purpose (for more detail go to Ludwig's link, and thanks to the translators, Ward Rafferty and assistants.)
# 1. (not titled) but seems to describe what we have been told to call chi no kokyu and ten no kokyu.
#2. Shinkokyu
#3. Torifune (Left)
#4 Furitama (with what seems to be an intent to focus on TEN no kokyu)
#5 Torifune (Right)
#6 Furitama(with what seems to be an intent to focus on CHI no kokyu)
#7 Torifune (left)
#8 Furitama (we focus on the "center" which happens to = Minakanushi no kami)
#9 repeat #1 (ten/chi no kokyu)
When I began in Aikido in 1984/1985, I recall Dennis Hooker was teaching us the movements of 1-9, in sequences, although I did not remember (or at the time failed to perceive the fact of) them being in a defined sequence. I know we did the basic thigns decribed at various times and in conjunction with one another. That was where I learned them. We often did sequences in smaller parts than that shown nor did single parts in isolation. We did not (and do not) do a lot of the claps and very few kotodama, other than "Eii" and "Sa" (sometimes Eii/Ho if I remember correctly) while doing torifune, though now it ispretty much exclusively "Eii/Sa," at least when we do it.
While I was wandering the world, Frank Calhoun continued the above practice in those variations in the dojo here after Hooker went south, and Calhoun Sensei still does and encourages other instructors under him to do so. And we continue it today as a regular practice, particularly the individual exercises in isolation or as correctives (although not in every practice). In conjunction we also do a number of the other kokyu undo. We think we also did a form of what (for lack of a better word) I'll describe as a ten-chi sort of shikko squat and rise, (which I may have picked up elsewhere than with Hooker Sensei, but I cannot really recall now), but I am the only one who really does that the same way these days and others do something similar but not quite the same as I learned it
We are somewhat provincial geographically, and not large, but we keep it up. We (the regular instructors) do routinely try relate the principles of those movements to the errors we see in practice (as well as our own when we catch them). We often do the the movements to which those errors relate as correctives -- which, not surprisingly, tends to correct most of the errors.
Go figure.
I wonder what the experience of others is in this light.