Quote:
Dan Harden wrote:
That makes sense Tom, truly. But... provided we leave out conclusions.
Dialoguing about those well known training models touches on triggers for many who have been asked for decades to believe and keep training and they will "get it," and then conversely being told they weren't thinking...all while having a verbal and physical dialogue with teachers who just could not, or would not.....teach.
Hence, some of the impatiance to just engage in even more dialogue with those who; - Don't have it
- Don't really know how to get it
- Doubt those who actually do...
- And want to dialogue with them about their own ideas that fail time and time again.
- Or tell them to go shout on a street corner for all they care.
For many here that sort of dialogue is BTDT. There is a growing group of Aikido teachers who are doing many of training models Ueshiba outlined. And...surprise surprise......it works in the real world. And up against that...their method?
Does not. 
Testing and conclusions is very dividing...hence people wanting to just dialogue...on the net.
Dan |
Dan,
I don't disagree with you here. I have mentioned Plato's allegory of the cave often enough. Some people are still in shackles in the dark, and only a few arrive in the light. Like O Sensei. The people in the dark will have a hard time accepting the person who has been in the light, they might even, as Plato puts it, ridicule or hurt him. And only slowly, maybe even only one at the time others will follow towards the light. While at the same time others still refuse to consider it.
In Plato's words the person who came to the light experienced episteme, reality or sophia, wisdom. While the others in the dark kept to their dogma (opinions).
It is not really possible to have a dialogue with someone who just holds on to opinions and refuses to be open minded to other possibilities.
So I can imagine a certain impatience with people that want to discuss about things that for you are already passed stations.
Perhaps I show the same impatience myself.
I have studied Buddhism and Taoism since a young age. It lead me towards Aikido and a study in philosophy at the university. When I started with Aikido many of the concepts were not new to me. But when I was confronted with O Sensei's words I had difficulty in understanding a lot of what he was saying. Fortunately I found a Shinto teacher who could explain the concepts. And I realized that Aikikai Aikido was only teaching basic techniques and not really or fully what O Sensei had been teaching. That started my search.
And I came across a lot of people in the Aikido world who did not understand or liked what I was looking for. And a few who were on the same search.
This was more then thirty years ago.
Imagine my surprise to come across your name here on Aikiweb and finding out that you were claiming to be the only one that had researched this and understood this.
Imagine my surprise to come across the website of Chris Li on the concepts of O Sensei - presenting this as if he had discovered something completely new.
Imagine my surprise when he, based on his fast expertise in the secrets of Aiki dismissed all the teachers that he had seen in Japan. Including the ones that could have told him more about O Sensei and could have introduced him to places and people that were so familiar to O Sensei. It would have clarified a lot for him as it has done for me.
Imagine my surprise when it appeared shear impossible to have a dialogue with him, and seeing him dismiss every thinkable argument without giving a valid counter argument.
While I agree that it is not always possible to have a real dialogue with opinionated people I do also think that we should make an effort to genuinely communicate.
In fact, if someone really understands Aiki, then noblesse oblige, that person has even a bigger responsibility to communicate. You do realize that the word dialogue has the same meaning as Aiki?
Greetings from the Auvergne,
Tom