Thread: Ueshiba's Aiki
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Old 10-23-2011, 06:28 AM   #34
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Re: Ueshiba's Aiki

Quote:
Michael Varin wrote: View Post
Mark,

So aiki is not martial? Or just not complete? But it is what set Ueshiba apart from other martial artists, correct? Can you expand on this?

Is aiki peculiar to martial arts, or can aiki be expressed in activities other than martial arts? If so, how does it fit in? How would it be trained?

Good luck with your book, by the way!
Aiki doesn't have to be martial, no. Aiki changes the body.

Sagawa (I think): Aiki is a body changing methodology.
Takeda's Daito ryu broken down into three: jujutsu, aikijujutsu, and aiki no jujutsu
Sagawa's father (after learning jujutsu) to Takeda: I want to learn aiki.
Mrs Horikawa: You steal it by watching the body
Ueshiba: You can't do what I do because you don't understand in/yo (not that you don't undestand enough techniques, i.e. jujutsu)

Etc, etc.

Once the body is changed, it naturally affects whatever that person chooses to do. Mifune in judo, Sagawa in Daito ryu, Ueshiba in aikido, Yoshida Kotaro in Yanagi ryu, Hong Junshen in Chen taiji, etc.

Why is it that Ueshiba gave rank to a dancer? Ueshiba saw *something* in that dancer that he believed was fundamental to his aikido. Yet the dancer was not a martial artist.

From what I understand, not all the great Chen style grand masters used what they knew for fighting.

To be good at judo, you have to train judo. To be good at fighting, you have to train fighting. Etc. So, while aiki can be made to change the body into a more effective, martial body, that still leaves training a martial system. How? Good luck with that one. Not being snide, or derogatory here, but being serious. Training aiki changes how the body works, so that it doesn't function "normally". If you're training most martial arts, you're learning how to make your body move and function "normally". By "normally", I mean how 95% of the rest of the world moves and functions. How do you merge the two if they are different training methodologies?

Some systems are somewhat compatible by their very nature: aikido, daito ryu, taiji, koryu. However, that doesn't mean it's 100%. Enough changes through history and you start to get removed from internal skills. Outward, physical jujutsu type movement is replaced to make up for lack of internally driven movement/functionality. And there are internal skills that have to be explicitly shown. Internal structure can sometimes be forced to be built in a body by training certain forms, but other internal attributes must be shown and trained specifically.

Aiki is what made Ueshiba great. But he used his aiki body in Daito ryu jujutsu, in weapons (of various sorts), in misogi, in farming, etc.

Thanks for the good wishes on my book. Appreciate it!

Mark