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Old 04-09-2012, 03:15 PM   #229
DH
Join Date: Aug 2005
Posts: 3,394
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Re: The Founder's Teaching Ability

Too much interesting stuff to respond to and not enough time. I don't know why I was brought into the discussion but.....

Overall I agree with the idea that it isn't always the teacher. I do not agree with the stress placed on failure being so much the fault of the student though. It is a good point, but there needs to be a balance in the discussion. Of course the students need to do the work. In stressing (maybe intentionally OVER stressing to balance the discussion?) the students lack- it diminishes the need or value of good information. We are talking about a series of some pretty significant people coming out of Takeda's line. And going back and looking at his eimoroku-they were the ones attending more. Were -they-the small minority being actually taught the truth as DR's dogma espouses?
In other words what if it was only partly to do with them, the other part being..they were given useful information by a teacher-Takeda.

Bit of an interlude here.
I have never agreed with the idea that big guns got it from steal this technique. Why? Simple I saw, witnessed and trained in real information across two cultures? I didn't steal a thing. I was told. And I watched a Japanese teacher tell me about solo training drills, and a totally different way to look at the body, breath power and how to do it...etc. and not others....over and over. So at least ...I...knew that there was real information to be had that was being kept back. Now consider, what happened to everyone else in that room? They went on to be seniors, And I don't know of one of them who would compare with the few given the better information. Yet every one of them would tell you "You had to steal the technique and there was no explicate teaching like that."
Where does that leave us in reviewing and vetting my statement as true or bullshit? I say there was and is real information to be given. What do we know to vet that statement-testimony of others

What did Tokimune tell Stanley?
"We were told to teach only one or two people the real art." I watched it happen in front of my face.

Sagawa
What did we find out about Sagawa, years later?
What did Sagawa say as well? "We were told to teach only one or two people the real art."
He admitted in his 90's that he got his aiki from solo training. What did he say about that?
That in 60 years......he never taught it!
He revealed that Takeda told him not to talk about it (meaning Takeda did it and showed him the model)
He admitted that he never taught anyone till near the end of his career.
He also said never teach white people
As an aside have you ever met a grandmaster level Internal artist who was NOT Asian????
Any of this sound familiar enough to vet my statement?

Tokimune
Shihan of the Takumakai goes to Tokimune to get aiki
What does Tokimune teach him? Solo training drills and paired forms
Later he tells that same shihan that his people don't do them, interestingly enough the Shihan can't get the Takumaki people to do them either.
Tokimune stated he never taught any of his students.....who supported him for decades...he only taught Kondo.
Any of that sound familiar enough to vet my statement?

Okomoto
Okomoto has drills that only a very few people have seen. I was floored at what they were composed of. One of which is a modification of my and Arkuzawa's push out drill. Surprise.

Shirata
Stunning collection of power building exercises and winding-more akin to Chinese work. Where did he get it? Ueshiba.
More real information that was not stolen...it was taught. Yet...with Shirata, it was NOT given to his supposed big shot deshi, but oddly revealed to other lessor lights. When Shirata tried to give it to the post war deshi...what do we know. It was banned by Doshu!
More real informations, kept hidden.
What do you think is happening with that training now? It is being trained again and here we have modern students improving at a much faster rate than their other studies because of Shirata's legacy. I will be the first to say those students didn't really understand the depth of it, but that didn't change what Shirata's work was and what it was intended to do, did it? It was -real information.

I am making a stand that there was and is real information that could have been given out and it was not. It was and is being held back on purpose and given to just a few. The hold back is happening in a big way in China-right now.

Last point
3. I do NOT agree with Ellis's comment that even if there were better teaching it wouldn't help much and the results would more or less be the same. I not only do not agree I have and will continue to put up or shut up several people who have trained under me. Their power and skill is demonstrable and has been shown to hundreds of teachers all over the states in various levels depending on their time in
Here is the key point.
*Having been given real information, they and others are progressing, and I have yet to meet any Shihan who can duplicate the teaching model or the results.

Which, now reveals that the statement I made here in 2006 "Give me five people and I will train them for five years. I will then put them up against people who have trained with top Japanese Shihan for twenty years....." Has proven true.
What made the difference? The quality of real information that made the giants in budo...giants in the first place.

Most people in budo will never get the heart of Budo, and it is not all their fault. It was in large part, teachers not teaching. There was real information withheld and/ or with a poor teaching model and/ or a language barrier, that greatly hampered any real progress in aiki. The quality of that particular information I am discussing has a pedagogy then and now of changing people and in a far more consistent way than anything I have ever seen coming out of the popular model in Traditional Martial Arts.

I will be more than happy to review this issue again in another five years. From Hobbyist to professional there are very serious people training this and showing that it is in fact the quality of information offered them that made a difference in their expression of their art.

Last edited by DH : 04-09-2012 at 03:21 PM.
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