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08-13-2014, 10:12 AM
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#201
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 1,318
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
FWIW, I know several fairly senior aikido teachers who've spent a lot of time working on Dan's stuff. I don't know what's going on inside their heads, but the observable results seem like they've found a way to integrate bits and pieces that have been there all along. Something like what happens in the sciences when you develop (or learn about) a theoretical basis to go with your experimental phenomenology.
Much of what he's doing *is* already there in aikido. The people who say "we already do that" are not wrong. It's just that, in many cases, you have the exercises without an explanation for why they are important or how they should be done. Or you have teaching visualizations without an understanding of what body structures they are intended to produce. Or you have people who can personally do some impressive things, but haven't been able to transmit the skills to their own students.
Dan's great contribution to the aikido community, IMO, has been vocabulary and teaching methodology more than specific skills. He's American. He speaks clear, unambiguous English and is able to describe exactly what he's doing in a way that other Americans can understand, emulate, and build on.
Katherine
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08-13-2014, 11:38 AM
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#202
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Dojo: AIA, Los Angeles, CA
Location: California
Join Date: Apr 2005
Posts: 1,604
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Katherine:
Ah, yup.
In my case I can still feel the eye rolls of people from years ago, some I even shared in this thread. But I can say that as someone who teaches a bit himself I also feel the frustration of not being able to teach someone something I can feel in my body, something I can do, something I can repeat, but for whatever reason they just can't get it. And I feel a failure as a teacher when that happens. Part of me says "well, spend a whole lot of years practicing and maybe you'll get it -- you have to invest the sweat equity." But I often think that's really a cop out and an admission that we don't understand it, no matter how flowery and mystical it all sounds when we pontificate about this stuff.
I know and have trained with a number of folk who seem to enjoy the mystical aspect. They'll blather on about some verity or profundity, demonstrate something, then without anything approaching a roadmap for how to accomplish this feat they have everyone practice. Then they clap dramatically, sigh at the obviously dense students gathered at their feet, demonstrate it again on their compliant uke, and with nothing more than additional bumper sticker level Kwai Chang Cain pithy statement they send you off to fail again. So maybe it really is for the better that more and more people are saying "Hold on, wait a minute..." and refusing to accept that as the status quo.
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08-15-2014, 11:21 AM
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#203
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
Location: West Florida
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,619
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Keith Larman wrote:
... I also feel the frustration of not being able to teach someone something I can feel in my body, something I can do, something I can repeat, but for whatever reason they just can't get it. And I feel a failure as a teacher when that happens. Part of me says "well, spend a whole lot of years practicing and maybe you'll get it -- you have to invest the sweat equity." But I often think that's really a cop out and an admission that we don't understand it, no matter how flowery and mystical it all sounds when we pontificate about this stuff.
I know and have trained with a number of folk who seem to enjoy the mystical aspect. They'll blather on about some verity or profundity, demonstrate something, then without anything approaching a roadmap for how to accomplish this feat they have everyone practice. Then they clap dramatically, sigh at the obviously dense students gathered at their feet, demonstrate it again on their compliant uke, and with nothing more than additional bumper sticker level Kwai Chang Cain pithy statement they send you off to fail again. So maybe it really is for the better that more and more people are saying "Hold on, wait a minute..." and refusing to accept that as the status quo.
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I have come to wonder whether the "you must steal my technique" approach was developed as a (not atypically Japanese) face-saving maneuver -- resulting from this very same inadequacy of the traditionally available means of objective explanation and correction. It alone may explain the now well-recognized problem in transmission -- even in the first generation.
Last edited by Erick Mead : 08-15-2014 at 11:33 AM.
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Cordially,
Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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08-15-2014, 02:21 PM
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#204
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Dojo: Hildesheimer Aikido Verein
Location: Hildesheim
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 932
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Erick Mead wrote:
I have come to wonder whether the "you must steal my technique" approach was developed as a (not atypically Japanese) face-saving maneuver -- resulting from this very same inadequacy of the traditionally available means of objective explanation and correction.
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Maybe true in some cases, but not in general, I think.
Both my direct teacher aswell as Endō sensei are able to very clearly explain and teach - after you have stolen ...
Having to steal is a didactical device here.
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08-15-2014, 02:57 PM
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#205
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Dojo: Shodokan Honbu (Osaka)
Location: Himeji, Japan
Join Date: Mar 2001
Posts: 3,319
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Carsten Möllering wrote:
Maybe true in some cases, but not in general, I think.
Both my direct teacher aswell as Endō sensei are able to very clearly explain and teach - after you have stolen ...
Having to steal is a didactical device here.
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I always understood stealing of technique to mean pay attention in class. Observation is key.
Does not matter how clear the explanation - you still have to watch carefully.
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08-16-2014, 01:35 AM
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#206
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Dojo: Hildesheimer Aikido Verein
Location: Hildesheim
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 932
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Peter Rehse wrote:
I always understood stealing of technique to mean pay attention in class. Observation is key.
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Yes, observation, but it's still more feeling in our context. Watching is essential, but most things can not be seen with the eyes. For they don't happen on the surface but inside tori. So they have to be felt.
At least, that's the way how I experience it with Endō sensei and with the students of his when they teach. Endō sensei uses to go around during seminars and he tries to let everybody feel his technique, feel his body.
Anyway, you have to stea,l be it with your eyes or your feeling. That's how it starts.
When it becomes apparent that you got something, found out something, felt or saw something and you bring it up or show it - then you get correction, explanation, instruction ...
That's what I tried to say: You are taught the things which you stole, after you stole them.
So there is no contradiction between you and me, I think?
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08-16-2014, 05:23 AM
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#207
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Location: Brisbane
Join Date: Nov 2009
Posts: 33
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
From my experience 'stealing' the technique refers to a few things;
1- You have to question your teacher. If you don't ask the right questions you wont be able to understand.
2- There are two types of Daito Ryu, one in the dojo, and another one no one can teach you. You have to pay attention to everything, it is all training.
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08-16-2014, 09:33 AM
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#208
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Dojo: Sakumeikan N.E. Aikkai .Newcastle upon Tyne.
Location: Newcastle upon Tyne
Join Date: Jan 2008
Posts: 1,266
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Mary Eastland wrote:
There is also the point that some people are looking for other than what they have because something is missing. An assumption is made that if it is missing from student A then Student B from another dojo must be missing it it too because it is Aikido after all.
As we see on this forum, Aikido means different things to different people. If ki is missing from your training and tradition it does not mean it is missing from say from say, Joe Curran's aikido. He does not seem to be looking for anything other than what he has. I bet he is as centered and as strong as a Mack Truck.
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Dear Mary,
First let me say I am not familiar with a Mack truck. As a mature guy I am not a strong as I was in my early thirties.You are quite right I do not look for magic stuff.All I try to do is work with what I have to the best of my ability.I do feel that one has to follow the maxim 'Maximum effect /Minimum effort'. I must say that I try to build my personal aikido using as a guidIeline all the information that I have accumulated from my teacher and other teachers.No more no less.
If other people feel a need to try other methods of training and are happy to do so and get results, that is great.
Anyway, thanks for your blog.As always I hope you are well, Best Regards, Joe.
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08-16-2014, 01:21 PM
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#209
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Dojo: Berkshire Hills Aikido
Location: Massachusetts
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 824
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Joe Curran wrote:
First let me say I am not familiar with a Mack truck.
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Here ya go Joe. Happy motoring!
Ron
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08-16-2014, 02:15 PM
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#210
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Dojo: Sakumeikan N.E. Aikkai .Newcastle upon Tyne.
Location: Newcastle upon Tyne
Join Date: Jan 2008
Posts: 1,266
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Ron Ragusa wrote:
Here ya go Joe. Happy motoring!
Ron
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Dear Ron,
Thanks Ron, the truck sure looks solid.Visited Syracuse many years ago, spent the night in a Truck Stop haven, All the truck drivers looked like cowboys, stetsons etc. Their rigs were enormous.My wife , young son and myself had the largest plate of food we ever ate.i have never forgotten this experience, Thanks Ron, brings back memories of past good times.Hope you are wel, Cheers, Joe.
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08-19-2014, 01:33 PM
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#211
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
Location: West Florida
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,619
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Carsten Möllering wrote:
Maybe true in some cases, but not in general, I think.
Both my direct teacher aswell as Endō sensei are able to very clearly explain and teach - after you have stolen ...
Having to steal is a didactical device here.
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I do not doubt that, in general -- the pedagogical method has a far longer history. But its application to this topic, both in Aikido and in DTR, is -- interesting... It speaks of a failure of concept -- in different ways in both lineages -- and only a narrow group that were predisposed to be able to "get it" without any such conceptual grasp or guidance. Admirable in achievement -- but also self-limiting ...
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Cordially,
Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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08-19-2014, 01:39 PM
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#212
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
Location: West Florida
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,619
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Joe Curran wrote:
Dear Ron,
Thanks Ron, the truck sure looks solid.Visited Syracuse many years ago, spent the night in a Truck Stop haven, All the truck drivers looked like cowboys, stetsons etc. Their rigs were enormous.My wife , young son and myself had the largest plate of food we ever ate.i have never forgotten this experience, Thanks Ron, brings back memories of past good times.Hope you are wel, Cheers, Joe.
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It is always interesting to see the plain, ordinary, overlooked commonplaces of your own experience, as experienced by an outsider.
There is much similarly to be said about the "outsider" perspective on this subject matter, as well, and on many perspectives, I find.
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Cordially,
Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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08-21-2014, 05:13 AM
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#213
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Dojo: london
Location: london
Join Date: Aug 2014
Posts: 1
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
observation on this thread.
one poster's response to comments from Erick
Quote:
Ah ha heh ha*cough cough* ow hah....
Oh man, sorry. Ahem!. <popping the spinal reflexes> AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!
Yeah no that ain't it.
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I concur.
one poster's response to comments from Mary
Quote:
Just to be clear, you're talking about George here, yes?
Best,
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you did not respond Mary.
My comment is that the skills of the 'confident' individuals may be viewed on youtube and quite simply
they are not doing what is being discussed here. - whatever they think.
Of course anyone is free to pursue an 'aikido' of their own choosing but please do not mistake it for the
genuine article. Not all aikidos are created equal.
A key thought in my mind is always
' what skills were being demonstrated by O'Sensei that would attract high-level martial artists from other fields' ?
How many 4th Dan Karatekas or Judokas have you attracted to your aikido?!
"It had to be felt" means everything. Feel it and you will laugh and scratch your head...
and you will know that is what you want !
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08-21-2014, 10:32 AM
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#214
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Location: Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,276
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Nick Belshaw wrote:
Of course anyone is free to pursue an 'aikido' of their own choosing but please do not mistake it for the
genuine article. Not all aikidos are created equal.
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Well these new blendings of Chinese martial arts with Daito ryu teachings are certainly exciting a lot of people, so I don't think people should get hung up on whether its "the genuine article" or not.
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08-21-2014, 10:40 AM
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#215
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 1,318
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote:
Well these new blendings of Chinese martial arts with Daito ryu teachings are certainly exciting a lot of people, so I don't think people should get hung up on whether its "the genuine article" or not.
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Indeed. Even O Sensei's direct students can't agree on what "the genuine article" even is.
Katherine
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08-21-2014, 11:24 AM
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#216
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Dojo: Aikido Sangenkai
Location: Honolulu, Hawaii
Join Date: Dec 2000
Posts: 3,313
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote:
Well these new blendings of Chinese martial arts with Daito ryu teachings are certainly exciting a lot of people, so I don't think people should get hung up on whether its "the genuine article" or not.
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I often make Chinese references, so did Morihei Ueshiba and Sokaku Takeda, there's nothing new about that. As for "blending" Chinese martial arts and Daito-ryu, that's just not happening (although you continue to allege it without ever having seen it firsthand). Dan does not do Chinese martial arts, Dan has never done Chinese martial arts, and, basically speaking, everything he does has direct roots in Japanese martial arts.
Best,
Chris
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08-21-2014, 12:37 PM
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#217
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Location: Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,276
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Christopher Li wrote:
I often make Chinese references, so did Morihei Ueshiba and Sokaku Takeda, there's nothing new about that. As for "blending" Chinese martial arts and Daito-ryu, that's just not happening (although you continue to allege it without ever having seen it firsthand). Dan does not do Chinese martial arts, Dan has never done Chinese martial arts, and, basically speaking, everything he does has direct roots in Japanese martial arts.
Best,
Chris
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As far as Dan goes, exactly. A lot of people are into it and you make it sound solidly...er, is disingenuous the opposite of genuine? (Okay, no, that's not the opposite of genuine.)
But there is certainly quite a bit of blending with Chinese martial arts going on these days. Akuzawa comes to mind, as well as Sugawara Sensei. There are a bunch of people around my neck of the woods who have cross-trained in Chinese martial arts directly too.
Last edited by Cliff Judge : 08-21-2014 at 12:51 PM.
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08-21-2014, 12:54 PM
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#218
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Location: Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,276
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
What I am getting at is there are a lot of options out there, you won't wind up with genuine aiki or even aikido but people really seem to enjoy these things.
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08-21-2014, 01:14 PM
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#219
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Dojo: Aikido Sangenkai
Location: Honolulu, Hawaii
Join Date: Dec 2000
Posts: 3,313
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote:
As far as Dan goes, exactly. A lot of people are into it and you make it sound solidly...er, is disingenuous the opposite of genuine? (Okay, no, that's not the opposite of genuine.)
But there is certainly quite a bit of blending with Chinese martial arts going on these days. Akuzawa comes to mind, as well as Sugawara Sensei. There are a bunch of people around my neck of the woods who have cross-trained in Chinese martial arts directly too.
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I'm having a hard time figuring out what you're trying to say, but since neither Ark nor Sugawara are "blending" Daito-ryu with anything (nor do they say that they are) I guess we can figure out who you were talking about in the original post.
Best,
Chris
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08-21-2014, 01:56 PM
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#220
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Location: Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,276
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Christopher Li wrote:
I'm having a hard time figuring out what you're trying to say, but since neither Ark nor Sugawara are "blending" Daito-ryu with anything (nor do they say that they are) I guess we can figure out who you were talking about in the original post.
Best,
Chris
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Do you have a problem with my use of the word blending? I don't get why you object to that term being used for teachers who have deep backgrounds in both Chinese martial arts and aiki arts. (Which is, I guess, just Sugawara and Akuzawa at this point in the conversation.)
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08-21-2014, 03:15 PM
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#221
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Dojo: Aikido Sangenkai
Location: Honolulu, Hawaii
Join Date: Dec 2000
Posts: 3,313
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote:
Do you have a problem with my use of the word blending? I don't get why you object to that term being used for teachers who have deep backgrounds in both Chinese martial arts and aiki arts. (Which is, I guess, just Sugawara and Akuzawa at this point in the conversation.)
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It wasn't the blending, it was the misrepresentation (not the first time) of what we're doing.
Ark, for that matter, has his primary influences in Japanese martial arts.
Best,
Chris
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08-22-2014, 01:26 AM
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#222
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Dojo: Southampton Aikikai
Location: Southampton
Join Date: Sep 2004
Posts: 401
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Nick Belshaw wrote:
"It had to be felt" means everything. Feel it and you will laugh and scratch your head...
and you will know that is what you want !
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Hi Nick,
Welcome to AikiWeb!
I agree mostly with what you say about "it has to be felt", but it still has its limitations. You can feel that what someone (I can make a guess as to who you are thinking of here!) is doing is out of the ordinary, and aspire to have similar skills, but it may well be that that person's teaching methodology - if that isn't too strong a description in some cases - is unlikely to get you there. There are some inspiring and skilful aikidoka out there who don't necessarily understand how they got their skills, or even really know how they do what they are doing now.
Alex
Last edited by Alex Megann : 08-22-2014 at 01:32 AM.
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08-22-2014, 07:35 AM
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#223
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Location: Kawasaki, Kanagawa
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,276
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Christopher Li wrote:
It wasn't the blending, it was the misrepresentation (not the first time) of what we're doing.
Ark, for that matter, has his primary influences in Japanese martial arts.
Best,
Chris
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I am not really sure what you mean by misrepresenting. I think it is laudable for a martial artist to cross-train in multiple systems, and synthesis of the different skills is simply something that happens.
The fact that your teacher has never received Chinese martial arts instruction is certainly news to me.
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08-24-2014, 05:26 PM
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#224
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
Location: West Florida
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,619
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
Quote:
Nick Belshaw wrote:
observation on this thread.
one poster's response to comments from Erick
I concur.
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Well, you see, when the level of technical deliberation remains stuck with objective concepts in Western terms that do not rise above " that" and " it" -- any conclusion on that point remains wholly in the eye of the beholder.
Since all human bodies work much the same, I feel privileged to assume that the bodies in question work in those ways and are not comic book superheroes, bewitched wights, nor yet space aliens in disguise.
But let us try to lay out what we agree or disagree about "it and "that", shall we?
1. I know that the man was not levered off the floor into the air -- and leaving aside Willy Wonka's Fizzy Lifting Drinks -- it is simply not physically possible. (I will refrain from giving the moment diagram)
2. Therefore, the man's body was MADE to launch itself, involuntarily by suddenly actuating its lower extremity extensor muscle groups.
3. What makes those actuate involuntarily ? (I give credit that there is no divebunnying occurring -- or is it "bunnyhopping" in this case? ).
4. Certain reflexive arcs in the body do that -- several of which are monosynaptic and occur subliminally to conscious kinesthetic awareness and voluntary motor control.
5. The timing of the spinal reflexes versus the voluntary motor arcs is off by an order of magnitude -- and the slower voluntary motor control here relies on forward model responses. Due to the slowness of conscious perception, the brain can suffer certain illusions of simultaneity, when resolving feed forward actions responding with resulting effects. Unless you unpack them analytically, what you think you "feel" about what happens and why can be, in part, made up of several white lies cooked up by your cerebellum and motor cortex.
6. What triggers those reflexive arcs?
7. Combinations of mechanical stresses applied to the muscle spindles and golgi tendon organs.
8. What can accentuate those reflexive actions ?
9. Certain upper limb contractions prepotentiate these sensory organs and can magnify lower body reflex arc responses (e.g. -- Jendrassik maneuver) We do it all the time with nikkyo and sankyo, and host of other applications of kokyu tanden ho. [Some thought has been given to this somewhat odd association being possibly holdover wiring from our ancestors' brachiation days, before proto-humans left the trees, FWIW.]
Given this set of observations, do you have some more fully considered thoughts on an alternative physiology or mechanisms that would cause someone to conclude that any of the above points may be in error?
I can assume, I hope, that they rise somewhat higher that "That ain't it" ?
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Cordially,
Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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08-25-2014, 03:26 AM
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#225
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Dojo: Shodokan Honbu (Osaka)
Location: Himeji, Japan
Join Date: Mar 2001
Posts: 3,319
Offline
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Re: Demonstrating aiki, demontrating aikido.Same thing ?
I think Erik's uber-technical description can be a bit off-putting but that's his kettle of fish to boil. I personally don't need the level of jargon to get where I want to go and I am pretty sure that's true for most of us.
BUT
"No that ain't it" just begs the question. "What is?".
From a physiological point of view (once you wade through the jargon) I don't think he is far off.
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