12/4/09 f [2s, 18n]
I Class size increasing, couple of new people. I'd promised people we would do some chair aikido, so we did chair aikido. Generally people like doing these moves, although there are always 2 - 3 who still don't participate. We started off with ikyo and nikyo from "ai hanmi", i.e., same side grab. I asked people if it made any difference if they took a centering breath on beginning the move and if bringing uke's hand fully into their center. The response was, and this is a direct, multiple quote, "Oh, wow, much better."
One of the guys asked what technique would I use with a cross handed grab, "Gyaku Hanmi. I said I didn't know, as I was sort of inventing chair aikido as we went. But if we relied on the 5 aspects, we would undoubtably figure something out. I then told them to work with their partner and try and discover techniques. Of course, they came up with a number of techniques, several of which were quite good. If I have a good group, I might do this again, i.e., have them try to develop variations of basic techniques.
NOTE:
I have to see if it might be possible to video some classes. Given confidentiality issues it might not be allowed.
(Original blog post may be found
here.)