Dan Harden - Orange County March 1-3rd

Folks
With consideration for late interest the Dan Harden is up for doing this seminar at Orange County Aiki Kai the first weekend of March. To make it happen you need to register within the next 6 days, by Wednesday, to allow for scheduling. This will be Dan's 4th visit to Orange County. Registration process is below.
Thanks
Gary

Registration process:
Please register directly with Dan Harden and dojoseminars@gmail.com
The seminar will be $180 for the weekend.
Payments are to PayPal homeoffice@charter.net
Please note for which seminar you are paying (date and location)
Registration and Payments are required in advance unless you have spoken to Dan directly

Gary Welborn wrote: Folks With consideration for late interest the Dan Harden is up for doing this seminar at Orange County Aiki Kai the first weekend of March. To make it happen you need to register within the next 6 days, by Wednesday, to allow for scheduling. This will be Dan's 4th visit to Orange County. Registration process is below. Thanks Gary Registration process: Please register directly with Dan Harden and dojoseminars@gmail.com The seminar will be $180 for the weekend. Payments are to PayPal homeoffice@charter.net Please note for which seminar you are paying (date and location) Registration and Payments are required in advance unless you have spoken to Dan directly

Folks
This one appears to be a go....if you want to be included please go in and register now. There will be a broad spectrum to folks in for this one...makes for good conversation and cross talk.
Gary
Thanks

Already sent in mine. I'm going to possibly bring one or two (or maybe more) new guys. Changing minds one at a time.

Gary, on a side-note, I need to give you a call. Been away, destroyed my cell phone, got a new one but then got busy with some serious family issues the last month. Got your number and will call tomorrow once I get the kid to school and deal with a customer in the morning.

Count me in!

Gary Welborn wrote: Folks This one appears to be a go....if you want to be included please go in and register now. There will be a broad spectrum to folks in for this one...makes for good conversation and cross talk. Gary Thanks

Folks
The Saturday and Sunday schedule is 10 to 6 with time off for lunch (or good behavior). Location is below:

Location:

Orange County Aiki Kai
2525 N Grand Avenue, Suite Z
Santa Ana, CA 92705
(714) 997-4861

A map can be found at this url: http://www.ocaikido.com/contact/

Friday evening schedule is 6:30 to 9 and is for folks who have trained with Dan before or have confirmed with Dan.

Location is below:

TIC (Long BeachCenter)
1775 Bellflower Blvd
Long Beach, CA 90815
562 498 9211

TIC is a small non-denominational church were we have friends who will let us use their space. We should be there by 6:15 and could then be reached at the TIC number.

The location is about 4 signal lights south of the San Diego freeway on Bellflower Blvd toward the beach. From PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) it is north past the Vets Hospital, past Long Beach State and across from the Y.

Thanks
Gary

Missed it again Gary ;( though I am going to meet Rob Liberti for the first time at a seminar in Santa Barbara.

William Hazen

"Veni, vidi, vici!"

Hmmm, no, not really that last one... Um well, ...

"Veni, Vidi, ..."

and then what's latin "I hurt myself"?

Thank goodness for Alleve. My dainty frame is just too delicate for that many hours...

Had fun as usual. Learned more and hopefully sucked less. Even brought a few folk with me (yeah, I'm coming out of the aiki closet more and more). Will bring more in the future. Slowly trying to spread the infection, but only among a few who are interested. So the rest are safe in their comfy hakama from the insidious evil that is whatever the hell it was we were doing.

Seriously, I had fun. Learned a lot. Thanks to Dan for obvious reasons, but also a big thanks to Gary for making it happen. Fun also to work with the guys from the Chinese persuasion as well as the folk from some other groups. Warms the heart to see so many folk from so many different areas comparing notes but more importantly, so many people trying to demonstrate what they've got (or haven't got). It is humbling for me each time to see just how far I have to go.

Keith Larman wrote: "Veni, vidi, vici!" Hmmm, no, not really that last one... Um well, ... "Veni, Vidi, ..." and then what's latin "I hurt myself"? Thank goodness for Alleve. My dainty frame is just too delicate for that many hours... Had fun as usual. Learned more and hopefully sucked less. Even brought a few folk with me (yeah, I'm coming out of the aiki closet more and more). Will bring more in the future. Slowly trying to spread the infection, but only among a few who are interested. So the rest are safe in their comfy hakama from the insidious evil that is whatever the hell it was we were doing. Seriously, I had fun. Learned a lot. Thanks to Dan for obvious reasons, but also a big thanks to Gary for making it happen. Fun also to work with the guys from the Chinese persuasion as well as the folk from some other groups. Warms the heart to see so many folk from so many different areas comparing notes but more importantly, so many people trying to demonstrate what they've got (or haven't got). It is humbling for me each time to see just how far I have to go.

It was a fun mix....Aikido folks, Aikijutsu folks and folks from one of the Chinese internal arts. Everyone played together well. Tiring and all, overwhelming at times in the shear amount to information passed along......at the realizations of gaps and holes in ones understanding on how the body connects within itself, how to use the body as a whole and how soft compelling power is generated and used......... and we are only talking about three days of lower level body related practice, both solo and paired that is paradigm shifting.....and needs to be felt.

I want to make it real clear that the basis for what we were training......the practice..... is not Dan's and is centuries old in Japan and thousands of years old coming up through China. Dan was very clear that it was not about him....... One of the Chinese practitioners, who have trained with a number of high level Chinese in China, mentioned at the end of the seminar that the weekend provided an opportunity to touch, feel, sense and taste moments of very high level stuff. To be in it for a moment..... Then come back to the reality that the steps leading to those higher levels are there to be taken....if you put in the time and the effort. Again not Dan's stuff, rather the practice that has been around for seemingly for ever without us knowing it.

Enough said on this.....we will continue down this path..... if you take a step on to it...you can step back off with nothing gained and nothing lost...if you travel a short way down the path you just can't just quite and be honest about it.

Fish or cut bait.......

Have a great day......
Gary

Keith Larman wrote: "Veni, vidi, vici!" Hmmm, no, not really that last one... Um well, ... "Veni, Vidi, ..." and then what's latin "I hurt myself"? Thank goodness for Alleve. My dainty frame is just too delicate for that many hours... Had fun as usual. Learned more and hopefully sucked less. Even brought a few folk with me (yeah, I'm coming out of the aiki closet more and more). Will bring more in the future. Slowly trying to spread the infection, but only among a few who are interested. So the rest are safe in their comfy hakama from the insidious evil that is whatever the hell it was we were doing. Seriously, I had fun. Learned a lot. Thanks to Dan for obvious reasons, but also a big thanks to Gary for making it happen. Fun also to work with the guys from the Chinese persuasion as well as the folk from some other groups. Warms the heart to see so many folk from so many different areas comparing notes but more importantly, so many people trying to demonstrate what they've got (or haven't got). It is humbling for me each time to see just how far I have to go.

It was a fun mix....Aikido folks, Aikijutsu folks and folks from one of the Chinese internal arts. Everyone played together well. Tiring and all, overwhelming at times in the shear amount to information passed along......at the realizations of gaps and holes in ones understanding on how the body connects within itself, how to use the body as a whole and how soft compelling power is generated and used......... and we are only talking about three days of lower level body related practice, both solo and paired that is paradigm shifting.....and needs to be felt.

I want to make it real clear that the basis for what we were training......the practice..... is not Dan's and is centuries old in Japan and thousands of years old coming up through China. Dan was very clear that it was not about him....... One of the Chinese practitioners, who have trained with a number of high level Chinese in China, mentioned at the end of the seminar that the weekend provided an opportunity to touch, feel, sense and taste moments of very high level stuff. To be in it for a moment..... Then come back to the reality that the steps leading to those higher levels are there to be taken....if you put in the time and the effort. Again not Dan's stuff, rather the practice that has been around for seemingly for ever without us knowing it.

Enough said on this.....we will continue down this path..... if you take a step on to it...you can step back off with nothing gained and nothing lost...if you travel a short way down the path you just can't just quite and be honest about it.

Fish or cut bait.......

Have a great day......
Gary

Gary Welborn wrote: ... we will continue down this path..... if you take a step on to it...you can step back off with nothing gained and nothing lost...if you travel a short way down the path you just can't just quite and be honest about it. Fish or cut bait....... Have a great day...... Gary

But it is *sooo* much easier to just pontificate on-line without actually having to get on the mat and possibly, heaven forbid, actually do it, don't cha know...

I have never understood why so many seem to think it is a spectator sport... Watch, comment from afar, but never, ever leave that comfy safe place...

But... On a more positive note, I agree completely with Gary. Get out, see people, see some of these guys that folk talk about. Just one session. You don't like it, nothing lost and you can honestly say you tried it and it wasn't for you. If you do find something that resonates, however, won't you regret not having done it sooner? I've been to a lot of seminars. Some great, some horrible, and then everything in between. But I don't really regret any of them. Some just convinced me "that's not for me". Others, however, opened up massive doors to entirely new domains.

Later. Got some things to work on... Less chat, more mat...

I haven't been postin' much here lately, but I was thinking about this last night and thought I should drop another note in here, just as a gigantic fwiw.

I took a couple friends of mine to the seminar. Both somewhat new to this stuff (apart from the small bit I had tried to share with them prior). So for both it was a first exposure to Dan, a first doing stuff with folk "outside" our normal group, etc. One guy, well, I forget his rank (I really should know that) but he's been yudansha for a while now. The other is not quite yudansha yet, but on his way. I was curious to see how they both would do, how they would react, and what they'd say later.

We all car pooled because it was a longer drive. On the way home they both commented on being overwhelmed. They both commented about how much sense it all made and how, well, obvious it is that this stuff has value. I think the best comment I heard was that it was like being handed another toolbox, a big one, one full of new tools and new things to do. The only problem was that the toolbox is heavy and requires a lot lugging around daily to get anywhere with it. But they saw absolutely nothing in conflict with the Aikido they've learned. No, it's not the same descriptions, but it's not like it isn't consistent. If anything it is simply more expansive, larger, more defining, etc. Like suddenly being given more context and a wider field of view so much more comes in to focus. But then you are hit with the realization that none of that makes the work to follow any easier. It just makes it clearer where the path lies ahead.

Both men have asked me to get together again on our own to work on what we all remembered from the seminar. Both have asked me to make sure I let them know the next time Dan comes to down. And now I have a few other people in mind locally to bring along next time as well.

And the contagion spreads...

There was no need to debate anything. What remained were simply questions of how to do things, how to improve, how to fix things, and how to train more.

This is a reaction I get to some seminars I attend with some folk within or when I see folk outside my group. Sometimes things at seminars resonate and so many other doors open as a result. Sometimes they're simply small bits of enlightenment, small bits of realization, small expansions of understanding. Sometimes the changes are more like tectonic shifts. And sometimes nothing at all. In the end none of us felt we had to toss anything away. If anything we all felt well served by our training and realized we were given a gift of a vastly larger toolbox with which to continue. Yeah, maybe as Ellis says it will be done quietly while training, simply working on those things we've been given, allowing it to expand our understanding. And sometimes I work on ways to bring more of this stuff to our formal training.

So a thanks again for a fantastic seminar. As I said... the contagion continues to spread...

Keith Larman wrote: ... the contagion continues to spread...

Good. The SGV has a lot of potential as a Petri dish.