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Old 10-23-2013, 08:10 AM   #176
Demetrio Cereijo
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Hugh Beyer wrote: View Post
Demetrio, you apparently wanted to throw mud at those videos but it seems you couldn't man up to make any specific criticism (#151).
Do you want me banned?
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Old 10-23-2013, 08:46 AM   #177
Cliff Judge
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Christopher Li wrote: View Post
Let's assume that you are correct and that they didn't use those training methods.

Does it matter?
You can believe what you want to believe. If you need to adopt a faith to drive a pursuit that is going to take a lot of time and consistent effort to achieve some result, then you might benefit from imagining that you are doing exactly what Ueshiba was doing and might some day be able to do the jo trick.

When you need validation of your faith from others, things get a bit weird. At the least you become a little annoying to people. Take it a bit further and you are going to be at odds with people who believe differently. But if you are an instructor and you are teaching things like this to your students, it can get really damaging to the whole system. Your students are going to listen to you. They might not buy it or like your paradigm shift in training and might "leave in droves." Or they might buy right into it and take the message to the streets, where they are going to encounter people who do things the old fashioned way and might have otherwise felt you were all practicing the same art. But you aren't, no matter which group is right. Eventually you won't have the people on the other side of town saying to prospective new students "If you are interested in Aikido you might also want to check out that dojo over there, they have a different teacher than us but they are really nice people." It will become "Yeah they do things very differently, that's not really Aikido that they are doing, there is this whole controversy about it."

Let me flip your proposition over for you. What if *I* am wrong and you guys are right? Dan's This Stuff method is actually the same exact method by which Sagawa gained his legendary skills, the same thing that Takeda only taught his senior students and admonished them only to teach to one or two of their students and never a foreigner? Dan was just the Edward Snowden or the Chelsea Manning of Aiki, just taking a long-kept secret and sharing it openly. Well aren't there at least some ethical issues to consider before you start spreading around information that was deeply proprietary? Aren't there some technical problems with taking something that was meant to be transmitted on a small scale, and very personally, and just handing that out at seminars? For example, what happens ten years from now when everybody has been talking about This Stuff but only a few people can actually do anything with it? Are you sure that won't have an impact on the "modern" Aikido world?

Maybe I am the only person who is worried about this or thinks anything of it, but my point is, any and all of the problems I have raised could really be avoided if you just dropped the whole bit with "the This Stuff method is the for-reals honest secret of Aiki that They didn't want you to know!"

If it ISN'T then you have not gone ahead and propagated a bunch of half-truths - you know not everybody who starts Aikido researches it on the internet, most people want to receive the history of their art from their instructors. There's some responsibility there to keep the upwards butt smoke under control. And you don't make happy with your Aikido neighbors who aren't interested, if your version of history involves what they are doing being a lie.

And even if it IS true, there really is a huge amount of explaining that needs to be done, because questions will keep coming up again and again. That's one reason why secrets are generally secret. Why bother rocking the boat? Get together in study groups and knock yourselves out, smirk to yourselves when somebody has something nice to say about Doshu's Aikido. Why bother trying to convince some east coast nidan that some historical link exists between your training methodology and what Osensei was doing?
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Old 10-23-2013, 09:05 AM   #178
jonreading
 
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote: View Post
You can believe what you want to believe. If you need to adopt a faith to drive a pursuit that is going to take a lot of time and consistent effort to achieve some result, then you might benefit from imagining that you are doing exactly what Ueshiba was doing and might some day be able to do the jo trick.

When you need validation of your faith from others, things get a bit weird. At the least you become a little annoying to people. Take it a bit further and you are going to be at odds with people who believe differently. But if you are an instructor and you are teaching things like this to your students, it can get really damaging to the whole system. Your students are going to listen to you. They might not buy it or like your paradigm shift in training and might "leave in droves." Or they might buy right into it and take the message to the streets, where they are going to encounter people who do things the old fashioned way and might have otherwise felt you were all practicing the same art. But you aren't, no matter which group is right. Eventually you won't have the people on the other side of town saying to prospective new students "If you are interested in Aikido you might also want to check out that dojo over there, they have a different teacher than us but they are really nice people." It will become "Yeah they do things very differently, that's not really Aikido that they are doing, there is this whole controversy about it."

Let me flip your proposition over for you. What if *I* am wrong and you guys are right? Dan's This Stuff method is actually the same exact method by which Sagawa gained his legendary skills, the same thing that Takeda only taught his senior students and admonished them only to teach to one or two of their students and never a foreigner? Dan was just the Edward Snowden or the Chelsea Manning of Aiki, just taking a long-kept secret and sharing it openly. Well aren't there at least some ethical issues to consider before you start spreading around information that was deeply proprietary? Aren't there some technical problems with taking something that was meant to be transmitted on a small scale, and very personally, and just handing that out at seminars? For example, what happens ten years from now when everybody has been talking about This Stuff but only a few people can actually do anything with it? Are you sure that won't have an impact on the "modern" Aikido world?

Maybe I am the only person who is worried about this or thinks anything of it, but my point is, any and all of the problems I have raised could really be avoided if you just dropped the whole bit with "the This Stuff method is the for-reals honest secret of Aiki that They didn't want you to know!"

If it ISN'T then you have not gone ahead and propagated a bunch of half-truths - you know not everybody who starts Aikido researches it on the internet, most people want to receive the history of their art from their instructors. There's some responsibility there to keep the upwards butt smoke under control. And you don't make happy with your Aikido neighbors who aren't interested, if your version of history involves what they are doing being a lie.

And even if it IS true, there really is a huge amount of explaining that needs to be done, because questions will keep coming up again and again. That's one reason why secrets are generally secret. Why bother rocking the boat? Get together in study groups and knock yourselves out, smirk to yourselves when somebody has something nice to say about Doshu's Aikido. Why bother trying to convince some east coast nidan that some historical link exists between your training methodology and what Osensei was doing?
Cliff, I just opened a thread for this exact type of post. I think you raise some good points here.

I am personally not of the notion that I need to validate the internal power model against anyone. I am not sure if that is a misconception. Most of the people who have jumped into the models have long since left these public forums and are working without any care as to what "other" people are doing. Aiki models seem to be the proverbial "red pill" that, when taken, lead students to seek elsewhere what they are not finding in modern aikido. I perceive this "we're not validating you" notion to be uni-directional from the entities being left, not necessarily the entities leaving.

But, throw these up on the other thread, I think you have outlined several common criticisms of aiki.

Jon Reading
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Old 10-23-2013, 09:26 AM   #179
hughrbeyer
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Demetrio Cereijo wrote: View Post
Do you want me banned?
Um, no, not particularly.

If you mean that posting your honest opinion of those videos would get you banned, maybe you have an inflated sense of the value of your opinion. Which is not really a slam at you--there's nothing easier than criticizing an internet video, and the value of that criticism is pretty near zero if you don't know what the people on the video are trying to do or why it's interesting. If this thread hadn't gotten hijacked long ago, somebody might have started a conversation about what they're doing there, and what it has to do with IS. Oh, well. Another time.

Cliff, I need to say a word about this "it takes years and years to master IP/IS/Aiki" meme.

Yes, it does. And to master Aikido, or golf, or anything worthwhile. But it doesn't take years to start seeing the benefit.

Take me. I'm a shallow, impatient, short-term-thinking, quick-results kind of guy. If I don't see the point, I lose interest pretty quickly. I play music, but not a lot because I haven't got much talent so however much I put into it, I don't get that much back. The ROI (return on investment) isn't there.

IP hasn't been like that. Within a month, I was trying simple things and seeing a difference in uke's reaction. Within a year, I could see how moving this way was totally different (and more effective) than what I'd been doing before. Within 18 months, a new guy on the mat (so he didn't know anything about IP) asked, "How come as soon as I grab you I'm off balance? You didn't do anything!"

That doesn't mean that if we got on the mat together you'd be blown away. Maybe you're a connected kind of guy and could shut down my low-level IP skills right away. Maybe you're a bag of hammers and couldn't tell what I was doing at all. Maybe you'd assume I was stiff and using muscle because you couldn't move me. It just means that I'm way ahead of where I would be compared with what I'd be doing otherwise.

So the answer to your question of why anyone would sink time into this, the answer is: because it's immensely seductive and it puts my Aikido waza on wheels. Once you've felt that, you can't go back.

Evolution doesn't prove God doesn't exist, any more than hammers prove carpenters don't exist.
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Old 10-23-2013, 09:29 AM   #180
Cliff Judge
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Jon Reading wrote: View Post
Cliff, I just opened a thread for this exact type of post. I think you raise some good points here.

I am personally not of the notion that I need to validate the internal power model against anyone. I am not sure if that is a misconception. Most of the people who have jumped into the models have long since left these public forums and are working without any care as to what "other" people are doing. Aiki models seem to be the proverbial "red pill" that, when taken, lead students to seek elsewhere what they are not finding in modern aikido. I perceive this "we're not validating you" notion to be uni-directional from the entities being left, not necessarily the entities leaving.

But, throw these up on the other thread, I think you have outlined several common criticisms of aiki.
Jon,

Just to put a fine point on one thing - I am not at all talking about validation of the internal power model at all. I am talking about validation of the belief that the training methods being used are the original secret methods of Osensei, either the ones he was taught when learning Daito ryu, or ones he developed himself later on.

This is outside of the realm of things that are felt. It is entirely a matter of history and documentation. And in my opinion it matters.
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Old 10-23-2013, 09:47 AM   #181
Chris Li
 
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote: View Post
You can believe what you want to believe. If you need to adopt a faith to drive a pursuit that is going to take a lot of time and consistent effort to achieve some result, then you might benefit from imagining that you are doing exactly what Ueshiba was doing and might some day be able to do the jo trick.
I don't understand this at all - virtually everybody in Aikido "imagines" that they are, at some level, doing what Ueshiba was doing.

Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote: View Post
When you need validation of your faith from others, things get a bit weird. At the least you become a little annoying to people. Take it a bit further and you are going to be at odds with people who believe differently. But if you are an instructor and you are teaching things like this to your students, it can get really damaging to the whole system. Your students are going to listen to you. They might not buy it or like your paradigm shift in training and might "leave in droves." Or they might buy right into it and take the message to the streets, where they are going to encounter people who do things the old fashioned way and might have otherwise felt you were all practicing the same art. But you aren't, no matter which group is right. Eventually you won't have the people on the other side of town saying to prospective new students "If you are interested in Aikido you might also want to check out that dojo over there, they have a different teacher than us but they are really nice people." It will become "Yeah they do things very differently, that's not really Aikido that they are doing, there is this whole controversy about it."
I'm not particularly looking for validation of my, or any, faith from others. It's a discussion forum - we tend to put out our opinions, just as everybody does.

Theres nothing wrong with doing things differently - virtually every student of the Founder that I've ever trained with had their own approach and methodology. It doesn't seem to be "damaging to the whole system" - there isn't even a single monolithic "system" to begin with.

Your opinion, that we "aren't practicing the same art", is based on what?

Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote: View Post
Let me flip your proposition over for you. What if *I* am wrong and you guys are right? Dan's This Stuff method is actually the same exact method by which Sagawa gained his legendary skills, the same thing that Takeda only taught his senior students and admonished them only to teach to one or two of their students and never a foreigner? Dan was just the Edward Snowden or the Chelsea Manning of Aiki, just taking a long-kept secret and sharing it openly. Well aren't there at least some ethical issues to consider before you start spreading around information that was deeply proprietary? Aren't there some technical problems with taking something that was meant to be transmitted on a small scale, and very personally, and just handing that out at seminars? For example, what happens ten years from now when everybody has been talking about This Stuff but only a few people can actually do anything with it? Are you sure that won't have an impact on the "modern" Aikido world?
It's not nuclear technology, nobody's going to die of radition poisoning by accident. I can say absolutely that no vows are being violated, no oaths are being broken. Even if there were - that wouldn't be your problem, it would be a problem between Dan (or whoever) and another person.

It may have an impact - but anybody teaching may have an impact. Yamada objected to Saotome's impact when he first came to the US - are you saying that Saotome shouldn't have come and shaken things up?

Quote:
Cliff Judge wrote: View Post
Maybe I am the only person who is worried about this or thinks anything of it, but my point is, any and all of the problems I have raised could really be avoided if you just dropped the whole bit with "the This Stuff method is the for-reals honest secret of Aiki that They didn't want you to know!"

If it ISN'T then you have not gone ahead and propagated a bunch of half-truths - you know not everybody who starts Aikido researches it on the internet, most people want to receive the history of their art from their instructors. There's some responsibility there to keep the upwards butt smoke under control. And you don't make happy with your Aikido neighbors who aren't interested, if your version of history involves what they are doing being a lie.

And even if it IS true, there really is a huge amount of explaining that needs to be done, because questions will keep coming up again and again. That's one reason why secrets are generally secret. Why bother rocking the boat? Get together in study groups and knock yourselves out, smirk to yourselves when somebody has something nice to say about Doshu's Aikido. Why bother trying to convince some east coast nidan that some historical link exists between your training methodology and what Osensei was doing?
I'm not particularly invested in convincing you. It's a discussion forum and I discuss my opinions, just as you do.

They aren't just made up imaginings, there's quite a bit of support for the theory that conventional Aikido isn't really doing what Morihei Ueshiba was doing. Ellis, for that matter, wrote an entire book about the theory of internal training in Aikido and other Japanese martial arts.

Stan Pranin has been arguing that for years, and has amassed a huge amount of supporting documentation. His conclusions may (or may not) be different than mine, but the underlying arguments are quite similar. And of course, there is still a huge amount of material that is not even available in English yet, so we're far from the point where people can say that the party line is a foregone conclusion.

If you don't like and aren't interested in this kind of practice - then don't do it. It doesn't hurt you, any more then other people doing Yoseikan or Yoshinkan or Iwama does - and the founder's of all three of were deeply critical of conventional Aikikai Aikido in their time.

“What you guys are doing now isn’t real Aikido”
-Minoru Mochizuki to Nobuyoshi Tamura - more than 50 years ago, and Aikido somehow still survives


Best,

Chris

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Old 10-23-2013, 10:02 AM   #182
Demetrio Cereijo
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Hugh Beyer wrote: View Post
Um, no, not particularly.

If you mean that posting your honest opinion of those videos would get you banned, maybe you have an inflated sense of the value of your opinion. Which is not really a slam at you--there's nothing easier than criticizing an internet video, and the value of that criticism is pretty near zero if you don't know what the people on the video are trying to do or why it's interesting. If this thread hadn't gotten hijacked long ago, somebody might have started a conversation about what they're doing there, and what it has to do with IS. Oh, well. Another time.
Well, maybe you are right and haters gonna hate so here it goes:

Jon clips are perfect examples (amongst many others) of the sad state of contemporary Aikido as a martial art which has its cause, mainly, in purposeful poor transmission from the source plus much kumbaya singing, hippy dancing and new age sillyness since the early 70's. Lets not forget Jon is a Sandan in a major Aikido org with more than 15 years of training under his belt and dojo cho too. I see him as one of many unsuspicious victims of a pyramidal scheme organized by some smart japanese people leading a japanese org. However he is not morbidly obese... props to him.

IMO as he goes into IP/IS training I predict he (as many others following this path) is going to move from paleolitic to neolitic. Regarding martial skill thas a great achievement but, by today's standards thats not impressive. Even if he gets to Takeda Sokaku skill level in, lets say 10 years from now, he will be substandard by 2013 parameters, as the others who go into IS/IP trainin will be.

Blunt enough?
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Old 10-23-2013, 10:12 AM   #183
hughrbeyer
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Re: 6 Directions

Blunt, but pointless. "Sad state", "poor transmission", "kumbaya singing" -- can anybody relate these phrases to the video in any way? Do you say anything in your second paragraph worth paying attention to?

As I expected, and warned you, it's not Jon who looks the worse from your criticism.

Evolution doesn't prove God doesn't exist, any more than hammers prove carpenters don't exist.
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Old 10-23-2013, 10:33 AM   #184
Keith Larman
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Demetrio Cereijo wrote: View Post
Lets not forget Jon is a Sandan in a major Aikido org with more than 15 years of training under his belt and dojo cho too...
Um, I'm the dojo Cho at my dojo. Which means basically I get to do a ton of paperwork, generate invoices, make the runs to the bank, make sure there's change in the drawer if someone wants to buy something in cash, talk with the parent who thinks their little ADD ray of sunshine should be allowed to hurt other kids so they can learn to control themselves, then spend all my remaining time trying to deal with a rather large, diverse group of folk who are rather opinionated. So you see "dojo cho" as somehow relevant here? Frankly some of the time I think the reality is that I drew the "short stick" so to speak. Yeah, authority and all, but it has freaking well nothing to do with my aikido.

Nothing.

Yeah, blunt is one word to describe your post. There are others that come to mind.

Yeah, hey everyone, post videos. That will go well...

Frankly some were banned because they were popping up in damned near every thread hijacking the conversation. I didn't like that they were banned but I also fully understood how annoying the behavior was. What I find astounding is that now that a few have finally tried to start explaining what they can, the exact self-same freaking behavior is coming out, just from the other perspective.

Which reminds me why I pulled all this crap off my list... Keep getting sucked back in.

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Old 10-23-2013, 10:33 AM   #185
Demetrio Cereijo
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Hugh Beyer wrote: View Post
As I expected, and warned you, it's not Jon who looks the worse from your criticism.
Well, I'm not concerned about my e-image.
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Old 10-23-2013, 10:34 AM   #186
jonreading
 
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Demetrio Cereijo wrote: View Post
Well, maybe you are right and haters gonna hate so here it goes:

Jon clips are perfect examples (amongst many others) of the sad state of contemporary Aikido as a martial art which has its cause, mainly, in purposeful poor transmission from the source plus much kumbaya singing, hippy dancing and new age sillyness since the early 70's. Lets not forget Jon is a Sandan in a major Aikido org with more than 15 years of training under his belt and dojo cho too. I see him as one of many unsuspicious victims of a pyramidal scheme organized by some smart japanese people leading a japanese org. However he is not morbidly obese... props to him.

IMO as he goes into IP/IS training I predict he (as many others following this path) is going to move from paleolitic to neolitic. Regarding martial skill thas a great achievement but, by today's standards thats not impressive. Even if he gets to Takeda Sokaku skill level in, lets say 10 years from now, he will be substandard by 2013 parameters, as the others who go into IS/IP trainin will be.

Blunt enough?
Um... thanks for not calling me fat? I know the camera adds a few pounds...

I'm kinda at a loss for anything else to say... Thanks? I'll look to minimize my sad state of participating in a contemporary aikido pyramid scheme... Wait. You're advocating that I stay in Aikido? I'm so confused...

Jon Reading
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Old 10-23-2013, 10:37 AM   #187
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Keith Larman wrote: View Post
Um, I'm the dojo Cho at my dojo. Which means basically I get to do a ton of paperwork, generate invoices, make the runs to the bank, make sure there's change in the drawer if someone wants to buy something in cash, talk with the parent who thinks their little ADD ray of sunshine should be allowed to hurt other kids so they can learn to control themselves, then spend all my remaining time trying to deal with a rather large, diverse group of folk who are rather opinionated. So you see "dojo cho" as somehow relevant here? Frankly some of the time I think the reality is that I drew the "short stick" so to speak. Yeah, authority and all, but it has freaking well nothing to do with my aikido.

Nothing.

Yeah, blunt is one word to describe your post. There are others that come to mind.

Yeah, hey everyone, post videos. That will go well...

Frankly some were banned because they were popping up in damned near every thread hijacking the conversation. I didn't like that they were banned but I also fully understood how annoying the behavior was. What I find astounding is that now that a few have finally tried to start explaining what they can, the exact self-same freaking behavior is coming out, just from the other perspective.

Which reminds me why I pulled all this crap off my list... Keep getting sucked back in.
Dude, you're getting screwed. I have a stone seal and manacles of power. And groupies.

Jon Reading
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Old 10-23-2013, 10:48 AM   #188
Keith Larman
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Re: 6 Directions

Oops, forgot the last thing I did in my official capacity -- run to Target for toilet paper and toilet bowl cleaner using my "dojo" debit card. But don't worry, I maintained zanshin and full martial awareness as I slid the Charmin in the cart...

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Old 10-23-2013, 10:49 AM   #189
Keith Larman
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Re: 6 Directions

Final words. This is why we cannot have nice things.

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Old 10-23-2013, 10:50 AM   #190
Chris Li
 
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Jon Reading wrote: View Post
Dude, you're getting screwed. I have a stone seal and manacles of power. And groupies.
Groupies...I've always wanted groupies...

Best,

Chris

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Old 10-23-2013, 11:01 AM   #191
Mert Gambito
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Demetrio Cereijo wrote: View Post
IMO as he goes into IP/IS training I predict he (as many others following this path) is going to move from paleolitic to neolitic. Regarding martial skill thas a great achievement but, by today's standards thats not impressive. Even if he gets to Takeda Sokaku skill level in, lets say 10 years from now, he will be substandard by 2013 parameters, as the others who go into IS/IP trainin will be.
It'll fall along a bell curve. Most people who undertake this path will appreciate it but not put in the time necessary, resulting in little or no net benefit to their martial skills.

Those who succeed will consider themselves, and be considered by those with whom they train, successful because they will surpass the current standards for success / high-end ability within their respective training environments: if 90% or more of your martial practice and application is within the confines of aikido waza, henka and randori, and within a given aikido dojo, then that's naturally what will set the bar.

There's a very good chance that 0% of IP/IS adherents -- including those training in MMA -- will aspire to become professional fighters, at least for the foreseeable future, whether in the UFC or in a lower-echelon organization, for reasons stated prior. I'm a big fan, for example, of Jon Jones' fight game. Maybe he'll show up in Honolulu one day, and we'll see how good his stand-up push-test game is. In the meantime, since I've been in Hawaii, to date, other than MMAists who already train with Dan Harden, only one MMAist has expressed enough interest in IP/IS to attend one of Dan's workshops here. Maybe Chris needs to change the name of his organization to "Sangenkai Gym".

Anyway, the opinions in this and other IP/IS threads also fall along a bell curve. It is as nature intended.

Mert
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Old 10-23-2013, 11:03 AM   #192
jonreading
 
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Demetrio Cereijo wrote: View Post
Well, maybe you are right and haters gonna hate so here it goes:

Jon clips are perfect examples (amongst many others) of the sad state of contemporary Aikido as a martial art which has its cause, mainly, in purposeful poor transmission from the source plus much kumbaya singing, hippy dancing and new age sillyness since the early 70's. Lets not forget Jon is a Sandan in a major Aikido org with more than 15 years of training under his belt and dojo cho too. I see him as one of many unsuspicious victims of a pyramidal scheme organized by some smart japanese people leading a japanese org. However he is not morbidly obese... props to him.

IMO as he goes into IP/IS training I predict he (as many others following this path) is going to move from paleolitic to neolitic. Regarding martial skill thas a great achievement but, by today's standards thats not impressive. Even if he gets to Takeda Sokaku skill level in, lets say 10 years from now, he will be substandard by 2013 parameters, as the others who go into IS/IP trainin will be.

Blunt enough?
On a more serious note, I recognize that I have imperfections. I recognize that when I memorialize myself, I memorialize those imperfections, transient or not, as they may be. Functionally, you have provided only an over-broad negative criticism of me (and possibly aikido). You have not positively contributed to the topic, nor provided your own advice. As it turns out, I see my training as persevering for 15 years of life in an art that I enjoy. I have met and parted with friends who cannot say that. I have a wife, great kids, a job and a roof over my head. I am dojo cho because my dojo needs me to be. I am in ASU because I value the instructors, the direction and the leadership of the organization. I sleep quite well at night and will answer to all of those criticisms with a head held high.

Blunt as your thread may be, it resembles little more than a collection of general frustrations applied in the same direction. And you don't even have manacles of power.

Jon Reading
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Old 10-23-2013, 11:30 AM   #193
Mert Gambito
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Re: 6 Directions

Quote:
Paul Funnell wrote: View Post
Thanks Mert, we're looking forward to it, although my questions are more around training methods/theory/pedagogy/origins than of the IHTBF variety but I'm sure I'll get some answers there too. I enjoyed Gleason's videos btw (also like what I've seen on Aunkai and ILC).
Ask Dan to show you his version of torifune, as solo taiso, then take ukemi for it (remind him that you're relatively new to aikido [one of the CIMA practitioners in our study group literally wears a "no ukemi" shirt at workshops]).

He's readily shown other aspects and expressions of his methodology that tie into M. Ueshiba's and K. Tohei's models and exercises. I see that you have a CIMA background, and understand that there are CIMA practitioners in the UK study group, so I think you'll not only enjoy the discussions and hands-on demos that fall within the vertical relationship between Daito-ryu and aikido, but also the broader connections to skills and training in the CIMA.

Look forward to your comments and impressions after the workshop, if you're so inclined to share.

Mert
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Old 10-23-2013, 12:01 PM   #194
phitruong
Dojo: Charlotte Aikikai Agatsu Dojo
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Re: 6 Directions

because i looked too good on camera, i won't subject you to over exposure of my greatness by making any video whatsoever.

going back to the topic of 6 directions. do we agree that at the very least two of the directions are up and down? folks differ in the other directions. for me, away from you and toward you are the other directions.

from my understanding that furitama where i saw aikido folks shaking their hands up and down to vibrate their whole body. a few years back, i was at Saotome's dojo (the shrine dojo in his backyard). He talked about this. at first, everyone was shaking the arms. Saotome sensei said "no arm". he demonstrated and looked like he bounced up and down. we bounced up and down. He stoped and said "no leg". so, "no arm" and "no leg", now what? he was telling us a story that O Sensei made him doing the furitama exercise, then when off somewhere. Saotome sensei was young and bored, so he just did for the shake of doing. O Sensei appeared out of nowhere and yelled at him for not doing it right. Saotome sensei said it's his job to show us what he was taught. He pointed to his hara and said "move inside". i heard Ikeda sensei said the same thing so many times. when i heard Saotome sensei said that, the dantien-movement lightbulb when "ding" in my head. i got one of those "aha!" moment. ya, i got it and you don't! what can i say, i am, being an asian, just naturally better at it than you guys!

here is an easy question for you guys, when you do down, do you have up too or just down; same goes for up? there is a related second question, but will wait for the next set of direction.

so let get back to topic and start with the up/down first, then move on to the next set of direction.

"budo is putting on cold, wet, sweat stained gi with a smile and a snarl" - your truly
http://charlotteaikikai.org
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Old 10-23-2013, 12:05 PM   #195
Janet Rosen
 
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Re: 6 Directions

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Keith Larman wrote: View Post
Oops, forgot the last thing I did in my official capacity -- run to Target for toilet paper and toilet bowl cleaner using my "dojo" debit card. But don't worry, I maintained zanshin and full martial awareness as I slid the Charmin in the cart...
But did you extend ki when you squeezed it???

Janet Rosen
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"peace will enter when hate is gone"--percy mayfield
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Old 10-23-2013, 12:16 PM   #196
Mert Gambito
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Re: 6 Directions

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Phi Truong wrote: View Post
. . . when you do down, do you have up too or just down; same goes for up? there is a related second question, but will wait for the next set of direction.

so let get back to topic and start with the up/down first, then move on to the next set of direction.
Why would one tomoe ever leave home without the other, regardless of direction?

Mert
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Old 10-23-2013, 12:50 PM   #197
Bill Danosky
 
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Re: 6 Directions

It's well established that Yoshinkan Aikido is not about IP. But our Shihans still have the goods. I have taken ukemi from Robert Mustard Sensei and there is some crazy stuff going on there. But every time I think it's magic, somebody shows me the trick behind it. Now, 9 years on, I can pull a tiny rabbit out of a hat, and I know it's just good waza with a lot of nuance. IMO all those "old guys" were just really, really good. O Sensei didn't do anything but train and chant for most of his life. He should have been able to pull a few tricks.

Last edited by Bill Danosky : 10-23-2013 at 12:51 PM. Reason: no ' in O'Sensei. He wasn't Irish.
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Old 10-23-2013, 01:50 PM   #198
hughrbeyer
Dojo: Shobu Aikido of Boston
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Re: 6 Directions

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Phi Truong wrote: View Post
going back to the topic of 6 directions. do we agree that at the very least two of the directions are up and down? folks differ in the other directions. for me, away from you and toward you are the other directions.
6-directions:all directions::4 corners of the world::throughout the world

That is, it's not 6 literal directions only, it's shorthand for saying all directions. So the other two are forward/back and left/right.

Quote:
Phi Truong wrote: View Post
here is an easy question for you guys, when you do down, do you have up too or just down; same goes for up? there is a related second question, but will wait for the next set of direction.
Yes. But opening in 6 directions happens before movement.

Evolution doesn't prove God doesn't exist, any more than hammers prove carpenters don't exist.
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Old 10-23-2013, 03:11 PM   #199
phitruong
Dojo: Charlotte Aikikai Agatsu Dojo
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Re: 6 Directions

addressing both mert and hugh. for starting out with IP, you work with up/down. it seemed simple, but how often you see aikido folks only go one direction but not both at the same time. how often you heard folks said "keep the one point" but when you grab them, you absolutely certain that they only go one direction but not both. it's the simpliest thing, but how often we messed this up? ki of heaven, ki of earth, bridge over trouble water?

"budo is putting on cold, wet, sweat stained gi with a smile and a snarl" - your truly
http://charlotteaikikai.org
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Old 10-23-2013, 05:04 PM   #200
Cady Goldfield
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Re: 6 Directions

Eventually, you learn to expand and project out in all directions, creating the spherical feeling of "fullness" that is peng.
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