Are you invincible if you possess Aiki?

Igor Vojnović wrote: The fact is that they are reluctant to sacrifice their time for something that is considered "magic or circus tricks".

Ikeda tried repeatedly to impress upon seminar attendees that the reason his ultra-efficient approach (you touch him, you're off balance. Just. Like. That.) is worth pursuing is, well, you neutralize the attack much faster. Who wouldn't want to finish off an attacker in one barely perceptible, yet quick and decisive movement?

Unfortunately, he has been unable to pass on his skills to those who have been attending his seminars for years, so who knows what the answer(s) are to that problem - clearly communication is one of the issues.

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: Maybe when the IP proponents switch from "stupid jin tricks" mode to "winning olympic medals" mode all this arguing could stop.

You mean like the Olympic TKD people? oh dear....this was going going so well and then "stupid" & "tricks" are hurled around.

Theres nothing stupid about this work ....rewiring the brain is about as challenging as it gets.....if anyone thinks its a bunch of tricks.....you have not been training with the right people.

Oh well...I take solace in the growing numbers of those endorsing the work. Proportionally its far higher than it used to be so either the penny is dropping....or the brainwashing is so good that its affecting more and more people.

I don't think so.

Daren Sims wrote: You mean like the Olympic TKD people? oh dear....this was going going so well and then "stupid" & "tricks" are hurled around.

Sorry but the "stupid jin tricks" has been coined by well known internal training proponents who used to post here. I was merely using your lingo.

And Olympic TKD sucks, trust me, I know it well.

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: Sorry but the "stupid jin tricks" has been coined by well known internal training proponents who used to post here. I was merely using your lingo. ...

Service to the community: http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/showthread.php?p=258985

If you lack basic fighting skills, then no, you are not invincible simply because you "have" "aiki". You have to know how to use those skills.

There are enough people teaching it competently now, that you should go where the endorsements are, with a realistic expectation of being able to pick up something of value.

By endorsements, I mean recommendations from people who have trained for an adequate amount of time (as direct students, or participants in several or more seminars with one teacher) and have gained demonstrable, measurable skill and understanding.

I don't mean they must have expertise -- that will take some years of progressive study, training and development; however, they should be able to demonstrate and explain, to you, what they are doing on some level that is truly observable. Then you can make a reasonable assumption that the person they learned it from has some skills and the ability (and well-intentioned willingness) to teach it to others.

Cady Goldfield wrote: There are enough people teaching it competently now, that you should go where the endorsements are, with a realistic expectation of being able to pick up something of value.

Exactly.

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: Igor, is not that complicated.

It would seem so Demetrio, but don't forget, these are Aiki(do) matters we are discussing here.

Aiki is retraining the body via set of exercises, it makes your aikido better or at least closer to the original aikido: what the Founder did.

That would be the ideal situation.

This kind of power is not for everyone because it requires lots of time and effort and, for performing mainstream aikido, is not really needed. Thousands of people are doing aikido without internal power and they're doing fine.

Ehh. Maybe hundreds.

So, if you want to do aikido the most closely possible to what Ueshiba did, internal power is needed. If you want to do contemporary aikido then do what your instructors ask you to do and if you want to learn to fight... well, there are lots of places where you can learn how to fight.

It's not just internal power, Ueshiba trained since his youth, Sumo, a couple of Ryuha's, Judo (somewhat), army sergeant, went to war, not to mention that he was a physical specimen, force of nature if you will. Takeda also, traveled intensively, got in near death situations, always on the alert, basically paranoid. That's how they lived. What i am wondering is did that life(style?) had effect on their achieving such high levels of Aiki in a relatively shorter time frame then other people. Makes one wonder.

Fighting is another thing and requires not only strength (internal, external or a combination of both) but also strategy, timing, mindset , viable techniques (those that not depend on partner collusion for them to work) and a lot other things. A body with aiki is useful for fighting but the other elements are also required, especially if your opponent knows what he is doing.

As for fights, you have to make a distinction between sport matches and street situations, war situations are a totally different topic. In matches you have to have a strategy, mindset, awareness of the fact that your opponent is also as much as prepared as you or even more, all of which you mentioned. But also you have to have in mind that you have time to prepare yourself, analyze your opponent, do extra physical training (weight training, strength training) if needed etc. On the street, mostly, it's your basic instincts, from which you develop everything else, that determine the outcome. That's were most Aikido people fail. Why? They never develop the proper instinct for such situations because they lack the desire for it. For instance several guys from my club (dojo) were/are doormen, they didn't/don't have problems applying Aikido. They don't deal only with your ordinary drunks, there were trained people among those they had to deal with, albeit not champions but still dangerous and sober. Everything else, experience, strategies, techniques comes from those instincts for which they had a desire to develop through their training. Most people, hell 90% probably, just don't have that desire. Like Peter said, they just wanna get some exercise and grab a beer afterwards.

As for the viable techniques, all techniques in Aikido are viable, but like i said, people don't develop instincts on how to use them. Here is a good idea of somebody who has a good instinct would use Kokyu Nage, at 7:08 and a similar move at 7:20: https://www.facebook.com/LawrenceKen...4587955885915/

Internal skills, aiki, are passed from teacher to student directly -- jikiden, direct transmission. It is inculcated largely through feeling what the teacher is doing inside his body, then intuiting those movements and processes oneself. There are also solo exercises (tanren, forging drills) that one can do to develop the internal mechanics, but jikiden is the primary way that aiki has traditional been taught.

In order to receive that transmission, a student has to have a lot of physical, hands-on training with the teacher or a senior student who has aiki, at least for an intensive period of time. Morihei Ueshiba evidently had adequate, intensive periods of training with Sokaku Takeda to develop the skills. His other physical training in bayonet, etc. had nothing... nothing to do with his development of aiki. That could come only by jikiden from someone who had aiki -- Takeda.

Here's an example of jikiden of aiki, from Horikawa Koko (deshi of Takeda, and founder of Daito Ryu Kodokai). Starting at 14 seconds into the video, he is giving a lesson.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8H4Fi43pPw

The above should have read "Horikawa Kodo," not "Koko"... late night typo.

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: Sorry but the "stupid jin tricks" has been coined by well known internal training proponents who used to post here. I was merely using your lingo. .

Hopefully things have moved forward considerably since then.

David Soroko wrote: Service to the community: http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/showthread.php?p=258985

Thanks - some valuable resources in that thread that this forum is poorer without.

Igor Vojnović wrote: It's not just internal power, Ueshiba trained since his youth, Sumo, a couple of Ryuha's, Judo (somewhat), army sergeant, went to war, not to mention that he was a physical specimen, force of nature if you will. Takeda also, traveled intensively, got in near death situations, always on the alert, basically paranoid. That's how they lived. What i am wondering is did that life(style?) had effect on their achieving such high levels of Aiki in a relatively shorter time frame then other people. Makes one wonder.

I think Ueshiba's training pre-Takeda is not really relevant.

As for fights, you have to make a distinction between sport matches and street situations, war situations are a totally different topic.

Here we're going to disagree. Fighting is fighting, like swimming is swimming. There are core skills needed, it doesn't matter if you are a waterpolo player, a SEAL a surfer or a fisherman.

As for the viable techniques, all techniques in Aikido are viable,

You sure? How do you know?

Daren Sims wrote: Simple answer is No. Alrready said by others. O’Sensei is dead. Mike Tyson and Ali both got defeated. UFC guys lose every other week. No one and nothing is invincible.

Jon Bones Jones still hasn't lost though.

Whatever.....but this stuff......made sense of those that I hold in most respect. It was the final, hardest bit that is best learned through repetitive solo work....which in time floods into waza.

One of the most important things i was wondering about. Thanks for the answer.

Working specifically with Aiki/IP guru types had given much greater progress already than I feel I personally would have achieved.

Another important issue.

Even before Aiki/IP training I’d have answered same thing here. The techniques aren’t really techniques at all...they are tools to learn how to use your mind and body....Aiki/IP just added a whole new dimension to what the toolset can teach. In fighting there is no attachment to specific techniques....my instructor said “I move and something happens”....Bruce Lee endorsed “no fixed forms”.

I am not a fan of Bruce Lee anymore but i understand what you are saying.

The point is that Aiki is a quality of feeling or body control and not an amalgamation of anything.Once you’ve developed it you can use it regardless of how you trained to achieve it.

Another important issue resolved.

Cool. In return ....thank you for asking about it. Its kind of gone off the radar here but clearly by the quality of some of the posts in recent threads it is gathering momentum and recognition as something that we should be considerate of if we are serious about our art.

Most definitely.

Okay...

To bring back a couple of items...

1. Aikido has no presence in Olympics, and for that matter sport fighting, in general. Please point to the aikido people in sport fighting that are "'winning olympic medals' mode all this arguing could stop." This is an insinuation that mainstream aikido has a presence in sport fighting and Aiki does not. Otherwise, you are crafting a personal comparative that you, [Demetrio], will only consider the validity of aiki in a sport environment. If that is your test, then this is neither the thread, nor the best art for that comparative. As Darren pointed out, that is entirely not what we are talking about.
2. Stupid jin tricks are, by definition, elements of our training we have not been able to figure out in a larger context - that is why they remain tricks. In another thread, I addressed the issue of stupid jin tricks. Stupid jin tricks are the possession of mainstream aikido, not aiki.
3. Aiki is not fighting. Aiki is the body movement that maximizes body power in fighting. Yes, there are core skills you need to move correctly and without those core skills your body movement is disadvantaged. Fighting is not a core skill, it is a learned skill that lies on top of core skills like body conditioning or cardiovascular fitness.

I don't want to create confusion for readers in this thread. These elements not only confuse issues in this conversation, they are actually markers that indicate a lack of knowledge. For example, if you have only experienced stupid jin tricks, then you probably have not worked with a good IP person - This is not categorical, but it is correlative. Please keep the dialog clear so readers unfamiliar with internal power training or aiki training do not mis-perceive what we are saying. Or, if you are going to insert non-sequitur comments, please be clear about the irrelevance of the comment.

Internal power is a motor - it's a core element of how we move our body. It takes time to change how your body moves and relearn how to move within a fighting art. Frankly, I think this is a strong argument why many sport fighters and novice martial artists avoid the training. If your fight career is, say 8 years, and I propose a training methodology that requires 10 to become highly effective... I am not sure if that is a good option. If your training commitment is 2 days per week, and IP training requires consistent training 5-7 days a week... I am not sure it is a good option. Does that mean IP training does not teach highly effective movement? No. It simply means the expectation of training does not align with the training requirements.

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: Here we're going to disagree. Fighting is fighting, like swimming is swimming. There are core skills needed, it doesn't matter if you are a waterpolo player, a SEAL a surfer or a fisherman.

Funny you should mention swimming and water polo. I remember a few years ago when my country played against the US in a water polo tournament. My country's players lost every ball possession race at the beginning of the quarters yet in the end they won i think every quarter and eventually the game. The US players were more technically sound on the actual swimming part but my country's players were more sound in the game playing part. So even though the core skills are indeed the same there is always a difference when applied in certain situations.

You sure? How do you know?

By researching of the most relevant techniques and how and were they can be applied but also to which purpose. They all follow basic principles but it depends on who and in which situation can apply them. The main problem i encountered in the process is that they are mostly not taught for, let's say, general situations, meaning adapting the technique to the situation. It's rather the situations that are adapted to the techniques. Off course you will say "Well that's Kata training for you!?" but there are also restraints in the Kata itself which don't allow somebody who trains in them to evolve from them with a much needed knowledge to advance latter on. It's pretty frustrating when i think about it.

Jon Reading wrote: Internal power is a motor - it's a core element of how we move our body. It takes time to change how your body moves and relearn how to move within a fighting art. Frankly, I think this is a strong argument why many sport fighters and novice martial artists avoid the training. If your fight career is, say 8 years, and I propose a training methodology that requires 10 to become highly effective... I am not sure if that is a good option. If your training commitment is 2 days per week, and IP training requires consistent training 5-7 days a week... I am not sure it is a good option. Does that mean IP training does not teach highly effective movement? No. It simply means the expectation of training does not align with the training requirements.

Another reason is that it´s not by any means a necessity for doing good martial arts.

Cady Goldfield wrote: Internal skills, aiki, are passed from teacher to student directly -- jikiden, direct transmission. It is inculcated largely through feeling what the teacher is doing inside his body, then intuiting those movements and processes oneself. There are also solo exercises (tanren, forging drills) that one can do to develop the internal mechanics, but jikiden is the primary way that aiki has traditional been taught.

Are some of the general Aiki Taiso techniques good for developing Aiki, like torifune undo?

In order to receive that transmission, a student has to have a lot of physical, hands-on training with the teacher or a senior student who has aiki, at least for an intensive period of time. Morihei Ueshiba evidently had adequate, intensive periods of training with Sokaku Takeda to develop the skills. His other physical training in bayonet, etc. had nothing... nothing to do with his development of aiki. That could come only by jikiden from someone who had aiki -- Takeda.

Well that's good to know.

Here's an example of jikiden of aiki, from Horikawa Kodo (deshi of Takeda, and founder of Daito Ryu Kodokai). Starting at 14 seconds into the video, he is giving a lesson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8H4Fi43pPw

Thank's. I've seen it actually before.

Jon Reading wrote: Okay... To bring back a couple of items... 1. Aikido has no presence in Olympics, and for that matter sport fighting, in general. Please point to the aikido people in sport fighting that are "'winning olympic medals' mode all this arguing could stop." This is an insinuation that mainstream aikido has a presence in sport fighting and Aiki does not. Otherwise, you are crafting a personal comparative that you, [Demetrio], will only consider the validity of aiki in a sport environment. If that is your test, then this is neither the thread, nor the best art for that comparative. As Darren pointed out, that is entirely not what we are talking about. 2. Stupid jin tricks are, by definition, elements of our training we have not been able to figure out in a larger context - that is why they remain tricks. In another thread, I addressed the issue of stupid jin tricks. Stupid jin tricks are the possession of mainstream aikido, not aiki. 3. Aiki is not fighting. Aiki is the body movement that maximizes body power in fighting. Yes, there are core skills you need to move correctly and without those core skills your body movement is disadvantaged. Fighting is not a core skill, it is a learned skill that lies on top of core skills like body conditioning or cardiovascular fitness. I don't want to create confusion for readers in this thread. These elements not only confuse issues in this conversation, they are actually markers that indicate a lack of knowledge. For example, if you have only experienced stupid jin tricks, then you probably have not worked with a good IP person - This is not categorical, but it is correlative. Please keep the dialog clear so readers unfamiliar with internal power training or aiki training do not mis-perceive what we are saying. Or, if you are going to insert non-sequitur comments, please be clear about the irrelevance of the comment. Internal power is a motor - it's a core element of how we move our body. It takes time to change how your body moves and relearn how to move within a fighting art. Frankly, I think this is a strong argument why many sport fighters and novice martial artists avoid the training. If your fight career is, say 8 years, and I propose a training methodology that requires 10 to become highly effective... I am not sure if that is a good option. If your training commitment is 2 days per week, and IP training requires consistent training 5-7 days a week... I am not sure it is a good option. Does that mean IP training does not teach highly effective movement? No. It simply means the expectation of training does not align with the training requirements.

Its really hard to join into these conversations since invariably it becomes swamped in hyperbole. The idea that aiki makes one unbeatable is a recurring theme that leaves a sour taste in the more pragmatic. I think it is perfectly fair to ask for performance based proof and truth be told that has fallen short at least at the level of top performance fighting arts. When you say it makes you unbeatable that is exactly what is implied and beyond that it is really hard to measure.

At the risk of being told that I have no idea about aiki or IP training (also another recurring theme) there is hope if you isolate technique and pair it with certain exercises that are recognized by the lovers IP training. One of my favorite examples is the pairing of shote awase (a type of structured pushing exercise) with shomen-ate. It is really easy to see the connection between the exercise and the expression and to understand the result. Trained right you don't loose the ability in a more dynamic situation.

Hi Joe.

Jon Reading wrote: Okay... To bring back a couple of items... 1. Aikido has no presence in Olympics, and for that matter sport fighting, in general. Please point to the aikido people in sport fighting that are "'winning olympic medals' mode all this arguing could stop." This is an insinuation that mainstream aikido has a presence in sport fighting and Aiki does not. Otherwise, you are crafting a personal comparative that you, [Demetrio], will only consider the validity of aiki in a sport environment. If that is your test, then this is neither the thread, nor the best art for that comparative. As Darren pointed out, that is entirely not what we are talking about.

I know there is no Aikido in the Olympics but, please tell me, which objective means of measuring the benefits of aiki developement could be used. You can have greco wrestlers/judo players/boxers... trained conventionally vs aiki trained ones... The people with better training will get better results.

Of course working on developing internal power is good and those who are into it had their aikido upgraded but still it seems they have not figured how to objectively quantify the results of their training.

2. Stupid jin tricks are, by definition, elements of our training we have not been able to figure out in a larger context - that is why they remain tricks. In another thread, I addressed the issue of stupid jin tricks. Stupid jin tricks are the possession of mainstream aikido, not aiki.

I missed that post.

3. Aiki is not fighting. Aiki is the body movement that maximizes body power in fighting. Yes, there are core skills you need to move correctly and without those core skills your body movement is disadvantaged. Fighting is not a core skill, it is a learned skill that lies on top of core skills like body conditioning or cardiovascular fitness.

I'm not going to disagree with that.

I don't want to create confusion for readers in this thread. These elements not only confuse issues in this conversation, they are actually markers that indicate a lack of knowledge. For example, if you have only experienced stupid jin tricks, then you probably have not worked with a good IP person - This is not categorical, but it is correlative. Please keep the dialog clear so readers unfamiliar with internal power training or aiki training do not mis-perceive what we are saying. Or, if you are going to insert non-sequitur comments, please be clear about the irrelevance of the comment.

Roger.

Internal power is a motor - it's a core element of how we move our body. It takes time to change how your body moves and relearn how to move within a fighting art. Frankly, I think this is a strong argument why many sport fighters and novice martial artists avoid the training. If your fight career is, say 8 years, and I propose a training methodology that requires 10 to become highly effective... I am not sure if that is a good option. If your training commitment is 2 days per week, and IP training requires consistent training 5-7 days a week... I am not sure it is a good option. Does that mean IP training does not teach highly effective movement? No. It simply means the expectation of training does not align with the training requirements.

Maybe you're right, but that sounds like some kind of weird excuse: Sports people are not going to engage in retraining their body for maximum performance because that takes a lot of time and work.

Sounds weird, isn't it.

Igor Vojnović wrote: Funny you should mention swimming and water polo. I remember a few years ago when my country played against the US in a water polo tournament....

All of them were competent swimmers.

By researching of the most relevant techniques and how and were they can be applied but also to which purpose.

By researching you mean exactly what?

Demetrio Cereijo wrote: By researching you mean exactly what?

Meaning friendly sparing, drills, different types of strength workouts etc.

Igor Vojnović wrote: Are some of the general Aiki Taiso techniques good for developing Aiki, like torifune undo?

Originally, Morihei Ueshiba's exercises, such as funakogi undo, were meant to help strengthen specific aspects of internal body movement; however, the actual physical mechanics that were meant to be activated and strengthened, are no longer part of the exercises. So, contemporary aikido practitioners are doing "empty" movement, in most cases.

Even when the exercises are demonstrated by someone who is using the proper internal qualities, unless he or she is very explicit in explaining and demonstrating (such as in letting the students put their hands on the instructor's body where the actions are taking place) to students exactly what to recognize and activate in their own bodies, they will have difficulty actually doing the correct movements. There are "pre-exercises" that are intended to help students to simply recognize, isolate and activate very particular muscles and tissues, as well as breathing processes, before they can do the exercises that will further develop those functions. Until a student can recognize and activate each thing at will, the forging drills will be useless to him or her.

The same issues exist in other arts that were originally internal, such as in the Chinese internal martial arts (taiji chuan, bagua, hsing-i, yichuan, baji, etc.). Their forms are supposed to be driven by "the internals," but in many cases are now just arm, leg and torso movements driven by the practitioner's own immediate musculature, or by centripedal or whipping force generated by gross motor movements and stepping. When you meet, observe and compare "feel" with internal martial artists who have these skills, it becomes obvious that there is a very big difference in what is driving their movement and creating their body structure.

Cady Goldfield wrote: Originally, Morihei Ueshiba's exercises, such as funakogi undo, were meant to help strengthen specific aspects of internal body movement; however, the actual physical mechanics that were meant to be activated and strengthened, are no longer part of the exercises. So, contemporary aikido practitioners are doing "empty" movement, in most cases. Even when the exercises are demonstrated by someone who is using the proper internal qualities, unless he or she is very explicit in explaining and demonstrating (such as in letting the students put their hands on the instructor's body where the actions are taking place) to students exactly what to recognize and activate in their own bodies, they will have difficulty actually doing the correct movements. There are "pre-exercises" that are intended to help students to simply recognize, isolate and activate very particular muscles and tissues, as well as breathing processes, before they can do the exercises that will further develop those functions. Until a student can recognize and activate each thing at will, the forging drills will be useless to him or her. The same issues exist in other arts that were originally internal, such as in the Chinese internal martial arts (taiji chuan, bagua, hsing-i, yichuan, baji, etc.). Their forms are supposed to be driven by "the internals," but in many cases are now just arm, leg and torso movements driven by the practitioner's own immediate musculature, or by centripedal or whipping force generated by gross motor movements and stepping. When you meet, observe and compare "feel" with internal martial artists who have these skills, it becomes obvious that there is a very big difference in what is driving their movement and creating their body structure.

Thank you for the complete explanation.

Internal power is a motor - it's a core element of how we move our body. It takes time to change how your body moves and relearn how to move within a fighting art. Frankly, I think this is a strong argument why many sport fighters and novice martial artists avoid the training. If your fight career is, say 8 years, and I propose a training methodology that requires 10 to become highly effective... I am not sure if that is a good option. If your training commitment is 2 days per week, and IP training requires consistent training 5-7 days a week... I am not sure it is a good option. Does that mean IP training does not teach highly effective movement? No. It simply means the expectation of training does not align with the training requirements.

How long it takes to develop usable internal skills depends on how it's taught, and the level of applied and instructional skills of who's teaching it. I am seeing people develop very good internals with two years of focused instruction and training (6 hrs/week plus solo practice at home). It's a separate discipline from technique and fighting skills, but in a well-rounded sports training regimen, fitting in 45 minutes or an hour a day for internals practice is not a huge investment, IMO.

If it's taking 10 years to gain adequate practical understanding and physical development, that might make a student want to question what and how he is being taught, if he is doing the work with due dedication. Even learning just basic internal structure and how to manipulate it simply, is enough to up a fighter's game compared to the conventionally trained competitors. With competent instruction and even a half hour per day of solo practice, you can have that in less than a year. It's the nuances of aiki, and of learning to read and act with an opponent, in combat and in martial expression -- that is the lifetime journey and the limitless art. But basic technical function? A couple of years.