An Aikidoka on the Way of Disgrace

Hi everyone, I just published a rather interesting interview of Olivier Gaurin, a long time Aikikai practitioner who started a few years ago to study Daito-ryu with the masters of the Takumakai. He explains why he thinks that the questions that we have in Aikido might be answered through a study of Daito-ryu. While I don't necessarily agree with everything he says, it is definitely worth a read for its refreshing views.

Very interesting read. Lots of valuable history and viewpoints from a knowledgeable aikidoka and sensei. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

This stood out for me as I have heard it before:

Yamaguchi Sensei was special in that he did not have a court like other Sensei. All the Sensei in Japan, in France, or in the rest of the world have a sort of court that gravitates around them. Yamaguchi Sensei did not encourage this at all, quite the opposite in fact. He did not recognise the courtesans who wanted to be near him and access his knwoledge. In that sense, he was someone pure, someone who wanted to keep Aikido intact. His teaching was at same time very close to his students but also very cold. I have the feeling that he did not like the people who considered themselves as his students. Someone who claims to be the student of Yamaguchi Sensei is probably a liar, unless they are people like William Gleason or Bruno Zanotti. Of course, a lot of other people have learnt and propagate what he taught but they don't brag about it. One has to be very careful when one hear someone claiming that they are the student of Yamaguchi Sensei. Don't forget that Yamaguchi Sensei, like Arikawa Sensei, had very solid bases issuing from Daito-ryu Aiki-jujutsu, he also had very storng sword work, and he was proficient in other disciplines. So yes, it kind of looks similar but Yamaguchi Sensei was complete in his art and it will always be very difficult to try to emulate what he did. I understood this only when I started to practice Daito-ryu Aiki-jujutsu and this is when I started to understand where Yamaguchi Sensei's techniques came from, why he was doing them a certain way. There were true historical bases that made his Aikido. He was not the only one like that at the Aikikai at the time but very few people know this, even those who claim to be the students of these Sensei.

As I said before, I understood all of this when I started to practice Dai-ryu Aiki-jujutsu and this is something that the students of Yamaguchi Sensei cannot understand since they have not studied Daito-ryu. I would even go on to say that one who is not familiar with Daito-ryu cannot understand Yamaguchi Sensei's Aikido. Some Sensei tend to rediscover some of these fundamental points through teaching and refining something that they do not understand. They cannot however identify the important points, they accentuate them too much as if they were true, then they tend to forget them or mix them up with less important points. As a result, all of this is a bit messy. This is precisely the problem of nowadays' Aikido, there are no basis of Aiki. Everyone cooks up their own little recipe.

I will only say that Bill's own take on those days and how it relates to his own encounter with aiki and DR in his later years sounds similar to this fellow's findings. At one point calling it Grad. school for Aikido teachers. Asked in an open room to keep this training under wraps from the public for now (with four shihan from different affilates present) Bill publicly stated "Bullshit. We should be shouting this from the roof tops not keeping quiet. I am going to talk about this wherever I go." ...and there's Bill!!

Guillaume Erard: What is the cause of this loss of basics within modern Aikido? Olivier Gaurin: Kisshomaru Sensei is the one who operated this historical split with Daito-ryu and even though I understand why he did that, I think that it was a bit awkward on his part to do this. The reason is that if you separate anything from its history, it becomes an orphan, and an orphan always looks for its identity. As a result, since O Sensei's passing, Aikido is trying to find itself. When O Sensei died, people lost their "god", their framework and therefore, they started to seek new totems. Aikido started to wander like an orphan lost in the woods. Students are then obliged to follow teachers who are blind. Tamura Sensei, in a very important interview, confessed this fact some time ago. It was at same time very lucid and very courageous on his part. I think that we should reintroduce Daito-ryu in the history of Aikido.

Another very interesting take on the development of the art.

Unfortunately, I cannot read the whole interview right now, but so far his views are interesting and could lead to some further discussions.
Dan

very nice article

very interesting interview. thanks for posting.

the only part that leaves me unclear or with doubts is his treatment of Saito's Iwama style versus what is done at Hombu.

as Stan Pranin recounts, Saito felt vindicated to discover the Budo manual, where O Sensei had pictures detailing a "syllabus" of techniques, which Saito claimed he was faithfully following. Budo was from the 30's if im not mistaken. Also, Iwama style embraces a 'basics' approach that insists on static positions, so as to give the practitioner experience with strong grips and ukes that need to be moved as opposed to already moving -- which is the approach that Gaurin finds limited.

It seems to me, then, that Saito's Iwama style cannot be lumped into a bigger umbrella of 'aikido' which is then compared/contrasted with Daito-ryu; it seems more complicated than this from an Iwama-style perspective.

either way, a great read.

Thanks for posting quite an interview as well as supporting footage that are similarly polished. I wonder if you would venture a personal opinion? you intimate you have some thoughts and would love to hear them. I ask because of the other interviews on your site, and also my own more recent experiences in DR schools have given such tremendous insights.

best,
dan

Thanks everyone. I was a bit nervous putting this up at first as it is by far the most potentially controversial interview I have done so far. But your positive reactions, even though you might not agree with everything, encourage me to try to seek this sort of persons and ask them questions. Thanks a lot.

Daniel James wrote: Thanks for posting quite an interview as well as supporting footage that are similarly polished. I wonder if you would venture a personal opinion? you intimate you have some thoughts and would love to hear them. I ask because of the other interviews on your site, and also my own more recent experiences in DR schools have given such tremendous insights. best, dan

I am afraid that my lack of experience requires me to observe a respectful silence at the moment. As you said, there is much to be learnt from these experiences but I lack the maturity to emit any sort of personal, let alone relevant, opinion on the matter, at least publicly.

I found the interview to mirror much of the aikido discussion for the past few years, namely the lack of aiki, and how practicioners are atempting to mirror the end result without the knowledge of how to get there.

I find what Gaurin says quite fascinating, particularly his comments on Yamaguchi Sensei.

It occurs to me that my own teacher, who went through a period of being strongly influenced by Yamaguchi Sensei (both directly and via Masatake Sekiya and Minoru Inaba), started off with a strong base he gained from Gozo Shioda, who as a pre-war deshi probably counts as a Daito Ryu teacher.

Alex

Interesting and thought-provoking interview.
I wonder if anyone will ever really understand O Sensei either as a man or a martial artist.
Aikido is evolving - where it will end up I'm not sure but in the meantime it's a hell of a ride.

Just to give a supplemental visual aid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIhZ-WXkEe8

I really like his movement!

Philip Smith wrote: Aikido is evolving - where it will end up I'm not sure but in the meantime it's a hell of a ride.

That pretty much sums it up for me, fantastic sentence Mr Smith! I might just actually steal it from you and use it as a motto from now on!

Matthew Gano wrote: Just to give a supplemental visual aid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIhZ-WXkEe8 I really like his movement!

Beautiful! You should also look at Shimamoto Shihan's aikido, one of my favorite teachers. He said to incorporate beauty in all your movements.

Philip Smith wrote: I wonder if anyone will ever really understand O Sensei either as a man or a martial artist.

No one ever will - the time is gone that molded him in both - best we can do is take the pieces we can relate to and make them our own.

Philip Smith wrote: Aikido is evolving - where it will end up I'm not sure but in the meantime it's a hell of a ride

As are all things in the universe; and, as had been said, nothing is as constant as change - I like to look at things as: learn from the past, embrace the present, and welcome the future

Greg

Matthew Gano wrote: Just to give a supplemental visual aid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIhZ-WXkEe8 I really like his movement!

I don't at all. He has many of the problems that plague newer students of Daito ryu-more typically newer AIKIDO students- who join:
If you note when he is connecting as nage in single hand techniques-such as in 0:14, 0:19, 0:24; his non-active hand is dead. I would be willing to bet you, if he has a good teacher, that either he has gotten yelled at for it continually and would laugh himself and sort of say...oops...or else he is going to. The reason this is so common is that Aikido-ka typically choose to train their body to go dead on one side in ukemi. In other words, they launch an attack and one half of their body goes "dead" as their active hand strikes, grabs, what have you. His uke demonstrates this as well. They bring that prewiring into Daito ryu. It is fairly well known and talked about by Koryu and Daito ryu teachers alike. Okomoto would slap and wiggle your dead arm and say "Blah blah." Trying to get the habits out of MAers is sometimes very hard to do. This is yet another example.

Also his vertical drops suffer for the exact same reason. There is a dynamic way to connect your own body coherently that makes your change of position extremely magnetic and sticky and thus when it changes-in this case in vertical space- it can be devastating. I have seen men knocked out on 2" foam mats from it. Once that internal connection is broken...or mores the point never having been attained, the rest will be just hokum; loosy, goosy, following, co-operation and such.

There are ways to fix it externally...really not the way to go, but the way everyone does seem to go, and ways to fix it by creating an internal connection, something I routinely teach to fix this sort of problem. Of course everyone here knows I go on about this stuff, but here is yet another example of where the lack of an integrated body just cannot be hidden. These videos are everywhere, they go on and on, video after video, and it is thee reason why when people feel someone who actually ...is...connected, they want it, and they never go back. It's what the art is all about. Actually most can't believe there even could be such a dramatic difference.

Moving from center, taking kuzushi on contact, sticking and connecting, and being incredibly soft all at the same time you have tremendous bone breaking power is the calling card of aiki, and it begins with aiki in you...a thrumming connection in yourself... looong before you try to create aiki between you and someone else. That type of softness is soft, but not dead. Other peoples dead soft is to be dead. You can see it in their shoulders and hands, where the body is "off." This was never what Ueshiba was doing or after. Remember his students saying that he inflated when he stepped on the mat? That his old man muscles changed? There is a reason for that. If we are lumbering around, feet heavy and our arms freely swinging it is an advertisement that we are NOT doing what the founder was doing.
Dan

Great interview Mr. Erard. Thanks for posting.

Dan Harden wrote: I don't at all. He has many of the problems that plague newer students of Daito ryu-more typically newer AIKIDO students- who join: If you note when he is connecting as nage in single hand techniques-such as in 0:14, 0:19, 0:24; his non-active hand is dead. I would be willing to bet you, if he has a good teacher, that either he has gotten yelled at for it continually and would laugh himself and sort of say...oops...or else he is going to. The reason this is so common is that Aikido-ka typically choose to train their body to go dead on one side in ukemi. In other words, they launch an attack and one half of their body goes "dead" as their active hand strikes, grabs, what have you. His uke demonstrates this as well. [snip] [snip] ... here is yet another example of where the lack of an integrated body just cannot be hidden. These videos are everywhere, they go on and on, video after video,...[snip] Moving from center, taking kuzushi on contact, sticking and connecting, and being incredibly soft all at the same time you have tremendous bone breaking power is [snip] soft, but not dead. Other peoples dead soft is to be dead. You can see it in their shoulders and hands, where the body is "off." [snip]

Your critique of the video is interesting. We all know that you won't post any videos that demonstrate your ability. How about if you post a video of someone in aikido (other than O-Sensei ) moving in a way you like? Or is it your position that no such videos exist?

Jim

So....

Olivier Gaurin: Many people have trouble accepting it but technically speaking, Ueshiba Morihei, throughout his life, never ceased to practice Daito-ryu. Even today, Daito-ryu practitioners often say that they practice Aikido [they in fact use the word as a synonym for Daito-ryu as can be heard in the video documentary about Takumakai Aiki-jujutsu published herein]. A perfectly executed Daito-ryu technique does not allow for ukemi and therefore, the techniques had to be modified in order to allow a continuous training and avoid practitioners to end up in the hospital. Even hard core Daito-ryu practitioners acknowledge the fact that within the context of study, they actually do Aikido. Traditional Daito-ryu techniques are very destructive and they have little to do with current practice. There is a very well-known notion in Daito-ryu that says "one second, one tatami", which means that the techniques only lasts for a second after contact and that the space of only one tatami is required for its execution. There is no great projection in Daito-ryu, it is not a showy art and the opponent is either dead, or reduced to a total incapacity to fight. Ueshiba Sensei's students therefore know very well these techniques that their master learnt before the war, before Daito-ryu got softer. As I said before, I understood all of this when I started to practice Dai-ryu Aiki-jujutsu and this is something that the students of Yamaguchi Sensei cannot understand since they have not studied Daito-ryu. I would even go on to say that one who is not familiar with Daito-ryu cannot understand Yamaguchi Sensei's Aikido. Some Sensei tend to rediscover some of these fundamental points through teaching and refining something that they do not understand. They cannot however identify the important points, they accentuate them too much as if they were true, then they tend to forget them or mix them up with less important points. As a result, all of this is a bit messy. This is precisely the problem of nowadays' Aikido, there are no basis of Aiki. Everyone cooks up their own little recipe.

To truly understand aiki, and particularly Yamaguchi Sensei's aiki, you must first train a class of techniques that do not allow for ukemi and are therefore exceedingly difficult to train simultaneously with integrity and regard for your training partners' safety? But these aren't even trained in Daito ryu anymore?

I am kind of disappointed by this. I feel like he is really copping out on explaining what is in Daito ryu training that is not in most Aikido training. He seems to be saying, you should study Daito ryu because it is more lethal and isn't all flowy and projecty.

Cliff Judge wrote: So.... To truly understand aiki, and particularly Yamaguchi Sensei's aiki, you must first train a class of techniques that do not allow for ukemi and are therefore exceedingly difficult to train simultaneously with integrity and regard for your training partners' safety? But these aren't even trained in Daito ryu anymore? I am kind of disappointed by this. I feel like he is really copping out on explaining what is in Daito ryu training that is not in most Aikido training. He seems to be saying, you should study Daito ryu because it is more lethal and isn't all flowy and projecty.

My "understanding" (probably just adding noise to the proverbial signal, but here goes): "A perfectly executed Daito-ryu technique does not allow for ukemi and therefore, the techniques had to be modified in order to allow a continuous training and avoid practitioners to end up in the hospital."

My understanding of ukemi is that it is not a seperate waza; in a manner of speaking there is no "doing" ukemi. There is trying to throw, but, being that we're a training partner, we're not trying to the point where we overpower tori and so tori is able to perform the movement. Perhaps he's saying that people should practice more toward the idea that uke shouldn't be able to "do" ukemi, but rather that it should just happen...tightening up the lag in the system, as it were. If I understand the common criticism to "soft" Aikido, it's that people have too much slack in their system. It can be scary to have a throw or pin happen so quickly, but dealing with that kind of situation seems to be the crux of the "realism/potency" issue.
Or perhaps it's something that cannot be explicitly stated when describing Aikido in general...I mean, in a specific movement we can point to what part of the body is slipping out of alignment, but speaking in general, how can we point to what's missing when that which is missing seems to vary somewhat from place to place?
My two wooden nickels...
Take care,
Matt
p.s. For what it's worth, Jim, I appreciate knowing Dan's thoughts, and maybe I'm just getting used to them, but I chalk it up to "one well-studied man's opinion." As with all points of view, I just try to take note and keep sallying forth.
p.p.s. Merci pour l'article gran, Erard-san! (Probablement le dit mal? C'est ci aussi?) Take care!

From the interview:

Yamaguchi Sensei was special in that he did not have a court like other Sensei. All the Sensei in Japan, in France, or in the rest of the world have a sort of court that gravitates around them. Yamaguchi Sensei did not encourage this at all, quite the opposite in fact. He did not recognise the courtesans who wanted to be near him and access his knwoledge. In that sense, he was someone pure, someone who wanted to keep Aikido intact. His teaching was at same time very close to his students but also very cold. I have the feeling that he did not like the people who considered themselves as his students. Someone who claims to be the student of Yamaguchi Sensei is probably a liar, unless they are people like William Gleason or Bruno Zanotti. Of course, a lot of other people have learnt and propagate what he taught but they don't brag about it.

Is that so?

I was under the impression it was the other way around. That Yamaguchi had a very exclusive set of followers - not including everyone who wanted to be one. I was told that he had his own dojo and that training there was by invitation only. This made me think that Yamaguchi sensei probably had the most elitist clique of followers. (The last sentence is my interpretation entirely.)

Cliff Judge wrote: So.... To truly understand aiki, and particularly Yamaguchi Sensei's aiki, you must first train a class of techniques that do not allow for ukemi and are therefore exceedingly difficult to train simultaneously with integrity and regard for your training partners' safety? But these aren't even trained in Daito ryu anymore? I am kind of disappointed by this. I feel like he is really copping out on explaining what is in Daito ryu training that is not in most Aikido training. He seems to be saying, you should study Daito ryu because it is more lethal and isn't all flowy and projecty.

I was curious about that myself Cliff. From the various conversations here over the years, it seems that MOST Daito-ryu doesn't have "it" and isn't teaching "it" anymore than aikido. It seems to me, on the surface at least, he's talking about uke attacking in a way that delivers force and resistance that has to be worked through, not around and ukemi is the result of that happening, not just some arbitrary response to grabbing someone. There are styles of aikido that do this, but that certainly is no sign that you'll find real aiki there. Even in his video you see him drop his body to get under uke, which is all fine and good, but that ain't aiki, to me at least, and despite what he said regarding how aikido is practiced, his demo sure looks a lot like the thing he was speaking against in the interview.

Jim Sorrentino wrote: Your critique of the video is interesting.

Really? How is it interesting? Where?
I've go some recent P.M.'s that showed me that people didn't even know what I was talking about.

We all know that you won't post any videos that demonstrate your ability. How about if you post a video of someone in aikido (other than O-Sensei ) moving in a way you like? Or is it your position that no such videos exist?

I haven't personally met or felt anyone in aikido that was connected and moved from center, most have no idea what or where their hara even is and what it does, so there goes any idea of moving it or moving from it in the first place. At least it explains a lot of what I see. The best or closest I have ever felt personally was Bill Gleason. And he is improving. The next few years will be interesting.

As for video? Gees, off the top of my head. Shirata, Mochizuki, Shioda, Tohei, Saotome, Ikeda. I wouldn't choose to move the way they do, but it is stridently obvous there is at least levels of connection going on.
Dan

Jim Sorrentino wrote: Your critique of the video is interesting. We all know that you won't post any videos that demonstrate your ability. How about if you post a video of someone in aikido (other than O-Sensei ) moving in a way you like? Or is it your position that no such videos exist? Jim

Talking to just the video, keeping in mind that anything said will be considered a criticism when it is not intended as such.......Uke seems always to be doubled weighted to the same side..that is same side foot/leg/hip and hand/arm/elbow/shoulder which to my mind means he is already throwing himself in that direction. There is no stability across to the other side. The same seems true for Mr. Erard as he appears doubled weighted to the same side with no connection across to the what is then the empty side. I try as best I can to be stable across with what might be called a push from behind which requires connection from the off side hand/arm/shoulder to the forward hip/leg/grounded foot and from the offside leg/hip through the throwing shoulder/elbow/hand. The off hand is one visual of the connection to the grounded foot with the push through the off hip to the throwing hand showing the connection to the stable back foot.
Gary

Matthew Gano wrote: My "understanding" (probably just adding noise to the proverbial signal, but here goes): "A perfectly executed Daito-ryu technique does not allow for ukemi and therefore, the techniques had to be modified in order to allow a continuous training and avoid practitioners to end up in the hospital." My understanding of ukemi is that it is not a seperate waza; in a manner of speaking there is no "doing" ukemi. There is trying to throw, but, being that we're a training partner, we're not trying to the point where we overpower tori and so tori is able to perform the movement. Perhaps he's saying that people should practice more toward the idea that uke shouldn't be able to "do" ukemi, but rather that it should just happen...tightening up the lag in the system, as it were. If I understand the common criticism to "soft" Aikido, it's that people have too much slack in their system. It can be scary to have a throw or pin happen so quickly, but dealing with that kind of situation seems to be the crux of the "realism/potency" issue. Or perhaps it's something that cannot be explicitly stated when describing Aikido in general...I mean, in a specific movement we can point to what part of the body is slipping out of alignment, but speaking in general, how can we point to what's missing when that which is missing seems to vary somewhat from place to place? My two wooden nickels... Take care, Matt

Thanks, Matt.

What the statement about "not being able to take ukemi" brought to my mind was something I saw on Kondo Sensei's intro to Daito ryu video that I just got from Stan Pranin last month. He demonstrates Shihonage and performs the technique in a way that his uke really has no options for getting out of it, his shoulder is a goner. Then he says "we don't do it this way in training because its very dangerous."

I get it that proper training in Daito ryu requires tori to keep everything really tight, and uke has to be ready to deal with what happens because he's really just along for the ride. Uke doesn't go "wait, wait...okay I think I will fall over here with a resounding thud." Is that really what Aikido has lost, that would enable us to have a better understanding of aiki? If so....how?

You know what I think is a significant difference between Daito ryu and Aikido? This has to do with your statement:

I mean, in a specific movement we can point to what part of the body is slipping out of alignment, but speaking in general, how can we point to what's missing when that which is missing seems to vary somewhat from place to place?

Daito ryu uses kata as a training vehicle. I guess some Aikido does. We don't where I train. if uke and nage both have specific, choreographed moves that you spend some time working on, then you can build a bit of trust and familiarity with what is going to happen...if nage is suddenly picking you up and rolling you off his back at a hundred miles an hour, there is a lot less terror involved if you knew that was what you were going to work on. Furthemore, I imagine once you can do the kata without thinking about it too hard, your instructor can help you fine tune the whole thing, give you things to think about this part or that.

I think the more open-ended "it is never uke's fault" approach I am familiar with in Aikido has a lot of possibilities also - enough to keep you very confused for a very long time. Attacks come in with different vectors, intensity, levels of commitment, and you try to pull off your technique, or you ditch the technique and do whatever seems appropriate for where you are. Classical jujutsu systems, you are supposed to wind up here, but Aikido seems to start you out here.

So I kind of think both are good ways to train, and I wouldn't cross-pollute the one with the other, because I don't see how either of them can teach you aiki, honestly. Gaurin Sensei claims that you have to know some Daito ryu to understand what Ueshiba was doing, and I was kind of hoping he'd elaborate a little on what there is in Daito ryu that is not in Aikido, and I am not seeing it here.

Cliff Judge wrote: ... Daito ryu uses kata as a training vehicle. I guess some Aikido does. We don't where I train.

What do you define or understand "kata"?
How can aikido be learned without using kata?

uke has to be ready to deal with what happens because he's really just along for the ride

Isn't this the aim of every "good" technique? (That it is tori who decides what happens. Not uke.)

@ all:
It's just a side issue: In our aikido we distinguish between moving with or from the hara and moving with or from the (lower) tanden. Is this common or don't you make this dinstinction in your exercises or waza?