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Semi-adequate aikido student willing to do degrading menial tasks for aikido lessons. Must be within bus distance of Bellingham, WA. Specialties include medical sanitation of premises and odd job repairs. Also capable of taking falls and receiving mild joint manipulation. Not looking to advance in grade, just in understanding. Please leave email address below.

Bass Rutten is an expert. Andy learns the importance of sarcasam.

Any thoughts?

So much for that idea.

The aikido project is dead. It was, i thought, a good idea for the hour it lasted. At the moment it looks like i'm going to be taking something of a step backwards. My plan now is to try and find a way to get into the local aikikai classes and start training there. Yes, i'm going to be starting over at square one in a different organization but not getting to do aikido ever again seems to be the worse option. What's an ikkyu 2500 miles from his teacher really supposed to do?

Pat says i should find a couple of people that would like to learn aikido and practice with them, in a way teaching each other, but i just don't feel like i would do our style justice. There's a lot of rust and uncertainty on my part in that regard.

Suggestions?

Aikido Project

Just a quick update. Here's the actual page for the project John and I are doing. It's nothing fancy and you are bound to be disapointed if you're looking for the reinvention of the wheel or extremely crisp technique. It's really just something john and i are doing to practice various parts of aikido. Hopefully we'll get better and get some great advice along the way.

So, here's what i did....

Sorry for the large lapse in blogging. I realize it's been 5 months and no one may even still be reading this. That's cool because i use this thing to write down my random scattered thoughts on aikido.

The last 5 months were filled up mostly with life. I had a job that kept me busy so much i didn't make it to class very often. 3 times in fact, which isn't a record or anything. The year i was in Orlando i MAY have posted twice.

My last class at Pat's was my last class in Mississippi. I recently moved to Bellingham, WA where my best bud John of Johndo fame resides.

My last class was rather mind blowing. I guess since Pat knew i was leaving he decided to blow apart some of my ideas and leave me at aikido square one. After doing the class norm of tegatana we worked on hanasu. I have always had a problem with the second move in this kata, Hon Soto te Osu. I have felt rather led footed and one step behind with this technique all the years i've been doing it. I asked for some advice on how to make this move work smoothly and Pat told me to try and accomplish the technique on one foot at a time always causing a same hand/same foot to fall. Wow, said I. Instead of simply stepping around like i have been, i allowed uke more freedom to move me in whatever direction he was going making my aikido (i think) crazy better. I know you're supposed to allow uke to determine how the engagement goes... but this was really working great!

The whole class allowed me to re evaluate all the footwork and positioning that i seemed to have taken for granted in tegatana. With just a slight shift in focus my aikido (i think) as become a bit more free flowing and a bit less cluttered.

So fast forward about a month later and here i am in the top north corner of the United States. John and I, in an effort to keep ourselves training, have decided to do a video blog here. We're not trying to teach anything by any means, we're just recording our sessions so that we can 1)get advice and 2) have something that shows what we're doing, that we're doing something, and shows where we are at and were we need to go. I look forward to hearing what people think and trying to overcome my extreme anxiety over seeing myself move and flop about like a pregnant ox.

So, what do i do?

I haven't been able to travel to class since august. I have no one in my area that wants to practice. I have missed and will miss seminars because of my job. There is only so much tegatana i can really do.

I'm just really discouraged and don't know what to do. My aikido doesnt seem to be going anywhere because i can't get the practice i need to improve but i don't want to just...quit.

Suggestions?

"I thought i could instruct him....

....as well as Yoda. I was wrong."


So today i got up early and went to USM to do some aikido with my buddy Jessie. He's taking an aikikai off-shoot there at the college so every once in a while we get together and compare notes and work with a few things and basically uke for each other.

Today i actually went with the idea of us doing a few reps of tegatana with a few of the ideas from Pat's 100 terrific things to try with in tegatana and then working on hanasu.

With tegatana we went through a few reps focusing on:

1. relax
61. same hand same foot
&
3. balls of feet, heels slightly brushing

What made this more challenging than usual was the fact that our place to practice happens to be the volleyball court outside the college's fitness center. After doing a rep in the sand we did the second one on pavement and for the heck of it did another rep in the sand.

Hanasu is where everything felt like it fell apart. As we went through the first 4 back and fourth i had a hard time conveying how uke should generally move during each technique. Hanasu basically boils down into 2 things for uke

Either
1. uke grabs tori's opposite hand in an attempt to lead him off
or
2. uke grabs tori's hand on the same side and attempts to lead him off.

Somehow there was a gap in communication. Jessie would simply grab my wrist and just plant. It didn't stop me from completing the "kata" like continuation of the move.. but it didn't really move well at all. When i was playing uke i would follow through and things worked alright.

I eventually stepped back two steps away to see if i could maybe create what i was trying to relate and that seemed to solve it to an extent. It's so hard to get him to relax.

I'm not sure if it's just me not explaining things well (see subtitle at top of page) or the differences in style or his inexperience with aikido as a whole. It left me a little self-reflective, my thoughts as i repeated everything in my head became increasingly frustrating. I feel like at this point i should be able to show some of the simpler things of aikido but today that just was NOT the case.

Help??

Community

As i moved around in class last night trying to remember how this technique goes or how that technique moves a certain way something occurred to me that i thought i'd waste the virtual ink to share.

One of the new guys (i say new guy but he's been going for almost 3 months and having only met him twice that shows how good i am, plus i can't remember his name) and i were working on a chain of techniques that hover around shomeate and kotegaeshi and wakigatame. I had been having trouble all class with my wakigatames, still getting an "arm bar" but the grip felt wrong or this or that but we continued to move around and bouncing comments back and forth to each other and eventually it started to run a tad more smoothly for me.

The rest of the class went great. Pat had a loaded house so it gave us all a chance to work with everyone else. Everyone in class has variances in height and size and levels of experience but we were all communally working towards helping each other out.

It dawned on me during the car ride back home how nice it is to be able to participate in something (anything) where everyone is helping everyone else get better. Even (and i'm preaching to myself too though for appearance sake i choose to make the implications as to who vague) thought sometimes it seems like everything is getting frustrating and you might not be progressing you actually ARE getting better. Bit by bit.

I wanted to end off with a Doogie Houwer type revelation for this post, but all i can really say is it's just nice to be a part of that.

Our dojo has popsicles.

I made it to class yesterday and i convinced Jessie (the aikikai guy) to come along. We had class outside of the dojo this time, and it's always an interesting change. The parking area in front of the dojo has a decent slope upwards towards the street which makes movement on the balls of your feet quiet different from the norm.

Pat gave tegatana a bit of a switch up during the second rep. Going through the kata with a rubber knife in one hand causes you to have a different focus on what sometimes ends up as the "off hand" during the kata. I liked how it changes your ideas for some of the things you'd otherwise take for granted.

The rest of class we all worked on chains stemming off of hanasu #2 and a bit of a tune up for the first motion of nijusan.

A couple of things to ponder:

1) Even if tori somehow gets positioned further away from uke or an unexpected turn happens it takes very little for tori to turn this new situation into something defensible. Just stay aware.

2) I need to work on scaling back the "force" i try to apply on the first off balance of nijusan's shomenate by approaching it with a more agile footstep.


I'm hoping to get in some extra practice time this week. Jessie isn't working so that ought to allow for some tossing around at least a couple of times this week.

Also, you're always affirmed on your choice of places to train when you break between lessons for delicious frozen treats.

A moment of silence for a fellow aikidoka

I just wanted to let everyone know that Sensei Charles Crist passed away from his long fight with cancer today. Though i didn't have the pleasure of knowing him long, i considered him a friend.

He was a good teacher and a great person.

Hey kids, it's a new way to do the kote gaeshi!

Saturday's class was great and i was even able to bring my buddy Jessie along. We did a little bit of tegatana and moved right on into nijusan. The first motion was what we focused on the most, but the second popped up from time to time.

Class was really geared towards the different ways kote gaeshi can pop up. My favorite out of the bunch was done with a grip below the wrist. It squeezes down on the nerves just below the wrist itself, still producing a reaction from uke that causes him to lean to one side or the other. My favorite part of the whole thing is that it doesn't remotely risk hurting the wrist at all. I think it's the most aiki like of all the ways to do kote gaeshi.

Jessie seemed to be really interested in going back. He said the part he likes the most about Pat's dojo is that we work through what happens when one technique moves into another. The majority of his practice sounds like it's a strict repetition of kata moves. Hopefully with enough time in class, he'll be swayed over to our side. -=insert maniacal laughter=-

If i get there, can i give someone directions over the phone?

The last few posts my buddy John has made over on his blog show that he's gotten a lot wiser over the last year or so. He's teaching aikido one night a week at the YMCA and his classs (as well as his understanding of aikido) seems to be flourishing. The post he just made today got me thinking about goals.

In the martial arts, and in life in general, goals can mean and lead to a lot of different things. The reasons that drive us are as varied as the people that have them. I've had several different reasons for why i've been going to aikido over the (5+ off and on) years i've gone to class. I can't say one has really been greater than another or even if any of them would actually lead to an "achievement" of any tangible sort, but i kept going. In the times when class wasn't an option i'd noodle over some point or another or practice my footwork using our walking kata.

Eventually i came to terms with the fact that, for me, it's like playing with clay. You can mold something out of it but if you take a closer look at what you've made there will always be something that you can add on or shape differently. If you're dedicated enough or strict enough or if you love the thing enough to see what it becomes next your piece of clay will never run out of things to explore. Even when you place it aside and go about daily life the things you've done with that clay will carry with you. Spending that much time with a thing, i think, causes you to in a way become the thing or at the very least the experience of what you've done is a part of who you are.

Touchy-feely mumbo jumbo aside, and having lost all pretense of making a point i'll conclude with something of an idea.

I don't care about the next belt. I doubt i'll ever be "one of the greats" or even one of the mentionables. All i want for now is to become a potter that doesnt become so concerned with forming my best bowl that i forget how to translate potting to someone else.

Ok, i'm done with the psuedo wise man bit. Back to the ramble.

Quick edit

On that last post i put pluralsy when he actually had pleurisy. I'm sure there was no confusion, but i apologize anyway.

End transmission.

Midnight Aikido

Friday after a movie a couple of buddies and i went over to USM's volleyball court for some aikido practice. Jessie and i both practice aikido (he does a style akin to aikikai) and Jimmy is a newb interested in seeing what it's all about.

We did some forward and backward rolls and showed jimmy the basics of ukemi. He did alright though it's hard to get a lot of reps out of a guy who doesn't want to get sandy.

Most of the night was just Jessie and I comparing notes in a "I do this this way, how do you do it format". We did out best to give Jimmy some of the basics and by the end of the night we both looked upon him with a sense of pride. He easily adapted to the getting off the line idea but still had an occasional tendency to lean instead of fully move out of the way. We went over waki gatame and a bit of kote gaeshi with him as well. Between jessie and i tossing each other around we would occasionally spring an attack on Jimmy and he defended himself really well.

All and all it was a fun time. Jessie decided to do some airfalls at one point while i worked with Jimmy and at some point took a nasty fall onto his side. A few days later the doctor told him that he fractured a rib, got pluralsy and pneumonia. Ouch. He's doing better though..

The Aiki brush off.

Pat recently did a "What If.." article where he asked, amongst other things, "What part of your art is most rapidly teachable and imminently functional?"

In the post apocalyptic future of the damned that Pat set forth in his scenario i chose to teach the survivors the aiki brush off. I like it as a intro to aikido because it basically covers (in my mind) may of the things that make aikido aikido:

1) it's a decent intro to the concepts of ma'ai
2) it helps learners pick up on the lines of attack
3) (i think) it's an easy way to show people just how little force you need to deflect almost any attack
4) anything else i may not have mentioned

The time's we used it in class, during the seminars about knife defense, and at at Sensei Charles' dojo against various forms of faster forward attacks i've gotten to be something of a fan of it.

I agree with Pat that it won't really stop any conflicts but versus most types of the slow moving undead and those radioactive mutants with a low movement rate it WILL allow a holocaust survivor to wade throw small to moderate sized groups of them without much trouble. Throw the brush off in with almost any ones basic tools of punching and kicking and it's a good place to start. Another thing that might help would be the ideas behind "rolling the ball" and i'd be satisfied for group forays into the shattered wastelands to forage until they could train more.

Tai Chi Masters Battle

Time to read!

As luck would have it.. i happened to be traveling in Waynesboro at work today and the local library was selling books extremely cheap. I loaded up on just about everything Mark Twain wrote and a few odds and ends about Stalingrad and government files on first contact knowledge.

Of interest to this blog though are two books i decided to be worthy to pick up. The first one is by Bruce K. Siddle called Sharpening The Warrior's Edge : The Psychology & Science of Training.

The second is The Spirit of Shaolin by none other than David Carradine himself. Naturally i'm reading the Spirit of Shaolin cause Kung Fu the series rocked. My copy is hard backed and has a less fruity/new age cover than the one pictured at amazon.

Once i get these read i may say yea or nay on how worthwhile they are.

1,000 step journeys are much longer than advertised.

Yesterday we worked on 6 through 9 of nijusan. Pat started us off with some jodo like exercises that helped to emphasize bringing both hands down to our center using uke's weight/force. It was a great class but there are so many things to improve on it's sometimes hard to remember a time when i was not as adequate as i am now. And i do mean simply adequate.

Right now i want to become more comfortable with the motions and having better flow. I also need to work on better memorization of the techniques and the principles behind them so i can better describe/explain them to others. I'm glad im in no hurry to get anywhere but better.

Wait. It's THAT easy? Really!?

Ukemi.

Anyone out there who has kept up with my sporadic posting and my slightly askew monologues knows that I've always had a problem with my falls. I've always felt awkward in the execution, which led to "not quite great" falls or occasional flopping. This in turn created frustration with aikido in general and self-consciousness 'cause I must have been doing something wrong. (which i was)

Today's class changed all that.. and i couldn't be happier.

A good bit of class today was devoted to ukemi. Ground rolls forwards and backwards progressed to the standing forward rolls. Pat got us to extend an arm out for him to hold and as when leaned forward to a certain point he'd let the arm (which was limp btw) go and we would fall into the roll. For me, everything finally snapped into place. The roll felt comfortable, i wasn't tense, and i was easily able to come back up to standing. Great success!

So i ask Pat (in so many words), "Since you made those easy, can you make backward rolls as easy?"

"Ok then," says Pat.

2 weeks ago we were doing shomen ate and again (as had been the norm lately) the back fall just wasn't working right for me. I go flop onto my arse like i was just plopping down on the couch. My muscles seized up in my neck and upper back and, long story short, it took a few days to recover.

Back to the present: Pat broke out the crash pad, leaving it folded, and had us take a small step back and then sit down. As he demonstrated it i silently balked a little. "That looks way too easy." As as i crouched and sat it felt way too easy as well. After a few reps he unfolded the crash pad and we continued to step back and sit on a lower, though still comfy, surface.

At this point i was pretty amused by the fact that all this was was us sitting back and rolling slightly as the backward motion canceled out. It didn't hurt, feel odd, and it worked.. so i just couldn't see this thing being the right. I was enjoying this too much. It was fun.

Pat, being the ever patient teacher, finally moved the pad away and over and over the backfall worked. It was smooth and effortless. This still couldn't be that easy but I was hooked and enjoying it. This was definitely part of the aikido i had always felt i was missing out on.

With standing rolls and backward rolls covered i decided to push my luck and get Pat to fix my side falls as well. With these i had always just assumed, even more so than the other parts of ukemi, that falling sideways just walked hand in hand with eating a whole bunch of energy.

As it turns out though, not so much.

The thing i had been missing out on with these is that with the palm from whichever side i was falling and my leg/hip i was creating a arch to slow myself down and continue rolling slightly to the other shoulder. All this time i had been slamming onto my side with a slapping arm absorbing some of the impact but nowhere near the right amount i should have been getting rid of.

All of that said i was quite shocked and at the same time extremely delighted today. It was by far my favorite class because it cleared up nearly all of the things i have difficulty with in aikido. Or atleast difficulty in the sense that i constantly butt heads with it. I've been on cloud 9 all day and will for a while, i think.

I really love aikido. Best day ever!

I have mastered the Hadou!

It's kinda lame but i sorta dig it. I just wish i wasn't so damn pasty white! Lol

If you're a fan of Street Fighter.. and want to see your face on a cartoon click the link and make your own. It's pretty neat. I only wish i had thought to put John's face on Akuma.