A New Year, a New Start

“Life is growth. If we stop growing, technically and spiritually, we are as good as dead.”
–Morihei Ueshiba, O-Sensei

As with the coming of each new year, we have the opportunity to reflect on where we’ve been and set our sights on where we want to go. I’ve been thinking a lot about Aikido and our dojo lately, and I wanted to take this opportunity to outline my plans for training at Portsmouth Aikido for the foreseeable future.

Aikido is a true dō (道), an all-encompassing way of practice to develop ourselves, mind, body, and spirit. It is also a martial art, and the practice must therefore be grounded in sound martial sensibility. One remarkable aspect of our practice is that we have the opportunity to try out new ideas and discover new truths that may have otherwise eluded us without hands-on experience. As such, we must also pay close attention and notice when our habits, false beliefs, or blindspots may be keeping us from greater insight.

To be clear, simply being able to throw or defeat someone else is not enough; our practice must be grounded in compassion and a sincere desire to care for others and ourselves. On the other hand, it seems disingenuous to claim great wisdom in a martial art if we cannot securely handle actual physical conflict. As such, these are the three (plus one) concepts I’d like us to work on so we can continue to grow and improve as a dojo.

Committed Attack

Aikido is a cooperative art. It is sufficiently complex and nuanced that we must be generous with one another to learn. At the same time, when attacking in the role of uke we must provide a sufficient degree of commitment so that our partner can learn to handle an honest attack.

After hours, months, and years of Aikido training it’s easy to become complacent as uke, grabbing and striking half-heartedly, merely playing the role of the person about to get thrown to the mat. However, training in this way robs us of the opportunity to really understand the art. A proper attack should have a feel of spontaneity. Even when we know we are going to do yokomenuchi and they are going to respond with shihonage, each attack should feel like something new and uncertain, keeping our senses open to the possibilities of what could happen next.

Saying all of this, let me be clear–if I look out on the mat and see people manhandling their partners, wrestling, or thwarting others’ technique to satisfy their ego they will get a swift talking to. Newer students, and all of us at certain points, need their partners to go along with the technique so they can learn proper movement and feel. What I’d like to see is a balance such that nage has the chance to work with the energy of a committed attack without getting overwhelmed.

Atemi

If you’ve been on the mat for any length of time you’ve heard me quote O-Sensei as saying that “Aikido is 90% atemi,” but what does this mean? At first blush, it might seem to suggest that we should be punching each other at every opportunity, but that’s incorrect.

Aikido technique is predicated on a mutual understanding that both people, uke and nage, have the potential to harm each other. If either person lacks this awareness they have openings, what we call suki (隙). Proper training should cultivate an awareness of where you are open and how to minimize those suki in your technique and your ukemi.

As I have been doing more lately, I plan to help us develop this awareness by pointing out common suki in techniques. Sometimes it is helpful if uke points out that opening with an atemi (no need to bruise one another – if the other person can reach you they can hurt you, so we’ll leave it at that). Once we gain this awareness, actual physical atemi becomes less important and we can recognize our openings without the need to punch.

From the perspective of the attacker, if uke fires off an initial attack and then dumbly stands in front of their partner they are missing the point, and nage should help guide them to a safer place by letting them know where they are open. As you can see, training in this way helps further cultivates that spontaneity and martial awareness I’d like to see on the mat.

Unified Body

When we begin to learn technique, we tend to move in isolation. Specifically, we try to do the technique with our hands and arms. It is normal if not inevitable to do this at first, but isolated movement in this way is ultimately ineffective and tends to lead to shoulder injury if not corrected.

In the Tai Chi classics, it is said “One part moves, all parts move.” Proper use of the body dictates that everything is connected such that the power of our whole body may be expressed at any point of contact with our partner. The analogy I like to use is opening the back of an old pocket watch. You look inside and see the springs, wheels, and levers moving in a concerted way. Though the movement seems to ebb and flow of its own accord, everything is driven by one gear–that is our hara, powered by our legs.

In The Art of Peace, O-Sensei is quoted as saying that “The purpose of training is to tighten up the slack, toughen the body, and polish the spirit.” I prefer the phrase ‘remove the slack’ (nothing should be tight!), but the concept is that all parts of our body are unified in movement.

For newer students, this practice begins with tai sabaki: entering, turning, and shifting our stance to move our whole body. As training continues, this gets refined as we learn to open, close, rotate, release, and extend each part of our body in concert with the whole.

Kuzushi on Contact

Kuzushi (崩) means to compromise our partner’s balance. Without kuzushi, Aikido does not work.

At first we learn kuzushi in a rudimentary way by extending our partner beyond their base as in sumiotoshi, which we do on the first day of the beginners course. Though a necessary starting point for developing a feel for our partner’s balance, this type of kuzushi is limited since when people move naturally they adjust their feet to regain their balance.

For Aikido to be truly effective, one must create kuzushi on contact. Sometimes this may be achieved through atemi, angles, and timing, but at a higher level our partner becomes unbalanced because of how we arrange ourselves internally based on the principle of aiki. This is a sophisticated skill and should be of greatest concern to our black belts and more advanced students.

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I am excited to move forward with these concepts in mind. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, don’t worry–just come and train and everything will be addressed in class. If you have any questions, bring those along and I’m happy to say more.

Train well, and best wishes for the new year!

Self-Care for Continued Training

In my 27 years of training, I’ve seen many students forced off the mat because of injuries, poor health, and diminished mobility. Just as concerning, too many aikidoka go from young and strong to stiff, overweight, and in pain, reducing the quality of their practice.

Aikido is a uniquely sophisticated art, and as such it requires many years of focused training to understand its depths. One of O-Sensei’s longtime students, Kanshu Sunadomari once said something along the lines of, “When I reached 50, I really felt like I was getting good. At 60, I realized I had reached a whole new level. Now, at 70, I understand more than I could have ever imagined.” 

With age our bodies change, but if we learn to take good care of ourselves we should be able to train for a lifetime.

Below are some of the tools, methods, and concepts that have helped me stay healthy and continue my training. This is not intended to be a comprehensive list, but it’s what’s working for me now. I am not an expert, though after nearly three decades on the mat I experience less joint pain, am more flexible, and get sick less often than I did when I was in my 20s. 

I hope you find something here that helps you enjoy your practice a little more and a little longer.

Eat Well

This means different things to different people, but whatever you put into your mouth becomes  you, so make sure it’s good. Many of us put on weight as we age, but for Aikido practitioners this added weight becomes a big stressor on our knees, hips, and back. Whatever/however you eat, keep an eye on your weight and you’ll feel better for it.

There are a seemingly endless number of diets and methods of eating out there. I suspect most of us know what food and eating habits make us feel best. My advice is to listen to your body and do what’s right for you. 

If you haven’t heard of it, I love the hara hachi bu approach to eating. The concept is that you only eat until you’re 80% full. I’m not perfect about eating in moderation, but this concept has been a good reference point to help me get back to eating well if I’m not being mindful about food.

The biggest dietary shift I’ve made in the past decade is actually what I don’t eat. Two years ago my doctor noticed that my cholesterol was creeping up to unsafe levels—a trait that runs in my family. I’d do just about anything to avoid taking pills, so I started doing some research and learned about intermittent fasting.

I tried a couple of different approaches and settled on not eating from Sunday night to Monday afternoon. When I went back to my doctor after a year of intermittent fasting, my bloodwork showed that my LDL dropped by 28 points and my HDL went up nine. Works for me. It may take some trial and error to find the right method for you, but giving your body a break from food now and then really is great.

Stay Loose

In my teens and twenties, I skateboarded, biked, and snowboarded without ever stretching. As a result I ended up with great balance, strong legs, and tight muscles. The regular stretching we do in Aikido is good preparation for our daily keiko, but is insufficient for increasing flexibility. 

During the dark days of Covid I developed the habit of stretching daily. Since then, I have made significant gains in my static flexibility, experience fewer aches and pains (especially my knees and hips), and managed to stave off that horrible middle-aged feeling of struggling to reach things on the floor.

I don’t do a single type of stretching practice, but have developed a routine that works for me which is a combination of gravity yoga, static stretches, and a method O-Sensei followed called makko-ho (which you may recognize as part of the warm-up routine done at Hombu Dojo even today). 

My biggest suggestion is that you find a way to work stretching into your daily routine. I’m a busy person and need to unwind now and then, so I bribe myself by stretching while I watch shows on Netflix. Nothing profound, but hey, it works for me.

Gadgets, Toys, and Devices

If you don’t have a massage gun, buy one now. They feel good, help you heal faster, and are a great way for smoothing out the aches and pains of daily life. For the past three years I’ve spent five minutes every morning working my way from my neck down to the bottoms of my feet, and I’m better for it. There are dozens of these devices on the market. Do your research, but my one recommendation is to buy a brushless massage gun for quieter use and more mellow vibes.

Here’s a cheap and easy one—roll your foot on a tennis or lacrosse ball. One minute per foot feels great and can help with ankle mobility, plantar fasciitis, and keeping feet flexible for suwariwaza. If you have a standing desk (short version: sit sometimes, stand sometimes, and move around occasionally), leave a ball nearby and roll on it whenever you could use a little break.

Lastly, for injuries, tight muscles, and stuck fascia, a gua sha tool is great. I first had this done by my massage therapist, and it helped me get some lumpy-bumpy places unstuck. From there, I bought my own gua sha stone online and use it regularly to free up whatever part of me needs some attention.

Final Thoughts

If you’re feeling overwhelmed with the thought of trying to do all these different things to stay healthy, put your mind at ease. Self-care doesn’t need to be another task in your daily life. Find one or two things that sound appealing or address an issue you’re having right now and give them a try. When you take care of yourself you are rewarded two-fold: first, you feel better now, and second, you now know how to manage issues as they come up later in life.

Take a deep breath, check in with yourself, and show your body a little love with some self-care.

Weapons Potpourri

For those of you not at the dojo since Covid, we have spent the last nine months doing a variety of weapons practices. For my students, I imagine that doing so many different things could feel overwhelming or random, so I wanted to take a moment to explain the many ways these practices converge.

Traditionally, the Aikido curriculum covers tantotori (knife take-aways), sword and staff surubri (solo cuts and strikes), kumitachi and kumijo (paired sword and staff forms), and jonage (techniques applied with a staff). Because of social distancing guidelines, we have had to get creative and find new ways to train with weapons while avoiding direct contact with each other. 

At first, back when we thought the pandemic would only last a few months (ha!), we did lots of suburi, kumitachi, and kumijo. It didn’t take long for that to become tiresome, and we soon branched out, trying new styles of practice, combinations of weapons, and means by which we applied our techniques.

We have gone off the rails a few times to be sure. However, in exploring these new ways I have come to appreciate how each weapon has its own distinct lessons to teach, while at the same time there is a common set of principles that underlies everything we do. 

In a practical sense, there are some basic differences between the weapons we typically use in Aikido. The sword is a curved tool used for cutting soft targets that tends to slash and thrust in straight lines. Conversely, the jo (short staff), is a straight weapon used to strike hard targets that tends to move in a circular manner. By virtue of the sharp blade, the sword is generally held only at the handle. The jo permits greater freedom, with the hands sliding, spinning, and moving around with less restriction.

I find that practicing with a sword tends to sharpen my mind and clarify my movements. When swinging a sword, I want each cut to be perfect, and that desire for precision hones my attention. 

When I pick up a jo I feel free, even playful. When someone grabs my jo, I find the techniques teach themselves. Feeling the feedback of the other person’s grab and moving in accord with the principles of aiki, it really does seem as though a limitless number of variations are possible.

Now, this doesn’t mean that simply holding a staff in one’s hands imbues him with magical powers. To the contrary, the exact shape, length, and construction of the jo defines, and in some ways limits, how it can be used. In practice, when we understand the nature of the weapon in hand, these characteristics actually help elucidate principles that can be otherwise hard to see in open-handed practice.

The jo is almost limitlessly strong along the length of the weapon. Applying force across the grain—sheer force, perpendicular to the length—jeapordizes the integrity of the weapon and tends to be counterproductive in technique. In a sense, the staff wants to be used a certain way, and practicing with that awareness informs our waza.

This aspect of the jo became evident when we started doing more nagewaza (throws with another person grabbing the staff) after moving from the paved parking lot behind the dojo to a local park where we could take ukemi on the grass. The most common feedback I gave my students when we practiced was to avoid using sheer force and instead move from center in a way that aligns the power of their movement with the grain of the wood. 

Practicing with the jo became very interesting because when someone grabs your jo, the point of contact effectively becomes the entire length of the jo. The line of entry, angle of force, and degree of rotation become more clear when reflected in the jo rather than trying to suss out subtle contours of pressure within a grab or strike, as in open-handed practice. Furthermore, the details of the technique become even more obvious when you relax your hands because the increased sensitivity to what’s going on can inform movement.

In a more theoretical aspect, when uke hinders the movement of the jo or applies force to it, spirals are created. A spiral starts with a line of expansive force, and when that line meets resistance it begins to rotate and expand, describing a circular trajectory. Unlike a sword, a staff has two equal and opposite ends that function the same. When a point midway down the shaft is constrained by a grab, those ends serve to illustrate the dual opposing forces (in and out, forward and backward, yin and yang, aiki!) expressed in spiral movement.

Though the sword and staff have much to offer, we eventually needed something new, and escrima sticks fit the bill. I have never trained in Philipino fighting arts and claim no expertise. However, thanks to our local hardware stores and the magic of the interwebs, we made our own escrima sticks and learned a few basic patterns. Soon after, someone grabbed someone else’s stick and a new aspect of our training began to unfold.

Because of the length of the stick and subsequent lack of leverage when the other end is grabbed, it became readily apparent that trying to muscle the other person with hand strength was futile. That’s when I remembered some things Yoshi Shibata Sensei shared a few years back: don’t grab forcefully, let your hand pivot around the stick as you change angles, lead with the butt-end rather than trying to move the person with the tip.

Suddenly, ikkyo became quite doble. Allowing your hand to freely pivot lets you move to where you can effectively apply the mechanics of a sword cut. Sticks and swords—together at last!

Once we had ikkyo down, one of my students asked how to do shihonage. The sword-cut concept alone wasn’t enough to get a solid opening. After noodling around for a bit I was reminded of O-Sensei’s response when Mitsugi Saotome asked him the secret of Aikido: “The sword cuts and thrusts, that’s it.” 

Aha! Like a mini jo in your hand you can thrust with an impressive range of motion when you allow your hand to pivot around the stick. From there, the cutting motion allows you to move and throw your partner in other ways. All of a sudden we could do shihonage, kokyunage, kaitennage, and more. Put a second escrima stick in your hand, and atemi (a strike to point out another’s openings) brings techniques to life even more. 

The escrima sticks were a welcome change of pace after months of standard Aikido weapons training. They allowed us to practice dynamic, interactive paired techniques that felt much like our open-handed training.

From there, we returned to our bokken sword cuts with the escrima techniques in mind, and we worked to refine the mechanics of our swings with newfound awareness. When we would thrust with the escrima sticks, it taught us how to align our bodies in ways that weren’t obvious with a longer weapon like a jo. The weapons changed, but the principles of movement held. Same, but different. Different, but same.

The escrima sticks were fun, but we soon jumped further into the deep end of the pool. I found out you can buy ‘kids’ bokken’ at bargain-basement prices and ordered a handful for the dojo so we could try two-sword style. Someone had graciously (possibly in violation of copyright law) uploaded Saotome Sensei’s two-sword instructional video and we started working some of the patterns. 

Having the escrima sticks in hand really felt like an extension of our bodies. When holding a bokken and wakizashi (short sword, which sounds much more cool than ‘kids’ bokken’) that extension is bladed. Adding this awareness of the blade forced us to look more closely at the angles with which we held the weapons and the arcs we drew. Deflecting an incoming cut required using the flat of the blade, while finishing with a decisive entry meant cutting with the monouchi (the final third of the blade). 

Whereas the escrima sticks are blunt tools that inflict damage with the force of impact, the bokken and wakizashi of two-sword style are cutting tools and are therefore meant to move in a different way. 

The escrima sticks are light and can be maneuvered easily and quickly. Holding a sword in each hand is cumbersome, and setting up an effective attack more time-consuming. The weight of the weapons required us to move more intentionally from center. 

The asymmetry of the weapons’ lengths required us to be more aware of the left and right sides of our body as we moved. The unique characteristics of the weapons demanded a certain sensitivity and awareness of movement that we wouldn’t have discovered otherwise.

For the past decade, I have trained regularly with William Gleason Sensei, who studied Kashima Shin-Ryu style sword in Japan. Since I can only make it down to his dojo once or twice a month, I have had lots of exposure to this style of sword but never committed the patterns to memory—until Covid hit, and suddenly I had an excuse to do so.

Compared to the standard curved sword we use in Aikido, the Kashima bokken is completely straight, longer, and significantly heavier. Similar to the jo, a long, straight weapon, the Kashima sword tends to be wielded with spiral movements, which contrasts notably to the stop-and-start linnear chopping movements we tend to see in traditional Aikido sword.

The most basic cut in the Kashima repertoire is kesagiri, a diagonal cut to the base of the neck. Though relatively simple, it’s so different from what we tend to do in Aikido that it took weeks for my students just to get the fundamentals (and trust me, I’m still working myself!). 

Though the forms of the Kashima sword are notably different from those of Aikido, the two schools share many similarities in principle. One of the Fivefold Laws of the Kashima Shin-Ryu is kobo ittai, meaning ‘offense and defense are one.’ In the Kashima Shin-Ryu sword kata, there is little blocking and parrying. One stays safe not by defending, but because the opponent is forced to respond to your attack and the two swordsmen interact dynamically without so much need for clashing swords.

O-Sensei is widely quoted as saying that Aikido is ‘90% atemi.’ This may sound uniquely violent, though in Aikido this means we must recognize we are all capable of harming one another and to move in a way that doesn’t leave us open to attack. Offense is defense.

Similar to the jo, when making contact with someone else’s sword we don’t respond by pushing back with greater strength. As Gleason Sensei says, “Strong is dead.” Rather than meet force with force, we maintain the point of contact and pivot such that one side of the sword yields (yin) while the other enters into the opponent's space (yang). Defense is offense.

I recognize it can seem overwhelming at times to learn new things, but there’s no need to worry. Each weapon has something new to offer if we are willing to listen, and with each step the unfamiliar becomes more familiar. Our training should never be about the arbitrary accumulation of knowledge anyway. Rather, when we train properly we move more and more closely into accord with each moment, regardless of the situation we are in.