Tenkei Aikido Dojo

What is it that makes Aikido, Aikido? If anything it’s got to be aiki, this word which we loosely translate as Harmony. Yet what is often presented as for Aikido seems notably lacking in aiki making it more another form of jiu jutsu.

An understanding of balance lines, the mechanics govern body movement, proper positioning, etc. are the foundations of technique or waza. Initially, Aikido training is about mastering this level. Strength, speed, power, and focus are developed. The basic elements of timing and spacing become second nature, as well as an intuitive understanding of suki or openings, ones own and ones partner’s.

But if practice of our art stops there, it stays on the level of jiu jutsu. It remains merely an efficient method of physical manipulation of the partner or opponent. This is the level of the physical, the realm of science which can be observed and quantified, can be understood and explained in concrete fashion by the thinking, logical functions of the brain.

Aiki is the term which refers to the intersection of the physical with the Mind and Spirit. It is fundamentally a term which has to do with relationship, between things, between beings. In terms of waza it relates to how the physical interaction as two people come together is effected by their perceptions, their thoughts, and their emotions.

In this realm explanations are difficult and usually metaphorical. Effects can be felt and sometimes observed but causes seem mysterious. Interactions are characterized by a lack of tension exhibiting a quality of “naturalness” which is not found in the merely mechanical. This is the realm of aiki and it is what makes the aiki arts, including Aikido, unique.

The great practitioners of the aiki-related arts, of whom Morihei Ueshiba, the Founder of Aikido, is the most famous but not by any means the only one, all exhibited technique which lacked tension. Physical tension, mental tension, any tension whatever is largely a product of the mind. Training to develop aiki necessarily focuses on simultaneously relaxing the body and the mind.

O-Sensei used a term, take musu aiki, to describe what he saw as the essence of his art. Take is the same character as the bu in budo, the “way of the warrior”. Here it refers to the techniques of the martial interaction or waza. Musu is the same phrase that is found in musubi (lit. to tie the knot) which is used to describe unbroken connection between the partners in Aikido. Musu has a procreative or generative meaning as well. So in this context, take musu aiki could be said to mean that waza (martial physical technique) arises out of or is born from the state of aiki. When the partners, or opponents, come together, technique spontaneously arises. O-sensei would often say that his techniques were “Divine techniques”, that the Kami simply “revealed” these techniques to him. It is precisely this element of technique happening, seemingly without an actor that characterized the Founder’s Aikido and should serve as a model for our own training.

To begin to experience this, it is necessary to lose one’s attachment to the success of a given technique. Unfortunately, most Aikido training tends to increase this attachment rather than decrease it.

The standard training model in Aikido is for the Sensei to stand in front of the class with a partner who takes the role of uke (the attacker) who executes a particular attack. The Sensei then executes an appropriate technique which the students attempt to imitate.

The problem with this training model is that from the very start it is artificial. The uke knows what technique is to be done and consciously or unconsciously changes his energy in anticipation. This can make the technique difficult to do, creating a situation in which the nage (defender) tries to force the technique in order to make it look the same as the Sensei’s. This is fundamentally not aiki. A great degree of tension is introduced into a student’s technique in the attempt to duplicate someone else’s technique.

The uke may not even be giving the proper energy for the technique demonstrated by the teacher, but nage will work very hard to get that particular technique because that is the expectation. This is not conducive to developing the sensitivity required to utilize aiki, rather than physical power, in doing technique.

One response to this problem is to take the energy out of the interaction between the partners. It becomes the attacker’s job to facilitate the defender’s technique. The attacker is no longer “attacking” but merely going through the motions. This allows the nage to relax, develop flowing movement, and feel positive about their practice because everything seems to be working.

The problem with this solution is that it is a fundamentally faux solution to the problem of having aggressive tension in one’s technique. When harmony exists in technique only because the attacker is acting in agreement with the defender then all martial meaning is lost. This is like saying Aikido is a form of conflict resolution when there isn’t any conflict.

It is a fundamental requirement of the practice that the attacker do his job. If he is grabbing the defender, then he must give a grab which is designed to connect with the defender’s center. If he is striking it is the fundamental definition of what he is doing that he really attempts to hit the defender. It is impossible to understand aiki when the energetics of an interaction are counterfeit. A partner with an arm extended towards one’s head isn’t doing a strike; he is holding his arm out. A partner with a weak grab isn’t grabbing anything more than your wrist. A real grab would attempt to control the defender’s center. It would be designed to impede nage’s movement, off balance him, and prevent him from executing a counter strike or kick. If this isn’t what is happening, then the entire interaction between the partners is flawed. A committed encounter is absolutely fundamental to developing real technique.

Some styles of Aikido, in seeking to counter this type of degeneration in training, go to the opposite extreme. As if it were more martial to do so, you find ukes that hunker down on every technique and make it difficult if not impossible for nage to do his technique. Nage in turn seeks to develop physical power, rather than aiki, in order to prevail over these resistant partners.

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to be continued
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* by George S. Ledyard (b. 11 May 1952). Aikido 6th Dan Aikikai, Aikido Schools of Ueshiba. Aikido & Defensive Tactics Instructor. B. in Syracuse, NY. Direct student of Mitsugi Saotome beginning in 1976 at the Washington DC Aikikai. After moving to the Seattle area in 1982, attended the Seattle School of Aikido under Mary Heiny as well as the Seattle Aikikai under Bruce Bookman. Other aikido training influences include Hiroshi Ikeda, Tom Read, Ellis Amdur, and William Gleason. In 1986, became chief instructor of the Seattle School of Aikido through 1989 when he opened Aikido Eastside where he currently teaches. In 1993, founded “Defensive Tactics Options,” an aikido-based police defensive tactics training program and has conducted training for local departments, corporations, and security agencies. Also, teaches at the Bellevue Community College Administration of Criminal Justice program. Demonstrated at Aiki Expo 2002 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Taught Defensive Tactics class at Aiki Expo 2003.