A Privilege and A Pleasure

Between working in Spain and Japan and then beginning this course at the Kokusai Budo Daigaku, I have spent little more than six months in the United States during the past five years. Trips home, then, are marked by the scramble to visit friends and family and there is never enough time. I am a man of clear priorities, however, and my first stop after dropping off my suitcase—and putting on my gi—is the
Kyoseikan
Dojo of Grand Rapids.


I have known Sensei David Mata (2-dan, Bironkai of North America) since I first began Aikido at the age of eighteen. The summer after my freshman year of college found me with a new passion for the martial arts. I had been practicing Aikido for six months with the Yoshokai club of the University of Michigan and I couldn’t let the summer vacation pass without finding a dojo in the Grand Rapids area. After a couple “false starts” which I will not bother to mention, I found my way to the Toyoda Center.
It was Sensei Mata who first greeted me upon my entering into the dojo. At that time, he was teaching the Saturday afternoon class and he invited me to join. Over the next few months, it was Mata Sensei more than anyone who oversaw my training. I was impressed, immediately, by his attitude toward teaching someone with a visual impairment. Aikido, after all, is a martial art anyone can do.


When Sensei Mata separated from the Toyoda Center and founded his own, Kyoseikan, dojo in September of 2006, it seemed only logical that I follow him. Mata Sensei has been both my friend and teacher during these past nine years and has always encouraged me to pursue the martial arts in any way possible. As much as he has watched my Aikido grow and develop, I have had both the privilege and pleasure of watching Sensei develop as an instructor. Mata Sensei is always working to improve fundamental aspects of his own Aikido, never taking an attitude of superiority. Most recently, Sensei has dedicated time to the deeper study of kenjitsu and the ways in which the buki—weapons—relate to Aikido.



I had the great pleasure of spending some time this past trip home being thrown around by Mata sensei. I take a lot of pride in my ukemi (falls) and I was very pleased, therefore, when Sensei noticed my movements had become lighter and faster. I enjoy these opportunities to take ukemi as they challenge you to react quickly and rely on your instinctual feelings to guide your body. The slightest turn of Sensei’s wrist can communicate the direction or type of ukemi expected. For a visually impaired budoka, the ability to read an opponent or partner’s movements is crucial. Even in daily life, when walking with a sighted guide, it is important to understand the message conveyed through subtle body movements. The way a guide’s weight shifts from one foot to the other can communicate a step or change in the terrain; the sharpness of an arm movement can indicate surprise or distraction. Its amazing the amount of information we project in our slightest motion.
This is a video of Mata Sensei tossing me around:
Taking ukemi
A word of advice: Do Not, I repeat, Do Not do a full stomach work out at the gym immediately before a class in which you may have to take prolonged ukemi. I was struggling to get up from back-breakfalls.


It is so important to know that, no matter where I travel or how long I am gone, I always have my home at the Kyoseikan Dojo. For a real budoka, your dojo is in many ways your second home…. Or even your first.

Aikido

     My first real introduction to the martial arts and Japanese culture came through my training in the Aikido club of the University of Michigan.  Due to the many times I have moved, I have studied under a variety of instructors in several styles of aikido.  To date, I hold rank with four associations; no one of which has recognized my time with the others.  But though Aikido is sometimes a highly insular martial art, I believe my wide exposure has benefited me.  Where I lack high rank in any one association—I hold the rank of 2kyu with Birankai of North America and the Japanese Aikikai associations—I have learned much about what I look for in a good instructor… and what I look for in a great one.  Most importantly, I have had the opportunity to consider what Aikido means to me, personally. 

 

     This being said, I consider myself to be always and above all others a member of the

Kyoseikan

Dojo of Grand Rapids, Michigan.  My instructor is David Mata, under Keith Moore sensei, under T K Chiba Sensei.

  

         What is Aikido? 

     You can research Aikido on the internet and discover much more than I could ever hope to explain here on this blog.  My purpose is to tell you what the martial arts mean to me: my feelings, interpretations and reasons for training.

     I believe patience is the word that best describes Aikido at this moment in my life.  Patience is a powerful virtue both in and out of the dojo.  It embodies control, awareness and self discipline.  In an art such as Aikido, we train with a wide range of people of varying levels of skill and physical ability.  When we rush into a situation, we are liable to overpower our partner or, in turn, be overpowered ourselves.  Patience is required to find the “path of least resistance,” so to speak and prevent us from immediately relying upon muscle.  One habit we have in the western world is our reliance on brute strength. 

      This does not mean that speed and force hold no place in aikido.  We practice patiently now so that we understand, later, how to apply techniques with greater power.  In a given class, you might learn one technique—you may even learn that technique perfectly—but what you have learned is one variation of a technique in a universe where there are a thousand incarnations of that movement; you have learned the technique in the setting of a dojo from a specific attack.  Aikido requires years of practice in order that the body learn to react instinctually, from a variety of attacks and in a variety of situations.  This might make it seem as though “repetition” were the most important key to developing Aikido.  Repetition, however, implies a mindless series of movements.  Patience, on the other hand, requires the mind’s active engagement in an activity. 

     The energy in Aikido can be illustrated by thinking of the movement of water.  Water, when presented with an obstacle, seeks the path of least resistance.  Water does not draw back, nor push outward.  Rather, it maintains a constant pressure in response to that which is exuded upon itself.  A wave may be gentle or highly destructive, according to the power of the circular energy which generates its movement.  Similarly, Aikido depends upon circular movements to generate techniques. 

     This has been a brief introduction to my thoughts on an art I have studied for nearly nine years.  In the future I will write about more specific aspects of Aikido or possibly revisit ideas I have mentioned here.