One of the hardest question to answer is why people do budo, or why you train in budo, or just what is the daily motivation for the non-result-oriented endeavor of a Japanese archaic form of physical exercise with strange uniforms and bowing and protocols.
Now, I know, and you know and everybody knows, that we do this for different reasons, and that it is precisely the fact that we do it for different reasons which is big part of the reason itself. However, if I look at myself, and my personal journey and motivations as they have come and gone, I try to find a common one; one single motivator that has followed me since I started. Sadly, I have never really been able to articulate that one thing.
Until now, the night between the 4th of July and the morning of hangover.
I train the way I do so that I can be at ease when I don’t train.
“What?” you say… “I train because the training itself makes me at ease, during training!”
Yes! That is 100 percent true, for me too. During training I feel free and great! However, that is not my consistent motivator. The one thing that has been with me, like a personal trainer sitting on my shoulder, screaming: “…get to the dojo! one more ikkyo! have you done your daily suburi? No! well, get on with it then!” has been something else.
When I look back at my dojo life, walking on the symbolic path of the mythological “warrior“, what drove me past the temporary goals of grades, or self defense, or friendships?
I can breath better after training,
I can relax better after training,
I behave better after training,
but unless I keep training in my budo; this personal, physical and mental struggle of mine, on and off the mat; unless this training is done often enough, intensive enough, passionately enough, I will not be able to breath better, relax better, or behave better in between those sessions. So what it comes down to is that I get all those things, not just after training, but between training. As long as those training sessions are done frequently enough and properly enough, I don’t have to be on the mat to be ok and feel ok. I can live my life and not stress about not being on the mat every second. I can live my life.
I know, it is a bit pathological to need something like this to seemingly function normally. Nevertheless, that is how I roll it seems. Just ask my wife! If I don’t get to the dojo I become a miserable person to live with within a couple of days. So I keep at it… with the one master motivator which rules them all: training the way I do so that I can be at ease when I’m not.
In our dojo we sometimes host try-outs where groups from various non-budo backgrounds have a chance to experience budo through the art of aikido.
It is the penultimate challenge for most aikido instructors to explain what aikido is to a group of completely uninformed individuals; people who are absolutely not helped at all by the rich and deep Japanese terminology of aikido. Words like aiki, ki, kokyu, ikkyo, kuzushi, hanmi, maai etc. etc. will only confuse the nice people in front of you. The problem is often not that we don’t know what aikido is to us, but sometimes we struggle how to explain it in a concise way to outsiders without feeling we are neither deep enough nor clear enough.
Last time I was responsible for such an event I decided beforehand to break aikido up – or the description of it at least – into 6 principles. 6 ideas, or headlines, completely devoid of Japanese words, which hopefully would help the outsiders understand the scaffolding on which we support our strange techniques and ways of training. The raison d’être of the format of a normal aikido class. The 6 principles are:
posture
managing distance
whole-body movement
blending
the concept of center
multiple opponents
I know, there are so much more in aikido, which is why we love it so much, but remember who the receivers of the information are in this group vs. the ones in the dojo. Spirals, breath power, and ki goes a long way to keep aiki-holics in the program until they can no longer get out of bed, but, it does next to nothing to help the outsiders who in that one hour are trying to make sense of the tai-no-henko:s, the kokyu ho:s, the irimi-tenkan:s, or the shomen-uchi attacks we do every day. Let me break these principles down in the way I did to this group.
Posture:
The author taking it all in. Photo: Per-Ola Olsson
Posture is the physical body frame which enables us to move in any direction, where we balance directionality awareness with physical stability, while presenting a minimal target for an attacker. Posture is also the state of mind were we allow ourselves to silence the noise and wandering thoughts, sending out the antennae and keep our senses open to input. I would give the example of how a good posture would significantly make it easier to handle the chaos one would experience in a physical altercation, like a swordsman in the past, in a fight for your life outside the pub, or when confronted with a stressful situation at work, in a conflict with a student (or a teacher), or every morning when struggling to get pre-teen kids out the door. Without good posture everything is harder, no matter what techniques you have. With a good posture, often you won’t even need anything else!
Managing the distance: This is a major principle, and I found it easiest to exemplify by letting them pair up, face each other, one holding a bokken – yes, that’s right, a wooden sword in the hands of a beginner – and I would ask the one with bokken to slowly close the distance, sword pointing towards the partner, until the other feels that it is getting too close – spider senses help – and moves back to stay in the safe-zone. I will ask them what made them decide when close became too close. I will then tell them that this time I want the one holding a bokken to try to cut the other one in half (but take it easy of course). The one without bokken are to position themselves by the evildoer’s back (in their blind spot) without being cut. Suddenly it becomes crystal clear what is a safe distance and what isn’t. Managing the distance is to take ownership of your personal space; it is to use your posture to instantly sense what is a safe distance, and then to take the initiative and move in such a way that you keep yourself safe. Managing the distance is to stay in control.
Distance management, good posture, and whole-body movement are prerequisites for acting appropriately. Photo: Fredrik Sjöstrand
Whole-body movement: While working on the previous exercise it normally becomes quite clear for the group members that it is not enough to have a good posture, or to manage the distance, for them to comfortably move to the attackers blind spot. And even if they did manage to position themselves behind the attacker, they were not able to do much more. I would explain how it is important to use whole-body movement to accomplish the necessary action. Whole-body movement means to not isolate one part of yourself from the rest, not move your upper body first and let the legs fall behind. If one thing moves – everything moves. In aikido we work to optimize our ways of moving, generate power, receive force, and use our whole body as one, so that before, during, and after our technique we have the maximal ability to continuously manage the distance and retain a goodposture.
Blending: Staying with the same exercise it is easy to go into the concept of blending. As the sword wielder cuts down it becomes quite obvious why, in such a situation, it serves one little to receive the strike head-on, perhaps by parrying it with the arm and then act. In the world of budo, which is very much about working in the realm of life-and-death, blending is essential. I would sometimes use the example of standing on the road when a bus comes charging – a very real situation where I live! – it would be enough to move out-of-the-way whenever, as long as it was not too late. However, for someone facing a sword about to connect with their head, accurate blending is vital. If you just move out-of-the-way too early, the attacker, quite unlike the bus driver, will just change the direction and follow you like a heat seeking missile. Blending is the action of using the information you receive and acting appropriately, to not collide, but to allow the consequence of the attack play out until it is almost too late, and then, by using whole-body movement, move with, not against, what comes at you. Whether a swordsman trying to kill you with a single cut, or someone trying to control you by grabbing your arm, or simply just someone trying to control you, blending is to allow yourself, for a moment, to honestly observe the conflict as it unfolds through the eyes of the opponent, mold your body and mind to acknowledge their reality, and then act decisively.
Concept of Center
Find your center…
Changing exercise for a while, I would show them a technique from cross-hand grab (attacker grabs one wrist using one hand, very much like shaking hands). I will take them through the choreography of a wrist twist – we would refer to it as nikyo – and observe the joy they display when they receive the inevitable shot of pain as the technique’s anaconda-like constrictor movement hits their wrist. I will let them play around with it for a short while, but would soon join each group and take over the role of executing the technique. By changing the angles and usage of my body they are able to feel when I connect directly to their center,and move their whole body through this connection, or when it connects solely to their wrist resulting only in local discomfort. Both are effective but only one is satisfying. The concept of center is explained this way. In aikido we strive to stay connected to our own center – that is how we generate whole-body movement – and we strive to connect with the attacker in such a way that we can move their center, not just the point of contact. Through the concept of center we constantly refine our ability to identify and connect to the heart of the matter-at-hand directly, and to not allow ourselves loose focus by being distracted by things which happens to fly past our eyes in that moment.
Multiple attackers Having explained each of the previous five principles I will show them that even with all of them in place there is something missing. Using one of the guests as attacker I will demonstrate that after I blend with the sword cut or the grab, and positioned myself in the blind spot behind the aggressor, nothing prevents me from just trapping their legs and down to the ground we both tumble. If I know anything at all related to martial arts I will manage to stay on top and in control. Everything is good right? I can punch or submit this person with fancy techniques. What’s wrong with that? Nothing at all. However, just at that moment my assistant will suddenly come charging, raining down attacks on my unprotected back and head, illustrating in that moment a very important point. In aikido we don’t just have one or two special techniques for multiple attackers; instead every technique and movement is performed under the assumption of a second or even third person hiding in your own blind spot.
Always act under the assumption of multiple attackers.
From a swordsman’s or soldier’s point of view trying with all their might not to be killed in the chaos of the battle this makes perfect sense of course. In a modern world, acting under the assumption of multiple attackers means that you don’t focus your attention at what is just in front of you or what you see initially, but instead accept that there are people around you who are either affected by your actions, or who would like to affect you with their own actions, possibly against your will. Your job is to perform each and every necessary action in front of you, completely mindful of what is happening behind you.
This is the way we train in aikido. We act out particular forms of responses to the conflicts we model, using our archetypical and quite frankly arcane attacks as our model test cases. In the confinement of the training place – the dojo – where the absorbing power of our soft mats as well as the strict sense of etiquette will prevent injury and out-of-control and dangerous behaviours; these techniques, forms, movements, and responses we enact are all supported by at least these 6 principles outlined above. Hidden within this form of training lies universal principles of mind and body that one can use just as much in everyday life as during training (if one chooses to do so).
The joy of rolling…
Aside from the techniques of aikido, there is also a whole bunch of learning going on in how to take safe – and if it you like the workout also acrobatic – falls. This is truthfully the most enjoyable part of training for the majority of aikido enthusiasts. For that reason I make sure to teach those who come to try-out aikido the basics of safe falling and rolling too. If they forget everything else, at least they will leave feeling empowered, knowing they have learned something they didn’t know before.
As a final comment about the training of aikido, I usually like to mention that if you join an aikido club or dojo, you also join a family; the family of the dojo as well as the global aikido family. In this family you are able to train from pre-school age until you are unable to get out of bed. The format of aikido training is very forgiving and naturally gives a platform for people with every possible background to train together. You don’t need to be athletic, but you can be. You don’t need to be strong, but if you are, aikido will provide also you with an abundance of life long challenges. For many the aikido family is truly worth more than any technique. It is to me!
The Dojo 