Big Ideas

During the last month I have been trying to transform my aikido practice into something new. New to me at least.

I've taken some ideas from different sources and I am trying to unify and integrate them into something practical and meaningful. First, here is a list of some of the more important ideas.

• The fence.
• Mirrors.
• Compliments.
• Pillars.

The Fence. The fence is a very common sense idea that I am lifting from Geoff Thompson who has authored a whole series of books and DVDs on practical martial applications. The fence is simply a guard up position, but whereas a normal martial arts guard signals your opponent that you are about to go all Bruce Lee on him, the fence very casually says that you don't want any trouble. The hands are palm out, staggered, hovering around chest level. They keep him out of your face, bring you closer into his guard, help you judge distance, and allow you to either attack pre-emptively or respond to his attack. From an aikido perspective, the fence brings my hands up higher into a less passive or reactive starting point.

Mirrors. This comes from aikidoist John Bailey who practices a more contemporary aikido. Basically, a mirror is one body movement that produces two or more techniques depending on uke's position. For me, right now, the major mirror movement I am working on is ikkyo/ irimi. With my fence up, uke grabs my arm cross handed and I move right through him into ikkyo. Uke grabs again, this time non-cross handed, and I perform the same movement which now results in irimi-nage. One movement, two different results. I do not need to wait for uke to clarify his attack (which would be too late anyway). With my fence up, I sense the immediacy of uke's attack and move to meet him half way.

Compliments. Also from John Bailey. I think of compliments as an no nonsense approach to henka waza. Why complicate things? Certain techniques (when encountering resistance) feed logically into others. When they do, take them. I am seeing that compliments really tie in well with the next idea, pillars.

Pillars. I have seen this idea in several places. Basically, the idea is that not all techniques are created equal. Some are more straight-forward and universally applicable. These are pillars. One of my pillars is ikkyo (also part of my mirrors practice). Being a pillar, I will generally go for ikkyo whenever possible. But sometimes it may crumble, especially under stress. Then I look for its compliments, techniques that logically flow from and incorporate uke's resistance. For me, I often end up with sankyo (which can then take me back to irimi which is another pillar). I like pillars for a few reasons. For one, it gives me a focus; I no longer have dozens of options to choose from for responding to an attack. I just have to hardwire a few fundamental techniques. Pillars also lets me off the hook. A lot of techniques are just plain hard to make work most of the time. Pillars says that that's all right. They aren't supposed to work most of the time. Your core (pillar) techniques are the ones that are supposed to be your bread and butter; the rest are supplementary for meeting specific instances of resistance.

At the moment, my pillars are ikkyo, irimi, sumi otoshi (for lack of a better name), and shihonage. Focusing on these four shows a lot of examples of mirroring.

Up A Notch

It is very hard to avoid thinking about whether my aikido would be at all effective in a real confrontation. I say 'my aikido' because I don't doubt that aikido is itself very effective. The techniques of aikido are the same techniques found in other arts like judo or jujitsu. It is only the implementation and focus that is significantly different.

So I look at books and videos of these other arts in action and try to understand what makes their practitioners so pragmatically effective. The base-line answer I always come up with is training style. They are practicing essentially the same techniques - maybe with an emphasis on groundwork or competition - but the techniques themselves are generally quite recognizable. What is different is attitude.

Judo and jujitsu both incorporate a lot of drills, free practice and competition. At least that's how it appears. Therefore, their practitioners all get regular experience in making techniques work under pressure against someone trying to prevent them from succeeding. In my normal aikido practice I get none of that.

I am sure there are some aikido dojos where people do get those experiences. I am only speaking to my own current situation here in Saigon. I feel myself repeating the same techniques over and over in a lackadaisical context, stuck continuously at the same level because no more is ever required of me.

I am convinced that if I want to take my aikido to the next level, if I want to know unequivocally that my aikido is effective, then I must ratchet up my practice to include outcome oriented drills, free practice, and, if not actual competition, at least a form of sport or game that requires tori and uke to have specific and opposing goals. I do not believe these things are contrary to the spirit of aikido. Not at all. Actually, I think they are essential and were probably inherent in the style until very recently. I just think that without formal competition, aikido has not had a clear litmus test to keep it strong. With each generation of practitioners, shortcuts and weaknesses slip into practice and there is no way to challenge these deficiencies short of someone from another style walking into the dojo and demanding a match.

Anyway, I don't have all the answers, and I think this will take me some time to work out. But I do have a few immediate ideas that I can take to the dojo to try to force a higher quality of practice.

1. Insist that uke grab with intention. I already expect uke to strike with the intent of hitting me and not throw a hapless punch that misses me by a mile. Grabs are no different. The purpose of a grab is to seize control and I should expect uke to grab with force and a desire to take my balance.
   
2. Insist that uke follow up any strike with another. If uke throws one strike and stops, he is not mimicking a genuine flow of energy. Techniques work by capturing the flow of the attacker's energy. If the attacker halts his attack, there is no reason to continue to respond.
   
3. Pressure uke to attack again immediately. After uke receives a technique he should take the shortest possible route to a renewed attack. This then limits the amount of thinking that tori can do. Tori just needs to respond.
   
4. To help uke keep the pace moving, pursue him after the throw. Stay with him. Stay in his space. Even initiate the next encounter by striking first and forcing uke to react.
   
5. Do not practice techniques in the same sequence all the time. This is especially true with the 'numbered' techniques. Mix it up. Reverse the sequence. Do evens then odds. Uke doesn't need to know what technique is coming.
   
6. Especially with grabs, try to respond according to the direction of the energy. Uke grabbing and pulling should elicit a different technique than uke grabbing and shoving.
   
7. Do not practice techniques piecemeal. Don't be choppy. I can think of two ways to work through a technique without getting choppy.
   
   
   • Slow and smooth with deep, clean breathing. Or...
   
   
   • Uchikomi. I don't know if I am using the term correctly. But this is what I mean: working at speed, launch into the first part of the technique. Just keep hitting that first part, keep setting it up and backing out. Do it repeatedly until your are mentally ready to run through to the finish. Maybe you do it three times and on the fourth you pierce through to the completed throw. This is done a lot with hip throws but maybe it would be helpful with other techniques.
   
   
8. Practice jiyu waza at the beginning of class before time runs out. Initially start with grabs only. Maybe even one specific grab and each week after add another. When a barrage of grabs can be handled effectively, consider adding strikes. Utilize all available techniques and do not limit yourself to just a few favorites. You want to be able to make all techniques work under pressure.

YouTube - Kaeshi Waza

YouTube - Ganseki Otoshi

Thoughts on Kokyu-nage

I continue to struggle with kokyu-nage, or at least with certain versions of it. For example, ikkyo into kokyu. Or off a punch or strike where I enter on the outside and draw uke around and down and then take kokyu. With these situations I feel like I end up muscling through kokyu. I feel slightly off balance myself or like kokyu isn't really there and I am forcing it.

Reflecting after class today I remembered something I read recently comparing some technique from Daito Ryu to Aikido's kokyu-nage. It said they might look the same but that the first is executed with a vertical circle and the second, the kokyu-nage, is executed with a horizontal circle.

Now I know that the people I practice with are performing kokyu-nage in a very linear pull-push sort of way. I try to avoid that. I am trying to think circular. But I still meet resistance. So I started thinking about what is like to receive kokyu-nage. I thought about receiving the pull-push version and how as uke I feel like I am in a strong stance to resist. My balance is not taken unless I have been pulled so far forward that I fall that way and then what is the point of kokyu-nage? So I thought what it would feel like to receive it as a horizontal circle.

I imagine my arm being projected across my center line, being projected forward from (rather than clutched to) uke's center. The elbow is even with or lower than the wrist. Suddenly, my strong stance is corrupted. Weight shifts to the outside of the forward leg. By body tips slightly into uke. I'm pivoting a bit on the horizontal. Uke needs only a gentle motion to complete the throw. If he wanted, he could choose a gentle kiri-otoshi like move rather than kokyu.

I have tried to visualize how I might perform the technique this way, controlling not just uke's wrist but his elbow as well. Especially his elbow so that I can project it subtly across his center line in order to initiate a horizontal circle. I think there is something here. Now I will have to take it to the mat.

Ahh! An after thought. I also can see an alternate version. I would still first need to create that horizontal circle. But then in a situation where for some reason my arm is not in a position to cut smoothly through uke's center (maybe uke's shoulder is in the way or I just screwed up), I can use my elbow. My elbow can come up under the chin and keep going so that my hand is in uke's face. Sliding over his face, the hand finds his far shoulder to draw him round and down like kiri-otoshi. Seems hard to explain clearly, but in my mind's eye it feels quite simple and natural.

Receive Kokyu-Nage, Take Aiki-Otoshi (Part 2)

A few days ago, I mentioned a serendipitous discovery where I was able to receive kokyu-nage and take aiki-otoshi. It seemed to produce the best aiki-otoshi I'd ever been able to do. The problem was that my uke was a very small guy, and I didn't know if I was getting aiki-otoshi based on good technique and a legitimate opportunity or if I was only using my greater mass to bowl him over. Today, I got to try it out again. This time with a much larger uke. He is at least my size. Taller actually.

Like a lot of folks here, he exaggerates his movements and tends to sacrifice his own posture. So the chance was there. He was really pulling me right into aiki-otoshi. I took it. It worked flawlessly. I had the chance to repeat it several times. Again, they were some my best executed aiki-otoshi.

I cannot express how happy I am to have some success on the mat.

Ikkyo Into Tembin or Shiho-Nage

Here is one I have seen but haven't tried yet. But I want to make some notes right away lest I forget all about it.

Tori goes for ikkyo but fails to get it. Uke is resisting. Tori doesn't get enough of uke's elbow so uke remains a little too upright with the elbow noticably above the wrist. Tori lets his grip on uke's wrist shift a bit and lets the other hand drop behind and beneath the elbow (as opposed to trying to force the elbow down). Tori extends and enters right into tembin-nage or, possibly meeting other resistance, pivots tenkai into shiho-nage ura.