Answers from Ledyard Sensei

A few posts back I tried to summarized my understanding of aiki as taught by George Ledyard sensei. I think I had about as many questions as I had insights.
So I wrote an e-mail to George asking for clarification. Here's his reply.

George Sensei,

I'm still buzzing from you seminar in Bozeman!
And even better the magic is still flowing, though at 1/10th the rate. I'm calling it my new-aikido, as I have total beginners mind once again. Thank you!
But...would you mind clarifying a few things?

I'm working on kata-dori. In-Up-Out into tenkan.
My questions are:
1) To achieve center-touching connection, that moves across the others frame from near shoulder to far shoulder to far hip to far foot, I think I need hips. Is this where pelvis rotation up (that's directed by the fingers) comes in? Or is that more for generating step #2 "Up"? Or is the hip rotation more in the horizontal plane, not the vertical (yet)?
There are a number of ways that these connections can be made. Despite the fact that what I showed folks seems like advanced technique, it really represents only the start towards real internal power per the discussion on the web. So. To start with go for connection using weight shift and subtle rotation of the pelvis forward and backwards to get he up anf down. Use weight shift side to side and subtle hip pressure to get the horizontal. The big deal with internal power training is to develop the ability to make this happen with no visible outer movement but rather by using the myofascial connections inside your body.

2) Is the "Up" generated by breathing in and/or (?) pelvic rotation up. We did both so much I can't recall the order/steps.

The in breath expands you, fills your body with “ki” (in other words, energizes the myofascial structure). The out breath can be part of the “receiving” process, allowing the partner’s energy to come into your structure. The pelvis is merely giving direction to the energy of he connection. So it’s going to move in the direction you wish the partner to go when you want him to go there. It is very subtle. Evenetually, it’s really an energizing of the structure rather than an overt movement. That’s why you can’t see Ikeda Sensei or Saotome Sensei actually doing what I am talking about. This is just a foundation to get people connecting properly.

3) The "Out" is where I'm failing the most. My first step in the out-phase is to pinch my shoulder blades and subtly exhale.

This is the “receving stage”. The shoulders bring the incoming power to the spine. The out breath allows you to be relaxed and soft so you don’t clash with the partner

That elicits an unbalancing feeling in uke. I see people shifting weight or wobbling around, which is a good sign, but not enough to move into anything. And the second I do I totally loose the connection...dohhhh.

Without feeling it, I can’t say exactly but 99% of the time, people start ok and then lose the forward flow to the partner’s center when they try to turn him. There must be constant flow to the partner’s center. That’s why all movement is from te body, not the arms. If you try to moe him with your arms, you will loser the center to center connection.

Can you explain the release of a hip, in the context of what it's doing before it releases. Is it tight, holding either a hanmi stance tailbone tucking action? And then is free to rotate around the other hip, thus creating an axis of rotation...? Any hint/clues? :)

When you “connect” and brong the power of the attack to your center vertical axis, if nothing else happens, all that power simply grounds out and the attacker is essentially pushing oin the floor through your structure. We donb’t really want to stop at that point. So just as the center to center connection creates a small pressure zone between you, you release one hip (just relax it… this isn’t a big hip turn, it’s a release of tension). The partner will go in the direction of he hip you released. Using weight shifting, you can set up different nuetral pivots points so that either hip can be the axis of rotation. Once again… the REALLY good people don’t shift the weight, they do this internally. I can do it a bit but it’s too hard tyo teach people who don’t already know what’s going on. Ikeda Sensei was doing this the last time I saw him and I think I was the only person in theroom whoi had any idea what he was doing.

For more context, I just posted the extended version of my internal conversation and questions to my class-blog.

I'm having a blast, you should know, uncovering this new-to-me principles that I can see will add an incredible amount to my Aikido.

Unfortunately, these are new to almost everyone principles. A lot of what I am teaching is material that is “hot off the presses” so to speak. I am passing it along as fast as I can figure it all out. There are some people I am hoping to train with next year who are off the charts oin this stuff.

Happy holidays!!!!

- George

Orders of resistance

After Ledyard's seminar, I am having to re-evaluate (among other things) appropriate levels of resistance. At first I struggled with the idea that in order to feel, get and learn these more subtle levels of internal aiki, that we had to have an uke who provides the perfect level of both connection and resistance. But I keep remembering what George said about having to relearn this stuff from a basic starting point before moving on, and that having a cooperative uke to help is an important part of that process.

So that get's me started thinking about my own progression as uke and the different orders of resistance we can apply.
I'm using the word "Orders" here like I would "orders of magnitude" or "third order differential equation", or "fifth order polynomial approximation"...you get the idea.

First Order:
I could not get out of this mode to save my life until about 4 years of training. I don't know if I was just too nice, too soft or too whatever. I was a compliant uke, offering nothing but strikes and force in one direction, rarely connecting constantly to nage. This is a nice place to be for learning kihon waza through about Nikkyu exam.

Second Order:
This is what I'm going to call the ukeme required to learn the subtle internal aiki techniques we learned at the seminar. The ittaika one-body, bridge connection. This has underlying martial principles of connection and sensitivity to nage. Once the uke-nage connection is made, it's kept until the last possible moment before receiving the throw. More importantly, and what set this up as different from the next order of resistance is that resistance to unbalancing is minimal enough that nage is allowed to get a rough feel for success using subtle aiki technique. Once a movement is induced that would break your balance, you do not try to regain it.

Third Order:
Add to the second order resistance. Now when nage connects and you move let's say forward a very little bit, you try now to reset and resist by going the other way equally. Nage has to sense and shift from forward unbalancing to rear, or what ever direction is required to throw to fully unbalance and throw.

Fourth Order:
Let's just call this bastard ukemi for now.
In this mode I try to not move under any circumstance. I'll use all my internal structure, frame and center finding tricks to undo nage's power and leverage.


To these order of resistance, there of levels of course. Roughly...too soft, just right, and too hard.
I usually spend most of my time doing third order and a little too hard for my(and our) own good.
I want to move back to second order so that we can start building on successful applications of proper soft aiki power. I'm afraid that if we don't start back there, we'll loose that feeling of "can-do" we found during the seminar. I think it takes a more compliant, but better connected uke than we're used to...

That's my theory for the week...


And now for something completely different:
Some OUTSTANDING randori.
Be sure to check the 5v1 with bokken around 1:00 mark.

In, Up, Out

In

Up

Out

That has been my beginners mind mantra since the seminar.

Sounds easy...
But the "How" for each queue involves some new internal techniques that I'm struggling to put all together. I've been focusing on kata-dori for a common point of reference that I can internalize and start each class with.
So here's what I have so far:

In --> I can do OK. A center-touching connection as uke or nage, from a flexible extension. I really like the feeling of proper attacking "intention" that achieves the single-body bridge feeling. This is an alive feeling, where attack and defense flow because of the connection.
Once I know the bridge has been formed, I will move on. At the same time I'm trying to find how to minimize the force requied to make the "bridge" connection that immobalizes the person I'm attached to. Ittai ka, check.

But here's also where my first question falls. To achieve center-touching connection, that moves across the others frame from near shoulder to far shoulder to far hip to far foot, I think I need hips. Is this where pelvis rotation that's directed by the fingers comes in? Or is that more for generating step #2 "Up"? Or is the hip rotation more in the horizontal plane, not the vertical (yet)?

Up--> I can do too, with either breathing in or with pelvic rotation. But to be honest I'm shotgunning with both because I'm not sure exactly how to use each...
As I'm figuring that out, I'm still very focused on keeping a neutral force connection at the point of contact so nothing get's telegraphed across. This element is perhaps the biggest relevation of the seminar for me. It makes so much sense and explains so very much about the potency of Aikdo that to date has totally elluded me. Aiki prinicples do-not-require strength to achieve!

Out --> Here's where I'm falling short. My first step in the out-phase is to pinch my shoulder blades and subtly exhale. That elicits an unbalancing feeling in uke. I see people shifting weight or wobbling around, which is a good sign, but not enough to move into anything. And the second I do I totally loose the connection...dohhhh.
So here's where my attention is focused on understanding futher.
Towards that end, there are 3 things I'm working on. Breath release, shoulder pinching, and rotation by realeasing a hip. The hip release is the one that I have hard THE hardesting time feeling....

But the good news is that each time on the mat, I have at least once been able to generate that magic feeling of taking uke with no force purely by internal/energetic means. I just can't explain everything I'm doing yet, and thus can't really share the theory effectively.
Thus, I shal continue to practice and study, and study and practice...becuase this stuff is awesome!

I appreciate your thoughts, epiphanies, revelations, feelings and feedback.
See you on the mat!

My textbook reference comes from the two PDFs George Sensei sent out prior to the seminar.
They are Here: "The Principles of Aiki" and Here: "Elements of Connection"

Beginners Mind

This last weekend's seminar with George Ledyard Sensei has left me with a profound feeling of "beginners mind". I now get to rebuild my Aikido. Sincerely, thank you Ledyard Sensei.

For months now training in Saturday morning "Breathing" class, Sensei has been hinting at the power that lies when you choose to let go of conflict. I realize now that I have so much to unlearn. I can't just do it during randori practice at the end of class, I have to start back at the beginning, on everything. Olson Sensei has showed me what's on the other side of the brick wall, a lush garden of Aiki possibility. Ledyard sensei has handed me, and everyone else on the mat this weekend the instruction manual to dismatle that wall.
In, Up and Out.

It will take me a while to figure out exactly why these new techniques work. But when they work, it feels incredibly magical. It's so hard to not think they were flukes, or that uke just bailed for you. The most incredible experience for me by far was on Friday night, after working through breathing and hanmi excercises. Ledyard called on me to uke for katate-dori tenkan.
I was so excited to get to plant a "spine-touching" uke-waza attack on his wrist. I was planted, grounded and felt like I was not going anywhere. And then without feeling any sensation in my wrist or arm, when Ledyard breathed and shifted into me, inexplicably I felt myself go up. Not much, maybe 1/4", and then when he exhaled slightly, I felt like I fell about a foot as he easily turned around me and pinned my feet to the mat. It was one of the most profound uke experience I've had.

After spending the whole weekend practicing the rescipie for this type of fundamental aiki techique, I'm so excited to keep working on it. It's going to be hard for me to not spend my entire time on the mat looking for those perfectly relaxed but extended movements of hip and breath that let us tap into uke's unconscious movements. This is in fact my challenge in the Intermediate Class. How do I teach my "old" aikido, while wanting to learn "new" aikido at the same time. And once I to have a grasp of the true subtle nature of this aiki, how much should/can be taught to those only beginning on their path? It's obviously incredibly important. How do you teach that the unseen and unfelt is more important that the big movements that we've been doing for years?

I don't have the answer, but I'm going to go looking for it.
I hope you'll all come along with me.

Introduction to Koshi-nage

Koshinage 腰投げ

Bending over and pulling the opponent over the attacker's hip, then throwing the opponent to the ground on their back (hip throw).

This technique is the big new technique for the second kyu examination. A lot of the time, people put learning this off till about 2 months before they are going to test. (myself included) I want to teach this technique to the intermediate class audience so people have as much time to prepare as possible. I first really learned koshi during my second kyu test. Yea, that's right, during my test. Second kyu test has an open-uke format, and Stephen Duncan jumped up. He was THE biggest and scariest uke you can have on an exam...let alone my little second kyu exam.

What follows in this post, and on the mat is a synthesis of what I learned that night, and subsequent nights with Olson sensie who's judo background and academic approach infuse my koshinage teaching.

To start off, and for the sake of consistency I'll teach what I'm going to call an "omote" and "ura" variation to koshinage. Historically in our dojo we've only ever done the "ura". Omote and ura in this case are defined by whether or not uke's face crosses in front of your face (omote), or behind (ura). My hope is to see an omote and ura koshi on a second kyu or higher exam some day soon!

In order to teach to such a wide audience (pre-6th kyu up to Nidan) I focus primarily on the hip loading aspect of the throw. I'll leave it to uke to judge for themselfs (with a watchful eye from me) when they are prepared for the subsequent breakfall.

Here's some good reading: From Dan Penrod, chief instructor of the Budo Dojo in Beaverton OR> http://budodojo.com/CreatingKoshis.htm

And some good watching: my favorite koshi clip

Classic from Ikeda: Note Tres Hofmeister as uke

For the music alone ;0

From the ukemi master himself: Donovan Waite Sensei doing a koshi variation...and check the ukemi!

Speaking of ukemi. Here's Waite Sensei in "meeting the mat" clip on Youtube

Running...On the Mat

Of late I've become interested again in the activity of running, in whole because of a book I just finished called "Born to Run" by Christopher McDougal. It's a fantastic read and I recommend it without pause to anyone regardless of whether they run or not. But my relationship to running as a "fitness" activity is a pretty mixed bag. Olson Sensei would be correct in pointing out problems with doing something just for "fitness".

But history aside, i'm finding links between running and what we do on the mat.

The big key thing here is getting our moving bodies off our heals, which are only for supporting our standing weight, and onto the ball of the foot. In general, modern shoes have made this harder and harder to do with all sorts of high-tech wizardry.

Research is showing that padding under the heal and all encompassing arch support is weakening our feet to the point that our feet alone can no longer can reliably support us. Injury rates for runners have skyrocketed in the last 30-40 years, and are proportional to the price you pay for the shoe. Translation: more and more engineered shoes are actually hurting, not helping people.

On the mat this means lots of things for our feet. Your feet may hurt. You may not be able to stay balanced while moving, or may not be able to freely move in any particular direction at a given moment. Towards the goal of understanding these problems, and how to address them I'm going to study in and out of class these 4 pieces of my personal puzzle.

1. foot placement
2. running technique
3. mat/running surface
4. balance

FOOT PLACEMENT:

On the ball...on the ball...on the ball...

RUNNING TECHNIQUE:

"The shorter your stride the better" is one good running form motto.

SURFACE:

The firmer I feel the surface the better.

This translates into wanting a harder mat surface...sorry Sensei.

BALANCE:

I'd like some more of it please...

Intermediate Class Blog: Atemi

What is this blog about!?
My idea here is to provide an online resource to supplement my Tuesday night Intermediate Aikido class. On this forum I'll post my thoughts are inspirations for a particular theme that I'll focus on in class. I hope people will feel free to read and comment on the blog, and the class in general so I can make it a better learning experience, all in the quest to improve our collective Aikido.

In preparation for a class on the use of atemi or striking techniques in Aikido.
First here's some background information.
Definition of atemi via Wikipedia
An excellent article by George Ledyard putting atemi in context for its use in Aikido.

The first weeks class comprised of:

• Historical overview of atemi (sourced from Ledyard's article)
• Swariwaza shomenuchi ikkyo. Nage strikes first, uke blocks, nage uses blocked arm for ikkyo.
• Shomen-tski striking practice
• Shomen-uchi strike with shomen-uchi atemi
• Yokomen-uchi strike with shomen or yokomen uchi atemi, then added shihonage

My observations from the first class come down to two major points.

1. Atemi has to be seen and felt (psychologically) my uke. And it has to be like the way Goldilocks like things, not too fast, not too slow...but juuuuust right. For maximum effect target uke's eyes.
2. It's very effective to mentally "enter" into the attack, at the moment the attack' s initiated. For intermediate usage, this may be hard to understand, but easy to feel when do to you. Being inside the attack to me seems like not reacting to an attack, but moving with an attack. My response happens without thought of "she's striking here, so I'll go here...." I'm personally struggling how to teach this or even to explain it...so I'll leave it there for now.

This week's focus will be on putting atemi to use in common kihon-waza techniques.

• kata-dori ikkyo/nikkyo
• yokomen-uchi shihonage
• shomen-uchi kokyunage
• katate-dori kaiten-nage (variation)
  

And some ubiquitous Youtube videos.
Disclaimer. These are intented to see some different applications of atemi used in Aikido.
These are not what we'll be doing per say, but just something to brouden your understanding of atemi usage. I'll only be teaching basic techniques we're all comfortable with, but emphasizing atemi usages.