Aikido Bridge Friendship Seminar Day Three

Last night involved too much beer so I missed the 8:15 class.

Doran Sensei taught the second class of the day. After warming up and working on tenkan and irimi exercise Doran Sensei had us work on ryokatatetori techniques when uke grabs both nage's hands. From these grabs, uke's intention is not to just stop but to follow through with a kick so nage must be prepared for the kick and get out of the way or be prepared in some other way for that follow-up attack. We started with the ikkyo and then went to a nikkyo followed by a sankyo technique.

Ikeda Sensei taught the third class of the day and his emphasize of nage maintaining unity with uke was the focus of the different katatetori. Ikeda Sensei said something interesting (at least to me) in that in Aikido we often hear and talk about nage needing to breaking uke's "balance" all of the time, but what does "breaking balance" really mean? Ikeda Sensei stated that breaking balance is really about weakening uke, or making uke weak and not allowing uke to assert power but by moving oneself and by achieving unity with uke, it doesn't matter the size of uke, you can throw or control the movement of uke (the ideal of Aikido).

Tissier Sensei was the instructor for the forth class and we worked on a series of kaitenages from a variety of different attacks including katateori, shomenuchi, and ryokatetotori. We continued working on the same themes from earlier classes where nage knows what are the next steps in the progression of the technique, one can anticipate and be ready to respond if uke counters the movement of the application of the technique.

George Ledyard Sensei was the guest instructor for the final class of the day. Ledyard Sensei wanted to expand on what may of the different sensei were talking about in their classes so he started off by talking about how physicists conceptualize the nature of light and matter being both particles and waves. He stated that O'Sensei saw everything as waves and that what Ikeda Sensei in particular was trying to impart in his internal Aikido teaching was more wave based and not particle based.  We first worked on an exercise from Daito-Ryu Aiki-jujitsu, where nage is against a wall and uke grabs both hands, nage first moves the pelvis, then lower back, followed by the shoulders and bends forward all which create a wave that breaks-down the structure of uke and we all practiced this before moving off the wall and practiced it free-standing. We worked on a number of related exercises and techniques with Ledyard Sensei explaining its relationships to energy as waves and not solid as particles. This class was very interesting and helpful in the context of the other instructors and sensei at the seminars.