Northern Wind

Okay, ukemi isn't really a new cardio craze—but why not? I remember when I first started aikido years ago, just prior to my 20th birthday. I was a good 20 or 30 pounds overweight (I'd been that way since hitting puberty), and made no other lifestyle changes other than attending aikido classes 3 times a week. I remember the ukemi practice we did at the beginning of every class kicking my ass. Fall down, get up again, fall down, get up again, fall down, get up again. Backwards, forwards, sideways... I think I lost 10 pounds or more in the first several months just from that! The problem is, the older I got, and the more advanced I became, the more I started "leading" classes instead of "doing" them. Ukemi practice was gradually replaced by sitting around, watching everyone else, drinking coffee and giving input when needed. And I'm paying for it. My lifestyle in general has slipped and I'm probably in the worst shape of my life (and that...

Based on my own training over the years as well as observing the training of other students, it seems like there is sort of a three-step progression that occurs. What I Am Doing? When we first start out, our focus is mainly on our own bodies. We learn what our feet should be doing, what our hands need to do. We practice our positions, memorize certain choreography, learn terminology, get accustomed to a new culture. For the beginner, it's actually okay that they don't necessarily have kuzushi or off balance, that their timing is off. Build the plane first, then fly it. Defend It's also a time when we focus on what to do when we find ourselves in the midst of conflict, which is to say, defending ourselves, just staying alive. What HE/SHE Is Doing? Once we get the hang of all that, we can begin to think about the meaning behind it. When I do a given technique with all the appropriate footwork and hand positions, what is that supposed to do to uke? Sure, up u...

So, I've talked a bit about my experiences with "burn out", particularly why it tends to happen , and what to do when it does happen . The last dimension of the topic I wanted to touch on was: How do you prevent burn out from happening? Well, in a word: relax, man. Pace yourself As tempting as it may be when you're really into your art, I would advise not going to every single class and every clinic, like I did. Pace yourself, champ. Budo is, as they say, a marathon not a sprint. There are people who exist as living exceptions to that, of course; there will always be those rare few who seem destined to do this stuff as their primary purpose in life, but you need to brutally honest with yourself whether or not that's you. And for many, that may take years to figure out. Avoid major life events Okay, I'm kidding. Obviously, you can't avoid major life events, expected or not. So to that end, you might as well just accept that they will come an...

Most of us, at some point in our training, will encounter some level of "burn out." In may case, it may even happen a number of times. The other day, I wrote out some thoughts on what could possibly cause it (at least as far as I'm concerned). Today, I thought I'd offer a few thoughts on what has helped me deal with it. What do you do when burn out happens? This may sound crazy, but let it. Whenever you get hurt or sick, your body has ways of telling you something is wrong. Whether it be pain signals or fatigue, your body is trying to tell you to slow down, that something just ain't right. In fact, I came across a study once that showed arthritis can be directly caused by—not just exacerbated by, caused by—severe anxiety and depression. The brain is essentially crying out for help any way it can! So feeling burned out is probably your body's way of saying, Hey, something ain't right . Or, for the more poetically inclined, life it out of bala...

It doesn't seem to matter how intensely interested a person is in studying his or her martial art of choice, all of us, at some point or another, come face to face with burn out . Now, "burning out" can range anywhere from a small sort of fizzle—in which your interest dips, or your body is just plain worn out so you take a brief vacation for a week or two—all the way to a complete and utter implosion, where you give up entirely on the art and never set foot in a dojo again. I myself, have gone through several burn outs, so you might say I'm something of an authority on the subject. Fortunately, in each case, the burn out was never so bad as to prevent me from returning. I took months, even years off, but (so far) have always come back. So what is "burn out" exactly? Why does it happen? What do we do when it happens? How do we prevent it from happening? Over the years, I've developed a few ideas, and this post is the first of three on the subject....

I've had a blast in recent years exploring various aspects of the arts I study. Like what, you may ask. Well... Slipping judo nage waza into aikido I say "slipping" because I don't really think I intend to add judo into aikido, or combine them in anyway. Though they do go nicely together, they're slightly different animals, and prefer to regard them as such. That being said, there are occasions when a little leg or hip action can augment a technique nicely. I also say "slipping" judo in because I'm not really interested in trying to teach students who only study aikido how to do proper judo throws. Learning judo throws is a complex best reserved for, as you may have guessed, judo class. Rather, I want to a wee bit of judo principles to their aikido; just enough to augment what they already know, but not so much that it confuses them or complicates things. Not sure what happened here, but it sure looks uncomfortable. Bringing more renrak...

Here's an interesting little variation you might try in your aikido practice, just for funzies. Take junana hon kata / randori no kata as well as the eight release movements and try doing them by starting at least with only a "hip switch." Not the full, 180° turn we do in the Walking Kata, but more of a 30 to 45° shift to one side or the other on the balls of your feet. Be sure to do it right at the point of contact. The hands would do mostly the same thing, and after the first switch or two you can either move normally, or I dunno, see what happens!

We say it all the time—move from the center—but, truth be told, a great deal of the time, when something isn't working, guess what the culprit is? And I don't necessarily mean "moving" in the sense of your center traveling over a certain distance, but just about every action (aside from some ikioi ideas) needs to have the hips engaged and zeroed in on the target. We've been focusing somewhat on that concept in both judo and aikido in the mornings, and I thought I'd share a few drills/exercises I've pulled out of my bum to help illustrate it. The first set is... THE BELT TESTS Have everyone pair up, and give each pair an extra obi. There are two experiments each pair can do. #1 The Truck Pull Have tori stand stationary facing one end of the dojo. Have uke stand behind him, facing the same direction but several paces back. Wrap the belt around tori's waist so that uke is holding either end in each hand, and there's no slack. The object h...

I've noticed an unfortunate tendency creeping into my training the longer I do all this budo stuff. It's most noticeable when I'm the one leading class on a regular basis. Basically, I stop doing things correctly. Which seems odd, doesn't it? You'd think that the more advanced you get, the more correct your technique would be, right? Well, yes, it should , darn it. But the truth is, when I'm the most senior rank, I have a bad habit of getting lazy. Why , I ask myself. For one, I can get away with it with lower ranks. Because they're not as skilled, I only need to get most of the pieces in place to make a technique happen, and they typically don't know enough to take advantage of it to counter it. And frankly, deep down, sometimes I'm showing off a little. Look how easily I did that technique, aren't I smooth? Check it out, I'm not even looking at the guy... Sigh. Not good. Even then, I'll botch something on occasion, and f...

There's nothing like an occasional class of randori to bring certain issues to light that would be good to work on. We did a little light randori in judo this morning, mostly just trading throws, rotating partners with every bell (which I believe lasts about 3 minutes). When we were done, I asked everybody what their thoughts were, what went well, what didn't go so well, etc. A handful of issues came up, which is natural, and it should prove amble fodder for future classes. One thing that I thought might be worth mentioning here was the problem of controlling escalating frustrations. We've all been there, where something isn't working, the guy's not going down, so we get stronger, faster and more desperate. So how can you deal with that in your practice? The temptation is usually to stop, to quit, to just go sit down until you cool off. Like you're punishing yourself. "How could I loose control like that? I know better than that!" are the kinds...

I've thought about the concept of a wave in relation to aikido or judo before, but in the past I only ever considered the crest of it. The crest of a wave is the top part, the part that comes crashing down on you (or in this case, uke). But that "crashing down" is only the end of the whole cycle. I'd been missing the other aspects of what makes a wave happen. Now, I'm no physicist, so my science is going to be pretty sketchy here. Spend a minute watching this nifty animated GIF I swiped from Wikipedia. Watch the red dots and watch their path. Notice how, after riding one wave, they actually start drifting backwards for a bit. If you've ever spent any time on a beach, you might notice that the water retreats back into the ocean before the next wave comes crashing down on the beach. You've probably also felt how surprisingly strong that undertow can be. It's the undertow that I think I've been neglecting. Just walking up to uke and trying to ...

Holy smokes, it's been a while since I've posted anything! My latest excuse has to do with the lack of a car. We sold one, and until we bought another I had to bum rides to work, which meant that I couldn't get to morning classes for a while. And if I don't make it to class, I guess I don't have much to think about regarding budo. Now, we have another car finally, and I've been back to class for a couple of days. But even from those couple of days, a couple of things have popped in my head. 1) Everyone  has something to teach you. I've probably said it before, and you've probably heard it before, but never, ever, ever let your rank, whatever it is, make you think for one split second that you don't have something to learn from every person you meet. On Wednesday, my first day back in a while, I worked with a brown belt (the only other person to show up) who had once trained under a very, very accomplished judoka. I let him do most of the tal...

I don't know how it works at your dojo, but at Windsong Dojo, there has always been a policy that everyone ranked shodan or above (or yudansha ) is given a key to the dojo. You see, there are no teachers assigned to teach given classes. Here, whichever person attending class that day has the highest rank by default leads that class. In many cases, that's usually the same person, but not always. And many times, the regular class leader won't be able to make it, which means someone else will have to run the show. And as long as a black belt is present, class can be held. So, rather than have a bunch of students standing around outside waiting for one or two people to show up, each black belt has a key to let everyone in. It's an amazing display of trust on the part of the dojo cho that, as far as I know, has yet to be broken or abused. The other week, we promoted a student to shodon in our morning aikido class. He now has a key, and being an early riser, no longer...

On the radio this morning, a DJ was asking listeners to call in and share some valuable life lessons they learned in school growing up, since today is, for most kids, the first day of the new school year. I didn't call in, but I started thinking, what did I learn from a teacher? I don't know that I remember a whole lot of what I actually studied. Even the experiences that the DJ himself recalled had nothing to do with classwork; just solid advice from a teacher to a student. But one piece of advice I got actually had to do with the class, but it has definitely applied to much more than that since. When I was in junior high, I played the saxophone in the symphonic band. We were working on a particularly challenging piece of music, but there was one short refrain that the whole saxophone section was having trouble with. Our teacher, Mr. King, told us to go home and practice just those couple of measures. When doing so, he wanted us to do three things: 1) Play them very,...

My wife had her tonsils removed last week (third surgery this year, after a c-section and a hernia!), so I've spent my mornings getting the kids ready and taking them to various friends who have been kind enough to watch them while Amy recuperates. Which means, of course, I haven't done any budo, and boy am I missing it. I've sure been thinking about it, though. What have I been thinking about? Lots of stuff, really... In aikido: Aikido hand change drills Not just the "wave" but the "undercurrent" The shiho nage / mae otoshi entry Finally demonstrating the sections of san kata & yon kata I've been working on with Scott In judo: No-gi nage komi / ne waza Certain throws no one seems to know very well More about the "undercurrent" Forms of morote gari Lots of ground work The only problem is, deciding what to play with first when I get back!

Like most Americans, I took my son to watch fireworks this last 4th of July. He's four, and it was his first time to see fireworks live and in person. Outside of the mugginess and the residual heat, we had a pretty good time. Until it came time to leave. As you might expect, or as you might have experienced yourself, when the show was over, everyone wanted to leave at the exact same time. Which makes for quite a traffic jam. In my case, the fireworks were held on the north side of town, which meant that everyone also wanted to head south. We sat in the parking lot without moving an inch for about 20 minutes. That's an eternity to a tired 4 year old. Even when things did start to crawl, it still would've taken another hour to get anywhere. Finally, I decided to try something. Instead of pushing relentless down the two main streets that everyone else was going down, I decided to drive north . No one was headed that way, so I had the roads to myself. I drove up a...

In general, I've always disliked a lot of lecture and stories during class, and much prefer to keep things moving. We have an hour or an hour and a half, two maybe three times a week to do this. That's not a lot. Let's make the most of our time and be productive. (I have a very influential college professor to thank for that, I think.) But once in a great while, the course of a class will turn more to discussion than the practice of technique. And periodically, I think that's a good thing. In fact, I'm beginning to wonder if I've prevented myself from doing it too much. There are some things we need to learn that have more to do what what and how we're thinking in MA than what and how we're doing something, and that needs to be addressed sometimes. Today, for example, in judo, we talked about a certain high ranking judoka (and aikidoka, but we were talking specifically about ne waza) who, despite pushing 60, proved to be more than a handful for a...

It's almost a cliché, really. Whenever you ask someone why they want to study a particular martial art, they typically give you the same handful of reasons: self-defense, to get in better shape and self-discipline. I think we can all understand where the "self defense" part comes in to play. For various reasons, many of us at some point feel a basic, fundamental need to protect ourselves. Maybe we live in a dangerous part of town or work in a potentially violent profession (such as law enforcement, emergency services, or even playing music at a raucous hole in the wall) and the threat of violence is ever-present; or, maybe we've always been picked on by bullies, be it physical or psychological abuse, and we want the confidence to stand up to them. It's a fairly strong motivating factor, one that's probably worth spending a few posts on in and of itself. But it's not what's on my mind. As for getting in better shape, there are probably much better ways ...

I've been struggling to try and squeeze a little sitting meditation into my life, and haven't been very successful. My life is fairly jam-packed, as it happens (I'm sure that's most people's excuse). I have too many interests and hobbies, it seems. In the past, I had entertained the idea of adding it to the routine of our morning classes, but feared I would be the only one truly interested in it (although the others would probably be too polite to say they weren't interested in it). And then, lo and behold, someone else actually suggested it! My friend and fellow budoka, Scott, happens to have had a little experience with it and he wanted to know if we could do a little seated meditation in aikido. Well, sure, I said! Now, most traditional budo classes start right off the bat with a little mokuso (meditation), but he suggested doing it after the ukemi practice and just before the Walking kata (tegatana no kata). Since some have described the Walk as a form of...

It would seem that, even though we study a martial art , an attack that we don't expect or see coming would still put us at a distinct disadvantage. But what is the line between being more "aware" of your surroundings, or in other words, being prepared for a possible attack, and being paranoid? How can you "be prepared" for an attack without becoming distrustful of mankind, of other people's intentions?