Moving

I decidd to move my blog to my website, so that everything is in one place. Future articles will be published only there.

http://www.godawski.piranho.com

and there navigate to Aikido > Aikido Blog

Tissier Video Iriminage

Nice video for all of you who think aikido is some sort of dance…

Training in the Dark

Show me what you have when there is nothing. When you are exhausted, when you suffer, when you cannot see.

During the Aikido workshop we trained for 20 minutes with blindfolds. It was amazing how the darkness changed into shape, direction, force and feelings. The other senses became sharper, the movements became more economic, softer and more effective. It seemed some of us doubled our skills in Aikido. Instantly.

If you want to gain you have to give. If you want to lead, you have to follow, if you want to see the truth, close your eyes.

Closing the eyes also directs our mind and attention from the future to the present. The eyes see, the weak mind wants. The eyes are closed the mind may rest.

Photo:http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/

Train Slowly-Think Swiftly

When you train slowly you teach your subconscious mind to save the physical movements. When you train too fast too early the movements will be perhaps good looking but shallow and without the internal strength. Flaws are discovered in slow motion, not in a blurred motion.

When your technique or movement work at lower speed, be certain it will be devastating performed faster. But beware of switching too early into the mode of your teacher. He or she has plenty of years of experience. You and me too, we have done our first step. Thread softly. The path is dangerous but very beneficial. So pay respect to the tradition by enjoying every tiny movement. The slow training will provide a double benefit. The fast and inaccurately performed moves will throw you back.

An excellent way to train the slow but powerful movements is Tai Chi. I am going to write more on this fantastic martial art soon. The Supreme Ultimate Boxing is far more than the watered-down movements you perhaps see in parks performed by elderly people to enhance their health. Tai Chi is everything, healing and fighting, it will heal you and others and it is also capable to kill your adversary in a spit second. Interested? More is coming soon…

In the meantime I will write about the Aikido workshop I am attending right now.

Breath and Flow

How important is it to breath?

Stupid question you say. It is essential for live. It is so important that the control of our breathing was shifted by nature into our subconsciousness. We do not think anymore :”Now I have to inhale and now I must exhale.” The crucial clock of our life is ticking without us. Time is running fast for the ones who do not pay attention to it. If you can transfer the breathing from your subconscious level to the conscious level “things” will begin to happen. With the appropriate Qi Gong training you will be able to feel the pulse and vibration of the heart in every bone. From your fingertips to your feet the life giving force will spread and nourish your bones, muscles and tendons, every cell of your body will be regenerated. You will be able to redirect your breathing into specific parts of your body and to your organs. You will really feel your liver, your lungs, kidneys, heart and spleen. After a long while you won’t have to perform fancy movements like in tai chi or yoga. ‘There is simply not enough lifetime to learn all the very good and healing forms of tai chi. I guess tai chi and such are at the very advanced level completely internal and all the movements of chi happen inside and are not visible in the outside world.

What’s the Goal?

Why are you training? Why do you go to the dojo so often? Always the same way tho and fro. How many times now?

What’s the point of being thrown? What’s the point of getting hit by an atemi? What’s the point of feeling pain in every muscle, in every tendon, in every bone?

But still, you go and I go, you train and I train. There must be something hidden that is worth it. Let’s try to find out what this may be.

“I am the Universe”

Sometimes during the practice of Aikido you can really feel you are more than bones, flesh and hair. Sometimes when you cannot breath because your sensei asks you to be the uke for him you can feel what you are when there is nothing left. Sometimes you can leave the earth for some seconds of ukemi flight and and the earth is above your head and you know everything is fine. Sometimes you will feel like a wood plank. Sometimes like someone else. Sometimes very rarely you can proclaim:”I am the Universe.”