About Aikido, How to Make the Techniques Efficient Enough For The Street

When I hear the uninformed speak about Aikido, it is generally a description of how the aikido techniques are graceful, or how they don’t work. This becomes the old disagreement, do you want form or function? This can further be understood as, do you want force or flow?

If one examines Aikido History, and here we are referring directly to Morihei Ueshiba, one needs examine two specific martial arts. One should look at Daito Ryu Aiki Ju Jitsu, and one should look at techniques of the sword and spear. These are the two most significant martial arts from which Aikido is synthesized.

Daito ryu Aiki Ju Jitsu was created a thousand years ago. After a tumultuous time in Japan’s history, two brothers gathered the samurai who had survive countless battles and asked them for the most workable techniques. They ended up with a list of over 3,ooo tried and true, no bushwah, martial techniques.

About Aikido sword and and spear techniques, these are gathered from a variety of martial schools throughout Japan. While a couple of schools could be singled out, the fact is that techniques are shared, training routines are shared, and there will be a commonality here. This holds true for both the sword and the spear.

The direct result of this combining of the arts of Daito Ryu and sword and spear is plain to see. The attacks executed in Aikido training are drawn from the sword or the spear. They tend to be wide and easy, and some people think that this makes Aikido less than adequate as it is based on handling attacks one would not see on modern streets.

The defenses, also, are large and perhaps unwieldy. They are taken, for the most part, from Daito Ryu, and they are wide arcs and curves, instead of the tight and quick geometry one would need in todays self defense movements. This fact, of wide and large being a faulty geometry, is the key to understanding the problem, and fixing it in Aikido.

Simply, go slower (in the beginning), and make the geometry of the attack smaller. Instead of the large circle of a hand descending like a spear, come off the elbow and make the circle of attack smaller, and the defender will have to become more street real. Instead of the slow grab of the wrist, change the motion into a quick punch, and let the defender handle this as he would on the street.

These two things should cure any person who dares to think that Aikido is less than street ready. One should, of course, take their aikido training at a slower pace, and take the time to adjust their body movements and harmony, so that there are no harmful accidents, and so that Uke can adjust to the fact that he is going to be thrown quick and fast, and not in ballet fashion. These simple things done, none will ever think less about aikido again.

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