Just curious, but I have an inordinate amount of trouble getting people to understand how important their body position is in doing techniques, and wondered if other aikido players have the same problem. I don't have any trouble getting there myself, but its almost like students have a mental block about stepping into the right position to execute throws, especially irimi nage. What's everybody else's experience?

This is in relation to Brazilian jiu-jitsu not Aikido, so I hope you don't mind my sharing my thoughts.

The ABSOLUTE hardest thing I've encountered, is getting people to relax. People always want to go all-out using every bit of strength they can muster up, only to gas-out and fall WAY short of developing any real technical ability.

But whaddya do....


-John

you have to tell them to "relax harder"...

Technical curriculum aside, you'd be surprised how much BJJ has in common with aikido, John.

Being relaxed and moving from your core is merely the starting point. The hardest part is dis-engaging the mind from conscious thought. I noticed a post of yours in the State of No Mind thread and couldn't help thinking, if I didn't know you did BJJ/MMA, I wouldn't have guessed. For all I knew, you could be talking about Aikido.

Ya wanna know something weird Eyrie, I really believe that there are many common principals found within...well, many arts. But I believe that there are even more in common between aikido and the things that I do relative to the clinch and the ground. To be sure, there are some differences as well.


-John

John,

It's funny. I trained in an Aikido Dojo under Mits Yamashita for a very short while. He's been training for 50 years in Aikido and trains police and has experience in boxing, kickboxing, karate and BJJ. He had trained with the Gracies, I believe it was for about 10 years, and still practices grappling though is in his 60s. In fact, they offer grappling classes after the Aikido classes for all those interested.

He even called BJJ, Aikido on the ground. Interesting....but believe it or not, I think there are a lot of corollaries between BJJ, Aikido, and several other more traditional arts. Principles of closing the gap, using the opponent's momentum against him, the "floating" sensation, etc.

I still belive it's less the art, but how you train. But there are commonalities between many of these stylistic interpretations.

-B

I'm only currently hold a 5th kyu ranking so I can't really offer much in the aspect of 'teaching' but when I practice with beginners and particularly beginners with a background in another art, I find they are very rigid and tense and their movements are very choppy. I find the hardest thing sometimes is getting some beginners to relax and just listen to what you are advising and picking up where they're going wrong. I particularly have a tough job working with most of the middle-aged male beginners. They don't listen, rush through techniques and try to use their strength and sometimes I feel they are not only a danger to themselves but also to the other practitioners within the dojo. I understand that they're learning, but when a higher grade offers advice and picks up where you go wrong you should work with that. Or maybe they don't like being told what to do by a female who is younger than them?

Couldn't agree with you more John... couldn't agree more.

This is not for Aikido in particular, but I reckon that the hardest thing to teach is patience. Today, we live in a world of instant gratification, people want everything now. This means that a lot of students don't realise that getting a belt now is not as important as the process of learning that comes before getting a belt. It takes patience and perseverence to progress and learn properly but few people want to do things that way.

I'd argue that a lack of patience is the cause of the "belt factories" we see so much of today.