Mokuren Dojo - Aikido and Judo

Nothing ever works

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:43:00 +0000

I like to occasionally peruse Henry's wonderful list of principles that make aikido work. Lately I've been working my way through this list, blogging about my thoughts on each one, and I've worked my way up to #3

Nothing Ever Works

Also occasionally stated as, "I wouldn't bet my life on THAT!"

All martial arts have assumptions and presuppositions. Axioms that they use as starting points. One of our most foundational assumptions in aikido is that it is near-useless to rely on strength and speed to get things done because (again, we assume) the bad guy is always bigger, tougher, stronger, faster, and more clued-in to the circumstances of the attack. This assumption makes sense because weaker, slower, smaller folks don't usually try to victimize more powerful people. So, it's not too bad a starting point to assume that you're always going to be the underdog.

Being the underdog means that Nothing Ever Works. Any time you try strength, he's stronger. Any time you try speed, he's faster. Any time you use your skills, he's more skilled.

This means that you have to build your martial art based on strategies that do not require abnormal amounts of strength, speed, or skill to work. Your techniques have to be robust and fail-soft, and everything has to have a back-up plan. If you have the co-ordination and athletic skill that it takes to stand up and balance and walk around at a fast walking pace, then you have enough athleticism to make aikido work. If you are strong enough to push or pull a heavy door open, then you have enough strength. And by the time you get to about green belt (around 60 mat hours) you have just about all the knowledge and skill that you need to make aikido work pretty good.

It's a crazy sort of near-paradox.

Aikido works because we start out with the assumption that nothing we do will ever work.

It's crazy, but it works.

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP Ch. 29 - Relaxation

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 06:47:00 +0000

Please join our ongoing discussion of Steven Pearlman's excellent tome, The Book of Martial Power

In this chapter, Pearlman covers the much-talked about topic of Relaxation. I have previously covered relaxation in several articles here. Pearlman doesn't seem to add too much in this chapter except that his previous chapter, Heaviness, really has the meat of the issue in it.

What I did find interesting was Pearlman's typically elegant description of the issue, "...power comes from movement in one or more joints." [as opposed to coming from isometric strength across those joints.] This brought back to mind the physics definitions of the phenomena under consideration. I'm certainly no physicist, but basically...

Power is the ability to do work.

Work is the ability to make things move.

Thus, you get work done, or you exhibit power, by moving - not by trying to being strong. I thought that little reminder was interesting

[photo courtesy of takomabibelot]

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Ma-ai and the blood circle

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 19:54:00 +0000

If there is one principle that is discussed and trained extensively, perhaps even obsessively, in aikido classes and some judo classes, it is the idea of ma-ai.

Ma-ai is usually thought of as a boundary around your body, the inside of which is defined as your personal space. So long as uke is outside of ma-ai, he cannot touch you without first moving toward you. If you allow uke inside your ma-ai then you cna potentially be attacked without having time to respond. Typically, ma-ai is thought to be the length of your arm plus the length of the attacker's arm, but this distance can flex a bit under various circumstances.

Despite our tendency to obsess about ma-ai, it is easy to get lax in your thinking and practice. This is something that you have to watch out for in your practice. A good way to instantly remind everyone about ma-ai is to put a rubber training knife in uke's hand (or in tori's). You dont have to change anytihng else about the practice, but as soon as someone is holding a knife, ma-ai becomes more obviously important.

A very good expression of ma-ai that is used by the Boy Scouts to teach knife safety is the idea of the Blood Circle. A blood circle is a radius around the knife-user the length of his arm plus the length of the blade. Obviously, anything or anyone within this radius is at risk of being cut if the knife-user slips.

At our house, my oldest son has reached pocketknife age, so we've been talking in terms of Blood Circles a good bit lately. Today, he picked up a bokken to do some jodo, held it at arm's length and turned in a circle and said, "Look, Dad, A really big blood circle!"

I smiled, and promptly the jodo lesson of the day became an emphasis on the interplay between uke's and tori's blood circles.

[photo courtesy of Hani Amir]

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

The art of the collar choke

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 14:53:00 +0000

My judo instructor when I was coming up through the ranks was uncanny with his choking techniques. He seemed to be able to set a choke from any conceivable position. Those chokes usually appeared from nowhere. There's even a great story about him being thrown in a tournament but choking the guy out on the way down, such that he won because the thrower was judged to not have control of the throw (since he was unconscious)!

Some of my students have recently asked me how I got so uncanny good at chokes. They make me want to laugh because my skill really is very modest. But seriously, my choking skills really have come together lately, and I've started getting these crazy, eye-crossing chokes in randori a lot lately.

So, I thought I'd give out one tip that I think is mine to give. I say I think, because I don't ever remember being taught this lesson, though I don't delude myself into thinking I'v invented something here.

Do not attempt to grab the collar in any old place and by main force wrench it around uke's neck.

Place your hand directly on the artery, then gather the collar into your hand.

This way, you will get much better positioning of the choking hand, and the collar will serve to anchor you hand to the artery.

Perhaps another way of thinking about this is - all collar chokes begin as katatejime - set the one hand properly, anchor it in place, then add the second hand in when you get the chance.

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

New schedule for 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 18:20:00 +0000

Starting January 2, 2012, we are going to be expanding our class offerings. The new schedule will look like...

Mondays

Judo - 6:30 PM

Tuesdays

Kid's Judo - 5:30 PM
Aikido - 6:30 PM

Thursdays

Kid's Judo - 5:30 PM
Judo - 6:30PM

Fridays

Aikido - 6:30 PM

Saturdays

Private classes per agreement

____________________

Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Ritual and spectacle in martial arts

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 21:28:00 +0000

In modern educational circles, folks like to talk about three domains of learning - psychomotor, cognitive, and affective.

psychomotor - learning to do the skills associated with the subject of study
cognitive - learning about the subject, vocabulary, history, etc...
affective - feeling good about, and "believing in" your increased knowledge and skills

All three are important parts of learning.

Some people have a need for ritual and ceremony and spectacle in their martial arts practice. It is part of the affective domain of learning. They can practice and increase in knowledge and skill all day long, but until the "rank test" or the "belt ceremony" or the tournament or demo, they just don't feel like they have reached the mark yet.

Some instructors are very good at using ritual and spectacle and ceremony in the martial arts to augment their students' affective learning. Bruce Lee and Ed Parker were brilliant showmen who played the mystique of the East for all it is worth.

I am not one of those great affective coaches. The phoney-ness of having an American Redneck pretending to be Yoda sorta sticks in my craw. I remember reading about Chuck Norris failing a rank test because all the candidates had to kneel in seiza while the folks ahead of them tested. He'd knelt on the cold floor for so long that his legs were asleep when his turn was called. That's kinda stupid in my book.

I'd rather run through all your material, taking turns throwing for a couple of hours, than do a formal, strenuous rank test with half a dozen inscrutible-looking sensei in hakama or suits glaring from the sidelines as the student sweats bullets.

I'd rather every class day be a test than build up to one big event. I'd rather spend the agreed-upon amount of months working on the agreed-upon material and then just toss the next belt to the student after class one day.

But there are students that need (or would like) more ritual and spectacle than I provide. To those students, I'm sorry. I've tried for years to build dojo traditions and rituals to help provide some of that affective learning, but those traditions seem to always fall to the side and get superceeded by the practical day-to-day running of the club and teaching of the material.

I'm not against having some of that go on. I just don't do much of it.

____________________

Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Changing forms and the thing-itself

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 17:51:00 +0000

The techniques of Aikido change constantly; every encounter is unique, and the appropriate response should emerge naturally. Today's techniques will be different tomorrow. Do not get caught up with the form and appearance of a challenge. Aikido has no form - it is the study of the spirit. - Morihei Ueshiba

I remember, as I was coming up through the kyu ranks, it seemed to us that our instructor and his instructors were forever changing things up on us. They would tell us one way to do something, then a couple of months later (usually after coming back from a big seminar) they would tell us what seemed like a wholly different way to do the same thing.

I particularly remember several changes in how we were to practice kotegaeshi. That thing seemed to change with the phase of the moon.

This was always frustrating from the point of view of the student, but looking back at it from a little greater distance, It seems like just the way the thing has to be.

We are studying a huge, complex, and chaotic reality. You have to have some sort of form to put the thing into to study it, but you also have to understand that after you study one form of the thing for a while you will start to be subject to diminishing returns. You will need to look at the thing from a different point of view.

This does not invalidate the forms of the thing that you have already studied. It augments them... zooms in and emphasizes different facets.

Often neither the old or the new form of the thing will be the thing itself, but if you have a good teacher then the older and newer forms should sort of bracket the thing itself. The aiki always lives in the interstices between forms. But it is the forms that we use to outline the aiki-thing and study it.

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Range of self-defense skills in judo

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 15:09:00 +0000

With respect to tachiwaza (throwing skills) in the traditional Kodokan gokyo, how many of those throws have you ever seen or practiced in a self-defense context? Or, put another way, how many of those throws have you either heard of being used in self-defense, or can even imagine cropping up on the street? For me, it's mostly the following list...

deashi, kosoto, osoto, hiza, ukigoshi
kouchi, ouchi, ogoshi, seoinage
sasae
teguruma or kataguruma
morotegari

...and that's about it. With greater than 25 years of martial arts experience, I can only come up with about a dozen of the Kodokan throws that I've ever heard of being used on the street - or that I can realistically imagine ever coming to pass in a fight. Sure, anything can happen, but we're really not into preparing for every bizarro eventuality. We're generally more into probabilities than possibilities.

So, why do we have 40 throws (or 65 depending on who you ask)? Why not spend more time on the down-and-dirty dozen that I listed above?

For one thing, we're not just practicing self-defense. The other throws are part of the art. Also, depending on the ruleset under which you compete, the rules might create situations where some of those other throws might be viable.

But personally, I think that the main reason that we have all that extra material is because when you work on those situations, it makes you better at those more fundamental throws that I listed above.

____________________

Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

One thing - Aikido 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 17:43:00 +0000

Y'all remember the old western comedy, City Slickers, with Jack Pallance playing the wise, old, grizzled cowboy named Curly? Y'all remember Curly's Law? When asked what his secret was, he held up one finger. When asked to expand on that he just said, "Choose one thing, and do that one thing." Pretty good secret cowboy knowledge.

For a long, long time, there has been an emphasis in my aikido classes on atemiwaza. Direct, simple, effective. And we've mostly got a decent handle on that facet of aikido. So, I've been casting about for a bit of a new direction to take my aikido classes in next year. That's when Curly's Law came to mind.

I figure we'll pick one thing and focus on it for the whole year and see where it takes us. And not only are we going to do "one thing" but we're going to do an emphasis on what Ueshiba called, "Thing-One."

Ikkyo. Oshitaoshi. Udeosae.

Sure, we'll continue to work folks up through the excellent teaching system that weve developed over the years. We're not throwing the baby out wwith the bath. But I think that a few minutes of various forms of oshitaoshi during each class next year is likely to open up some new ideas for all of us.

And if not, at least I'll know that my students will be the best in the world at One Thing (Thing-One) by the beginning of 2013.

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Where we've been - aikido 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 22:29:00 +0000

The technical emphasis in any Dojo changes over time. Over the past year, I think our Aikido has been characterized by an emphasis on...

Ichikata - especially looking at 90- and 180-degree offbalance pairs and automatically flowing around strength and resistance conditions.

Owaza - emphasis on being able to do this set of techniques from very generalized attacks - as in ryotedori - instead of having to have uke flying at you.

We've ramped up the jo and aikijo this year.

The JW Bode seminar certainly gave me a lot to think about wrt decisiveness, control, and very close range Aikido. For years weve been talking more about synchronization and flow and less about control. But lately weve been talking more about irimi, atemi, control, and aiki as "instant victory."

So, now the question is... where are we going with our Aikido in 2012? Stay tuned as I collect my thoughts on that...

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP - Ch 28 - Heaviness

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 21:50:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP)

"Heaviness," check. Got it. Next.

Ha, get it? That was a fat joke ;-)

No, seriously, Pearlman discusses in this chapter, an idea that he calls Heaviness. This is basically the ability to properly manage your structure so that you can relax, freeing your body mass to drop and affect the opponent.

Consider - strength is highly correlated with sheer body mass. That is, the heavier you are, the stronger you are (in general). This is largely because muscle is heavy. The more of it you have, the heavier you will be, and the stronger you will be.

We discussed, some months back the idea that we can only bring to bear some percent of our power at any given time. We would like to optimize our strength by eliminating the things that interfere with our ability to apply that strength to the other guy.

But in the same way, we can only drop some fraction of our mass (largely muscle) onto the enemy. The remainder of our (muscle) mass is involved in keeping ourselves from falling, and fixing our posture, and some of it is wasted as tension, etc...

But, to the degree we are able to minimize the amount of our mass (muscle) that is serving some other purpose, the more mass we can drop, like a brick (or even better, like a sack of water) onto the enemy. If we are using some of our muscle to keep the rest of our muscle from hitting the ground, then we have very little left to hammer the opponent with.

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP - Ch 27 - Structure

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:01:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP)

Chapter 27 is a sort of a review chapter, but in it he does something remarkable! On the face of things, it is a note that henceforth in the book he will use the word "structure" as a shorthand for five recently-discussed principles...

http://www.mokurendojo.com/2011/08/bomp-ch-19-breathing.html
http://www.mokurendojo.com/2011/10/bomp-ch-24-spinal-alignment.html
http://www.mokurendojo.com/2011/08/bomp-ch-21-triangle-guard.html
http://www.mokurendojo.com/2011/08/bomp-ch-20-posture.html
http://www.mokurendojo.com/2011/10/bomp-ch-25-axis.html

But, more profoundly, and more importantly, Pearlman has managed to boil down much of the vague, pseudo-spiritual, mystical-sounding talk about 'structure' and 'ground-path' and 'root' and different 'energies' and such into a handful of easily-teachable, easily understood (though admittedly, not trivial to ingrain) principles.

Pearlman has gone a long way towards giving us the language we need to discuss the more vague, woo-woo, spooky parts of our arts.

Bravo!

BOMP - Ch 26 - Minor axes

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 23:22:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP)

So, last BOMP post was about controlling the angulation and movement of the major axis of the body - the long vertical axis through the center.

Chapter 26 is a short little note applying the same principle to the other, minor axes of the body, such as the long axis of the forearm, for instance. Pearlman brings up two points regarding the minor axes of the body...

1. Seek the smallest axis possible for any rotation.
2. Rotate within the width of the rotating limb.

Pretty good points. Don't really have anything to say about those.

Punctuated equilibrium

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 18:02:00 +0000

Ever look at the old masters doing kata and marvelled at how incredibly smooth their motion was? Ever marvel at their amazing ability to stay right in perfect synch with uke the whole time? Ever compare your own skill to theirs and think, "Boy, I suck!"?

Sometimes (maybe even often) it seems like when we get to trying to synch with uke, something interferes. There is some sudden discontinuity and by the time you figure it our and switch tracks, uke's gone.

If you've ever wished that you could get in synch with uke and stay there longer, I have bad news for you. The world ain't like that. About the best that I can do under pressure against a non-compliant partner is about two synchronized steps with uke, and I suspect that even the folks that are way better than me can't maintain a nice, constant synch much longer than that. (Of course, if someone were able to reliably maintain a synchronized state for three steps, that would make them 50% better than me, and in a fight 50% might as well be infinity.)

But my point is, I don't think that its realistic or healthy to beat oneself up about the disequilibria that pop up in the uke-tori relationship, because those disequilibria are just part of the nature of the thing. It seems to me that synchronization (kimusubi) mostly happens in short snatches here and there amongst the motion between uke and tori. A much healthier, achievable, and still functional skill level is being able to synch with uke for a step or two, then when it goes to chaos, follow along, keeping yourself safe until you recognize another step or two of synch.

Now, we do often try to train in large, drawn out arcs of equilibrium even though that isnt how the world works, but this is because we think that this is a pretty good way to train beginners to recognize little pieces of those arcs when they occur.

Even though its easier to learn to see these things in the long arcs, you should'nt beat yourself up about your inability to find one of those long arcs in randori. It's definitely a good thing to step out of the long, beautiful kata arcs into the punctuated equilibrium of randori - and to practice that way frequently.

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Lazy is not the kind of slow that you want

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 18:07:00 +0000

I've seen an interesting flaw crop up in some aikidoka's practice.

We are forever preaching efficiency - we spend a lot of time and
effort on trying to get each motion just right, to clean up the
connection and coordination between our minds and bodies such that
when the mind tells the body, "step there," the body executes the most
efficient step and nothing else.

When you look at the highest-ranked practitioners - people who have
been striving at this for years, often their motion is so efficient
that it is deceptive. It almost looks lazy, or careless. This is not
the case.

But when we start preaching "move slowly...be more efficient..." at
students, and they look at the masters who look like they are
lackadaisical in their movements, often the student begins to affect
that lackadaisical motion in an attempt to comply with the "slow but
efficient" instruction.

Slow by means of inefficiency or laziness is not the kind of slow that you want.

What you want is motion that is so efficient that it has nothing
extraneous or incidental or arbitrary in it. This sort of efficiency
gives you so much slack that you can relax and slow down a little. In
turn, the relaxation and slowness will allow you to conserve your
energy and be a bit smarter in your tactics and techniques.

Efficiency begets slack which begets slowness which begets relaxation
which begets aiki.

Getting this out of order by going for "slow" first, you can lose the
prerequisite to slowness (efficiency) as well as getting the wrong
kind of slowness, which prevents you from attaining any of the
subsequent benefits (relaxation and aiki).

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Different bullets for different beasts

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 16:13:00 +0000

Some of my buddies posed a judo question onour FB group last night about koshinage. Basically, they wanted some specific hints about applying hip throws - particularly ukigoshi and particularly against larger and heavier opponents. I thought, having taken the time to put my thoughts together on this, I'd post them here for everyone to laugh at (ahem) I mean, benefit from...

First, different beasts need different bullets. You wouldn't want to go hunting a bear with a .177 spring-air rifle, and you wouldn't want to shoot a squirell with an elephant gun. In the same way, not every judo throw is meant for every opponent. I know, it's tempting to want to develop such exquisite mastery that you are able to throw anyone at any time with any throw of your choice - to be able to just have your way with anyone you come across. But not only is that not the way the real world works, it is also an unhealthy ideal.

Just as you will eventually have a handful of throws that you feel super-confident that you can throw nearly anyone with (tokuiwaza), you will also probably always have a handful of throws that are of no use to you at all - throws that youve never been able to throw anyone with. Most throws will likely fall inbetween these two extremes, meaning that different throws are more useful against different people at different times.

There may be people that you will never be able to throw with ukigoshi.

But you'll never know which throws are your tokuiwaza and which are useless to you until you try them out in randori, so with all that said, you asked for some specifics about variation and direction and grip, so here's what I usually try...

I find it easiest to teach beginners to turn into shoulder and hip throws when uke is stepping backward and tori chases him down, stepping across and through, throwing about 90 degrees to the side of uke's path of travel. Not only is this the form of hipthrow that I prefer to teach beginners, but it works nicely against larger folk, because youre throwing them off their heel, which often makes it easier to get larger opponents down.
As for grips, for an ukigoshi I will often hook his left shoulder with my right elbow (sort of like a hip toss in rasslin), or hook his head with my elbow for a ukigoshi-flavored kubinage. I usually want my left hand as far up his right arm as possible- definitely above the elbow, and maybe as deep as his lapel.
Somebody in the thread mentioned understanding teaching ukigoshi as a concept, but had problems doing it in randori. I think that's okay - to sort of categorize ukigoshi in your head as a theoretical sort of thing that you have to learn before you get to the cool stuff, because a lot of the later cool throws are just variations of ukigoshi that are created when you can't quite get ukigoshi, or when uke resists certain ways - throws like haraigoshi and hanegoshi.

So, keep working on ukigoshi but don't obsess about it. Try it every so often in randori, and sort of keep it in the back of your mind as an ideal or theoretical version of the later one-legged hip throws like haraigoshi and hanegoshi.

____________________

Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Misc thoughts on ukiwaza

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 17:21:00 +0000

Some miscellaneous thoughts on Tomiki's floating throws...

Our Ikkyu requirement is Junana #15, 16, and 17. You can sort of throw #14 into that group as well, but youve already done that one at nikkyu.

These 3 or 4 throws are classified as 'floating throws,' which is sort of a misnomer, because all the techniques of junana can be done as floating throws. Its just that these three (4) techniques exemplify the floating throw principle well, and all the other stuff in junana is usually done with a different focus.

What does 'floating throw' mean anyway? Basically two things...

There is a loose, airy, void sort of lack-of-feeling between uke and tori. You are not mashing on an elbow or twisting on a wrist to make the throw happen. It is a subtle connection, light-touch type of thing that is executed through exquisite synchronization and footwork.

Like all of junana, these throws are done on otoshi timing - on a footfall - but in these three (4), there is an emphasis on exaggerating the preceeding rise in order to make the timing window for the otoshi more obvious. You literally throw uke up in the air, wait for him to come down, and when he does, exaggerate his drop so that he hits the ground.

In the kata, all of these are done entering to the inside, capturing the wrist, making a golf swing through the offbalance hole, and tweaking the wrist and the elbow just a bit on the rise in order to exaggerate their rise.

Then, each of these throws is differentiated from the others by how uke tries to get down off of point...

in #14 - shihonage, uke retracts his arm by bending the elbow. Tori turns and follows and exaggerates that retraction

in #15 - maeotoshi - uke tries to take a step away. tori catches uke's far-footfall, and extends his step, pushing uke away.

in #16 - sumiotoshi - uke pulls his hand back, as if chambering a punch. tori follows that retraction and exaggerates it, pushing uke into the back corner on a near footfall

in #17 - hikiotoshi - the footwork is confused and uke somehow managed to foul #16 for you and ends up facing you, about to come down on you. Tweak the elbow again to get a bit of rise, then drop backward away from tori as he comes in and down.

Any of that make sense?

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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP - Ch. 25 - Axis

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 14:07:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP)

In Chapter 25, Pearlman discusses the positioning and use of our long, vertical axis - the line that runs through the crown of our head and our center of mass (and usually, through one foot). This line represents our center of full-body rotation. Pearlman gives several good examples of how to position and control our axis - most of which boils down to...

vertical axis (upright posture) promotes easier, faster, cleaner rotation
smaller footwork creates a narrower axis, which promotes faster and easier rotation.

I agree 100% with this as a general case, but wanted (just for argument's sake) to discuss some counter-examples...

Pearlman seems to be saying that faster is better... "As martial artists, we need to exercise the smallest Axis possible... [because this is faster]". Well, it turns out that faster is not always better - we see this in judo and aikido especially. It is often important to be able to move at uke's speed instead of your own arbitrary (faster) speed. One of my instructors once phrased this as, "It's not so much how fast you go that matters. It is when you arrive that matters." Timing trumps speed.

But, with that said, It is still a good idea to narrow your axis through relaxed upright posture and narrow footwork, because this potential increase in speed actually allows you to slow down and relax and process as you wait for uke to arrive at the timing window. My students will probably see kosotogari as the ultimate example of this idea. I stress narrow, fast, efficient footwork so much that kosotogari often feels like a "lazy throw" - that is, tori has to wait, and wait, and wait some more before he can pull the trigger and dump uke. Tori's footwork becomes so fast and efficient that he feels like he has to lounge around waiting for uke to get to the place where he can be thrown.

Another interesting point that came to mind reading this chapter, is when Pearlman discusses keeping ones mass centered around the Axis in order to avoid wobble in the rotation. Again, I agree with this in general cases, but there are instances where that wobble can be useful. The two examples that pop immediately into my mind are kataotoshi and koshiguruma. Both of these throws happen by placing a foot (the bottom of the axis) near uke, attaching the same arm to uke, and spinning the opposite leg around the axis.

The uncentered mass of the leg creaets a flywheel-like effect, transferring power to the arm that is hooked to uke. You can sort of see this idea in Pearlman's illustrations labelled Ax13a and Ax13b. The oval shape of the uncentered rotating mass can act as a cam (see the excellent animation at Wikipedia) to impart linear motion to uke.

Again, my counterexamples do not damage Pearlman's excellent discussion of the principle of properly managing your long axis of rotation through upright posture and narrow footwork. Just interesting ideas that cropped up.

____________________

Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Jim Elliot was a judo master

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 17:00:00 +0000

In 1956, Jim Elliot, a Christian missionary in Equador, was murdered by members of the Waodani tribe that he was attempting to make contact with. His life and mission and death are commemorated by the fabulous movie, End of the Spear. Elliot is perhaps best known for a famous quote that his wife, Elizabeth pulled from his journals after his death...

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.

So, what does this have to do with judo? I can think of three parallels right off the bat...

Kano gave up on the 'unsafe techniques' of jujitsu that he couldnt get really good at anyway because they couldn't be safely randori-tested, and because they were socially unacceptable at the time. In exchange, this allowed Kano and his students to perfect a smaller set of techniques, to thoroughly randori-test everything, and to get so good at what they did that Kano-ryu (Kodokan judo) became the predominant form of jujitsu in Japan and throughout the world.
Strength and speed are fleeting. They are subject to inexorably diminishing returns as one ages. Sure, you can (and should) exercise and eat right and take care of yourself, but that's just pushing that decline a little bit down the road. True-ju classical judo holds these ephemeral physical attributes in reserve, so that the judoka can get better at timing, mobility, and strategy - qualities that tend to persist better well into advanced age. (Note that I'm not saying 'no strenghth and speed' - I'm saying 'timing, mobility, and strategy first')
Static balance is an illusion in the context of the human body. You cannot ever be in a condition of static balance (standing strong and immovable in jigotai, for instance), so give up on that in favor of mobility - dynamic balance. This will make you quite hard to throw and it will destroy your opponent's ability to try to balance themselves.

It is true-ju judo to give up that which you cannot keep in order to gain that which you cannot lose. And for that reason, I say Jim Elliot was a master of judo.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP - Ch. 24 - Spinal Alignment

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 21:53:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP)

Most of the power that we are able to put to use in martial arts applications comes from our interaction with gravity and with the mass of the Earth. The placement of the point(s) where we interface directly with the Earth (our feet) is obviously important. The placement of our center of mass relative to our feet and the line of gravity is also important. Obviously, the way that we place our hands on the opponent is important.

But an often overlooked, vital linkage in the power chain is the alignment of the spine. It is through the structure and musculature of the spine that power is transmitted back and forth between our arms and our legs, or ultimately, between the Earth and the opponent. If we can manage to place our feet and our hands right, and to align our spine correctly, we can serve as a very efficient conduit between the opponent and the Earth.

What is proper spinal alignment? I was brought up in the old rigidly-upright posture school of thought. The idea that if you have to lean to do it, then you don't do it. Or, another way to think about it is, if you can't do it with a perfectly upright posture, then you can't do it.

But in the past few years I have come to think that there might be some acceptable deviation from that perfectly vertical posture. These days, I think that we generally want to operate in and around a generally upright, comfortable, natural, neutral posture, but that we can (and must) deviate from that to some degree in our movement.

But how much is it permissible to deviate from vertical? Generally I think that your torso can bend forward at the hips so long as the torso remains one stable structure - the torso does not bow and flex like a noodle. And I think that a good, common-sense limitation to this forward bend is however far you can lean and keep your torso between vertical and the line of the back leg. So, you might, if you have to, lean forward until your torso and your back leg make a straight line...

But it would be better if you moved your feet instead of leaning - generally, if you have to lean then it is an indicator that you got the preparatory footwork wrong.

So, the lean is a backup plan for when your feet don't end up just exactly right. But you have to get the feet correct enough that you can keep the lean to within functional limits.

It's sort of like those infuriating delta-epsilon proofs in Calculus I - where you just have to get one variable sufficiently close that the other variable stays within the bounds that you want. Crikey! I never thought that I'd ever see a use for those awful things!

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Balance is mostly in the mind

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 17:20:00 +0000

It occurred to me the other day (probably should have thought of it years earlier), balance exists mostly in the mind. Sure, there's some muscular tone involved, and you can train your nervous system to fine tune your balance some, but consider this...

If you find a 4-inch wide curb or a 4-inch wide stripe on the road, and you try to walk along it, it's not too difficult, but for most folks it is at least a little bit of a challenge. Everyone has to exert at least a little bit of attention to this task. Most everyone that walks down an eight-foot 2x4 a few times will fall off the side occasionally.

But think about this for a minute (we learnt this in college in a biomechanics class)... Healthy adults walking on level ground, not thinking about their balance at all, their average gait width (horizontal distance heel-to-heel) is about 4 inches. This means that if they were to take a walk and you were to follow them drawing a line through all their right footprints and another line through all their left footprints, those lines would average about 4 inches apart.

Everyone walks 4" wide paths all the time every day, and these people almost never fall over sideways or even stumble!

But as soon as you tell them to walk on a 4" wide line and they think there are consequences to failure (embarrassment about poor balance, threat of being arrested for DUI, perhaps fear of falling...) then suddenly walking a 4" wide path is a challenge.

What is the difference? Not the path - the state of mind with which we undertake the path.

Balance is mostly a function of the mind.

That is why I could teach an ukemi (falling) seminar to a bunch of yoga experts a few weeks ago, and immediately after the class, several of them told me that they felt more stable and centered and poised in their challenging balance poses - because I was able to remove or reduce a bit of the fear of falling out of those balance poses. We didn't do enough actual exercise of sufficient repetition or intensity to create a neuromuscular training effect - I just changed their minds about how they approached their balance poses.

Balance is mostly in the mind.

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Why is it...

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 14:55:00 +0000

Why is it that pretty much whoever you ask around the country (maybe around the world) will tell you...

Public schools all suck, except our local school is not as bad. It has caring, competent professionals who are trying hard - it's all the other schools that really suck!

But they'll also tell you...

Hospitals all suck - especially our local hospital. They are a bunch of greedy, incompetent, uncaring bastards - and our local hospital is much worse than the rest!

Apparently, no matter where you live, the local schools are better than average and the local hospitals are worse than average. Different institutions seem to induce folks to esteem their local instantiations of those institutions higher or lower than average.

...and heres another one that I heard today (that may be true, I don't know) that I found interesting...

Mechanics at car dealerships are crooks that do unnecessary work to squeeze people out of some cash - except our local dealership - theyre honest there!

Is it the same phenomenon as how we are all convinced that we have stumbled into the one true martial art with the only true master that really understands the magic of the ancients?

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Goshin jutsu as randori starters

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 16:54:00 +0000

Most of the martial arts that I've been involved with over the years have had sets of goshin jutsu, or situational self-defense techniques. You can sort of think of goshin jutsu as a concession to the folks that are forever asking, "Well, what if he grabs like this?" or "What if he kicks like this?"

Often these goshin jutsu sets include situations that aren't otherwise commonly practiced in the rest of the system. For instance, the Kodokan (judo) goshin jutsu includes defense against kicks and various weapons. The Tomiki aikido goshin jutsu (koryu dai san) contains clothing grabs, chokes, and seated techniques that we seldom practice outside of that context. Often in karate classes, the goshin jutsu sets will be heavy on grappling defenses, assuming that the typical mode of practice is more kick-block-punch oriented.

These sets of techniques are usually relatively small - maybe twenty to fifty techniques, and as such they are meant to be representative instead of comprehensive. You can't really come up with a programmed response to every possible "what-if" situation, so a set of goshin jutsu typically deals with probable situations instead of possible situations.

I've been thinking about goshin jutsu a bit lately, and something that has caused a bit of head-scratching is, what is the role of goshin jutsu in our martial arts? See, you can treat each situational technique as a distinct kata to be performed just so. This is sort of the approach that the American Kenpo guys took - they have dozens of short little pseudo-kata, evocatively named things like "clutching feathers" and "gift of destruction." They call these things self-defense moves (so they are goshin jutsu) but they are practiced and tested and performed as if they are kata. They seem to have evolved from goshin jutsu into kata over the years.

Most systems that do goshin jutsu or self-defense sets, seem to take the same process of kata-fying (codifying) goshin jutsu until it becomes kata. But that seems to lead in the direction of the American Kenpo guys - dozens upon dozens of kata-like situational self-defense moves.

Although I generally really like American Kenpo, I don't like that aproach to goshin jutsu... too much to remember... too technique-based instead of principle-driven.

So, how can we do goshin jutsu and not slip down that path to technique multiplication?

How about goshin jutsu as randori starters? Randori matches that begin in one of the goshin jutsu situations. So, after the initial attack/situation the randori reverts to normal aikido toshu randori rules wth both players active, and the partners play out the scenario. Then, however it ends, the partners switch roles, set up the situation again, and go again...

I suspect that goshin jutsu situations, if they were randoried sufficiently, would result in a lot of the same termination points as found in the canned goshin jutsu sets - just because many of those solutions are highly efficient, but this manner of practicing them should result in the practitioners getting much, much more practical experience than if we were to program the responses and run them like kata.

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

BOMP - Ch. 23 - The Primary Gate

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 13:07:00 +0000

This year we are discussing the Book of Martial Power (BOMP).

The Primary Gate - control the position and motion of the center of the opponent's chest (the triangle between shoulders and solar plexus) and you more easily control the entire opponent. If you leave your primary gate unguarded, you are more easily struck or controlled through it.

Pearlman's examples are mostly about striking through or into the Primary Gate of the opponent, but the concept comes into play in grappling arts, like aikido and judo, too.

In judo, it is generally advantageous to have the inside grip, meaning you have you hands on his body with your arms occupying the primary gate. This allows you to deliver power directly to him, while forcing him to take an outside grip, and deliver power to you in a roundabout way.

In aikido, I tend to think about this Primary Gate as a sort of Cone of Power, or funnel, with its apex at the opponent's chest and sides mostly congruent with their arms. Inside this cone is most of the opponent's power and potential. Aikido's two primary tactics involve either spearing through this funnel into uke's Primary Gate (irimi) or else turning out of the way of uke's force and potential - mostly outside uke's cone of power (tenkan).

A good randori game is to do some light randori, looking for times when your hands (holding him) are inside your cone of power and his hands (holding you) are outside his cone of power. At this point, you are relatively stronger and he is relatively weaker. You can execute a technique at this point, but I usually like to just hold him in this potition long enough to mark it in my mind, then return to randori.
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____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Doin' the junana drag

noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Parker) — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 17:00:00 +0000

I came up with an interesting idea for a drill to work towards multiple opponents this weekend. We didn't get to play with this because we had other things to do, but you might try this and see what sort of mileage you get out of it. I know we'll be trying it soon.

Choose a kata that you are thoroughly familiar with, like releases or junana, and execute it with a second uke hanging onto one of your sleeves, or hanging onto your shoulders. You could do this with different levels of difficulty - for instance, it will be easier if the hanger-on will willingly trail along with Tori, mostly staying out of the way, so that Tori does not have to drag them around. Or it will be harder if the hanger-on were less mobile and compliant, forcing Tori to move them while interacting with the other uke too.

Either way, the hanger-on represents a challenge because no matter how compliant they are, they constrain tori's motion and take up space that tori could otherwise be using.

Try it - you might find it fun and interesting.