When did you decide to make Aikido your profession?
It's not a profession!
That's a difficult topic.
It'is not a profession, because it is so enormous, it is research.
That is the point.
In the Budo of old, like the archery transmitted in my family, no students were taken.
One's occupation was as retainer of a lord, as samurai.
It is not the notion of earning a living through Aikido.
It was just about doing research.
It might be hard to understand.
There is a debate in the world of Aikido about how important weapons training is.
If you practice the basic empty-handed techniques well, naturally you should be able to use weapons as well.
This is not only true for Aikido, but applies to all the traditional forms of Budo.
It is said that "Jujustu is the mother of all martial arts".
So if you use your body and the techniques carefully and with precision,
then, if you hold a sword, it will become a sword movement, if you hold a spear, a Naginata a Jō, you will be able to use them all.
If you control the "kokyu" and timing, you should be able to use all of the Samurai's weapon such as chain and sickle, etc.
You don't have to learn it as a special skill.
But of course if you use the sword you have to get used to it and to know its characteristics,
the fact that it cuts for example.
With the spear you will use the spear's characteristic at will.
The same with the Naginata, it is necessary to grasp the specificities.
But to say because it is Aikido you have to practice with the Jo or the sword is odd.
The real idea is that you will be able to use everything.
That's how it is, and iit's not specific to Aikido.
There is a book about how in the Meiji period,
the head of a primary school created a form of gymnastics based on the martial arts for children.
You can read about it in the book Meiji budō-shi by Watanabe [Ichirō] Sensei.
It's not just normal callisthenics, the form integrates Japanese martial arts.
If you master this bujitsu-taisō well, they should be able to use sword, spear, naginata, and staff.
He was a schoolteacher, so he let the kids practice.
That's the idea.
So in Aikidō, if you practice the technique well,
if the way you use the movement is correct,
it will become Aikiken, or Aiki with the spear, or Aiki with the naginata, or Aiki with the jo.
Or if you throw something, it will become an Aiki-specific way of throwing.
Kokyu.
That's what it is.
If you look at modern day Judo or Kendo, you don't see this way of thinking.
Because they are competitive systems that are based on one set of rules.
Whithin that framework, you think of nothing else.
In Judo you have Jūdō rules, you automatically fall into a way of thinking and throwing that follows these rules.
When you look at contemporary Judo, Kendo and Naginata, they are all thought of as different things.
But that's not the case!
Historically, the way of thinking is different.
So originally in Aikido, if you can work with the sword or the spear, you can also work with the naginata, this is taken for granted.
But it requires a lot of time because you have to familiarize yourself with the weapons.
But people just don't practice.
If you don't practice you won't be able to do it.
For example, if you do Shiho-Nage in a flash,
you can also cut in four directions,
it will also become a Jo movement and if done with the spear it will become a thrust in four directions.
It all depends on your dedication.
O Sensei practiced this all the time.
Is this a question of practicing by yourself?
Practice on your own, yes, then it is a question of mastering the way of using the weapon.
But there is a fundamental difference in the way of thinking;
whether you think of the weapon as part of your own body, or whether you think of it as something external that you have to confront first.
If you don't understand it, you aren't going to be able to solve this problem.
Did O Sensei practice alone a lot?
When O Sensei was in the forests of Ayabe,
he would hang up small targets in 8 directions,
and practice piercing them with a spear over 5 meters long, from morning to evening.
That is how he mastered the spear.
Then when O Sensei moved to Tokyo at the behest of Admiral Takeshita,
Yamamoto Gonbei, who was Naval Minister during the Russo-Japanese war, and who later became Prime Minister,
saw O Sensei with the spear and said "This is the first time I saw a living spear since the Meiji revolution".
O Sensei himself said "I am confident in my spear skills".
He said that to stack up 60kg sacks of rice in different piles with the spear was child's play for him.
He said it was very easy.
So if you practice Aikido techniques intensively
and you want to express a certain flow of movements with the sword or with the jō it will work.
If you don't do this, you won't be able to.
Which is more important, to practice alone or with a partner?
Of course, moving alone is more important.
If you cannot move alone you won't be able to move with a partner either.
When your partner attacks you in this fashion, you can do this, (a certain suite of movements) you have to practice occasionally but it's different (from the core practice).
How so?
The first principle of training is to use your own mind and body working on the basics.
Once you've mastered this, you will be able to apply it to everything.
If you do not have this core idea (of practice) you won't understand.
If you cannot use your mind and body freely, how are you going to practice with a partner?
What is called realistic practice, when your partner attacks you like this you do this, when he attacks you like that, you do that, that is just one kind of practical application.
It is like a surgeon who is operating.
If you do not have the basic skills, you won't be able to operate.
So you have first to master the use of your mind and body.
Once you've done this, the techniques will be born naturally.
That's the traditional way of thinking.
In the art of the sword the use of the sword is crucial,
but when push comes to shove, it is all down to the way you use your mind and body.
Bear this in mind and forge yourself through training, this is the teaching of the traditional transmission (of Budo).
There is rarely talk of Ki energy at the Hombu Dojo, why is that?
This is something you have to research for yourself.
"It's the use of your own life energy, so learn about it by yourself" or so we've always been told.
That's the way it has always been.
If you are not familiar with this from your childhood onwards it is difficult.
For example, in archery, why should one not be attached to whether one hits the target or not?
Why practice in a dispassionate, indifferent manner?
To put it simply, it's the way you use your mind and body.
If you are not interested in this aspect, you won't be able to do it.
It's not because you are taught this that you will be able to do it.
One point is the flow of ki energy.
In the practice of O Sensei there was the "flow of ki" and the "tanren".
This was first described in the journal Aikikai-shi in 1950.
Now you can find it in the book "The Spirit of Aikidō".
"The method of practice in Aikidō is divided into flowing ki and tanren".
"Tanren" means you let your partner grip strongly.
But this won't turn into technique.
Because heads will just fly.
(The aim is) not to be perturbed even if you are held strongly.
If you are held strongly, if your feeling is not attached to the adversary, you will be able to move.
"The flow of ki energy" on the other hand is more complicated.
You first learn the correct order of the movements for a technique.
As you do it, the corners of a triangle become rounder and rounder,
and eventually becomes like a circle, as in "Riaii".
Then a flow emerges.
A flow of the body.
Add to this Kokyu, what is known abroad as Pranayama, receiving energy through breathing.
"Polishing the flow of ki" means to augment and focus your life energy.
Apart from techniques or Aikidō,
when someone falls ill and wants to heal themselves with their life energy, that is also "polishing the flow of ki".
In this way you unify the technique with the flow of your own life energy.
O Sensei said "polishing the flow of ki" to explain it in a contemporary fashion.
Did O Sensei expicitly speak about Ki No Renma?
Yes, and it also appears in his writings.
But when you only make an effort to study the word "ki", you won't understand.
It will depend on your world view on your view of the universe.
Japanese thinking is Eastern philosophy.
It is necessary to investigate the connections, from India and China and then Shintoism etc.
It is unique and independent of other developments.
It has also spread to Europe and America in other forms.
You often talk about how difficult it was to understand O Sensei's lectures, but how it became easier after you met Nakamura Tempu-Sensei.
What I understood after I started following Tempū-Sensei
was due to studying the transmissions of the ancient martial arts and the way of thinking of Japanese traditional culture.
That is different from saying that O Sensei's talk was hard to understand.
To understand O Sensei's talk you need to have a grasp of the way Japanese traditional culture understood things, then it becomes easier to understand.
The root of Ueshiba Sensei's lectures was Shingon esoteric Buddhism.
Over this there is a layer of ancient Shintoism.
If you do not grasp this, it will be hard to understand.
As for Shinto, there was a Sempai at the Tempukai, about 8 years older than me,
called Sugiyama Hikoichi who went to Kokugakuin, a school that taught Shintoism.
For him it was easy to grasp the meaning of O Sensei's speech.
The Shintō deities have meaning.
The different ways they are connected.
With these explanations, you can start understanding.
You grasp the rough idea through intuitive feeling.
From the different stories you hear from your childhood onwards, you immediately understand the feeling.
But a more detailed understanding is not possible.
What I understood through what Tempu Senseii said was rather the method to put it into practice.
Why do we practice with this method, because there are these reasons and these connections.
That is still relevant today.
The Western "mental training" or "mental management" all comes from the research into Raja Yoga and Hata Yoga.
Japanese culture contains what came from India via China.
One of the origins of Japanese Culture is Kōbō-Daishi
The syncretic mix of Shintoism and Buddhism.
This is Shinbutsu Konko.
To explain Raja Yoga in simple words as
"To put emphasis on the connection between human beings and the universe".
This then becomes Japanese Buddhism or even national doctrine under the patronage of the Imperial family.
This spreads all over Japan and also is contained in all the martial arts.
How can we realize this in everyday practice?
If I start talking about this it will take a long time.
The most important point is to not be attached by things/adversaries.
It is the difference between "concentration" and "attachment".
This is the biggest problem.
How to attain this state of non-attachment easily, this applies to all problems of everyday life.
Is it a skill developed through intensive practice?
Rather than skill or intensive practice, it is about whether it permeates your daily life.
This is an exceptionally difficult problem.
It applies to all actions.
If you think of it in terms of "how to augment and to use your life energy" you will understand.
Heightening your life energy and then to use it.
There is no one who is not facing this problem.
From the moment you are born to your death.
This is a difficult problem.
It is difficult but this is where the stress lies.
Was this what O Sensei practiced?
O Sensei was born in Kii-Tanabe, at the base of mount Kōya.
His family belonged to Shingon esoteric Buddhism.
Since his childhood he held these teachings dear.
Then when he was 35 he met Deguchi Onisaburo.
But when I tried listening to O Sensei talk,
I understood that he had profoundly investigated the teachings within the tradition and understood them in his own way.
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