Teaching gun safety

I have to admit, I have an aversion to handguns that borders on phobia. In college, my roommate, a black belt in multiple arts and a wartime veteran, made me handle an unloaded pistol to make a point in a discussion we were having. I couldn’t tell you what the point was because I was so freaked out at just having to touch the thing. So far as I know this attitude was not a taught thing – just an innate and extreme distaste for that particular weapon.

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Lately I have been considering buying one of the realistic simulation air pistols that fires BBs – so that I can face that phobia to some degree. But then this happened…

Walthall County sheriff’s deputies are investigating the reported shooting death of a 2-year-old girl in the Darbun community. The shooting occurred about 11:20 a.m. Sunday. Deputies said the child was shot in the chest by an air gun being handled by another child. The girl was taken to Marion County Hospital, where she later died. The shooting is believed to be accidental, and Walthall County Coroner Shannon Hartzog said an autopsy has been ordered. Authorities did not release the name of the girl.

Tragedies like the above bring the gun issue to the front of everyone’s mind. This particular case was especially shocking to me because it was a BB fired by an airgun! Around here, airguns are generally considered (if not actually toys) pretty innocuous so long as everyone is wearing eye protection but this child was killed by a BB into the chest.

Does this mean that I think airguns or even ‘real’ guns should be banned? I don’t think so. For better or worse, guns are part of the equation of modern American life and they are not going away any time soon. I certainly don’t think that ignoring them will make me or my kids any safer. I have been teaching my 7 year-old gun safety rules and safe gun handling using a Daisy Buck BB gun and I’m still thinking about getting an airsoft pistol.

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For more info on this topic:

• Gun Safety info for Parents
• Gun Defense at TDA Training

A helpful handful – 5 ways to improve your shihonage

Shihonage (lit. ‘four-directions throw’ or more loosely, ‘all-directions throw’) is the first of the ‘Six Pillars of Aikido' (shihonage, iriminage, kaitennage, kokyunage, osaekomi, ushirowaza). This technique is very common across most martial arts. Here are a handful of hints I’ve found helpful in working on shihonage.

• Work your way through the name of the thing. Work on finding ways you can throw this thing in every direction.


• Do it part of the time with only one hand and part of the time with only the other hand – like #6 and #8 in Hanasu no Kata. Practicing this with only one hand makes you move your body thru the right arc or you lose it. Don’t cheat by learning shihonage with the illusion of control afforded by using both hands.


• If it goes bad toward the beginning, try flowing into maeotoshi or sumiotoshi. If it goes bad toward the end, try flowing into aikinage (A.K.A. iriminage) or ushiroate.


• We use a crash pad when we practice binding the arm and throwing forward (i.e. hijikime) or when we set it up then step under the arm from the outside to the inside for a floating throw. These are severe falls and represent a severe risk to the shoulder if there is anything wrong with the ukemi.


• Going back to the name, consider Beth Shibata’s article in which she suggests that it might be more appropriate for learning purposes to call the thing the 'all-directions release' instead of the 'all-directions throw'. How does what you call the thing affect your execution of it?

Koryu Dai Ichi

Aiki with Patrick M. and Kel

• ROM and ukemi (including reps of 2 buddy falls)
• Hanasu with emphasis on moving forward on #3
• Chain #2 including R2→R1→oshitaoshi
• 2 variations of Ichikata ushirowaza kotegaeshi (ducking under the arm) and R1→R2→kotegaeshi.
• Nijusan kotegaeshi and oshitaoshi (step aside at the end of the line)

Y'all will be proud of me!

I've finally mastered the secret to a beautiful, effortless deashibarai! All you have to do is find an uke that is 1/8 your size and all of a sudden you are a shoe-in for perfect form!

Cool Jimmy Pedro bio

More clinic clips

Here are some more short clips of some of the participants at the latest Henry clinic.

You get just as wet no matter where you jump in

One of the cool things about aikido is that there are no prerequisites. There is no ‘most advanced skill.’ You can work the skills in any order and call that a ‘system’. A beginner may jump in with the whole class profitably practicing whatever happens to be on the lesson plan for that day. Sure there are safety considerations - you don't make newbies take big falls - but they can still practice the same techniques and principles as everyone else. I've heard it said that there are no advanced techniques or concepts in aikido - just skilled students practicing the fundamentals in a very advanced way.

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Many Aikikai schools (if I understand rightly) start with ikkyo (oshitaoshi) as the first teaching, while most Tomiki schools start with shomenate as the first teaching and only get to oshitaoshi (Aikikai’s ikkyo) as the sixth teaching after several hours of practice. Either is an okay way of teaching the thing, and after a few hours of practice, it probably doesn’t matter because students of both methods end up understanding both concepts.

In some schools, there is this talk of omote (superficial techniques taught to anyone) and ura (deep, hidden teachings only taught to the initiated) but Musashi in the end of the Wind Book writes about there being no internal teachings and no gate:

There is no "interior" nor "surface" in strategy.

The artistic accomplishments usually claim inner meaning and secret tradition, and "interior" and "gate", but in combat there is no such thing as fighting on the surface, or cutting with the interior. When I teach my Way, I first teach by training in techniques which are easy for the pupil to understand, a doctrine which is easy
to understand. I gradually endeavour to explain the deep principle, points which it is hardly possible to comprehend, according to the pupil's progress. In any event, because the way to understanding is through experience, I do not speak of "interior" and "gate".

...Accordingly I dislike passing on my Way through written pledges and regulations. Perceiving the ability of my pupils, I teach the direct Way, remove the bad influence of other schools, and gradually introduce them to the true Way of the warrior. The method of teaching my strategy is with a trustworthy spirit. You must train diligently.

…In my Ichi school of the long sword there is neither gate nor interior. There is no inner meaning in sword attitudes. You must simply keep your spirit true to realize the virtue of strategy.

Order your copy of Musashi's Book of Five Rings:

Martial arts – They’re not just for kids anymore

Demographers have been telling us for years about the baby boom generation. This is the group of people born between about 1946 and 1964. This is a worldwide phenomenon, but in the U.S. it represents a group of about 80 million people beginning to move into retirement age.
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Three trends that concern many older adults are health care (in 2004, boomers averaged $2700 per year in healthcare spending), finances (fixed incomes and rising cost of living), and personal safety (Things seem to move faster and violence seems harder to deal with). The perfect solution for these problems is my aikido class.
.If you are an older adult living in Southwest Mississippi and want an affordable way to get a little reasonable, moderate exercise and learn to protect yourself in an increasingly chaotic and violent world, come check out my aikido class.
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Fees are both reasonable and negotiable, and you can learn a martial art designed by older adults for older adults, taught by an adult, and proven effective in countless real-world instances for use as personal protection by older adults.
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You don’t have to be trapped by your own fear and you don’t have to spend a fortune to learn a martial art with the potential to really change your life for the better. Send me an email at mokurendojo@gmail.com and I’ll get you set up or I’ll try to help you with whatever other information you need.

Kids lay in wait for teacher

A shocking attack on an older adult.

Kote hineri practice tonight

Aiki with Patrick M. and Rick

• ROM & ukemi
• Tegatana emphasizing synching arms with rise-fall of body and movig the center and building a stance underneath it.
• hanasu #1-4 with emphasis on releasing as brush-off. The idea was to make #1 feel like #3 and the strong side to feel like the weak side.
• Nijusan kote hineri
• Ichikata tachiwaza #3-4 (Release 5 into tenkai kote hineri and release 3 into mawashi oshitaoshi)

Pick your nose

Straighten your shirt

Wipe your hands

Scratch your butt

Slap a mosquito

Shuffle your feet

How many of us have noticed that we have some unconscious or barely-conscious habits that occasionally take over during a practice. Do you find yourself starting to take a step during a kata and suddenly your nose itches maddeningly. How easy is it in solo practice to give in to the itch and call a do-over for that particular move? This happened to me this morning during the beginning of a jo kata. I'm sure it happens all the time but this morning at least I noticed it.

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I know my instructor in college was always complaining that I wiped my face with my sleeve or wiped my hands on my thighs during kata. not only does this spoil the kata aesthetically but it changes the place where your mind resides. You have gone from mind-in-the-fight to gotta-scratch-that-nose instantly and at random. What may be worse is trying to avoid the tic. Trying to defer it to a more opportune time. Here you mind is flipping back and forth between the two modes. Concentration and focus are right out the window.

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I have found in jodo that the occurance of this sort of tic seems to be similar to grabbing your jo with your hand in slightly wrong posture. Do you fix it then strike or strike then fix it? I tend to try to continue the motion with imperfect grip until I come to a node or a lull in the kata when I can reposition the grip.

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This morning I looked like a cartoon - at least I felt like I did. Trying to do a kata with a mosquito on my foot and some pesky imp tickling my nose with a feather.

A lecture by Henry Kono Sensei

I just got back from seeing our great friend and teacher, Henry Copeland. I posted a video of Henry a few days back and a couple of the videos that YouTube suggested as similar was a pair of videos by Henry Kono. The first one is a very fine lesson and the second is a very lovely aiki demonstration. Much the sort of aiki I'm talking about in much of my blog. Enjoy...





I enjoyed his discussion of the eidetic teaching style of OSensei. I've talked about that elsewhere. I think (I'm guessing) that what Ueshiba and Kono were calling the "Yin and Yang" solution to the aiki problem is the same thing that we're talking about when we refer to the Kito principle - the idea that energy waxes and wanes. You can read more of my ideas on the Kito principle here and here. I also find it interesting that he mentions the idea that real aikido is driven by getting your mind straight - not through years of physical practice. Here is an interview in which he expands on this a little.

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In any case, This certainly looks like good aikido and I would love to have the chance to work out with Kono Sensei sometime.

What you put out comes back to you thrice

Aiki with Kel

• Tegatana playing with the idea of grouping 2-3 movements as one thing in your mind. The kata changes in meaningful ways when you change the groupings. We also played with the idea of otoshi-guruma and back hand as the do-er instead of the front hand.
• Hanasu #1-8
• Aiki evasion and brushoff working into release-synch-ping-brushoff and release-synch-ping-tenkan The tenkan was remarkable. We were getting some of that feel of the wind of uke's passing blowing tori out of the way. That real kokyu feeling.
• The first two standing techniques of Ichikata as the cool ninja techniques of the night. release #1 to oshitaoshi and release #1 to tenkai oshitaoshi.

All of this stuff tonight provided good practice in the idea that if tori puts out energy and uke doesn't eat it then tori has to eat it. We all know that aikido is about harmonizing with energy but it is common to think that uke is putting all the energy into the relationship and we concentrate on trying to harmonize with that. But any time tori puts energy into the relationship, if uke doesn't eat it, it comes back to tori - sorta like that karmic law - "What you put out comes back to you thrice."

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So tori's energy output had better be minimal and short-lived and tori better be light on his feet or he might get an all-you-can-eat buffet of energy (with a doggie bag) instead of a little one-bite energy snack.

Persistence

"This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy." -- Winston Churchill