Feldenkrais movement principles

Just like me, Moshe Feldenkrais was both a therapist and a Judo black belt. Unlike me, Feldenkrais was a genius. Everything that I have ever read by or about Feldenkrais has been mind-blowingly thought provoking, including his book, Awareness Through Movement, and his Judo Groundwork book which is interpreted in this essay at Judoinfo (this is cool too). Any of Feldenkrais' stuff that I read once I have to read over and over.

.

In Awareness Through Movement, several chapters are dedicated to the questions, "What is good posture?" and "What is good motion?" The following are some of the most interesting points (to me) from those chapters. These seem to be applicable to both Judo and Aikido and speak particularly well about aikido.

• Effective action improves the ability of the body to act.
• Reversibility is the mark of [good] movement.
• Light and easy movements are good.
• There is no limit to improvement.
• Use large muscles for heavy work.
• Forces acting at an angle to the main path cause damage.
• Superfluous efforts shorten the body.
• Concentration on the aim may cause excessive tension.
• Performance is improved by the separation of the aim from the means.
• Lack of choice makes strain habitual.

Whenever you think that you have mastered something in aikido, I recommend you choose any one of these ideas and consider it carefully in the context of the motions in your technique. See doesn't the whole technique fall apart for you. See isn't your aikido better when you finally get it reassembled in accord with Feldenkrais' ideas.

Basically Just Judo

Some years back, Dave Chesser posted an article in which he suggested that the acronym BJJ, which a lot of people mistakenly think means Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, actually means Basically Just Judo.  I laughed my proverbial asterisk off - particularly after asserting for so long that Judo and BJJ are just competitive brand names for the same thing.

.

The other day I managed to dig up a copy of a book I've been looking for a long time, Feldenkrais' Higher Judo Groundwork!  Fantastic book!  Following are a couple of pictures from this book, published in 1952, showing some judo moves that a lot of folks think of as distinctively BJJ.

 

First we have a minor takedown that is allowed and used in BJJ contests but is disallowed in Judo and is derisively known by some as 'buttflopping' (watch out for some mildly offensive language if you follow that otherwise hilarious link).  Feldenkrais presents this as a good way to take the contest to the ground if it is allowed in the rules. Note, please, that if any of you smartaleks ever do this to me or do this in my club, get ready for a ride you'll wish you hadn't signed up for. Feldenkrais' variant of pulling guard shown here is extremely dangerous and places uke at a great risk of breaking his ankle.  But it is judo per Feldenkrais' 1952 book - not just BJJ.

Secondly, we have  a guard pass into a leglock.  Again, commonly thought of as the domain of BJJ.  Wrong again.  This stuff is judo - it is just disallowed in judo shiai and usually in randori - partly for safety, but partly just to allow emphasis to be placed on other stuff so you can become better in a smaller technical range.

.

Anyway, there is nothing at all wrong with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.  If you can find a good instructor for a good price near you, then by all means, roll with them - it is a great way to learn judo!

Feldenkrais' Awareness Through Movement

Seeing as this is posture month at Mokuren Dojo, I thought I'd drop you another little hint. Actually a BIG hint. Ok, a REALLY BIG hint!
.
I have written often about Moshe Feldenkrais' writings on judo and posture, but I also found this online copy of Feldenkrais' book, Awareness Through Movement. A definite must-read, even if it is not an easy read in places! If you want the free online copy then download it but it you're the type that prefers the mass and feel and convenience of paper, then pick up a copy at my Amazon store from the link below.
.
In either case, I consider this necessary reading before you really start to think deeply about posture and movement.

UPDATE: Here is the month-end review of all the posture articles from this month of focus.

___________
Subscribe now for free updates from the Mokuren Dojo blog

28 (thousand) days later

According to the statisticians at the Census Bureau, God is giving most of us about 28,000 days to live. It’s becoming increasingly common to see people moving about, living healthy lives even after having already lived thirty thousand days. What got me thinking about that was one of Feldenkrais’ movement principles, “There is no limit to improvement.”
.
How can that be? We see limitations and diminishing returns all the time. Well, consider where Feldenkrais was coming from. What if we were to spend five minutes per day diligently working to improve some particular thing in our lives. In an average lifetime, we’d accumulate more than 2300 hours of practice at that one thing. What if we spent 1.5 hours two or three times per week working on improving ourselves? That works out to 12-18 thousand practice hours.
.
According to Feldenkrais, the vast majority of people stop developing physical skills and abilities at around puberty. At this point we settle into our habitual (unthinking, senseless) modes of action. However, some few of us are able to continue to develop ourselves physically for years after this. These people tend to be celebrated athletes or dancers or perhaps actors.
.
Even if we start with a third of our life spent, we still easily have the potential equal to 8-12 thousand hours practice. Even with 2/3 of a life already spent, one would have between four and six thousand hours to get your act together! That’s a lot of potential, considering that people can achieve shichidan (7th degree black belt) in aikido or judo with just over 4000 practice hours!
.
Not only are we living longer, but we are dying longer. It used to be that people generally lived an active life followed by a short period of illness and then death. Now people may be inactive and invalid for years – perhaps even a quarter of their lives. Several of the problems that are endemic in our older population are related to poor posture, including back pain, thoracic kyphosis, osteoporosis and related fractures, sciatica, and restrictive lung problems. What if we spent just a few minutes per week working on our posture? This is why activities like aikido and tai chi have proven so beneficial for adult fitness. I think, in this sense, there is no limit to the potential for improvement.

Great posture exercise - climbing stairs

Ok, when you think about posture exercises you might think about Army recruits trying to stand straight up while a drill sergeant screams in their face, "Suck that gut in. Pull those shoulders back." Well, the aikido and judo ideal of good posture begins with relaxed, mobile, and upright. While the old drill sergeant might have gotten upright, he sure missed the relaxed part.

The folks that probably know the most of anyone in the world about functional posture are the Alexander Technique folks and the Feldenkrais Method folks. I've written before on the crossover between aikido, judo, Alexander, and Feldenkrais principles, including a recent article on a neat Alexander trick for fixing neck posture. Feldenkrais has some similar exercises which involve repeatedly sitting and standing from a chair to reprogram the neck muscles. Here's something that, so far as I know, is of my own invention... Walking up and down stairs to fix neck posture.

Try this. Get a flight of steps and walk up and down sliding your hand on the rail for balance. Repeat the flight of steps several times. First this will help your leg and cardiovascular strength if you do it regularly, and having better wind means you don't have to use shoulder and neck musckes as accessory breathers. So they can relax and control your neck posture more efficiently.

Second, keep breathing as you walk the stairs. If you are not used to walking stairs you might, without thinking, hold your breath and drag yourself up by the handrail. If one flight of stairs wears you out and leaves you breathless, look to see if you're doing this.

Third, and this is the really neat part, try the Alexander trick I previously posted while walking the stairs. Concentrate on moving however you have to in order to get your nose forward and upward. As you descend the stairs, imagine your face lifting forward and up, so that your neck gets longer and straighter and more upright as your body descends. As you climb up the steps, imagine leading with your face. Imagine someone gently holding your chin and the back of your head and giving you a little lift as you ascend. Notice that getting your nose and face up and forward releases tension in your shoulders (because you can't raise your face if your levators scapulae are in contraction) and frees your breathing (because your shoulder muscles are hooked to your rib cage).

Posture vs. morphism

Dojo rat sorta mentioned in his comment one of the next things I wanted to talk about - How do societal aesthetic values affect our perception of 'good' posture or motion? For instance, check out this picture of Usher-san that I labeled "Great posture." Usher has a mesomorphic (stratight, athletic) body type, which is generally more aesthetically accpetable than an endomorphic (softer, rounder) body type. Even if I were to take a photo in that same position, someone comparing the two pictures would likely say that Usher's posture is better than mine. Body shape plays into subjective evaluation of posture.

.

However, a pretty-much infinite amount of research has shown that most people's perceptions are skewed when it comes to their own bodies. I remember graduating high school weighing between 169 and 175 at my current height of 6'1". I've seen pictures taken during that era in which I look rail thin - almost gaunt. Years later, finishing graduate school, I weighed about 210. And looking back at the pictures, you can still see all the angles in my skull. I still looked skeletal - even with an extra 40 pounds. Now I'm a good bit heavier than that (though still a good bit lighter than my lifetime peak weight). Here's the kicker... I have always felt fat. Even when I knew that I was at about 3% bodyfat in highschool. Even knowing that body perception is so skewed that eating disorders prevail in the population.

.

So, where am I going with this? If you are going to evaluate your own posture and call it 'good' or 'bad' posture, then you need some criteria outside of how you feel about it because how you feel changes with the temperature and humidity and how your friends are treating you and every other variable in the world. I have found that brainiacs like Feldenkrais and Alexander and Hanna and Laban have given us some pretty good guidelines and criteria for evaluating motion and posture. See the list of Feldenkrais principles in the previous post.

.

Over the next several posts, I plan to work through these men's ideas about posture and post a series of thoughts about how they relate to my body and to aikido and judo in particular. Stay tuned, faithful reader...

Change your mind and the rest will follow

The other day I was scouring the net for info on Alexander Technique and Feldenkrais method because they are particular interests of mine. I came across an AT discussion of head/neck posture that I thought was interesting and enlightening. Try this out...
.

Notice what posture your head and neck is in then imagine someone yelling at you, "STRAIGHTEN UP!" What motion did you make? What muscles did you use? I can't see you through your computer screen but I bet it involved neck retraction (moving your chin straight back) and looking upward. Accentuate this posture so that you can feel the muscles required - pull your chin back and look up. I feel stress in my neck and shoulders when I do this.

.
Here's another option. Another way of thinking about straightening up. Instead of trying to retract your neck, think about lengthening your neck upward and forward. Move however you have to in order to get the bridge of your nose forward and upward a little bit. When I tried this a couple of times, I noticed that the heavy upper part of my head was naturally rocking back over my spine in better balance and my shoulders were relaxing and dropping. This posture follows all the shizentai rules (ears above shoulders above hips...) while requiring less from some really overworked muscles (traps, erectors, levators).

.
Alexander (as I understand it) specialized in fixing neck posture and using that as a starting point to fix other postural problems. Alexander used some cool mental tricks like the above in his work. The idea being that if you can change how you think about your posture and motion then your posture and motion will begin to change and fix itself. This idea is known as ideokinesis and was developed and elaborated upon by Lulu Sweigard, Mabel Todd and others.

.
I really like the leverage that these systems (Alexander, Feldenkrais, Ideokinesis) give us for self-improvement of our physical potential. Not only are they very effective but their principles appear to fit well with the principles of aikido and judo.

Practical Unarmed Combat - by Feldenkrais

Highly recommended classic tome on unarmed combatives - from the POV of one technique - hadakajime. As you can see from the above pic, Feldenkrais shows hadakajime from A-to-Z,  inside-out, upside-down, and backwards!

Want to discuss this blog post?
Come find me on Facebook at my Mokuren Dojo FB group

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Unfettered motion

So, why might it be a good idea to separate the martial from the art, at least for some of our practice? Consider one of the Feldenkrais principles I mentioned in previous posts: Concentration on the aim may cause excessive tension.

By placing these martial constraints on our motion, like ‘stay upright’ or ‘stay centered’ or ‘keep unbendable arms,’ we may be creating unnecessary tension in our motion and variance in our posture. By letting go of all the constraints and goals (i.e. of winning) and simply moving in contact with another person we may be able to learn what un-hindered motion feels like so that we have a reference point when we get back to practicing principled randori with martial goals. For another example of the type of motion I’m talking about (unconstrained by martial principles but still applicable to martial settings) check out this video of Tai chi silk reeling exercises. Silk reeling has the additional benefit that it can be done alone - unlike most aikido exercises/kata.

Autogenic discharge

Sounds messy, doesn't it? 

.

Actually, if you've done aikido or judo or some sort of bodywork like yoga or massage or Feldenkrais for long, I bet you've seen it.  You may not have thought much about it at the time, but when you think about it some it becomes a curious thing.

.

Have you ever seen someone take a fall from a perfect, amazing, aiki-like throw, and hit the ground laughing hysterically?  Have you ever seen someone doing yoga or receiving a massage start crying for no special reason?

.

Theory is, emotions have a certain kind of posture and movement associated with them.  Over time these postures and movement patterns can become habitual.  Some folks say this is sort of like storing the memory of that emotion in your neuromuscular system.  Sort of a neuromuscular memory of past trauma.

.

Well, when you start doing something to change your habitual motions and postures, something like aikido or yoga or massage, it's possible to release the emotion that was originally associated with that habitual muscle tone, creating a spontaneous, inexplicable outburst of emotion.  Often, when you see this, the person can't tell you why they are laughing or crying.  They just know that its not really funny or painful, but they can't stop laughing or crying.  When I see this, I tend to just quietly continue what we're doing and let the emotion wash  on out.

.

I wonder if some of the times that we get caught up in ego during randori and become frustrated or angry at our partners...  I wonder if some of that anger and frustration might just be autogenic discharge?  I wonder if we were able to reframe that frustration or anger, could we release it and move on more productively?

____________

Patrick Parker is a Christian, husband, father, martial arts teacher, Program Director for a Cardiac Rehab, and a Ph.D. Contact: mokurendojo@gmail.com or phone 601.248.7282 木蓮

____________

Subscribe now for free updates from Mokuren Dojo

____________

Send me an email or let's connect on Facebook or Twitter

Tactile invisibility in judo

A few days ago, one of my students got to reading Feldenkrais' Higher Judo Groundwork book and came up with the bright idea that he wants us to do newaza blindfolded for a couple of months to help improve our flow and sensitivity on the ground.  I think this is a great idea and we're kicking off this focus tonight.

.

But I figured I'd raise the ante a bit.  While we can't do tachi randori blind because we have a small matspace and we'd be forever crashing through my walls and throwing people through windows, we are going to be doing our standing judo work for a couple of months under conditions of tactile invisibility.  By that I mean two things:

1. sleeve-end grips only - we are used to working from our favorite grips (frequently sleeve&lapel) and we are also used to adding a lot of extraneous muscle noise into our throws.  But when we take sleeve-end grips, there is so much slack between partners that it is more difficult to put the muscle noise into practice.
2. following instead of propelling in ashiwaza - instead of letting uke feel your footsweep coming from a mile away, we want to follow instead of pushing with the leg.

Let's try this for a couple of months, along with the blindfolded newaza, and I think this stands to improve our judo immensely!

Want to discuss this blog post?
Come find me on Facebook at my Mokuren Dojo FB group

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Butt amok

I am really jealous of Usher-san's great posture. If he has to break his posture to do something then he doesn't do it. I saw a video of myself doing a kata the other day and, though generally upright, I found a new place to watch out for my posture breaking. When I am backing up and hit a tension point - i.e. the bad guy stops my motion. On the tape it was pretty common for my butt to rock back out from under my shoulders for a second before I could get it back under control. I will have to watch for that.
.

In aikido, we often work on improving our posture. To attain and maintain better posture. This is not based on some aesthetic ideal of 'straightness,' but rather, better posture is more neutral and gives the martial artist better mobility and options. The ideal is to be able to flow and do all of aikido in or very close to a natural upright posture (shizentai). In aikido you cannot really separate the posture from the technique or the motion. Upright posture in flowing motion is the goal.
.

Below is a re-post of several of Feldenkrais' principles from his book, Awareness Through Movement, relating to the questions, "What is good posture?" and "What is good motion?" I like to keep these ideas in the front of my mind when I am explicitly re-working my posture in aikido.

• Effective action improves the ability of the body to act.
• Reversibility is the mark of [good] movement.
• Light and easy movements are good.
• There is no limit to improvement.
• Use large muscles for heavy work.
• Forces acting at an angle to the main path cause damage.
• Superfluous efforts shorten the body.
• Concentration on the aim may cause excessive tension.
• Performance is improved by the separation of the aim from the means.
• Lack of choice makes strain habitual.

The seize & freeze

I like to walk along the edge of sidewalks or on concrete bumpers in parking lots whenever I get the chance. Its just one more opportunity to play with balance and motion.  I suspect a lot of my readers play like this too - aikido and judo people tend to be like that.

Have you ever noticed, while walking on a balance beam or playing on a rocker board or balance trainer, there are times that your body completely seizes up to avoid falling.  You're moving along fine and suddenly something disrupts your balance (usually you misplace a foot) and your arms fly out to the side and you lean and freeze.  It is as if your brain figures if you continue moving then your position can only get worse, so you lock up to try to avoid the degradation. I have started calling this phenomenon,  "the seize&freeze."

Yogis, have you ever felt that same fear reaction during a balance pose in yoga?  I get that feel in triangle pose and in half-moon all the time, when I get my hips rotating properly then I tend to fall over backward.

Have you ever noticed that when your postural muscles seize and freeze, there is no avoiding falling?  The seize and freeze is like a denial of the inevitability of a predicament. Just like in my previous post when I talked about hospital patients who seize and freeze, locking up their torso in a fear/pain reaction, making it impossible to stand up.

Denial does not sound very much like yoga, does it? And denial does not sound very healthy in the martial context of aikido or judo either.

The seize and freeze is counter to the ideals of yoga, aikido, and judo because it is mindless and automatic instead of being voluntary and controlled. Feldenkrais talks in his books a good bit about the undesirability of mindless, automatic fear reactions.

What if we were to learn to safely and gently fall/roll out of those broken postures instead of doing the seize and freeze?  That way, all the places on the far side of the point of no return become part of the spectrum of that particular posture.

If we can eliminate the fear of falling out of a yoga pose (or any posture), then we can eliminate the seize and freeze fear reaction and make the ukemi just part of the exploration of that pose. This way, the pose becomes a whole range of postures and motions in and around and before and after the actual textbook photograph.  That should make your yoga more joyful and more flowing.

Interestingly, the same thing happens when walking along the edge of a curb.  If you get out of whack and can just take one more step instead of going into seize and freeze, more often than not, your balance will right itself - gently and without making a fuss, just walk out of the unbalance instead of submitting to the seize and freeze.

Thoughts on the ordering of Tomiki's techniques

Somewhat stream-of-consciousness thoughts on the order that we teach things in...
.
Tomiki sensei gave us a set of a couple dozen techniques (sometimes 15, sometimes 17.  Some students added 5-10 more) that were representative of a large chunk of the aikido universe, but which were few enough that you could get good at them and get started with randori asap.
.
Tomiki's randori-no-kata eventually got canonized (fossilized?) into Junana Hon Kata, a set of 17 fundamental techniques divided into sections of 5 atemiwaza, 5 hijiwaza, 4 tekubiwaza, and 3 ukiwaza.
.
But who ever said we had to teach the 17 techniques in order? 1 then 2 then 3 then 4...
.
Who declared it and made it so that...
.
"...thou shalt first teach Shomenate and then having taught Shomenate thou shall proceed to Aigamaeate.  Thou shalt not proceed to Gyakugamae except having first taught Shomenate and then Aigamaeate..."
.
Of course, shomenate is a good place to start. We've spent a lot of time defending the primacy of shomenate.  It is, in some ways, the basis of everything else in Junana, and it is a very good answer whenever anything goes wrong with most any other technique.  Some old dead wise guy even allegedly said that nothing else in aikido will work unless preceded by atemi (like shomenate).
.
But why does it have to be first?  Other teachers started things out different ways, and our insistence on #1 then #2 then #3 and so on puts us at odds with them and makes interchange of ideas clumsy.

• Aikikai schools often begin with iriminage (aigamaeate) and then ikkyo (oshitaoshi).

• What little I know of Merritt Stevens, he taught oshitaoshi first, followed by iriminage.

• What I've seen of J.W. Bode, he likes to begin with gyakugamae, ushiroate, and hadakajime.

What if Junana, instead of being taught in technique-order were taught in set-order.  That is, introduce any atemiwaza first followed by any hijiwaza then any tekubiwaza and so on.
.
That would largely encompass the self-defense ideas of

• Feldenkrais
• Gracie Jiujitsu
• J.W. Bode
• Merritt Stevens
• Aikikai

...and it would free us to teach things in a potentially more practical order, all without diminishing Tomiki-sensei's life of work and contribution to the aiki-space.

P.S. While we're killing out sacred cows, who decided that release#1 was first?  I've often thought that the set of releases feels like it should go #3, #1, #4, #2...




Want to discuss this blog post?
Come find me on Facebook at my Mokuren Dojo FB group

____________________
Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Mokuren Dojo articles on Aikido Journal

Over the past few years, Aikido Journal has picked up and reprinted several of my articles from here at Mokuren Dojo. Thanks Aiki Journal guys, for the attention! I've enjoyed the increased exposure and it has allowed a much larger group of people to enjoy my ideas here on the blog (or at least a larger group is laughing at my ignorance now).

.

Following is a list of my articles that Aikido Journal has re-published. You might enjoy perusing these and reading or re-reading them.

• The least sexy is the most important
• Kuzushi is useless unless it is effortless
• The Long, Lost Goshin Jutsu post
• What can aikidoka learn from judoka?
• Invisible Shomenate
• Shihonage - 4-way throw or 4-way release?
• Structure and pliability in ukemi
• Kuzushi is an out-of-body experience
• A fight to the distance
• Feldenkrais principles in aikido
• 10,000 hours over 28,000 days
• Slow and steady wins the day
• Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threat
• Ego in the martial arts
• Knife changes nothing
• Atemi is 80% of aikido
• Aikido is 100% atemi
• Kata is not real aikido
• Interview: Gene Lebell
• Interview: Roy Dean
• Junanahon kata
• Aikido is great for self-defense
• Don't do tsuki forever
• The best self-defense skill there is
• Rethink your ukemi
• Attack of the living dead
• Advice from a world champion
• Seth Godin on aikido and judo
• Everyday aikido
• Aikido and Baseball
• Doshu aikido video demonstration
• Reps vs. "do it for a while"
• Expertise

____________

Patrick Parker is a Christian, husband, father, martial arts teacher, Program Director for a Cardiac Rehab, and a Ph.D. Contact: mokurendojo@gmail.com or phone 601.248.7282

____________

Suggested great books on aikido, judo, and strategy.

____________

Subscribe now for free updates from the Mokuren Dojo blog

Classical Judo - spirit and motivation

Last week I posed the question, "What is Classical Judo," and I got some good input.  I have several things to say about Classical Judo - but today I want to talk more about the philosophical underpinnings of Classical Judo.  What I really think defines Classical judo is much along the lines of Charles James response to the previous post...

"Classical Martial Arts" are those that retain as much of the originality as practiced by the person who created it.

What makes judo classical is not so much you doing your techniques the way that the old dead guys did their techniques. What makes judo classical is doing it in the same spirit and for much the same reasons as the founder and his original disciples.Kano expounded two fundamental philosophical principles upon which judo was based...

• Jita Kyoei - "Mutual benefit and welfare" ... "You and me going forward together" ... Classical judo must be a win-win sort of thing instead of being exploitative in nature.
• Seiryoku Zenyo - "Make the best use of your powers" ... "Maximally efficient use of effort" ... "Maximum efficiency with minimum effort" Classical judo must be both effective and as efficient as you can make it.

Problem with this is, anyone can say, "Yes, I subscribe to those two ideals whole-heartedly... jita whatever and seirokyu blah blah..." and then go and do judo any way that they want, calling it "Classical Judo" for some of the nefarious purposes I listed in the previous post.

.

You have to do judo in the spirit of, and for the same reasons as the founders, but those beliefs and ideals have to influnce your practice and your technique too. 

.

Your actions have to be congruent with your beliefs because not only will people not believe you otherwise, but also because the dissonance within incongruent, inconsistent systems will eventually shake them apart.

.
In the next post I want to get into some of the technical differences between classical and non-classical judo, but I thought to leave you with some questions...

• What is the antithesis to classical judo? Is it "modern judo" or "Olympic judo" or "competitive judo" or "eclectic judo" or "American judo" or what?
• Judo has been influenced by so many masters over the years, where do you draw the line as to which ones classical judo should emulate?  Is Kano the only model, or should we include Mifune?  What about Fukuda? Kawaishi? Feldenkrais? Okano? Daigo? Geesink? Sato? Gracie? At what point do we draw the line between what judo was and what it is now?
• Wherever you draw the line, what was the spirit in which the classical sensei did their judo?  How were their motivations different from those of non-classical sensei.

____________

601.248.7282  ~ Subscribe ~ Facebook ~ Twitter ~  email

Progress

My favorite poet of all time is Edna St. Vincent Millay - probably for no particular reason that I can put my finger on. I'm generally not much on poems about death and love, but her rhythm and word choice turn me on. One of my favorite pieces of her work is as follows.

We have gone too far; we do not know how to stop; impetus

Is all we have. And we share it with the pushed Inert.

We are clever, -- we are as clever as monkeys; and some of us

Have intellect, which is our danger, for we lack intelligence

And have forgotten instinct.

Progress -- progress is the dirtiest word in the language--who ever told us --

And made us believe it - - that to take a step forward was necessarily, was always

A good idea? In this unlighted cave, one step forward

That step can be the down-step into the Abyss.

But we, we have no sense of direction; impetus

Is all we have; we do not proceed, we only

Roll down the mountain,

Like disbalanced boulders, crushing before us many

Delicate springing things, whose plan it was to grow.

Clever, we are, and inventive, -- but not creative;

For, to create, one must decide -- the cells must decide -- what
form,

What colour, what sex, how many petals, five, or more than five,

Or less than five.

But we, we decide nothing: the bland Opportunity

Presents itself, and we embrace it, -- we are so grateful

When something happens which is not directly War;

For we think -- although of course, now we very seldom

Clearly think--

That the other side of War is Peace.

We have no sense; we only roll downhill. Peace

Is the temporary beautiful ignorance that War

Somewhere progresses.

It has been a long time since I have read this in its entirety. I remembered phrases of it, but not in Millay's crisp, precise, beautiful language. Something in Tegatana no kata made me think of this poem the other day and I had to look it up. This poem speaks volumes about war and peace, which is what aikido is really about anyway. This poem speaks about aikido on the spiritual/philisophical level but also on the physical, tactical level.

Whenever we take a step, there is a part of the step that is ballistic. By that, I mean we can't take it back. We are committed to stepping. "Impetus is all we have - and we share it with the pushed Inert." However, in tegatana no kata we work on minimizing this ballistic phase of stepping by taking smaller steps, walking on the balls of the feet, etc... What this does for us is makes us more neutral and gives us more options - more choices."

Consider this quote from another 20th century mastermind, C.S. Lewis, in juxtaposition to Millay's poem about progress:

We all want progress, but if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.

That brings up another, related aspect of tegatana. You want your progress to be reversible. As a general rule of thumb you don't want to make ballistic (irreversible) actions because you end up (in Millay's words) "rolling down the mountain like disbalanced boulders, crushing before you many delicate springing things whose plan it was to grow." You lose the capacity to make intelligent choice, which is what makes us human. You lose opportunity. Moishe Feldenkrais mentions this in his book, Awareness through Movement - reversibility is the mark of voluntary [good] movement.

So, in tegatana we learn to make small, conservative steps, minimizing our disbalanced nature while also minimizing the ballistic nature of our motions. Working on this in your kata will bring Progress (with a captial P).