Several thoughts came together this afternoon, as I read this Aikido Journal post and watched the video clip therein. I hope my readers will take the few minutes needed to do the same. Stanley Pranin Sensei's main point, though, is that many Aikido practitioners all-too-often resort to brute force in order to make techniques work, rather than using aiki (which for the sake of simplicity, and the aspect that is relevant for this point, means using the attacker's energy - not our own - by absorbing, harnessing and redirecting it).
The problem, then, according to Pranin Sensei, and a number of other high-ranking Aikido instructors, (in a paraphrased and summarized form) is that in many cases, while people easily enough learn the motions of the Aikido techniques, it appears that many have difficulty with doing them in the way that is necessary to achieve aiki. This includes - again following the opinion of these eminent instructors - such major points as relaxation, and kuzushi, or putting the attacker or partner off-balance. I'm not going to elaborate on those points in this post, but if anyone needs more information to follow this, I suggest checking the Aikido Journal website and its archive of excellent articles.
Some of these instructors, including Pranin-Sensei, have been developing different methods of training to put more emphasis on how to do Aikido properly, without resorting to exerting power to force a result.
Now, the streams of thought that came together for me started with remembering the examples my father has always given me for seeing and using aiki principles in other kinds of actions and work in daily life, by which I mean effective and efficient use of balance and various, mainly physical, kinds of energy (ki) in the handling of different objects, primarily heavy ones. Just as importantly, he taught me to look for and recognize aiki principles in action around me (as well other concepts from other types of budo). An interesting and significant thing is that in some cases, there is little or not difference between these applications and core movements of some Aikido techniques - doubtless with more to be discovered with some focused research.
And then - I thought about the classic Karate Kid movie. I suspect and hope that most readers will at this point know exactly where I am headed with this! For the sake of others, I will explain that in the movie, a teacher of karatedo teaches his student several fundamental blocks, and conditions them into 'muscle memory', by having the student perform a number of very repetitive chores ("Wax On! Wax Off!") with specific motions.
So, at the moment these thoughts merged together, I realized that there could be benefit in taking these applications of aiki principles with inanimate objects and adapting them as exercises that could be useful supplements to Aikido training. While some might correspond to actual and recognizable Aikido techniques, or portions of them, the really important thing would be the additional conditioning to using balance and energy without the additional tension found in working with a partner, and far more so in a true confrontation. It could only be a supplement to regular, traditional training, very secondary, but I see potential for it to be helpful to many.
This is something that must be properly worked out by qualified instructors. I most decidedly am not one such, however much I might hope to become one in the future. I can perhaps hope, at least, to be able to work in some capacity with those who might be interested, qualified, and able to put these things into practice properly.
This post is vague on details; that is conscious and deliberate, since this is just the beginning of an idea, and I've only just started thinking of it myself. I hope to expand on it soon enough, particularly if there is interest. Meanwhile I would of course be most interested to hear if similar ideas or even experiments have occurred elsewhere.
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