Tandoku and the Way of the Sword (Do Nothing Different)

Our shared art is said to be descended from sword work. Specifically, a Japanese in origin sword style that has little resemblance to modern Kendo nor Iaido and no resemblance to Korean, European or Chinese sword work. Definitely, this is not supposed to resemble any movie sword work - as much as I loved The Matrix, the movie did a disservice to us mere mortals.  We can never look as cool as what the public has come to find boring.

I have often wondered if the reverse was true - that our juijitsu came before our weapons.  Takeda Sensei, Morihei Ueshiba's teacher, was to my understanding mostly a Juijitsu teacher.  Takeda was not trying to gain popularity for his sword work, but rather his empty hand techniques.  Many Aikido teachers in different associations will have something probably called Shihonage, probably have something looking like Ikkyo with a variety of names, Iriminage by a variety of names and styles.  The devil is in the details.  Our empty hand forms have movements in common, though our language does not reflect that from association to association.

Basic sword and Jo work from Birankai, to New England Aikikai, to Iwama, to the students of Nishio and Shirata - very little resemblance.  Some do weapons daily, some very seldom.  Their empty hand work has more in common.

Of course, regular weapons training feeds and informs empty hand work.  But, when I look at the Tandoku clip of Tomiki Sensei, or the Iaido of Kanai Sensei - the weapons work follows the empty hand.  At one point in time for the Samurai, this might have been reversed.  Many decades if not centuries have passed since the sword was the default weapon.  Today, we learn to use our hands first.  The Samurai class was all but banned from wearing swords and guns in public in 1876.  The Founder of Judo would have been a teenager; Morihei Ueshiba would not have been born yet.  Post WWII, the sword would have probably been subject to heavy restrictions.

Kanai Sensei was a very impressive and powerful man.  I am friends with a number of his students.  His empty hand work was gorgeous and unique in the details.  His own Iaido system to look at it either came simultaneously or the empty hand Aikido came first.  The Shiho Omote movement in particular - the empty hand technique is the same, and unique.

http://youtu.be/cabwIuuKYSs

(bonus points for anyone who can tell me how to put two Youtube videos in a single blog entry)

At the start of this exercise, we were given several source videos one of which was Tomiki Sensei doing the same movements as appear in his Tandoku kata/exercise, but holding a bokken and swinging it.  He's doing nothing different.

Chicken or Egg?  Swords or Empty Hands?  Why care?  But if our empty hand is what taught us to get off the line and bring a weapon to bear to bear with mobility, power and stability - then who cares what tools we adopt into Aikido next?  Just do nothing different.

Da Lu

One exercise that I am somewhat upset to see isn't seeing much Youtube time is Da Lu. I approach it as a way of issuing and neutralizing that starts with the stepping and body movements. The hands play a secondary role. This is, I think, a more formal practice in Yang Taiji, and maybe one of the Yang developments along with the San Shou two person combat form.  There is a Chen Style practice called Da Lu, but it is more like what I equate with Walking Push Hands - nothing is different from regular push hands, your feet are just moving.

This video is a good representation of basic Yang Style Da Lu as I learned it.

For those people out there who want to bring Aikido and Taiji together, or for people who are following this as part of the Tandoku Challenge - I see something similar to the final movement in Tandoku, and some similar ideas to the Tomiki Walking forms.

Nothing Natural about "Natural"

Whole body movement is not how we like to move. Like most people, you probably didn't get lessons on how to move. One day, you didn't fall over when you sat up. That worked so well, eventually you didn't crack your skull standing and then eventually you threw all caution to the wind and moved your feet. Whether or not you moved effectively or smoothly was mostly an accident. You might have been teased on the school yard, or taken a dance lesson or joined Junior Miss pagents or something that made you pay attention to your walk.  Your first pair of heels maybe, or an injury.  Walking was not likely judged for it's effectiveness - the only standard was, "don't fall over most of the time."

In keeping with the Tandoku theme, the idea of feet only movements, then simple one step movements with one hand in motion, then increasing the difficulty in the feet, then increasing the difficulty in the arms and eventually using two arms with the more complicated footwork - this formula is something I see in Taiji push hands progression as well.

Isolating a body part to move it, then isolating another body part, then slowly complicating the whole thing - now, the whole body is being used.

The video above shows a series of Chen exercises, and a nice progression.  Few students get past solo form, and those who do get into paired work often stay in the early phases.  Basic push hands is where power and neutralization is expressed in the hands, and the feet are locked in place.  The waist and the weight shift is the driving force.






 

Half way

It came to me after a tirade on the perils of trying to recreate a strict form.  I am only half of the equation.

Tenchinage is not about me going Heaven and Earth.  If I move little, but Uke's shoulders go Heaven and Earth then I have kuzushi.  If I raise my hands in the Heaven and Earth idea, but I have no kuzushi, no affect on Uke, then I have failed.

A good punch in a Karate form or a Taiji form really doesn't happen in isolation, nor do throws, pins, blocks or any other strikes.  Ukemi taken in isolation is not ukemi - it receives nothing.  

When I trained in a Ki Society offshoot dojo, the idea of the Ki no Taiso appealed to me.  Beginners need to have some sense of the shape of a technique.  I started to have my misgivings at that dojo when people who had done the same shape many times had no sense of the relationship required. The esotericly named forms that I was gleefully told I had never done as poor little me was just an Aikikai student - I had done them all.  I knew how to apply them.  

Maai is the space between myself and my Uke(s).  Ai Hamni, Gyaku Hamni, Omote, Ura, Hanmi Handachi - these terms are about a spatial relationship.  Sen no sen, Go no sen, Sen Sen no Sen - these terms are about a temporal relationship. We can do solo practice for a long time, but without the sense of the relationship our techniques will not feel correct no matter how correct our solo practice is.

Do I sink low, stay upright, dodge, enter, blend, lead - I might not be the person who determines that.  I get one vote, so does everyone else.

What form does offer is a common language.  We have dozens of different words now for very pedantic constructs.  Which word is correct, which minor variation is being shown - we in Aikikai respond like this is a declaration of loyalty/disloyalty.  Different is a synonym for wrong, or a mistake.

I like how this Tandoku thing was presented for this exercise.  Several variations, lineages, timelines all noted and respected.  A whole community from several decades and several countries who can all move forward with their practice.  Innovations and changes catalogued, saved, communicated, expounded upon and held up for civil discourse.  Videos presented by people who spoke different languages and lived elsewhere in the world but still able to communicate in a physical language of form.  Even people like me who didn't know the form.

Because, ultimately knowing something in isolation doesn't matter much either.  Education, discussion, classes - these words all imply a relationship too.

Tandoku Challenge Post (from out of left field).

This is an ongoing Tandoku Challenge post, but it started as a letter to the editor on an unrelated subject.

Stanley Pranin has made his point that his personal teacher was one of O Sensei's finest and longest serving students.  I will concede that point.  Saito Sensei seems to have also criticized O Sensei's teaching method and tried to improve on it, as did Tohei, Kisshomaru, Tomiki and others.

Why do I even care that another system exists?  Why bother to look at another person's ideas?  Have I mastered all my own lessons I was given?  H--- NO!

Recently, the Aikido Journal forum is about who developed Iriminage, how it was performed, and then that all other innovations are less historically derived from the source.  A long time intended blog entry on this one technique started to come out.  It's not on Tandoku, but it does touch on why I even care that Tandoku exists:

I’m not against your thesis, in fact I agree and I approve of this forum and this discussion.  We should know our history, and we should explore what we think we know.

When I go to my copy of Budo, the first step does show Uke brought leaning forward as pic #1, then transitions to the pics you posted. The text refers to hitting Uke in the face, then entering. This would cause the Uke to straighten up, and this elicited reflex that gets followed is the emphasis of some types of Iriminage.

The difference between the generations is not the movement, but the degree of exaggeration. I have no concern about exaggerating an idea as a means to learning.

I have not been focused on trying to do only one singular version of Iriminage. The Dokka talk about a strategy based on natural patterns and an unlimited number of responses. So, rather than argue about who is right, I have no problem that Shin Shin Toitsu Do calls this Kokyunage – they do a lead and cut (at the one school I briefly attended), rather than cause kuzushi and respond to the Uke’s correction.

I like Shirata Sensei’s system of Sankaku Irimi, En no Irimi and Chokusen no Irimi with Omote and Ura but I think some other teachers like Akira Tohei did a better job of showing En no Irimi by expressing the circle more completely, and I tend to separate Chokusen no Irimi from variations found in Shodokan Atemi waza.  I see several teachers showing a wide variety of receiving, leading and cutting.  

I prefer to think of Yoshinkan’s Sokumen Iriminage rather than the increasingly vague-to-the-point-of-meaninglessness use of Kokyunage used to describe the identical technique and a million others that have nothing in common.

I think too little attention is paid to Ki No Nagare versus Kihon.

I only learned Gedan, Chudan and Jodan handwork explicitly in the CAF.

Our language needs a huge overhaul. I try to use the most specific names when I teach, even if that name is Shodokan, Aikikai, Shin Shin Toitsu Do, Yoshinkan, Iwama…

We need a way to communicate the different ideas beyond specific dojo. There are amazing ideas that deserve codification and dissemination. Overly focused on who is “correct” to the exclusion of all others – it’s not my approach. My Sensei was clear there were many right ways, just many, many more wrong ways. I don’t think attempted regurgitation of still life photos is the correct approach to accurately define “correct” for all time. Iriminage is supposed to be able to adapt to different weapons, different terrain, different sizes of attackers, different numbers of attackers. That means the form must change and be adaptable, not rigidly judged and forced into one external shape.

My final comment on the version being criticized – this large lead down works well in Hamni Handachi, which is great for learning to deal with attackers who are taller and have larger strides and reach. Sort of like a Japanese wartime student who suddenly found the country full of American soldiers, or teachers deployed overseas. This might have been a wartime innovation.

I like being unlimited.  Sometimes that means paying attention.  

As time goes on, I will probably edit this far beyond the scope of the original comment on Aikido Journal, so please bear with the discrepancies.  After the original tirade, I have come to realize that this is an example of Stanley Pranin's work as a historian.  We are ignorant of our roots.  Not merely ignorant of our uncles and cousins in the art, but of the Founder and his actual contributions.  Our shared art has been reinvented and redefined multiple times.  As our various political bodies drift further apart, we become more ignorant of our own shared history.  O Sensei should be correctly depicted, as should the historical art.  This does not preclude innovation.

Starting Points

This is part of a 12 day commentary on Shodokan Aikido's Tandoku kata/exercise as part of an ongoing challenge issued by Patrick Parker of Mokuren Dojo.

Where does your practice begin from?

When I train in the CAF and USAF, we start in Hamni.

The USAF dojo where I am now gives higher weight to Ki no Nagare style movement or Ki flow.  This has the benefit of having a sense of the encounter beginning before we make physical contact.  In Ki no Nagare, eventually Yokomenuchi, Shomenuchi, Tsuki, Katadori, Munedori, Katamenuchi all the way up to punch then do a triple kick to the head followed by some flying guillotine, eventually we get to respond to the first sign of movement so it all starts to look the exact same.  No waiting for someone to get their hands on your throat, no being an easy target.  We should feel connected and engaged from across the room.

In the CAF, we gave more regular weight to Kihon.  (We didn't call it that, this is a Saito Sensei term and the only one I ever heard for solid practice.)  We waited until we were grabbed Morotedori, then as Uke became as solid as they could, then we moved.  The same for any Ushiro work.  One of my sempai was a power lifter, and someone who did not get moved easily.  Kokyu Ho (Breath Power) was exhausting, but left me able to find the connections and structure to issue force.

The two ideas are very complimentary, and I have come to agree with Saito Sensei that Kihon should be the starting point - if your timing is bad in Ki no Nagare, you need to be able to respond to actually having someone grab you.  The shape your body should default to in Ushiro work is still the hands in front and close together for either practice.  Without learning Kihon first, then a student asks Uke to move more lightly and possibly fake the ukemi instead of taking the responsibility of moving Uke.

Hamni is used as the default position.  It's the position a throw gets completed from.  The position a second throw would be launched from.  A person who practices like this should be learning to have one or twenty attackers should be treated the same.  Each split second of a technique is the shape and structure of another response to a different attacker.  A standing pin is often Hamni as well, and for the same reason.

Shizentai seems to be the default position in Tandoku.  This is the starting point in Shotokan Karate immediately before and after a kata.  If two competitors are squaring off before the referee blows the whistle, this is the posture you see them adopt as they size each other up.  This is a common meditation posture in the Chinese Internal Arts called Wuji.  No forward motion.  No extreme posture.  A relaxed springboard.  A position of stillness and rest, and similar to an everyday posture.  The person who practices like this should be ready at any moment during their day to launch into any movement.

One of the big changes I saw in O Sensei over time - in the 1935 Asahi News video, he strikes a pose in between throws.  In his later life, he's walking.  Just good upright posture with his feet rolling underneath him as he goes about his day, moving into Hamni when he needs to (which didn't seem to be often) then back to continuous movement.  No worrying if the correct foot was forward when the Uke attacked, no poses or pauses between movements, no forced stopping.  No trying to make the power stance of Hamni something used to walk across the room - Hamni to Hamni is an awkward way to walk and not really a way to adopt as an everyday stride.

Depending on where I was training, I could expect a dojo to tell me any one of these practices was "Not Aikido."  I see advantages to training all the above.

What is a small circle?

In keeping with the challenge of 12 days of writing and posting, the handwork in the Shodokan Tegatana no kata seems to have a great deal of variety.  There are a number of circular movements.  I posted on circles in Taiji before, but covered it very simply.

With each of the four corners, it seems we can cut up (ie Yokomenuchi Ikkyo) or we can cut down (ie Yokomenuchi Shihonage).  We can make the circles different sizes, but I decided for myself size is not just a matter of - well, size.

Jodan is the upper level.  This can refer to any motion above the shoulders, but Sensei used to encourage kuzushi at the Jodan level, then at Gedan level (hip level), then Chudan (middle).  So, not just having hands drop down, but actually causing kuzushi by dropping down.  Not just keeping the hands at the middle level, but causing kuzushi by opening or closing.

For a small circle, I started to see if I had kuzushi at one level.  For a medium circle (a Taiji term no one ever defined for me, so I made my own which might be total crap) I started to feel if I had kuzushi at two points ie lead Chudan, then cut to Gedan or Jodan.  Or, cut down and then lead out.

In large circles, something Y.Yamada does very well, I feel every point of the circle is being used.  The connection and kuzushi can go through Gedan, Chudan, Jodan, back to Chudan.  While the feet are still moving.  A finished full circle technique is very difficult ukemi.

Large circles are not what we do for one on one encounters in a real situation.  They come into their own for a group attack moreso.  Huge and expansive might need to appear suddenly, but keep a compact shape as the default - more power from structure, balance, more safe overall.

For me, I want to make sure I can use the circle.  I hear people talk about how much they like large circles, but for all the motion there might be minimal connection and kuzushi - and very little happening to uke.  Ditto for people who insist small circles are more martial and real - if the structure isn't stable and powerful or doesn't affect Uke somehow, some way, then is the circle really being used?  The difference between compact and collapsed - watch what happens to Uke.  The difference between large and disconnected/over extended - same thing.

Shirata Rinjiro's Eri Dori Ushiro Waza

This is part 3 of an ongoing challenge to blog 12 days in a row on a Shodokan Walking kata.  I am not a Shodokan student.  One aspect I thought was worth mentioning was the foundation of Tai Sabaki shown in this kata. 

Shirata Rinjiro was the teacher of John Stevens, one of the most prolific translators and authors on Aikido today.  The book the two made together, "The Way of Harmony" not only inspired a thousand Aikido descriptions, it was one of the best books on Aikido ever done in my opinion.  I found the book accessible as a new student.  I still routinely return to this book.  My copy is 25 years old, and one of the most worn in my collection.  I never met Shirata Sensei, nor any of his students.  I'm just a fan.

While passing through the Kyu ranks, there are many kata that are taught in a specific way.  The handful of entrances (tenkan, irimi) exist, and a handful of exits (Shihonage, Iriminage, Ikkyo.). Lately, the USAF asks for specific variations ie Tsuki Iriminage is to be performed with Tenkan, Irimi and Tenshin variations.  I like this focus on different tai sabaki (body movements) to get off the line, receive, neutralize and issue.

I was always clear on what Kawahara Sensei was asking for - he would freely give us the kata he thought we should have, as well as the variations he thought were necessary for acquiring the technique in question.  I didn't have the "legend" to the "tai sabaki map." 

The Way of Harmony has an entire chapter on Ushiro Waza.  The attack practiced is Eri Dori, which I seldom ever had to practice.  Shirata Sensei shows these movements first in isolation, then in two person attacks with another swordsman trying to cut you down from in front of you while you are being held from behind.  The movement to receive the attack from in front or behind is the same.  His weapons work is the same - his movement doesn't change when he is holding a sword, nor when being attacked by a sword.

This is my own poor attempt at the techniques Shirata Sensei shows in that chapter, with many thanks to my Uke, Rob, who is coming up on a Yonkyu test.  Nice ukemi!

This one time lesson from a long dead teacher who I never met shows something similar to me that I saw going on in the Tomiki Walking Form.  It's not the same.  But, the whole idea of Tai Sabaki and four corners?  It's in the Tomiki Walking Form, and I see it in Shirata Rinjiro's well codified Aikido as well.

Sabaki Method by Joko Ninomiya, or Tandoku Day 2

I like methods that transcend separate Arts.  Sometimes there is a genius who creates something entirely new, but combat predates civilization.  Human anatomy and how to best use it damage another's human anatomy is not something restricted to any one art or culture.  A good idea is hard to keep down.  Other people will figure it out.  The good idea will be expounded upon, it will evolve, it becomes common sense and no one knows when it started being a good idea and soon no one can remember a time when we never knew it.

Kancho Joko Ninomiya is a practitioner of Enshin Ryu karate.  He published a book on his methodologies called, Sabaki Method that has ideas that the Shodokan Aikido kata of Tomiki Sensei seems to have in common.

From the book's cover:  "Sabaki is a Japanese word meaning "to channel power efficiently."  It can refer to the effort of breaking a horse or damming a river.  In Karate it means the natural way to use an opponent's power and momentum against him."

While this teacher does do a number of head high kicks that I have never been able to do, the set up for the kicks and punches are about four basic positions.

1.  Move forward and off the line to the inside
2.  Move forward and off the line to the outside
3.  Move backward and off the line behind your opponent
4.  Move backward and off the line facing for opponent's inside

If I am misrepresenting this theory, the error is mine and not Kancho Ninomiya's.  I believe he has shared information with Homma Sensei in Denver.  The book cover also identifies him as the 1978 All-Japan Champion and a Grandmaster of Enshin Karate.  I have never met him, nor am I his student.

From this position:

A parry will have the momentum of the opponent turning causing a break in balance.  This strategy has you moving off the line, so you will not be an easy target for follow up strikes.  Getting to one side can mean being in the opponent's blind spot, or the opponent finding themselves suddenly unable to punch or kick freely.  The attacker gets tied up when this is done well.

These four positions are the platforms for launching an attack in this system.  The idea is to use body movement to get to a powerful and safe place.

I would like to go crazy with a bunch of photos, or look through YouTube for videos.

But, to the guys on the Tandoku challenge, you've already seen these four positions starting around Tenkan Ashi:

Going Solo or Tandoku Challenge Day 1

I was challenged by a fellow blogger Sensei Patrick Parker at Mokuren Dojo to comment on the Walking Form of Tomiki Sensei.  I highly recommend his blog to anyone out there.  He's a great martial artist and a great all round guy and much, much more prolific a writer than I am.

There is a huge amount of material in Tegatana no Kata, and I am not really familiar with this kata/exercise.  There's several things that come to mind, but this is an essay I was working on for a while now that this Shodokan Aikido form had me thinking of.  I did not have much training in solo Aikido practices until after I was a Shodan.  There are benefits and pitfalls, and other systems that do extensive solo practice.  I commented on the systems I was most familiar with, and my own experiences as a student.

I have seen a few videos out there for combining Taiji and Aikido ideas.  Some like Kumar Frantzis have gone further and claimed they are convinced O Sensei studied Chinese arts.

For people who have asked if Baguazhang and Taiji are the same as Aikido (and there are a lot of you out there):  Ueshiba Sensei did spend time in China, had Chinese contacts, and did spend time in a Chinese prison.  His religious advisor did go to China to announce he was the next Dalai Lama and O Sensei did have some residual ties to religious supporters in China as well. 

However, Ueshiba Sensei was an avid nationalist and a trainer for the Japanese military and had Tomiki Sensei prominently represent him as a military trainer in occupied Mongolia.  Tomiki Sensei and his many students served in the events of WWII on the side of Japan against China and others.  Ueshiba would be regarded as a possible traitor for having a Chinese teacher; his Chinese teacher would definitely be a traitor.

There is much evidence that Ueshiba's history has been heavily sanitized for a wide variety of audiences, and the legacy of his on his own art is actually unclear.  Students do come from every country now, making the art more murky - many Aikido people I know now have a background in Baguazhang and Taiji, as well as a wide variety of other martial arts.  Human anatomy has not changed much in a very long time, so you will see something like Aikido wrist locks from every corner of the globe. 

Aikido did also originally aim to take on multiple attackers, which Baguazhang does as well, giving goals in common, which leads again to a resemblance between arts.  There is little historical evidence, but I agree there is a superficial resemblance.  The link might not exist, or might be from the art Daito-Ryu (which is one of the precursors to Korean Hapkido as well as Japanese Aikido) or there are many things like Ueshiba Sensei's military ties and Shinto worship that were heavily sanitized before he was introduced to the larger world, so why not a Chinese teacher too?

I personally believe no proof is ever forthcoming.

The teaching methods are very different in many, many ways.  Or so I thought.  Ethically, Taiji and Baguazhang have no restrictions on what types of techniques can be employed and make no claims to the development of peace and harmony for all.  The practical difference is that Taiji and Baguazhang are predominantly solo practices, while the Aikido I was learning was almost exclusively paired practice.

In Aikido, I never really did exercises like Tai no Henka in isolation.  We worked in partner exercises almost right from the beginning.  We did do exercises like the Rowing exercise and the Four Directions, but not during seminars.

Sensei was also clearly was getting more powerful without rolling around on the mat with all of us, and I began to suspect he had a solo practice as well.  Occasionally, he’d give us a glimpse.  Gradually I came to learn that other systems of Aikido had a very developed system of solo practice. 

Shin Shin Toitsu Do has a very developed system of movements that feed back into waza.  When a new student is learning a technique they haven’t seen before, their sempai says, “start with tekubi joho kosa undo!”  (Or, more often demonstrates the crossed hand position the beginner has seen many times at this point).  Muscle memory and body position has been established and engrained.  A new engram forms.  The beginner has a superior starting point.  One example is a Tohei lineage student will do tenkan in isolation before having a partner introduced.

In the USAF, Tohei was a major influence in the beginning, and then he divorced himself from his students.  Consequently, older students learned by this method, but they were ordered not to teach to their own students this way.  Within a few years of Tohei Sensei’s death, some of the Ki no Taiso have been reintroduced in the 6^th kyu test requirements.

In the Iwama Aikido system, weapons work takes the place of solo exercises.  There are very well developed systems of Aikiken and Aikijo in particular.  One exercise I have seen demonstrated by Saito Sensei in video (as well as O Sensei) is repeatedly cutting with a sword.  In one of Saito’s books, he recommends hitting a bundle of sticks or a motorcycle tire repeatedly with a bokken.  A Kendo teacher told me 1000x/d was the usual recipe for beginners.  If you’ve never tried this before, try it for a month or better yet 100 days.  I tried this once when I was sidelined by an injury, and a chronically sprained wrist magically healed and became very injury resistant and strong.

Saito Sensei’s teachings unfortunately live in something of a limbo outside of his son’s association.  Nearly every dojo acknowledges the 13 or 31 Jo kata, some have some basic knowledge of the kumijo or kumitachi.  O Sensei is mistakenly often identified as the author.

Saito Sensei’s empty hand system was never meant to be divorced from his weapons.  The use of Kiai, Kihon versus Ki no Nagare, the many variations for a single technique name; the sheer complexity of his system is intimidating and often not even acknowledged.  I even once attended a seminar in a different association where we spent an hour covering the 31 jo kata, then a couple of black belts spent the entire supper break to trash “this weirdo off in California who was doing “Op” noises and Kiai with his techniques.”  These blackbelts were completely ignorant that these two things belong together.  I stopped training with this group, but many dojo seem to only do Saito weapons as exotic cross training.  The idea that weapon and empty hand is the same is not transmitted – it can’t be, as the weapon work truly bears no resemblance to the empty hand work of a non-Saito lineage student.  Without a huge amount of work, the weapons don’t inform the empty hands of a non-Iwama student.

Why cross train in Chinese internal arts?  Certainly when it comes to Taiji and Aikido, I get the appeal. 

In Aikido, I was pulled, pinned and stretched on 20 year old moldy, dusty tatami mats with my face pushed down on decades of sweat stains.  I needed to change cloths.  I needed to be at a specific place at a specific time.  If I wasn’t healthy, I was likely to get injured.

It took years before I started to enjoy the pain, years before I could actually think about alignment and relaxation.  I didn’t feel like I was meditating if I wasn’t feeling the pain of seiza, which meant I didn’t feel I could meditate if I tweaked my knee on a ski slope.

Contrast this with my first main Taiji teacher, who let us come and go during class as we pleased.  We had a gentle, relaxing, politics free and often sweat free workout (yet another rare teacher I never properly appreciated at the time.)  It gave me an opportunity to focus on relaxation and structure in a way I was too busy trying to stay in one piece to do in many early Aikido classes.  I could meditate in motion, or in standing.  We did standing meditation in every Taiji class.  When I tried to push my teacher over, he was either a puff of smoke or a mountain.  I couldn’t touch his power, but he never caused me pain.

I could practice Taiji on my own, like during the nightshift on my lunch break.  I could be anywhere, at any time (big deal as a new nurse working shiftwork.)  I could use my Taiji and later my Baguazhang to heal from injures that were inflicted elsewhere, from a dislocated shoulder, to skin scraped off my knees and feet, to a partial hamstring tear, to a torn bicep and broken elbow.

My Taiji started to inform my Aikido.  The “magic point” in an Aikido technique could often be brought down to a movement in a Taiji push hands game.  The magic point was the one split second in time that I could be reversed or I could take control, the one moment in time that made a difference between a successful technique and a complete failure.  I started to learn to focus on this one split second and see how I could more reliably find this “magic.”  I learned to do Aikido slowly and deliberately, as of course, Sensei had shown us to do all along.

The irritations in Taiji classes were those intermediate people who were ignorant of kinesiology or combat and who were too proud to admit it.  In Aikido, I was throwing and being thrown.  Fake Ergonomics meant I felt pain or weakness in Aikido, something Taiji people did not get to feel as often.  Now, whenever anyone tried to demonstrate a Taiji form or tried to give me a correction, my Aikido bruises gave me a framework for evaluating what I saw.  My Aikido started to come full circle and inform my Taiji.

Solo form work needs to be informed by partner practice, or very good correction.  How wide should my arms be?  A person who trains solo will not necessarily know; someone who had been striking or throwing people with any power will.  Solo work informs partner practice, and partner practice informs the solo work. 

The danger in solo work is setting useless, stupid engrams out of ignorance.  Some students gravitate to solo work because they don’t like to be touched; this will never produce a martial artist.  Some students don’t like their hallucinations to be challenged, and so a solo practice means they never have to wake up. 

Many students are already “informed,” that is to say that they already “know” what the exercise is supposed to be like.  So, a karate person training in Taiji solo form work probably is still clearly kicking and striking.  A Judo or Aikido person doing a karate form will look like they are doing a throw when the form calls for a change in direction as opposed to just turning and hitting someone else.  Solo work will not challenge who you already are and your engrams and belief systems can be further entrenched.  Partner practice will always challenge you.  Mistakes can crop up in solo practice without feedback, and become very difficult to correct.

I accepted that my Aikido practice was going to be in perpetual tandem with my Taiji practices, as I got such very different things from each practice.  I simply could not choose.  If the Aikido I knew had a rich solo practice or set of self training exercises like Karate or Taiji, would I have ever started a second martial art?  Maybe not.

I wondered at the differences in the various Aikido systems.  As time went by and I met people who did Sayu-Undo hundreds of times, I found my own training in Morote Dori Kokyu Ho against some very strong people gave me a better foundation for power – lessons that fed back into being a nurse helping a patient walk, or transferring someone from bed to chair.  I see the advantages of the Ki No Taiso, and I do use them to teach beginners but I quickly transition to paired work.

At one point, I was realizing playing with two arts was a bad idea, and I was at a loss.  Yang Taiji was my solo practice, and Aikido was my partner practice.  The two did not come together well at the technical level.  I finally asked Sensei about this, and as usual he thought about his answer first for a long time.  The day came that he was sick and I stayed in hospital overnight with him.  I had known Sensei for ten years and I had been Shodan for about a year.  I knew he had no family.

Sensei was grateful, and clearly touched.  In the morning, he pulled the curtain around his bed and said he wanted to teach me something very important, something that would make a big difference in my Aikido.

We did standing meditation and a solo exercise.

"Gluten Free Cheesecake"

Bragging you can make a gluten free cheesecake is like bragging you can make gluten free coffee.  You’ve got to really disrespect coffee to make it contain gluten in the first place. 

The basic cheese cake is cream cheese, eggs, and sugar.  You can add vanilla, sour cream, fruit or whatever else you want afterwards.  Cheese cake is really more of a pudding than a bread. 

I have a link to my easy cheese cake recipe here:
Simple Plain Cheesecake

And some Cheese cake improv:
How to make any flavor of cheesecake

The only time I add flour is if I am using a very watery fruit or a jam that makes the batter too liquid.  I never add more than 3 tbsp for a very large cake.  This step can be skipped easily.

The catch is the crust.  Crusts are usually made with some crumb made from something that creates gluten.

For a shortcut, I like to use cookies ground up in a food processor.  It has become very easy to find gluten free cookies at Whole Foods these days. 

16oz of crumbs of gingersnaps, animal crackers, graham or whatever ground into fine crumbs.

Add one stick of melted butter.  I find this crust needs a little more butter than a gluten containing cookie crust.

Add 1-2 tbsp cocoa if you want.  Add ground up toasted nuts (1/4 to 1/2c).  Add a little more sugar if it’s not to your taste.  Press it into your pan.  If it is now too crumbly, it won’t press well.  That means add more butter until it presses easily into a semi solid.

Then, bake at 350 for 10-15 minutes.

Let the pan completely cool before you add in the cheese cake batter or the cake will cook unevenly and bubble up at the sides.

Alternatively, with Baker’s Parchment you can bake the filling without a crust in a springform pan.  100% gluten free.

Maple Walnut Bread Pudding

My sister has access to a maple tree farm. Sap coming out of the trees, then boiled during the sugaring off. I would love to see it some day. What I do get is the occassional bag of maple sugar. The flavour is amazing in coffee, but I stopped drinking much coffee on my days off. So, a small jar had been sitting around for a while.


I had a couple of baguettes left over that had gone stale. Weaver Street has an amazing bakery, but baguettes don’t have much of a shelf life.

FIRST: If you add any dried fruit like raisins, (I don’t) add the fruit to the Rum and Spice mixture below the night before. With the fruit having soaked, the pudding will be more flavourful and the fruit will be softer. As the fruit takes up more liquid, you might need to add more rum.

RUM and SPICE MIXTURE: 1tsp of ginger, 1tbsp of cinnamon and a ½ tsp allspice. 6 tbsp of Rum (secret ingredient). If you don’t like rum, pick a whiskey or something for this step.

If you aren’t using dried fruit, then just measure your Rum and Spices directly in the Egg and Sugar mixture.

The two baguettes (about 7c) got cut into 1 inch squares, then got soaked in 4c of 2% milk until the bread was saturated. Big important step that too many places rush through – if the bread isn’t uniformly wet, then when it is cooked some pieces of the pudding are still dried out stale unflavoured bread. The milk also lets the sweetness get around. About 30-40 minutes should be fine, no faster particularily if you have a very crusty bread.

Egg and Sugar Mixture: 3 eggs lightly whisked in another bowl. 2/3c of the maple sugar, with 1+1/3c white sugar, and blend well.

I put 3tbsp of melted butter into a 12” deep dish pie pan. No tin foil, use a glass one.

Pour the milky bread, Rum and Spice, and Egg and Sugar mix together in one of the mixing bowls. I added 3/4c of lightly chopped walnuts here. Give a good stir.

Then pour the whole lot in the pie dish up to the top. I sprinkled more cinnamon on the top.

Bake for 35 minutes at 350. This pudding will have some liquid in the pan, so I didn’t need to do a sauce. One of my favourite experiments.