What's in a Recipe?

Last week I talked about things I did to prepare for Randori.  Basic strategies, exercises to acquire new skills that might be helpful.  It completely didn't resonate with Katie.

If you know me, you know I never really follow recipes.  I make scribbles in the margin of some of my cookbooks now because I regret losing my happiest accidents.  I do follow the basic structure, as I have sad memories of many, many unhappy accidents in the kitchen.  I hounded Mom for my favourite childhood recipes, and now I mess with all the amounts.  I always add more spices to the gingerbread house dough because I want it to be more fragrant.  I get the recipes, then I never follow them.  Even my own recipes.

Katie never needs an alarm clock.  She wakes up at the same time each day.  She sits, stretches, and eats the same breakfast.  The SAME breakfast.  It used to be that she alternated porridge with bacon and eggs.  Now, every day is just bacon and eggs.  She goes to bed around the same time, and no matter if she has work to do or not she watches TV at the same time.  And, only a handful of shows.

I am chaos.  I get into a project or a book and I forget to sleep.  I might sleep for 16 hours straight, or be awake for over 20.  I'll be awake to go to work at 5:30pm or 5:30am and all bets are off if it is my day off.  My favourite breakfast foods are pizza, pasta and burritos.  There's nothing like an extra serving of hot garlic and tuna pasta first thing in the morning.  The first time my family doctor wanted to know what I ate for breakfast, that particular day I'd been eating Reese's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream and pork Keilbasa.  Yes, I teach all my patients about the importance of good nutrition.

Katie puts the fan on just from the smell of my food.  She is terrified to leave the house for fear I'll make a mess (not justified). 

At work, I could be teaching or doing acute care or researching.  A good day has me doing all the above.  I get told protocols all the time, and I violate many of them.  Admittedly, so many people follow protocols by the  time I come along the protocol has given the patient all the benefit that it can.  I don't "think outside the box" so much as I never like to be in a box.  I don't understand boxes.  I get uncomfortable in a box.  I rebel.

It was a huge revelation for me to take a clinic in cross country skiing.  I'd done many marathon events with no technique at all.  Suddenly, a way to aim my poles meant I could push harder.  Video was used to show me that I was driving my shoulders back too high on a double pole plant.  I was shown the physics of the movement, and I could immediately see there was only a certain distance that I could push and everything else just got me more tired.

Dad and I have gone canoeing many times, and we always push our luck.  Mom brought home a video of how to read rapids and how to do different strokes and why.  I watched it 50 times, totally fascinated.  When Dad and I worked together, we could run the worst rapids on the Nahanni River with no problem.  We took Figure 8 rapid better than the professional guides on the river with us because we learned to Ferry.

Dad is a lawyer, and is often deep in legal texts and looking at the fine print.  He leaves work behind, and he is chaos incarnant.  Stephanie and I joke that he is a dog obedience school cult deprogrammer - the best behaved dog is a hellion after he's looked after them for a few days.  He knows how to be more structured than anyone I know in the right environment, and he discards it when he wants to.

At work, certain drugs go together.  Certain drugs don't.  There is an order to draw blood tubes, and a very good reason for it (cultures need to take the waste blood, coags won't fill up fully if a butterfly is used, etc.) 

A good handwashing sink is high and wide enough that the water runs towards your elbows and not your fingertips.  You use the foot pedals or knee taps rather than using your hands so that you don't touch the dirty tap and recontaminate your hands.  Alternatively, you use the towel paper to turn a tap off.  You wash your forearms so that your sweat or your patient's blood doesn't carry bacteria to your hands.  Alcohol foam is only useful if your hands aren't visibly contaminated, and while it kills VRE and MRSA more effectively than soap and water, Alcohol has no sporicidal action and won't kill C.Diff.  There is a huge amount written on handwashing technique.  Silly little thing, but many priniciples and ways to do it and rationales for every option.

In a code, a board needs to be put under a patient so that chest compressions will work (the air bed will absorb the compression, not the patient's chest.)  The patient needs to be flat, or the angle changes and you're not pushing on a heart.  People go to ACLS classes to be taught how to talk - specific phrases are to be used for basic tasks so that everyone knows what you are doing.  Clear has a meaning, and everyone needs to learn that meaning.  You need to call for help, or you are there all by yourself.  There is a right way that will help you, and a wrong way that puts you and your patients at risk.  Research is carried on all the time over how long a port should be scrubbed, and how big should the alcohol pad be and so on.

I read a Taiji book many years ago when I was first starting to learn the Chen Man Ching form.  The author referred to making coffee.  What steps do you need to go through?  Do you actually know them all?  What is the most efficient number of steps.  What takes the least time and least effort to make the best coffee?  He went on to say if you already knew, then you were a Taiji master already.  I was very interested, and I saw elements of what I had learned in skiing and canoeing.

Dad lives in a world that is very organized and very heavy with rules and protocols.  Legal trials depend on it, or justice can't be served.  Katie makes a living correcting sentence structure, spelling and punctuation to make someone else's communication more clear.

I have no problem looking at how to make my approach more logical, because I know I have absolutely no problems discarding any semblance of logic when I want to.  Structure and "the best approach" can fascinate me, but I go back to constant flux very easily.  Using structure is actually very difficult for me, and I rebel against it constantly.  I have seen the consequences of a lack of structure in my own life far too often, and I can see the benefits I get from exploring and using structure.  For Katie and for my Dad, time off is a chance to let the restrictions completely go, but they can fall back on the structure of their lives immediately.

When the freestyle classes start, this will be a chance to really see which world, structure or chaos, most of the students live in.

Randori Class is coming!

Katie wants to set up a Randori class in a few weeks time.  As we're going to Canada at the start of March, the class will probably begin after we return.  It's her class, but I've had things I've been working on for a long time now and I thought I'd post them.

You see, when I did my Shodan test, the kata portion went very well.  The test went on for close to an hour.  I had very good feedback on Tachidori and Kaeshiwaza, which I needed to work on.  When the Randori portion happened, I got trashed.  I had four uke who all came from different cities in Alberta and Saskatchewan and they all knew me well.  We were in the basement of the Albert Community Center in Saskatoon where Saskatoon Aikikai still trains.  The room was very small. 

The first Randori, I had all four guys holding me.  I started to do a Shihonage variation to one of them, knowing that I could peel off a few others.  I felt my friend's wrist start to give way and I could hear him crying out in pain.  I had been stationary for a few seconds, and I knew that was enough that I could have been killed.  I gave up, and spared my friend as I had already lost anyway.

I was given a second chance.  I emptied my mind and kept three people away from me - then the fourth grabbed me in a bearhug from behind and picked me up off the floor.  Of course I thought I knew what to do about a bearhug - use my head to break someone's nose, use my heel to break his foot or kick him in the balls.  I stopped myself from doing this to my friend and got dumped on the ground.  I was angry with him for putting me in that postion of having to chose his safety over my testing well.  Yancy did explain to me later that he thought grabbing me around the waist was kinder than hitting me in the back of the head - I'd put him in a position of having to chose my safety over his role as uke.  If he'd been a lazy uke, I might have never looked to the people in the room like I had been honestly tested.

I learned so much from this test.  I had been trying to just flow with the attacker, and I had been doing some Taiji pushhands in the hope of learning to receive and flow with the energy of my attackers.  I ended up ignoring the environment and I was trying to receive one person at a time instead of thinking about fighting a group.  I also didn't learn enough about responding to some attacks - I knew little damaging tricks that I thought was going to get me through a "real situation" while forgetting as a nurse, I don't want to always hurt people "in the real world."  I didn't give myself the options and choices I needed.

First off, Randori or fighting a group is still about each individual throw.  A throw needs to be done well.  No amount of tactical planning makes up for poor execution.  So, every technique of every class is a chance to get better at Randori.  In other words, don't skip the Basics Class to only go to the Randori Class.

I started to take it one step further, making things a little more difficult for myself.  Could I carry on a conversation with the person I was practicing with?  It sounds like bad etiquette, and it is.  Beginners need to focus on one thing at a time, and this was my way of seeing if I could do more than one thing.  Was my technique getting so engrained that it wasn't mentally overwhelming?  I had a few partners who could tell me all about their day, what they had made for dinner and what girl they were dating while powering me very solidly into the floor.  I can't quote Shakespeare, or carry on a high level debate.  I can tell a lie, so long as I don't feel emotional about it ie the moon is made of green cheese instead of lying aobut something very personal and embarrassing.  It's much easier to be fully honest and talking about a subject not too distant from the practice.  Some partners will have their hands drop down and their whole body stops moving with a single question, and they need to have me shut up for their own development.

I tried to see the ceiling, the door, the walls and the position of other people more clearly while throwing and being thrown.  I kept working out in the busier sections of the mat during a seminar - could I avoid collisions, avoid hitting a wall?  Could I avoid landing on someone else or hitting something?  Did I know where the edge of the mat was when I was falling?  I started to practice with throwing people with this level of mat awareness as best I could.  Throwing with full speed and power with this level of awareness is hard for me - I need to be very dialed down to stay fully aware.

Omote and Irimi movements often have uke falling back the direction they came, and Ura and Tenkan movements often have uke falling in the direction they were already headed.  (Shihonage is the opposite.)  I had read about the four directions, and I taught a class where everyone was doing Tenchinage and Shihonage to four directions.  I put pieces of paper on the floor and made them targets for nage to hit using uke's body.  Then, I started doing 8 directions.  I was wanting to be able to throw to any direction.

I started to see four corners in Tai Sabaki.  The four corners didn't just let me throw to any direction, I could start to move in any direction and pick my placement in the group.

I started to get ready for my nidan test, and I knew I needed at least five techniques for each attack.  I knew that techniques like Sokumen Iriminage, Ukekimenage, Shihonage, Kotegaeshi, Kaitenage were all part of a sequence that can all be done off a single entry just like Ikkyo, Nikyo, Sankyo, Yonkyo and Iriminage were all possible off a single moment of contact.  The next part I wanted was to be able to pick and chose which thread I wanted to follow.

I started to focus on Tai Sabaki for my test.  There are thousands of techniques possible against Shomenuchi, but only a handful of relationships to uke and only a handful of ways to receive the initial attack.  If I could learn this, I could pick my location on the mat while blending with the attack and then throw to any direction.

It worked well, but to pick a location and a relationship (planning) while just letting things happen wasn't working well if I was receiving in a passive mindstate.  If I was being passive, at least I learned enough to work from wherever I was in relation to uke.  Initiating and receiving were very different and let different options appear.

My Nidan test arrived.   My kata portion was good again.  I was able to show different Tai Sabaki to different attacks, which is what I had set out for myself as a goal.  Three people tested at the same time, with their respective ukes.  Then, all three of us were brought together with the uke and each candidate did their Randori against the five of us in turn.  I was the last to go, and people were getting tired.  Two of my ukes thought they were finished, and the others had been thrown constantly for a while now.

I initiated strongly and remembered O Sensei's Dokka to "seize their minds and scatter them all."  I ended up going up the middle, then found myself to the outside.  My first few movements were clean.  Then, I decided to switch gears.  I had a sore knee and I had hurt my foot an hour before my test and I was getting tired.  Aikido is all about blending isn't it?  I tried to do some blending instead of just irimi.

a.  They were a little tired and tenkan is for leading or blending.
b.  I had set the pace of the Randori up to the point I "changed my mind."
c.  I had communicated that I was going to be aggressive and forceful.  They believed me and responded accordingly - more slowly and with more reticience in their attacks.

I came up to a guy who was slowly backing up.  He was bigger than me.  He'd been the first to go of the three of us, and in his mind, his test was done.  He was the outside of a circle of attackers now, and I didn't want the other four behind me.  I actually touched him first and thought about leading him in a circle.  His eyes were wide, and he was breathing hard and sweating harder.  It was briefly on my mind that he was going to fall into the crowd if I sent him straight backwards. 

He would have fallen easily with a straight irimi movement.  Instead, I tried to lead someone in a circle who just wanted to run away.  I didn't let my mind follow his motion, and I had to muscle him.  Now I was more tired.  O Sensei would write that I should have sent him on his way.  My uke didn't attack me, but I had threatened the group (with my movement) and told them not to attack me.

I finally broke out of the circle, using irimi.  The whole group had to run after me, and this time I was able to turn and lead them while they were in motion and it felt much easier.

A karate teacher from many years ago told me he was focusing on timing, as he thought that was everything.  All props to the karate teacher, but I finally realized that there was something more than timing.  I did a big intimidating movement.  I set up a mindset in my uke.  I manipulated their intentions.  I established the relationship. I changed my mind, discarded what I made, stopped reading their intentions and tried to be the passive one in the group.  I did that.  I created the situation.

Kawahara Sensei would often have us practice initiating at seminars, but the whole idea didn't feel like Aikido to some.  I remember his lessons, but I had never properly practiced them.  We were attacking first or eliciting an attack and then using Uke's movement.  How much better timed can a response be than if I set up the attacker to respond to me?  I can play my own game, and not just respond to theirs.  It just doesn't feel like the purely defensive desire only for peace to force the attacker to play your game.

I think this relates to Saito Sensei's Ki no Nagare practice.  If I wait for Uke, katatedori, katadori, sodedori, munedori, higidori, tsuki, and any combination of a grab and a strike will all look the same.  If I initiate or move before the grab, they're all the same.  That's one of my practices for now.