furiki-o-tazune atarshiki-o-shira we must study the old to understand the new ~ Aikido ~ A Journey in Center What I wanted to write about was mental attitude and the relationship that this had to the evolution of my aikido practice/technique. The first time I walked into an aikido dojo was when I was about 25 years old and I had already studied several "hard styles". And, having grown up in NYC, I was well-prepared "attitude-wise" to deal with confrontation ... i responded with a fighting preparedness ... combative. I wont say that I was angry. Yet, the spirit of being "combative" had a very definite reflection on my moves which is totally anathema to the principles of aiki. After 2 years, I could well execute any aikido move but my moves were "mechanical" ... I was a perfect technician, but the "spirit" of the moves, the essence of "aiki" eluded me. One day, hanging out with my sensei (Ken) at his painting studio, he said to me, "you know, I-kyo, ni-kyo, san-kyo, yan-kyo, go-kyo, etc., that's not aikido." and I said, "What?" (thoroughly dismayed by this statement.) and he said, "well, do you know the box-step dance?" I looked at him confused ... and he illustrated the box-step in a very mechanical set of steps ... and then he said to me .... "Is that the box-step?" and I said, "Yes !!??" and he said, "Okay, but is that dancing?" and I said, obviously, "Ah, no!" "okay, well then, I-kyo, ni-kyo, san-kyo, yan-kyo, go-kyo, etc. none of that is aikido" and I said, confused and feeling a little lost .... "Ah, .... so what is aikido?" and he smiled, and said, "It is something else that happens when you do those moves." Something I have meditated upon for many years. And then, several months later. In speaking to several people about the uniqueness of the ken's mastery of aikido, someone said, "Ah, well, he has center." And most of them attributed it to his having studied with Tohei. And the fact that Tohei had unbelievable "center". And this got me to thinking. "Center" hmmm, I wonder what this means, or how I could use this ... And then I recalled the very first conversation I had with Ken. It was 2 months after I had started at the dojo during a weekend retreat up in the woods and I was walking down a trail by this pond and waterfall and Ken was just standing there. I approached him and shyly said, "Hi" and he said, shyly, "Hi". (Ken is a very shy man.) And I said, "My names, Arthur." and he said, "I'm Ken." And I said, "Ah, yeah, I know." He chuckles and smiles with this kind and knowing smile.        (Everyone pretty much knew who Ken was at the Dojo. He was        kindof a legend. He had founded the dojo over 20 years hence and        then one day he just left it 7 years before and went up into the        country in Vermont and started several other dojos.        Now he was back and his return coincided with my joining the dojo.        He and Terry Dobson were good close friends.        They had started the dojo together.        And Terry was a huge legend.        Ken was 56 at the time. I was 25.        And as good as I felt that I was, it kinda humbles you when you        meet someone who has trained in the arts for longer than you have        been alive.        Ken had been coach for the Airforce Olympic Judo team when he        was 24. And Ken's aikido, was that smooth effortless stuff wherein        you see the guy just play with his UKE for 10-20 minutes ... magical        stuff ... he would show a technique in the class and everyone would        just sit around dumbfounded ..... "ah, what was that technique?"        It was mystical. I almost didnt know how to talk to him.) Okay, so, he askes me, "You just started studying aikido?" And I say, "Yes, well, but I have studied several other styles .... Shao-Lin, TaeKwonDo, KickBoxing, Judo,Wrestling," And he just listens and nods his head. Pauses for a moment, then asks me ... "... they teach you about center?" and I nervously respond ... , "Yeah ... what? Huh?" and then I proceed to forget that conversation .... .... till 2 years later. Okay, center? Well, so, I have no idea what this means and it seems to be a non-ordinay thing. So, what I did was I committed to the idea of meditating upon center for the next 7 years (or 10/12 forever, or till it became a part of me ....) And what did this mean? Well, I proceeded to make a mental note every time someone said or I thought of the word center ... or even a related concept, like ... "one" ... "inside" .... "line" .... "first" .... "heart" hmmm.... and so then this got me thinking. Ken is always stressing .... mind-body-spirit ..... And then this other idea popped into my head, well, if he keeps saying ... mind-body-spirit ... well, then, maybe, "What I am thinking during practice .... matters.?" Maybe, what I am feeling about my UKE actually makes a difference. Listen, I was REALLY frustrated, cause I **got** all the moves and I was at an impass, a brick wall, TOTALLY frustrated and nothing seemed to be working ... "muscling everything" And of course, during practice Ken would laugh at me saying .... "Why you workin' so hard?"        "All that **ego**?" That was one of his most favorite things to say to people .... "Why all that ** ego **?"        "Too much struggle!"        "It's not about strength" And of course, I would think to myself .... "ah, I'm lost." And so, I gave up trying to figure out the answers to so many questions and I focused ALL of my attention on answering just one simple basic question .... one question ... one focus .... one purpose .... one meaning .... and all definitions .... all meanings ... all related ideas .... i grouped them and included them and defined them as being a part of the same thing .... a thing which had a thousand faces and a thousand definitions and a thousand meanings .... but in the end ... the same thing .... *** center *** You know, like you are doing your Ph.D. dessertation on some research project and you start out by casting the widest net possible to include any and every possible piece of information to explain your topic .... well, this was the process/meditation/search-and-exploration ... this was my .... Aikido-Koan ..... center ..... it was an "Inclusive search" ** EXCLUDE NOTHING ** okay, now --- in japense .... I-Ten ... means one-point, this actually corresponds to the Dan Tien more specifically than Hara does (as I understand it,) and though, yes, Hara (which I believe more means ... belly), does apply as part of the "inclusive search" but then .... someone reminded me, "breath from your center ... move from your center, recall your one-point" And of course, my attention was immediately peaked because I now had become so attuned to anyone's even mentionnig the word "center" in a sentence. Okay, so I had to include, also in my search, every "application" of center too .... mmmmm. Breath ... kokyo .... and it was kind of like I got the idea that center and breath are two sides of the same coin .... that they are actually the same thing .... mmmm.... okay, so now my inclusive search was expanded to include breath ... but what is breath .... well, expansion and contraction... and then someone made reference to the flag blowing in the wind, and a bird flapping its wings .... etc ..... and of course, a world of things came flooding in and I became overwhelmed .... and so I said ... wait .... this is really only ... center .... okay, well, just leave that observation alone, catalog it .... include it .... and just keep pondering, hold it all in my consciousness. now, what began to happen was that any time I moved or did any technique, i began to become aware of different aspects of center ... like .. the center line of one's skeletal structure ... the fact that the one-point is the center of gravity .... and the fact that one had much more leverage when one's hands were near one's one-point(center) .... and someone said .... "your movements should always start from and return to ... center ...." i watched Ken move and I paid particular attention to his hand movements in relation to his center, and how his hands and feet seemed to move in unison, ie, his right hands/arm always moved together with his right leg ... as if there were a oneness between them .... "oneness" okay, so this is another expanded aspect of center .... oneness ... wherein two things become one ..... Musashi's Sword School .... Ni-Ten-Ichi .... the two as one .... Okay!!!! Now that discovery really sent me reeling cause I knew that i was on to something, but my moves were still using force .... struggling .... did i have center ?? no idea! a oneness of mind-body-spirit ? the three as one, a oneness of spirit, emotions and this led to, of course, ... emotional center .... centerdness ..... a centerdness of spirit .... and ken's almost constant admonishment ... Too much ego !!! ... and he would scrunch up his face mimicking me ... mocking me .... and then he would let me "try" to throw him as UKE .... saying " your pushing, your pushing ... " and, then reverse me and throw me .... in all the years of training with him, he almost never let me throw him ... i had to earn it .... and he would reverse me every time .... he was very unforgiving .. and he was one of those UKE's that gives you VERY VERY LITTLE to work with .... okay, so, More to meditate on ... And I did meditate on this for years. And it was not until 5 years later that I had a breakthrough. And this breakthrough occurred during a 3-day workshop with Ikeda Sensei .... And it was during a very simple excersize. An excercize that Ikeda Sensei kept going back to repeatedly over the entire weekend ... trying to use it to illustrate what he called ... the essence aiki ..... ______________________________________________________ Description of Exercise: ------------------------- The UKE grabs the NAGE's wrist. The NAGE let's UKE hold firmly into static begining ... and then ... just let the UKE go by you ... he described it ... saying ... dont do anything ... just open the door .... dont "ADD" anything when you let him by you ... dont try to throw him, dont try to "DO" anything to him .... just "LET" him by, ______________________________________________________ and, of course, during one of these excersizes, I get paired up with Ken ... and of course, Ken says ...        .... You're adding Ego ... "Stop it!!!!" and I got the connection between adding that little extra UMPH and my emotional desire to want to impose my will upon my UKE .... that being, what Ken was calling ... My Ego .... and of course, Ken would use that **little extra umph** to launch me into space .... ouch!!!! but this time ... i gave up ... and just ... ** let him go by me ** and so, for the first time in my life, after training for 7 years with Ken ... I moved him ... I physically moved him .... and his face lit up with a beaming smile ... and he said .... "YES !!!! " And we both laughed. And though I did struggle with that move a little more during that workshop, by the end of those 3 days ... I could do that move at will ... repeatedly ... and move my UKE .... Now, as I began to meditate and try to assimilate what I had learned and how this fit within the ** center ** principle .... I got this flash of an image within my head of the "center" of the direction of the UKE's force as I was "letting" him by me ... and so, there was the "center" principle at play / at work / mmmmm... more to ponder and meditate upon .... but, i had something, I had something tangible. And the more that I did it, the more that it became a part of my muscle memory and the more easily it became for me to be able to repeat it with any UKE ... at will ... And, i began to notice that I could not do it if I did not "feel" the UKE's force leaning into my wrist ... so i would then have to lean into him/her to instigate it ... and then, let it by .... And so then, this quality of feeling his force (maybe called "ki") came into play ... and so I then sought to find the "center" principle within this aspect ... and I began to become sensitive to the line that his force(ki) was moving through space .... ie, the center-line .... mmmm ... one more application/definition of center ..... and then, so, I started to think about lines ... and then a world of new ideas about center openned up .... why? well, I was orginally a math major in college, and so the subject of lines and vectors and curves and sin-waves all had great meaning for me .... and, also, the idea of ** APEX ** points ... Now, Apex points are points on a wave that demark some sort of change, a change in rate of change, or a change in direction, think of the highest point on the arch of a ball thrown into the air ... that highest point wherein the ball is actually motionless ... that is an apex point ... And, well, I thought to myself, imagining the trajectory of a ball traversing through space, or, energy, force, ki .... traversing through space ... and, that Apex point, well, it might be important, it might contain another application of **center** and during practice one day, i realized that if i was connected to the UKE's force/center-line, and if i did NOTHING but follow it till it hit this APEX point ... i was okay and it was effortless, but then, at the precise moment, I could actually change its direction at will with virtually NO EFFORT .... ie, let the UKE extend themselves to the end of their range ... and voila ... i could launch someone through space with almost no force.... and the heart of what this required was a minute sensitivity and study of my UKE's application of force(ki), and a study of lines and geometric patterns, and the never ending search for those Apex points in space wherein i could change the direction to do my bidding, and then the idea/principle of Musubi ... the blending/binding of two ropes/lines as one ... took on profound meaning, and ai-ki .... spirit meeting spirit .... hormoniously, took on a real and profound meaning .... and Ni-ten-ichi .... the two as one .... and Ken-tai-ichi-jo .... the body and the weapon as one .... and then the more advanced challenge, how to feel the UKE's center-line-of-force when across the **Maai** ... distance .... mmmm .... It became a study in feelings .... and emotions ... vibrations.... mmmm ..... another area to be assimilated into the **center** principle ... but how ?? I started to try to correlate a deeper quality of a persons ki, Right? I mean, mind body spirit ? When Ken moves, and you **feel** him, he is vibrating differently than anyone else, and vibrations at the most minute level, are waves, mmmm... ki .... mmmmm.. more to ponder. What is the center of the UKE's emotions .... and doesnt our emotional state become the center of our physical movements .... mind body spirit ..... What do I feel about my UKE? Do I like him? Can I feel his emotions from a far? Can I sense them? And so I asked Ken about Maai/distance/timing/positioning and sensing the UKE's attack .... and he said .... ** you have to move sooner ** And i said, "What?" and he said, ** you have to move ... before the before ** And I said, "What?" And he ... demonstrated ... from 6 ft / 4 ft / 2 ft .... I looked at him, and each time i thought to strike, he moved first ... he moved sooner ... and in the spirit of his initial movement which was almost imperceptible ... I actually felt as if he had attacked me ... as if he had hit me in the face ... As the Nage, I had always waited for the UKE to attack so that I could *** do aikido *** to him ... Ken never waited. He seized control of the entire interaction from the very beginning. He attacked. And then I remembered that someone had once told me that O-Sensei said .... ** Aikido is 90% Atemi ** And I thought to myself ... mental atemi ... hmmm.. And then something else that Ken used to say started to make sense ... He said, "When does the confrontation really begin?" And then I recalled that when Ken executed Kota-Geishi he often began it by throwing his hands in the direction of the UKE's face (even though due to the distance(Maai) he could not possibly hit the face), but this quick darting motion always caused the UKE (often me) to pause, and then from that moment forward in the move, i was simply actually following his hand movements ... never got any real chance to throw that tsuki (jab) .... ** before the before ** he had seized my attention and he just let me follow through whatever he felt doing .... and he just laughed ..... and i went flying ... you know the feeling .... Its funny, when people watch a really advanced practitioner of aikido they think that it is choreographed .... and they are right ... it is ... but the UKE has little involvement in that choreography ... Ken was conducting the show and I was simply along for the ride ..... He seized the ** center ** of my attention by a strike to my eyes, and drew the **center-line** of my attention and i just followed like a horse following that carrot ... And if this sounds magical and mystical, I did feel that it was. I believe that this is a transcended way of dealing with and being connected to ... your UKE ... it is as if you reach out and touch their heart .... Someone once described        ** Ai-Ki ** to me as .... Spirit Meeting .... and that its corollary is        ** Ki-Ai ** .... Spirit Happening .... and that whenever you do a move in aikido, the Nage, experiences ...... Ki-Ai , (yang "yo") and the UKE experienes ... Ai-Ki, (yin "in") In/Yo (yin/yang) He said .... *** Changing His Priorities *** And ... is that *mental atemi* how you might change your UKE's priorities ....? Let me add here, that Ken also spoke much about the planet and how we are treating it. And that taking care of the planet is or should be as much a part of your martial training ... cause if there is no planet to live upon ... you die ... we all die ... anyway. He is a kind and gentle man, a softspoken man, he smiles easily, he laughs easily, he hates being called sensei or master or any such formal thing, its ken, with a small "k" .... he is a fine arts painter and has been for almost 50 years .... and this and teaching is how he has made a living for most his life .. he was and is like a second father to me, i used to travel with him and spend holidays with his family ... for me, aikido is inexplicably connected to my feelings of love and respect for ken .. today, at 68, he looks much like o-sensei, it is uncanny, i wrote this poem, many years ago, about him, ____________________________________________           wood wood wood,           'and yellow'- he says,           The canvas larger than life           and so much more to learn,           a simpler quieter way,           the frame slightly tilted           the light from above           and behind, slightly to my                     right-           music speaking and living                  and telling a tale-           the flowing circle and           the hand reaching up,           the wind swirling around it,           stillness and a man           working,           I had been in the           artist's studio before,           yes           but this was the           first time while           he was working,           I could feel           the glow of his           being calming the           room and telling                     its tale-           -- Arthur,           -- june 24th 1992 ____________________________________________ peace, Arthur,

Arthur Paul Levine ©
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