The reflections of a 47-year old beginner in Aikido, about training, learning, aiki, horsemanship, and life.
Linda Eskin is horse person (dressage/trails), user experience planner (Web/apps), and a student at Aikido of San Diego.
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
A LITTLE ABOUT ME
Most of the posts here are duplicates of my posts from
my blog on AikiWeb.com, a very active and friendly community of Aikido students and teachers. If you are a member of AikiWeb, and would like to comment, please do so there.
I am a beginning student of Aikido, a martial art that, like horsemanship, takes a lifetime to master. These posts are only my own observations on my own experience. You should not rely on anything I say here. Any inept or incorrect information is my own responsibility, and should not be a reflection on others.
I am grateful to
Dave Goldberg Sensei for being an extraordinary teacher, and for creating an engaged, thinking, and compassionate community of students and teachers at
Aikido of San Diego. If you are in the area, visitors are always welcome to observe classes. If you are a student at another local dojo, keep an eye on
our dojo calendar for upcoming seminars and other events.
Copyright 2009, Linda Eskin. Please feel free to share any of my poetry, online, or in print, keeping my name and any other acknowledgments with it. I will almost certainly be happy to let you use anything else I've posted here, with proper attribution, but please ask first.
Contact me via e-mail
Linda Eskin
MORE AIKIDO READING
Scanning the Instruments
When flying a plane, one thing a pilot does, to be sure things are working correctly, on course, and safe, is to frequently scan the instruments. Check the altitude, check the heading, check the airspeed, etc. Look around for traffic, communicate if needed… Check the altitude, check the heading, check the airspeed, and so on. Scanning the instruments lets you detect little problems quickly, and fix them before they become bigger problems.
I’m finding that paying attention to each aspect of my Aikido would be a similarly good idea. Am I breathing freely? Does my posture have integrity? Am I centered, and grounded? Am I aligned with Uke/Nage? Try to work out the next step of that new technique… Am I breathing freely? Does my posture have integrity? Am I centered, and grounded? Am I aligned with Uke/Nage? Notice the little problems quickly, and fix them.
Inattention to one aspect or another in Aikido has similar consequences to inattention in flying. Going faster than you’re capable of going safely. Heading in the wrong direction. Unintentional flight into terrain.
Doing a frequent scan of a few key points could help keep me on course. It’s something I’ll play with, and see how it goes.
[Note: Thank you to Mark De Souza for a post on his blog, Mark’s Meanderings referencing this post.]
