Aikido is unique among martial arts in that it teaches calmness and creativity in the midst of aggression .... compassion and non-violent responses towards violence .... and resolution of conflicts without harming others.
Miles Kessler
Miles Kessler
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Sunday Oct 13th. On Saturdays in the past month we have had some new kids come in. The numbers dropped off quite a bit at the beginning of September, but the past two weeks we have had 11 and 10 kids on the mats. Thursday two new girls came with their Mom. There has been a new woman coming on Sundays and another woman came in Thursday evening. On Tuesday, Oct. 8th we had 15 female college students with the UF Empowerment group in for a Women's Self Defense class. 5 of our most advanced teens and kids students helped with teaching and taking falls with the college ladies helped out. The students wanted to see a demonstration of what these kids know, so I had them do some 20 second free-style one-on-one attacks on each other. The ladies were pretty impressed with these demonstrations.
I have taught these kids a lot and they have learned well. 20 seconds usually works out to 3 throws. The time for a throw includes the time for the attacker to get up and get to the thrower and the time for the thrower to respond. About 5 seconds per throw is a very respectable time. That is about the same time for everyone who knows what they are doing. One of the throwers here was able to get 4 throws in the 20 seconds. Saturday Oct 12th. At the beginning of September I received word that one of my most advanced families would no longer be coming to practice. I have grown to love these kids so much it put me into a funk for the whole month. I found they had been practicing too much (not just with me) and they were getting tired and the mother was thinking she didn't get to see a portion of her family enough. I can understand that. If you are not planning on teaching, Aikido is not something you should be doing every day. My thought is that when you come to practice, it's to come and have fun, not think of it as a chore you need to go do. I also don't want people to feel so driven that they must master any particular technique at every practice. Come and have fun. Enjoy the camaraderie. Have fun learning something that may enhance or even save your life at some point. I have had lots of techniques that were hard to get over the years. You need to relax and keep hitting these hard techniques now and then and one day it will just click and you will have it. Sometimes you get epiphanies. Those are exciting. Saturday August 31st. The Labor Day Weekend August Birthdays party was a bit of a bust this time. We only had 4 kids and two adults show up. We did sing Happy Birthday for Aedwyn cause we know her birthday is in August. I have a lot of sweet left overs now. The good point was they all got a lot more close instruction. Four of them now have all their stripes to take the Blue belt test, but they need to do some more practice before they test. Christopher is now working on his Green belt test. He starts learning the weapons in this test. So we worked on his Bo (long staff) katas; Bo 1 and Bo 2. He is coming along pretty good on those. They aren't memorized yet, but he is moving better and better all the time. Saturday August 24th. Slow morning today, we only had 6 kids and one adult. That's OK, we have slow days. Gavin came Friday afternoon and I ran him through his purple belt test. He tested this morning with Christopher as his Uke. Gavin started out really well, but as he progressed to the more advanced techniques he started having memory troubles. So instead of the circle grade he started out showing, it ended up as a triangle grade for the test. A pass is a pass. Once you leave the university, most often, nobody cares if you had a 4.0 GPA or a 1.5 GPA. You graduated. I will start teaching on Wednesday afternoons out at the Queen of Peace Academy this week on the 28th. That will continue for 15 weeks. I have 3 students signed up out there so far. Since we have a number of students advancing up on Saturday mornings, and their techniques are becoming more complex, I am starting to do partial stripes on their belts to show that we worked on a technique but it's not yet understood. That gives me a better idea of what to concentrate on the next time they show up. It also shows the students that I am paying attention to how they are progressing even if I don't give them a stripe every week. I received this awesome message from my friend Mike Fowler about a night with Nishio Sensei after practice. This was Nishio Sensei's deep philosophy. In Tokyo, one night after class, we all went out to Nishio Sensei's favorite yakitori place for dinner. There were 5 or 6 students with us; We ordered some things and after a while Nishio Sensei looks at me and said "Michael, I'm one of the best martial artists on the planet, if you have a question for me, you can ask it now!” That's called “Front Street.” It's an unusual, direct way of Japanese speaking. I thought about it for a second and said, “Sensei, when you practice Ken Tai Ken, What do you feel when you meet your Uke without hurting them?” Sensei answered me in a deep voice, "Forgiveness.” “Most people have a hard time to forgive even once. I'm an aikido man. I must do better than that. In the Aikido techniques we practice, there are many points of reflection where we have the chance to learn forgiveness for others and ourselves, even when they want to harm us!” "Sensei, How many times do we need to forgive in one technique?" Sensei said, “At least 3 to 5 time's is good, or until they feel the sharp part of my sword, after that it gets repetitive!” "Sensei, What do we think about when we practice cutting with our sword?" "We should think that we are cutting out the bad parts of ourselves, or our character that we don't like. With every cut we go deeper. The Aikido sword cuts in the correct way for people to follow and develop good character and spirit to become strong and to help others to do the same.” “But first, we must work on ourselves!" “I believe in myself!" He said, “1000 Sword cuts for your heart!” “10,000 sword cuts for your spirit!” Sensei looked at me deep in the eye's for a minute and said, "Most students would not ask this kind of question of me Michael-san.” I looked at the other student's at the table. We all had tears in our eye's at that moment. We all said, “Kampai Sensei!” I always tried to pull things out of him in this way. Thank you Nakamichi Sensei, for reminding me of that moment in time. I feel AIKIDO is the physical expression of love and compassion. I miss you Sensei!” Michael fowler 5th dan Nishio sensei. Ronin, Saturday August 17th. We had 9 kids and 2 adults. Jessie and James got a bunch of stripes for rolls, working on their first tests. James is sharp and picks up fast for just having 2 practices. Ms B was working with them and teaching them well. Sensei Keith was helping Gavin with his purple belt test. He has all his stripes, but has missed a lot of Saturdays cause he is playing a lot of team sports with games on Saturdays. So Gavin still needs some more practice before he tests for Purple belt. I was working with the Purple with white stripe students the largest group, on Irimi Nages. They are getting into more complex stuff and it has not kicked in yet that as they progress they have to practice more. So, no stripes for what they learned this week, but some of them did get stripes for what they learned the past two weeks. Thursday, I was working with Sandor and Simone. Sandor will have Koshi Nage (hip throws) on his next test. When I showed him and he went over, he landed just fine, then they realized that the play throws, on half unrolled mats, that I have been doing with them off and on for months, maybe two years or more, have actually been training them all along to take those falls. The play has become practical application. Imagine that! Saturday August 10th. We had 13 kids and one adult. Simone tested for her brown belt, 8th test. She received some prompting from her brother, who was Uke (attacker) for her, but still, overall, it was a good test. I was impressed with her shomenuchi (overhead strike) Kotegaeshi (wrist turn back). She was slow reacting to the attack, but then moved like lightning. The effect was very good. Even though she usually knew what she was doing and I know that she knows how to do everything well, there were mistakes. So she gets a triangle grade, pass with mistakes. I am happy for her. We also had three new students. There was a 6 year old tiny black girl who was so cute and shy. She had the biggest smile all through the class. I'm sure she had a lot of fun and her shyness will melt away if she keeps coming. There was a preteen black girl, who was mainly uninterested except while Simone was testing. She watched like a hawk. We also had a new Chinese heritage boy. I think he had fun too. It was a good day. The Alachua County schools opened Monday, so the weekly classes have flipped to afternoons. Right now the dojo is open Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 2:30 to 5:30 but that will change to Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays soon as I will again be teaching an after-school class out at the Queen of Peace Academy starting August 28th, for the Fall Semester. Saturday and Sunday Aug. 3rd & 4th. This was a terrific weekend. Here in Gainesville, there were 14 kids & teens on the mat, with two adults. Mr. Herron was teaching along with Judith, Joy, Martin, Sandor and Simone, the most senior of the kids and teens students. They actually developed a new routine that the students feel is like another game. Wonderful! We will try that again next time. Sensei Keith, his son Alex and I, along with Ian Phillips from the Aikido Orlando Dojo were up in the Fredericksburg area of Virginia at the Aikido in Fredericks Dojo for the first Nishio Style Aikido seminars East of the Mississippi since well before Nishio Sensei died in 2005. Arisue and Nakamichi Sensei's taught as a team for two seminars on two weekends, the first in New York and the second in Frederiksburg, Va. I trained often with these men for about 4+ years until the USS Independence got out of dry dock in late 1994. The last two years of my 6 years, I was out at sea for about 9 months of the year, so I would see them when the Independence was in port. I think Nakamichi Sensei was on 3 or 4 tours I gave my friends and I think Arisue Sensei was on at least one tour. If he didn't tour the ship, it was certainly not a slight. I loved showing everybody my ship! Nishio Sensei was on at least two tours. Nakamichi Sensei was at my retirement ceremony on the ship. The seminar was terrific! I learned more in depth about so many things, Aikido, Iaido and various people I know of in Japan. Many things I have been teaching for years were again verified as authentic and correct. Also new friends and connections were made with these students who have retired to the eastern U.S. after serving and studying Aikido in Thailand for many years. Saturday July 27th. There were 13 kids & teens for the July birthdays party. Walmart didn't even have a day old cart out when I got there. So there wasn't any different pastries, just cupcakes, ice cream, grapes and bananas. Everybody made do with what we had. Sandor tested and passed his Brown with black stripe test. He didn't remember the Tokimune no Kun Bo 12 kata well enough, but he did well on the rest of the weapons, knife take-aways and empty hand techniques. He did the attack side for both the 13 movement and 31 movement Jo katas, doing very well again. He has told me he likes the empty hand but not the weapons. He is smiling/grinning a lot when we do the Jo katas. I'm hoping that as he gets more and more into the advanced weapons that his interest will be regenerated for those. His sister Simone is about ready to test for her brown belt. That will be good for her. Saturday July 13th. We had 8 kids and two adults on the mats. Christopher tested for Blue with a White Stripe and Rafa tested for Purple with a White Stripe. Both were successful. Rafa had trouble with techniques I knew that she knew, so I went through the test a second time to verify her knowledge. Sometimes the nervousness is too much. But I keep them going forward. They are moving towards overcoming their fears. We had one new boy this morning. I think he had fun and learned some things about rolling. Rolling is about 80% of the first test. It's important to know how to take falls, which often end in a roll out. Since practice most often is done with a partner and both learn the technique and the way to receive or to handle the take down by taking turns as attacker, then defender. Thursday evening, July 11th. Wonderful night! We had 8 on the mats and conducted a split mat class with Nishio Style for the advanced students and Iwama Style for the junior students with some of the advanced students rotating between the styles to help the junior students. Everybody learned something new, even me. Alex, Joel and Travis were so impressed with practicing Gyaku Hanmi Irimi Nage as empty hand, then with boken (wooden sword) and later with the Jo (walking staff). This was new for Joel, Travis, Judith and Joy. I think they are beginning to understand why I refer to the Nishio Style as building the cathedral. It's so much more than the regular building. Joy said she felt like she was on a roller coaster when she was being thrown. It's different and fun. Alex pointed out that the boken and the Jo stressed different points that enhance the empty hand, which was something I had never realized before. So that was what I learned tonight. Wednesday evening, July 10th. Todd was back from Homestead. He's graduating and moving down there for his first agriculture job. I presented him with his first certificate, then proceeded to blow his mind with Nishio Style techniques. Shaun and Keith came to practice Nishio Style to get ready for the Nishio Style seminar in Virginia the 3rd and 4th of August. Todd's wrists and Keith's hands are sore from house repairs work, so we worked on Irimi Nage. Lots of open hand stuff, easy on the wrists and hands. Todd thought this was terrific that we could incorporate the sword and walking staff and have practically the same movements whether doing empty hand or using weapons. I have been encouraging Todd to try out Stephanie Yopp's dojo in Hollywood when he gets down there. I've probably thoroughly spoiled him, so that's one of the few places he would be satisfied with to practice at. Saturday July 6th. We had 12 kids on the mats that morning. That was pretty good. The little boy who came in last week came back. His family is traveling to Vietnam for nearly a month. So I expect them back in August. We have a very diverse bunch of students. They are all born in America, but their parents are from different countries. Just this morning we had the boy with Vietnamese heritage, two girls with Bangladeshi parents, 3 girls and their mother who is from India, Another girl has parents from eastern Europe. The mother has told me the country, but I'm not positive at the moment. I'm thinking Romania or Bulgaria. They have traveled there this summer. We did have some black kids practicing and progressing well, but not in the past year. Things change and people come and go. I love teaching everybody. Thursday evening, June 20, Martin passed his Brown Belt test. I was thinking he was not really ready and would have a difficult struggle, but he surprised me and went pretty straight through the test. I had him repeat a few things, but overall it was a good test. So he passed with a lumpy circle. These kids work so hard when there are rewards on hand and there is a bit of competition between siblings or friends. I love it and I am continually proud of them. This is a video of Saito Sensei teaching a seminar in Japan. Maybe it's a university aikido club or perhaps multiple universities cause the average age looks like college student ages. Probably you won't be able to understand the words, but you can still understand the teaching cause it goes more by demonstration than exactly what he says. I linked it, so you should be able to just click on the url address here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzNa_7uufAs&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR16mgTh9-FqDmg1OPowQDP-lUQdXF0CRs8BNq0CbNwYm5rhjcD9VLwAGN0 I stumbled onto an old demonstration by Nishio Sensei. It's the 11th All Japan Aikido demonstrations. I think they are up to around 57 now so this must be back in the 1960's I'm about 85-90% certain the Uke's are Nishimoto Sensei and Masuda Sensei. Everyone is so much younger than when I practiced with them. Nishimoto Sensei was my Uke and tested me for Sankyu at the old Matsuo Dojo. He just called me up near the end of class and had me do techniques. I didn't even know I was being tested. How many white belts have a 7th Dan test and Uke for you at the same time. That was special and I didn't even know it at the time. I was still pretty clueless at the time. This is the link to the video: https://www.facebook.com/senseiaikidocom/videos/544548876016792/UzpfSTEwMDAwMTA0Njg4Njk3MzpWSzoyNDQ4NjUxNTQxODE2OTQw/ Sensei Keith was up in Virginia attending a Fukushidoin (assistant instructor seminar) in April. To expand on Sensei Keith's experience of the weekend, he already knew much of what was being taught while many 2nd and 3rd Deg. blackbelts were seeing things as new. It is always so gratifying to me when my students go somewhere and see that what I am teaching is spot on or even advanced to what others are teaching at the higher levels. I know I'm a good sensei, but it's better when my students really recognize it for themselves. Others may take my attitude as arrogant. No, it's self awareness of what I was taught in Japan and what I continue to expand on and pass on. I received this wonderful Thank You from the woman who requested and coordinated bringing the children with Tourette Syndrome to the Saturday morning classes. She said posting this was great with her. Simpson, Heather N. Mon, March 2019 to Sensei Tom, Thank you so much for welcoming our group this weekend. I know that the children loved it and really enjoyed learning the activities. In particular, while the kids were learning, the parents were bonding and connecting, which was a real bonus to Saturday. I have taken your flyer and will hand it out whenever possible. Your program is truly remarkable and I appreciate your kindness to the group. Most sincerely, Heather Simpson, OTD, MOT, OTR/L Tourette Clinic Coordinator Southeast Regional Centers of Excellence UF Health Rehab Center at Fixel Center for Neurological Diseases I received this great email complement from Nathaniel after his first class in Jodo, walking staff, last Thursday evening. It's so nice I asked him if I could post it on the website. He said he would be honored. Dear Sensei, Thank you for writing and for teaching a wonderful class. Having dabbled in various martial arts and numerous dojo’s over the years I have developed a good sense for quality instruction and found it in abundance on Thursday. And I feel very fortunate to be able to receive such a level of instruction within a small class (although I do not expect the class to remain small for long). The commute is a challenge but is what it is. I look forward to seeing you again on Thursday. Best regards, Nathaniel This video explains how to perform the first kata of the Aiki Toho Iaido developed by Shoji Nishio Sensei. I also explain about the cutting draw I was taught right from the start of my practice of Iaido. I did not need to change anything when I was introduced to Tasaburo Tokutomi Sensei, master of the Morinaga line of the Toyama-Ryu style of batto-jutsu, cutting of rolled rice straw matting. Here is the URL of the first Aiki Toho kata https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBuEw99f3CE The senior Kids students are not asking to play games at the beginning of class anymore. They now realize that the Aikido is the "play" and they have graduated to a higher level of play. I'm hearing "I love this technique." or "This is my favorite Bo kata". And just a few months ago the statements were "This is hard." Now it has become "This is fun." I have decided to offer extra discounts of extra classes for parents or students who help clean the dojo while their kids or teens are in class. I'm swamped so much of the time with keeping track of the dojo financially, keeping up the websites, doing maintenance, processing new videos and such that the cleaning is not up to snuff. I think this can work out as a win-win for the dojo and the parents. The Aikido of Gainesville Dojo will be closed on Tuesdays during the day. I might be there to do maintenance, but I will not be teaching on Tuesdays. There will regularly be a Free Community Service Aikido Class on Tuesday evenings from 6:30 to 8pm. Tuesday Evening practices may not always be open. Please call ahead of time to determine if there will be a class that evening. Call first Jun Evangelista 352-222-0872. If no answer or Jun is not teaching, call Keith McInnis rd352-258-4725. |
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The primary question: What constitutes a good dojo? How do you recognize a good dojo?
1. The Sensei (instructor) is knowledgeable, helpful and safe. 2. The techniques work and can be powerful, but don't always need to be powerful. 3. The senior students look out for and help the junior students and keep things safe. 4. Everybody is learning a lot and having fun. |
There are Dojos that stand a lot on visual image and ritual because they can't stand on knowledge and there are Dojos that forego a lot of ritual and may not look like much but they have an abundance of knowledge. We are in the latter group.
TEST US! There is an overwhelming abundance of knowledge here.
TEST US! There is an overwhelming abundance of knowledge here.
To see and learn more about the dojo, go across the top menu to "About". On the drop down menu click on "Location". On that page there are 10 videos showing the dojo with explanations of what I have on the walls.
Under the videos menu I have added instructional videos for both Iwama Style and Nishio Style. I will begin showing how I teach the techniques, as time allows. You may find them very informative.
If you want to get in contact with me, email; sensei@aikidoofgainesville.com or 352-494-7816.
Under the videos menu I have added instructional videos for both Iwama Style and Nishio Style. I will begin showing how I teach the techniques, as time allows. You may find them very informative.
If you want to get in contact with me, email; sensei@aikidoofgainesville.com or 352-494-7816.
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The more time spent in class becomes more learned which means the faster the advancement.
Free Saturday classes will remain in the mornings until further notice. Kids 9am to 10:30am and Teens 10:30am to Noon AOG web sites with information about Kids classes are; Aikido Kids of Gainesville, Stop the Bully Using Aikido and Bully Defense Using Aikido These sites have more information about what to expect in Kids and Teens classes and Anti-Bully techniques. Thursday Free Class times are 6:30-8:00pm. There is now a weapons class from 8:05 to 9:00pm following the free class. |
The Nishio Sensei videos shown above here are advanced techniques. I start practically everybody in the Iwama Style to build knowledge and a foundation of basic techniques. After you have the knowledge to pass the third test, then you will better understand and appreciate the Nishio Style techniques which are strong and fast.
Calendar of all Aikido of Gainesville Events
Classes will be tracked by the use of a punch card. The number of classes purchased will be written on the punch card and when the number of punches are completed a new card may be purchased. There will be no time restrictions on the cards.