Have you used Aikido to protect yourself or others in real life?

Would you expand on what you mean by "Ki manipulation of aikido" ?

Thanks

Dave

 

Osu,


That's great towag; as my friend says:
"effective always looks good!"



OsU!

 

Many Aikido techniques use the energy of the attacker to direct the attack away. One can do this with other martial arts.

Example: One may use the graceful movement Aikido encourages with a Karate block, so instead of meeting the attack with force, sweep the attack away and bring the attacker off balance.

Aikido is perfect for integration.

 

Ok I see what you're diving at however; there's a significant difference between uke (as in to block) and barai (as in to sweep). Both methods exist in Karate and the nature and extent of the application will largely depend upon what style of Karate-do one studies.

I think what you're alluding too is actually more akin to awase in concept rather than "ki"

Awase comes from the verb "awaseru" which comes from the verb au these all use the same character as ai in "aikido". Awaseru essentially means to match [something] up with [something else] So, applying that to your example, you'd be matching [blending] your movements with that of the attack then, making a connection - musubi - with your attacker however, instead of meeting physical strength with physical strength you redirect that energy because you're harmonised with it - ai -.

Dave

 

Dave, I think you may have figured out what aikidoka-je was getting at. Since all blocks in karate can be strikes combined with the knowledge that you don't meet force with force in karate, I could not figure out what aikidoka-je was talking about. For instance, in karate, you get out of the way and your block is a strike... or I could cut in and use my block as a strike to intercept... none of this is meeting force with force because of maai. If I was to redirect in karate, that would be a parry. I have no idea how aikidoka-je got the idea that in karate it is force meets force.

I did, after reading his post over several more times figure out sort of what he might be talking about and that is similar to the conclusions you came to Dave.

Another way to put it is in the intentions involved with atemi. In karate, atemi is mainly intended to stun, break, knockout but could unbalance whereas in Aikido, atemi is mainly intended to unbalance but could stun, break, knockout. I know this from my experience with ara waza (severe technique). The ara waza in Aikido is nearly identical to the ara waza in karate. The only difference is that the Aikido ara waza works more off of atemi to unbalance on contact but the karate atemi works more to stun on contact...

 

Agreed, like almost everything in life, there's only so many ways to do things. Martial Arts are no different because we're talking about the physical manipulation of the human body in various forms, be it via the empty hand or through the use of a weapon.

The concepts behind those means can however be debated until the cows come home