What's the Right Way?

by Troy Turner, 5th kyu, Florida Aikikai


Editor's Note: We continue our Beginner's Corner department with this article by Troy Turner, a student at Florida Aikikai. We hope this will be helpful to other beginners as they first grapple with the complexities of Aikido.




When I first began my study of Aikido, I was (and still am) a bit overwhelmed by the amount of detail involved in such seemingly "simple" movements. I would watch Sensei demonstrate the technique, try to discern as much as I could, and then struggle through it with my partner. Naturally I was anxious to get as much input and advice from my training partners as I could. Some would freely volunteer information without being asked; others would answer questions posed to them. In the midst of all this, I began to notice that everyone had a different version of how techniques are supposed to be done. These versions often conflicted or even directly contradicted each other!

What was going on here? How could there be so many different interpretations of the same techniques? Surely somewhere amid all this advice and sharing of knowledge was the RIGHT way, and that was what I wanted to learn. It was annoying to me that it was hidden among all the rest of this stuff, which was seemingly there only to throw me off the path.

I would try to do the technique like Sensei did in class, but he also encouraged us to ask questions and learn from more senior students. I watched everyone else and tried to determine which people really seemed to be doing their Aikido well. They would be the ones that could help me. However, I had to admit that some of the best practitioners were some of the same people who had given me different advice about the same techniques. Curioser and curioser. All of these people obviously did Aikido well. Which one was right?

Being exposed to visiting Sensei made things even more confusing. They were doing things differently too! When I asked my partner about this during a seminar, he said that while there was a visiting teacher, we should practice techniques the way that they did them.

I began to realize that because of the different bodily attributes that different people possess, different approaches would allow them to make Aikido "work" better for them. Wow! I became a bit embarrassed that I had been getting frustrated with people who were actually all showing me their own true way in their best understanding of it.

The "one true way" I had been looking for didn't seem to exist; instead I was going to have to discover what worked for my own unique self. I could be shown the basic fundamentals upon which Aikido is built, but finding the best way to apply them to ME was up to ME. This was going to take a lot longer than I thought. It began to sink in how comfortable and unchallenging some arts can be that are very rigid in their definition of their art, and how much easier it is to have a teacher show you "the only way to do it".

So now when a beginning student asks me why everyone is telling him something different, I have to smile to myself a little. I have heard it said that one can watch the original uchideshi of O-Sensei all do the same technique, and to someone who doesn't know Aikido it would look like they were all doing different things. This is probably one of the greatest testaments to the malleability and adaptability of Aikido. Truly this is an art that one can make one's own.