Aikido in my life (essay for shodan grading)

Aikido is an integral part of my life. Having been practicing Aikido for a few years now, I don’t imagine a life without the regular practice. I enjoy the learning and the sharing but, most of all, the friendship. Aikido gave me friends for life and I am truly thankful for that. And my small repay is to keep practicing with dedication and enthusiasm.

However, I find in my Aikido a lot of contradictions. Maybe because I am learning, maybe they are real to someone else.

To begin, it is a martial art that promotes harmony.

It is a martial art where one’s opponent attack is to be neutralized so smoothly and naturally that the outcome should be almost therapeutical to both.

An opponent that during training is trying to harm us, but in reality is offering themselves as a tool for our own improvement and understanding of the techniques. Like a canvas lends itself to be the surface of the painter. The same way the painter needs to be gentle with the canvas, so do I try to be respectful and treat my partners with care so they enjoy the practice and, hopefully, would like to train with me again.

It is also a contradiction how the attack needs to have an honest intention of delivering the blow to your partner, but should be fluid and relaxed enough to take a good ukemi without endangering anyone.

I find a contradiction that the Aikido is more joyful when one is fully relaxed. Only because I find myself very often in this situation where I am trying to do what my sensei asks, in a relaxed and harmonious way only to find myself stiff and using more strength than I should in the process to relax. Plenty of room for improvement there too.

Also there is the aspect of the practice. One has to look after him/herself and of the partners but at the same time, should give everything he/she has so the practice is genuine and honest. Even if it means reach the end of the class completely exhausted. Very often I find myself more relaxed when my body is exhausted, because there’s no more strength in my muscles, so whatever I do from there, it will have to be relaxed.

And finally, the contradiction in grading. I am going for my grading with the conscience that I have trained and prepared myself the best I can, despite thinking I could have done better, that I could always practice more and try harder to get better.

I think that I am reaching a milestone. Which for me does not mean the end of the road, but just another step. A very important sensei in the my past once told that life in Aikido is like a vine tree branch where the gradings are the knots in it, and after each knot there is more branch to follow. I am going for the grading, wishing to pass, knowing that either way I will always be learning, and as the years of practice increase, so does the responsibility to learn more deeply about Aikido.

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(Gilberto Serrano de Almeida)

London, 31st of March 2017