Should Uke Resist Their Partner From Executing a Technique?
If you have never practiced Aikido, you may not know this, but this topic is continuously coming back every now and then. I guess we feel differently about it when we study and progress in Aikido over a period of time.
What I know for sure, is that any Teacher in the dojo will want his new students to perform the technique without feeling much resistance from Uke (receiver or attacker) so that they can first copy and perform the technique as best as they can. Otherwise, the training could hinder their efforts and enjoyment.
When a Beginner has to perform the technique, often Uke would certainly be more ‘experienced’ than his/her partner. So Uke would agree to ‘let’ Tori (person doing the technique) execute the technique and Uke is willingly cooperating or ‘guiding’.
But I do recognise that this type of training giving or letting Tori to execute the technique can be a challenge for Uke on so many levels. First, Uke would want to feel he is losing his/her power and losing his/her balance at the right moment preventing him/her from retaliating for the technique to be strong. But the reality is that it would take years of practice for Tori to get to this level (as well as years of practice as being Uke too!).
So, Uke may be tempted to talk to help his/her partner, which is a big temptation for us all, as it is easier to talk than guiding Tori without a word and let him/her lead the technique.
We know that talking prevents our good training, as Aikido requires physical movements to be done repeatedly until we begin to assimilate what is happening – so there is a process of doing rather than speaking. Do you remember this? “You hear you forget – you do, you remember”
By practicing in this manner, we begin to feel connect with our primary instinct too, knowing where and when to block and where to strike, which will help us respond more spontaneously and this is an important part of our training.
In fact, if we look at the way many senior Japanese Teachers were teaching, you will find that most of them would use the old Japanese methods of teaching i.e. the teacher would show the technique a few times without saying any words and let their students practice and find their own way to copy and try and feel the technique, if students were doing it wrong, often they would not even be shown the right way. The traditional method would rely on students to find the right way themselves, which would take years. Sadly, some may never find the right way if they stop training with a Teacher because of injuries or due to change of jobs and have to relocate etc. So the ‘no talking’ in my view can take too long to see good result.
If I see a student doing the technique wrong, I would always want to help and show how the technique is done, so I would give a new opportunity for the student to correct his/her mistake. Then it would be up to them to assimilate and add this good advice to help their Aikido.
But I have to say that, we (Iwama Aikido community) are extremely fortunate that we had Morihiro Saito Sensei who was unique and different from many other Japanese Teachers. Morihiro Saito Sensei knew how to connect with Westerners and understood them better too by meeting their needs quickly when stuck with any technique. Indeed, Morihiro Saito Sensei was able to provide detailed explanation and break the technique down giving pedagogic explanation why this is incorrect and why we must practice like this etc.
Since the passing of Morihiro Saito Sensei, we are still fortunate to freely view his videos on Youtube – by the way thanks to every video owners who knew that it would be treasure to share rather than keep the video for themselves. We are very grateful for that! Thank you to all of you who have been sharing these wonderful videos.
Morihiro would often quote that we should practice Kihon before we ‘jump’ into Ki No Negara for some time and I believe until one reaches Sandan level (3rd Degree black belt), with the view to build hips stability and power. So when we begin in Kihon, we allow Uke to attack firmly, in another word, Tori is in the worst possible situation to start with.
The only way to get out of this situation would be to do the technique correctly. But what do I mean by doing the technique correctly? Well, there are quite a lot of things that I could say, which would be very important to me (some Teachers or practitioners may share my points or they may take a different approach, which is fine):
correct footwork (Hanmi),
correct use of the hips,
good posture, upper body staying relax and not tense with muscles, but the body remain relax and connected with hips feeling.
feel the Kokyu in your hands and be guided by the movement of your hips, feel when and where Uke is losing power and balance,
keep a good Zanchin and
practice in mind that you are doing Bukiwasa when practicing Taijutsu so you retain strong interlink how and where you should go,
feeling of being surrounded with multiple attackers etc. There are lots of things we would need to ensure we tick all the boxes.
But there is one crucial point: when Uke applies lots of power or strength in the grip for instance, the only way to do overcome this is by staying relax, staying ‘centered’ and use the hips power. I must say that it is very easy to say but it takes many years of practice to get to this level.
Until then, you will be tempted, like every beginner (and we have all been there, me included!) to use your arms and shoulders and exert some physical power to subdue your partner, which would work if Uke is weaker than you.
Truly speaking, one should be able to practice a strong Aikido on someone else bigger than us and the only way to do it is to find the good use of your hips!
Otherwise, your Aikido will be fairly limited. If you are big, you could ‘make it work’ until you meet someone else twice your size…
Now, if an experienced Aikidoka performs a technique (so is Tori) and Uke is still more experienced than Tori, I do believe that Uke should do what he can to resist when attacking firmly to make Tori work on his/her technique.
However, this is where it becomes tricky:
As teacher, we would need to immediately assess if Uke is resisting his partner for the right reasons ie to help his/her partner to feel some resistance so Tori can work on his technique better with the use of his/her hips or if Uke is applying more strength than he should because he is driven by his ego to prove a point that he is better and stronger than Tori?
The latter would not bring any good feeling to the practice, and it should be avoided at all cost.
Aikido only forges our mind, body and spirit if we rid of our own ego and become humbler. Something that some practitioners may still find a hard time to accept.
We should practice with the former mindset, ie to help our partner get a good opportunity to feel the resistance (with no vile intention) and to work on their technique using more of the hips than the arms for instance. This engagement becomes extremely productive.
If Tori finds it difficult because Uke’s strong grip is too much to overcome, then Uke should lessen the grip a bit allowing Tori to continue perform the technique so that they can work on the technique with hips movements.
Only then, after repeated practices, Tori would be more ready to overcome stronger attacks. Just like when you go to the Gym, you would never start with the heaviest weight to lift but build on your own strength first and gradually build up your training with lifting.
Aikido has these traits and amazing abilities to help one another become better people and more respectful people. It is through practice and sharing of the love for Aikido that we truly do amazing things afterwards.
So bear this in mind, we need one another to learn this Art and to practice the right way is the key to progress and build our confidence!