Hiding one whole self from another whole self encumbers full meeting. It is difficult enough for naked bodies to meet wholly. When two selves are clothes in pretense, they cannot come together; there is separateness in their togetherness, not...

One of the hardest things to do is to open up in the face of an attack. It feels counter-intutitive. All of one's defensive mechanisms scream in protest at the impending doom. And yet that is often what aikido demands of one - to step into the space...

For a while now I have had a gnawing feeling that something's been missing from our practice - or to be more precise, from my own practice. And it struck me that perhaps over the last little while the lightness has not been there. O-Sensei exhorted us...

From Shihan Ken Cottier (7th Dan) I have been surprised on a number of occasions by just how badly some students take a failure. On the other hand I have been happy with the mature way in which some have reacted to a disappointment. (I should point...

26 April 1969, the Founder of Aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, passed on from this life. Acknowledged as one of the greatest martial artists of his time, O-Sensei is often likened to Miyamoto Musashi in terms of his influence over the development of Japanese...