Is aikido a soft martial art?

Many people criticise aikido for being too soft (and many love it just because of that). Others watch Steven Seagal films and say that aikido is brutal (and many would love to start aikido because of that). Now, is it soft or hard?

I left out something from the introductory lines above: There is a third group of people who try to understand the duality of softness and hardness. I consider myself a member of this group as I think that if many people emphasize softness and many others prefer hardness then probably both groups have some point. I think aikido can be both soft and hard, not rarely at the same time.

Aikido sometimes reminds me of water. Water is soft but it's also used to cut diamonds which are supposed to be the hardest things that naturally occurs in nature. Considering its other forms, ice is harder but rigid so it can break easily while steam can go everywhere and it's hard to make it flow to directions you want it to flow. Ok, the steam part might not be the best example or analogy but the main point is that water can be soft and hard at the same time - just like aikido.

Aikido looks too soft sometimes because tori (the defender, who does a technique) and uke, too, are very experienced and their skills make it possible for their aikido to look soft. The experience and expertise of how to be a good uke is a useful thing if, as an uke, you don't want to end up with injuries because of a soft-looking - but actually hard (meaning very effective) - throw. If you have received ukemi from a great master then you should know what I'm talking about. I always talk about my greatest such experience with Fujita sensei, now I won't do otherwise either: we were in a seminar and we did the usually very painful nikyo (at least I had always been hurting before when we did this wristlock technique). Shihan came to correct us and showed the technique on me. I was prepared to the painful experience because that was what I had been used to. I could not really imagine how that would happen (i.e. the appearance of pain) as Sensei had always looked so soft and I tended to feel that his ukes (attackers) were 'helping him too much'. Then he applied nikyo on me. I was down on the mat in no time but it didn't hurt! It looked soft, felt soft but - as I was down immediately with no effort - it was hard and effective, and it would have been even harder in a conflict situation. Karesz also told us about his experience with Fujita sensei and ki (the equivalent of the chinese chi, it can mean life force and many more 'vital' and powerful things): Sensei likes iriminage and tenchinage in a way that he puts his palm on your forehead and that's how your head goes into your irimi point (the point of unstability). According to Karesz, Sensei moved only a little bit and did tenchinage (if I remember well) and Karesz Sensei didn't even know where he was and went straight into the mat. When he told me this story he said he had been feeling some warmth in his forehead for a considerable amount of time. This might have looked both hard and soft from the outside. It was soft because noone was actually hurt, only a simple circular movement was involved; and it was hard because it might have been scary to see someone going down like that.

Aikido can be hard when applied as self-defence. There is something called atemi which is supposed to distract uke and help you keep distance and control. It looks like an imitated punch (sometimes not just imitated), some people even say using only one finger for atemi is sufficient. So this atemi can be a very effective punch 'in the street' if a defender decides to finish a technique as soon as possible. But is it really aikido when you destroy your attacker? I don't think so, so let's move back to the hard side of aikido when training. If you want to practice the hard way, I think, knowing well how to fall and roll is essential (and we can show you how, in our Aikido Instructional Videos). Sometimes sensei wants to practice effectiveness and then things can speed up and locks can hurt, pins can cause pain, stretches can force you to keep going towards a certain direction so that it won't hurt so much. Just think about Steven Seagal and Haruo Matsuoka. You might not know the latter name but you will certainly know who he is if you watch Nico (aka. Above the Law) and some more demonstrations by Seagal sensei. There is an expression 'the Matsuoka high fall' which I first read about in the uchi-deshi blog only to realise that Matsuoka is the Japanese guy who is often the 'victim' of Steven Seagal's direct iriminages. I think everyone can agree that it is a hard side of aikido.

There is a truly soft side of aikido which I tend to prefer slightly to the hard side. First I tell you about what it is and then explain why I like it more than the other. So what I think is a soft side is when aikido looks like dancing. This is when harmony and connection is emphasized over effectiveness. Obviously, effectiveness and control over the situation and the attacker is needed but some people prefer the soft aspects - connection and harmony - more and they feel balanced when there's a bit more harmony than strict control. At this point I should mention things like the Integral Transformative Practice (ITP) which is based on aikido (at least the kata is highly similar to some moves we do as well), but it takes the harmony acpects out of it and combines with other disciplines, such as yoga, which emphasize connection between people and the practitioners themselves. This is at least how I understand ITP from my limited experience.

So what I think about this soft side: I think the hard side teaches discipline but I feel it's not what I need the most (I'm not sure if I can assert that it's not what the world needs either). What I need is some softness, harmony in the world, connection with people and flowing communication. We read about violence in the papers every day, there is enough stress in our lives, I don't need more in trainings. Besides, I'm not a violent person by nature and I don't think I would try to use any physical aspects of aikido if I was confronted with someone who wanted to beat me up. I would run away, simply because I don't feel I could engage in a 'fight'. It's also pretty unlikely that you get into a situation where there is no other way to get away. So when I go to trainings I look for how I can increase my harmony level and release my energies and improve connection with others. This is what I try to communicate in my Kids Aikido Classes as well.

At this point, I might sound a bit frustrated (because I am a bit) but I don't see much point in trying to hold back and down a defender (tori) just to squeeze out some effectiveness. The other day, some time in 2008, we were practicing tenchinage and iriminage and one of the students grabbed me hard and then expected me to start executing a technique. I was just standing there frustrated because I haven't reached a level where I could move him if he didn't want me to. So, for a moment, we were just standing and I expected some initiative as I thought uke's task was to attack, and when he shows some energy I can connect with that, use it and lead him to a harmonious ukemi (yes, I am an idealist).

Another thing that I think is in favour of softness is that aikido techniques look simple but they are, in fact, complicated and a lot of things need to work properly in order to be effective. There is a kind of a saying the first half of which we could just hear in a recent grading: "Simple? Of course it is! Easy? Of course it's not!" Simple things are not always easy, even if you don't do aikido but, for example, need to stop smoking. It is simple to just quit, it is simple to just draw a circle and throw the attacker, but it's definitely not easy.

As there is always something new to learn and improve, we don't practice at full speed so we can study the techniques and the whole martial art. Sensei has just explained that we do katatedori, and we do it slowly because "how of Earth" would you be able to handle a full-speed punch if you are a beginner? When studying (studying body-mind-motion system, not fighting and trying to destroy an "enemy") there should be some help from your opponent. It is said that the attacker is there to teach you. Saying 'this didn't work, try again' doesn't serve this studying process much. So I think we should practice at slower speeds and we need to cooperate or assist even if - because of the speed itself - an attacker can notice when a defender starts moving somewhere and could easily counter. The technique we practice at a time can also give an idea to uke about where he can stop you. So this is where softness, cooperation and harmony comes to the picture in my opinion: they are needed if both of us want to improve ourselves.

Softness can also be more effective in non-physical situations. When arguing with someone it's clearly not acceptable to punch them in the face or pin them to their desks in their own office (especially if they employ you), so what can aikido teach us for such situations? What should we do? Keep fighting and throw rude words against each other? Possibly not. What about the principles of connection and harmony? Those should rather be the aims. Soft talk instead of hard punches.
I had a lot of trouble with the application of aikido principles in conversations and so called verbal conflicts. It was one thing that I didn't have a clue about how aikido principles could be applied in real life, but even if you know how to and it's simple it is still not easy to actually apply them. A good book that is not really about aikido but uses the connection principle very well is by Marshal Rosenberg. When I was reading it, first I felt nervous as, in the described stories, he was always asking questions from anyone. But then it turned out that asking questions about what others are feeling and needing is a good way to be a good speaker (!) and listener. Once the connection is made you can achieve a win-win situation much more easily. And a win-win situation is what harmony means there.

There is a famous aikido story by Terry Dobson who described aikido in real life (it seems to be everywhere on the web and since it's a very good story I will paste it as my next blog post). I first read this story years ago and I've been trying to imagine what I would do in similar situations (e.g. when confronted with a drunk) but it's not easy just to imagine myself reacting nonviolently, even if I have an hour to imagine a simple scenario like this. I agree with him that reacting nonviolently and achieving a win-win situation is one of the most important parts of aikido. And you don't need to be grabbed, don't even need to be physical to practice aikido. I think I read it somewhere that when a master had been asked how much should a student practice aikido, he had said something like "24 hours a day". First I was thinking "there is no way you can roll and stand up without any break"... :)

There can be many more posts about the details of softness, hardness, connection and harmony, I will write about them as I learn more and ideas and principles get clearer in my head.