Update at long last

It's been over a year now since I had a near fatal accident, spending a week in the hospital and suffering things ranging from memory loss to infection and good old fashioned blunt force trauma from being struck by a car while riding a bicycle. Group classes and private lessons were indefinitely suspended with no clue when or if I would be able to return to my own practice or begin teaching again.

Recent discussions with others in the bay area martial arts community and a few informal contributions and workshops a possible return is on the table. Perhaps beginning with some new blog posts and meetup style gatherings to explore topics in and around aikido.

There are no definite plans for classes at this point in time.

Oni Kai T-shirts on Zazzle!

Hey!

Finally got the Zazzle shop set up. So, if you want a t-shirt or a hoodie with our super cool Oni Kai ronin on it, you can get one!

Oni Kai Zazzle shop

Contact Improv and Aikido

When teaching children, I'm doing my best to teach and transmit Aikido skills, important ones, like falling safely and getting out of the way. It's still a combat art any way you cut it but one of the lingering issues was that I hadn't yet found a way to teach it without striking, something children aren't very good at and something I'd rather my students not get good at until they are much older. How to proceed in the most peaceful manner possible was a mystery until recently when I spent some time with friends from the dance world. Both dancers and choreographers kept saying Aikido wasn't all that different from dance. What!? Well, it took all of one rehearsal and an afternoon analyzing Youtube footage to see that they are far more correct than I'd have liked to admit. Nothing at all wrong with dance, it's pretty amazing, but this is Aikido!

As it turns out even very simple adaptation of the most basic principles of contact improv gleaned from observation and a few conversations had an immediate effect, the kids get it. Not only do they get it, it adapts almost flawlessly. Students seem to intuitively learn to be sensitive to each others proximity and without lengthy explanations beyond making sure they understand the concept of a conversation, talking; with their hands, they begin some very aiki movements. The primary differences between the two seem to hinge on Aikido being tuned not only for combat but efficiency. Aikido can be big and is often pretty but to many Aikidoka, that gets old in a hurry. ...anyway, yeah, I'm successfully teaching Aikido through modern dance.

There are numerous examples of contact improv with excellent quality video like this one from Youtube.

Of similar interest may be an illustrative, if somewhat controversial, Aikido video from a self-described "aggressive" Aikido school in Serbia. (Turn the sound down for this one.)

Though, this is really more the idea...

Teaching little ones to roll

Teaching younger students to roll well and safely can be a challenge. There are some very subtle nuances to making it happen that aren't always easy to see even when demonstrated properly. The key is often repetition and doing that repeated rolling on mats that are adequate but not exactly "soft". Students need to feel the ground under them and understand what exactly they are doing.

It is possible and in this video we see an Oni Kai student doing some fairly advanced rolling, not using her arms going into the roll. She'll need more practice and some tuning to her technique but she's really grasping things at this point. Suffice it to say, if  a four year old can do it, most anyone can. This video was shot right around her fourth birthday. Noting again, we're working on getting that cute little noggin off the ground and protecting her neck but I'm more than pleased at the thought she's even a little less likely to break a wrist falling on the playground or tumbling off of her bicycle. We've been working on this for about eight months, so it hasn't happened over night but if all goes well she'll be tumbling like a champ by her next birthday.

This has been another experience for me as an instructor learning just how much the little ones are capable of doing and understanding. They can often accomplish far more than popular culture would have us, or them, believe. They really are incredible and it's a gift to work with young students.

OODA in Aikido

While the OODA concept is well known in some circles, it remains relatively obscure overall. Developed by Col. John Boyd as a framework of rapid decision making for USAF fighter pilots, it has far reaching applications that go well beyond the military sphere and is gaining popularity in the business world as well as a number of sports. In the case of Oni Kai, we are using the concept more true to form in it's military construct (adapted directly from DOD/USAF training) as a way to instill a level of repeatable conditioning to help young students learn to look before they leap, as it were, and make decisions that consider their entire environment instead of just themselves and what they intend to do. This is not as such a "combat" tool but a safety tool that conditions students to be aware of themselves and one another so as to avoid being injured as well as inflicting injury. 

In the simplest terms this equates to good old fashioned situational awareness though in this case we need to instill an all important pause at the D(ecide) point so that students have an opportunity to A(ct) in a safe manner. In more broad applications this might be as simple as reminding them to watch where they are running but making sure to do so long before the traditional time to use the phrase; that seeming to happen more often than not, after an ill fated collision, the very thing we strive to prevent. 

As illustrated in the graphic the order is Observe Orient Decide Act. These are usually referred to as "loops" that with practice and awareness, cycle faster and faster. The initial observation loop speeds up with experience as students begin to recognize patterns of movement or even feel them. This then feeds into how they move or orient themselves both physically and mentally before they decide what action to take. This decision is also something that radically speeds up over time as practiced routines become more deeply ingrained and require little to no thought when moving into action. The act then happens very quickly in conjunction with a running observation feeding into the cycles all over again until the entire process seemingly just happens. 

Aikido tends to be very circular and indeed "cyclical" in nature and while, especially at first, it's is useful to keep those circles large and flowing, it is also useful to consider the idea that if you make smaller and smaller circles they eventually come to resemble a point. The faster we run these loops the more agile we become both mentally and physically. 

Fudoshin and Zazen

Fudoshin is an interesting thing usually associated with Japanese martial arts that loosely translates to "immovable  mind". Our closest Western equivalent is likely the state of "flow" we sometimes use to describe when someone is in the "zone". The mind is focused on the activity at hand and not rattled or shaken by distractions. For a Samurai this may have meant being able to remain focused in the heat of battle regardless of the noise and chaos around them or even simply being able to pay attention in spite of things designed to distract and confuse.

In a more relevant context for Oni Kai students, fudoshin is a state of mind we cultivate in order to pay attention in Aikido or school classes, be aware of our surroundings and stay focused on what we are doing so as to apply ourselves directly to the tasks at hand. The world we live in is literally designed to reach out a grab attention at every turn, constantly interrupting coherent thoughts and activities. By training even our youngest students to focus through simple distractions as well as loud or startling noises they learn to remain aware of the world around them while selectively keeping their minds where they need them.

Through a process of zazen, seated meditation, students learn to center themselves and clear their heads. Then through the gentle application of distracting influences they learn to filter outside influences that rob all of us of productivity.

Even the youngest of our students (currently not even three years old) have embraced this practice and have been showing incredible ability of application. With less than ten students in such a young age group it's hard to say what is normal but if our current group is any indication, there are a number of organizations that could benefit greatly from teaching and allowing these same methods, if a two year old can do it, it can't be all that complicated but rather simply require patience and practice.

In the end, if the only thing we do with our Oni Kai students is give them a few minutes of peace in our noisy media saturated world, that they can recreate and replicate any time they like, we'll have done them and everyone around them a great service.

The Oni Kai Logo

Oni Kai Aikido logo and trademark!

Not long ago when I signed on to teach an Aikido class for San Francisco Rec and Parks, just a happy little class for 3-6 year old students but something I decided I should take my personal approach to Aikido to the next level.

The best way to accomplish this seemed to be by creating a micro-brand and just building it out like any other "business". Every organizational identity package needs a logo, some way of branding and identifying it. Even non-profits benefit from this and while graphic designers are most often talented folks with hard won skills, basic graphic design doesn't have to be hard or require expensive software.

Initial photograph of the ink drawing.

For this project I wanted something that would have a Japanese feel, be somewhat nostalgic and remain viable as an eye catching logo. To illustrate how simple this can be I'll go through the rough steps I used to make the logo.

The design centered on a mythical oni demon crossed with a ronin samurai. The inspiration came from a number of things including photographs of Samurai, Zen monks, blocks prints, paintings as well as modern imagery from anime and films. So, somewhat traditional with a bit of modern appeal. I made several simple ink drawings with a traditional brush pen until I had one that seemed to capture the feel of the mental image. Once that was set I needed to move it to the digital realm. This could have been accomplished with a scanner or in many cases these days with a pen interface such as a Wacom or Bamboo tablet.

Modifying and cleaning up the image.

I was on the go and didn't have access to any of those and realistically didn't actually need them. It's worth noting that as a photographer I do have formal graphics training but it's not in my first order skill set. I also didn't happen to have the laptop where my copy of Photoshop lives but not to worry, this really isn't complex stuff.

I first used my phone to photograph the ink drawing. Since I wouldn't be printing the photo but rather converting it to a digital logo that I'd work over with graphics software, resolution wasn't much of an issue. This allowed me to import my ink drawing as a JPG into GIMP, a free graphics and photo manipulation tool. It's probably closest to Photoshop but can serve a number of functions and as I'm not printing anything to large, will work even for creating promo materials business cards, t-shirts and stickers. I'll vectorize it later.

Cleaned up image ready for text.

Once in GIMP it was a simple matter of using the magic wand to select the parts of the image I wanted to work on and clean up to get the look I was after. I think most anyone could learn this in anywhere from a couple hours to a weekend if they wanted to.

Once I got the basic logo, and several versions carefully saved along the way, I was able to add text with the native fonts in GIMP and put the whole thing together. Pretty easy and with a brush pen, cell phone and free software as my only tools, I've got custom business cards on the way to promote my Rec and Parks Aikido class.

So, if you don't think you can do graphic design, you might just be right about the more complex things but the small stuff, most anyone can do that and there's no reason you shouldn't at least give it a try.

All images copyright Jason Barnhart 2011. "Oni Kai Aikido" copyright and trademark Jason Barnhart 2011 all rights reserved.