Aikido practice "magic" for an aching back

Aikido in my Life

by Moshe Rachmuth 2016

You are reading the thoughts of someone who had about fifty “dojo-hours” in the last ten months. It means that all that I am about to write can teach you very little about Aikido as a martial art or as a way of thinking. It can only open a window—for what it is worth—into the experience of a forty-something Israeli, living in Portland, at the Multnomah Aikikai.

About a year ago I discovered that I have a back. I work as a college professor so—other than the ten hours a week of teaching—I spend most of my day sitting in front of the computer. Sitting, I prepare classes, I write, I watch chess broadcasts and in the weekends I play chess tournaments at the Portland Chess Club. This is what I do today and this is what I was doing a year ago—living an intellectual life. I needed my head to think, my fingers to type (or move pieces on the board) and my legs to carry me from my chair to the car. But about a year ago I discovered I had a back—it ached.

I tried to solve the problem. At first I asked myself who was it that had designed the weird curve between our heads and our buttocks but as the pains moved to my neck and shoulders I realized that flawed or not, this back and the whole body surrounding it had to be taken care of, and with exercise. So I tried to keep in shape: I ran—it was tough on my knees. I walked—it was too easy. I went to a Tai Chi class—the teacher retired. I went to another Tai-Chi class—I did not feel the teacher was knowledgeable enough. I looked at a couple of Taekwondo classes—it seemed too tough for me. Everything was either too easy or too hard, did not feel safe or did not seem helpful. And the pains continued.

Things changed after I arrived at the Multnomah Aikikai. Google tells me that “Aikikai” is the original school of Aikido, headed by the Doshu. You see, Aikido has many words in Japanese that are defined by other words in Japanese. You can easily sink into the intellectual side of learning the terms and the philosophy but this is not what I came for, I came for the life change and this is why I stayed. I joined the introductory-month program—I was given the uniform and two beginner classes a week for nearly the price of a month's membership. With the other beginners I was taught how to call the uniform (Gi) how to wear it, how to tie it, how to bow at the beginning of the training and how to fall, and fall, and fall. My main memory from the first two weeks is taking a step back, turning around, sitting down, rolling backwards, and standing back up. My back hurt for the whole two weeks, on and off the mat, mainly because I was so afraid to hurt it that I tensed my muscles constantly. Everybody but one (unfairly young) person who started the program with me reported pains. For one it was the thighs, for another a wrist and for a third the elbows but each hurt at their weakest link.

After two weeks the pains passed, and I felt much better than I had felt before I started and have been feeling much better since. You may ask, “What, like that, just like magic?” and my answer would have to be “yes.” In fact, when I go to the Aikido I feel exactly that—I am in a show that is a combination of magic and dance. A black belt student “attacks” the sensei (=teacher), the Sensei’s feet dance away, behind the attacker’s back, while the sensei hands perform their own magic escape. Suddenly, it is the attacker who has his wrist caught. Like a tango master, the sensei gently helps the attacker to the ground, where the latter taps the mats to sign for surrender. It is my turn to practice and I am lucky to practice one-on-one with another sensei that is present. She is a woman and smaller than me. I attack her with confidence, not because I think I will harm her but because I know she will drop me on the ground within the blink of the eye and it will not hurt (we practice a lot of falling). Still, I am surprised, every time and I get up of the mat laughing as if I were the magician’s assistant who was cut in two but is somehow intact.

I have been on the mat for mere fifty hours but Aikido is with me through other parts of my life. I come back from practice exhilarated, even if exhausted (Somehow, the practice is no longer difficult physically but it still is a cognitive challenge.—I get learn so many new moves every time that after forty minutes I cannot remember what is left and what is right, what is up and what is down, what is forward and what is backward). I go to sleep happily and wake up happily. The next day, waiting at the Max stop, I imagine getting away from a wrist-grab. In my head, I perform an Ikkyo. I do not move my body but in my imagination I dance and I do the magic. Recalling the last class makes me more aware of my posture and my breathing. The train whistle awakens me and I look at it as it pulls into the station. Between me and the front car there is a line of people, all on their phones. I could have performed a complete Katate Dori Ikkyo Ura and nobody would have noticed.