Tales of Centering
(Extracted from Aikido-L)
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002
13:21:44 +0200
From: "James R. Acker"
Subject: Re: tales of centering
> --- Aikido Penguin wrote:
> > Just wondering if the listkas can share their
> > experiences of centering alone
> > that solved a situation favourably.
I have a good one I think. This is from around 1979 when I was hitchiking
through (and living in) Denver.
I met a woman in there that told me this story. She was not trained in Aikido or
any martial art. I have complete faith that this was true. I believed her. I do
not remember if this happened in Denver or another city where she came from.
Doesn't really matter though.
She was stopped at a light in the center of the city when a stranger, a man,
suddenly opened the passenger side door and jumped in. He pulled out a knife and
held it at her side, right up to the left side of her waist and told her where
to drive. She did it.
After driving for a while, she realized he was directing them to the more
isolated area and intuitively (she was a naturally centered person, and trusted
her instincts) this made her realize that things were getting ever more
dangerous. The most telling thing, I told you she had good instincts, was that
she told me "I just had a feeling that he wasn't AS dangerous as he seemed,
because when I turned right as I bent at the waist a little, he didn't keep the
knife pressed against me...it actually lost contact with my body and I felt like
he wasn't all that serious because of that".
Now, I believe that there certainly was more than that little sign that gave her
the idea, or the courage to do what she did. I believe she was reading a myriad
of signals from this person, that culminated into the one she remembered
afterwards as being maybe the last straw that made her decision.
In any case, she simply stopped the car, turned to face the guy and said loudly
and firmly "GET OUT of my car right now. I am NOT going to drive any further and
am going to start screaming if you don't GET OUT OF THIS CAR NOW!!"
and he did. He opened the door and got out and ran away.
I wouldn't advise anyone else to try this, unless they really felt it was the
right thing to do, but I think she showed an amazingly braver and correct use of
centeredness.
Without a single aikido lesson.
Jim
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Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 17:35:20 -0700
From: Janet Rosen
Subject: Re: tales of centering
When I used to work nighttime street patrol in the post-hippie,
pre-yuppie Haight (mid 1970s) sometimes in the wee hours you'd see a
woman alone standing waiting for the bus (which after midnight might
only run once an hour). A couple of times I'd see a guy walking towards
a solo woman. I'd walk over, stand alongside the woman, facing the man,
saying nothing, very calm. Guy would invariably just leave. Woman would
say thank you. :-)
janet
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Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 10:35:34 -0400
From: Jake Jacobe
Subject: Re: tales of centering
Giles Chamberlin wrote:
>The grappling arts give you the option of grading your response. You
>eight year old nephew grabs you, you can grab him back without being
>committed to an unpleasant outcome.
>
>You point a firearm at someone, the two options are that it gets fired
>or it doesn't.
Of course, one would hope that you wouldn't point a firearm at your eight
year old nephew just because he grabs your wrist.
When it reaches the point that one feels the need to use a firearm, then
the possibility of shooting (and perhaps killing) the attacker should
already have been deemed an acceptable one. That's why it is always
recommended that someone who carries a firearm for self defense also have
other less-than-lethal self defense tools so that appropriate responses are
possible.
As they say, when the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem looks
like a nail. But if I were being attacked by three young gangbangers with
crowbars, I would feel a lot better also having a shotgun in my self
defense tool box than just my grappling arts.
Jake
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 16:02:50 -0400
From: Bill Schuster
Subject: Re: tales of centering
I had to thwart a purse-snatching in June of 2000. It was a successful
encounter in that I got the "purse" (actually my wife's back pack) back and
nobody was injured. I am totally jazzed, and want to share the experience with
the list. It happened like this:
Cecelia (my wife of 31years) and I went to the New Haven green for a free
concert by Cool And The Gang. Another couple, Tom and Karen came with us. We
set up a blanket and some chairs and our coolers with a picnic dinner and cold
drinks. Cecelia's black JanSports back pack was on the blanket. When the band
played their hit "Celebration", we moved from the blanket to some open space to
dance. As the song ended, I glanced back to the blanket and saw a guy dancing
there. No big deal, I thought. Then he bent down and scooped up a black back
pack. It could have been his, but It looked just like Cecelia's. I took off
after him.
He was moving away at a fast (but not conspicuous) walk. I caught up and taped
him on his left shoulder. He turned slightly and I said: "Excuse me sir, that
looks just like my bag and I want to look at it to be sure you didn't pick up
mine by mistake". He ignored me. I grabbed his shoulder and he turned his
torso toward me. I said: "I really need to take a close look at that bag, it
might be mine". He did not meet my eyes, but said: "I'll show you over there",
and started walking again. I thought that he would have some friends "over
there" and my chances of recovering the bag and escaping uninjured would be
pretty poor. I also realized that this guy was half my age and about 50 lbs
lighter than I am. So I moved my grip to his upper arm, stopped walking in a
solid hanmi , made my arm "unbendable", and drew my center back. He stopped
short like his arm was attached to a bolder, and his entire body pivoted like a
gate on a hinge. I was prepared for him to strike as he came around. Sensie had
warned me about getting distracted by his eyes, and I had read the thread on
"looking at Uke", so I took in his whole face - it started to turn hard, then
faltered and I saw indecision. I relaxed and focused my attention on his center
keeping all four limbs in my peripheral vision. I said: "Sir, I need a close
look at that bag - NOW!" adding as much authority and volume to my voice as I
could. He handed it over without a word and I released his arm to check out the
bag's contents. He evaporated into the crowd - about 2,000. The back pack was
indeed my wife's with her wallet, keys, and all the miscellaneous stuff that
tends to accumulate. When I turned toward our blanket, I saw that Tom was just
behind me and to my right. He had seen me peruse this guy and decided to back
me up like a wing man in Top Gun - It's nice to have friends.
While I performed no throw, no joint lock, no pin, this seemed like Aikido to
me. So I told Sensei about it at Monday night's class. He told me that these
street thieves almost always back down when their intended victim puts up some
determined resistance. This fits nicely with an old post where someone said
(I'm paraphrasing here) that the most likely Uke on the street is an insecure,
untrained, punk. If there is a second coming of Bruce
Lee (or O Sensei) his in not likely to be a purse snatcher. To be sure, some of
these people are dangerous - some are armed, and I played the odds with good
results this time.
Refusing to be a victim sure feels good.
I would never have had the confidence to chase or confront the thief without my
training.
Bill Schuster
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 16:42:54 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: tales of centering
At 04:02 PM 4/30/02 -0400, Bill Schuster wrote:
> So I moved my grip to his upper arm, stopped walking in a
solid hanmi , made my arm "unbendable", and drew my center back. He stopped
short like his arm was attached to a bolder, and his entire body pivoted
like a
gate on a hinge.
{Sorry if the above is formatted strangely...This version of Eudora doesn't
cope well with "multipart/alternative" MIME encoded messages.}
Good job! Well done! 100 Attaboys at least!
Simcox sensei covered purse snatching in class one day. He often asked,
"What do you want to learn?" and that's what someone asked for so we did
it. We didn't do exactly the scenario you described though. His class was
more on the power of staying relaxed. I got picked as demo uke for some
reason. :^)
He had one of those kangaroo pouch things that people wear around their
waists when they are being tourists. He hung it over his shoulder like a
purse, and had me come the other way and snatch it as I passed. We were
just walking, but because he stayed relaxed and centered, he didn't even
slow down when the slack came out, and I nearly ended up flat on my back!
It was a little like grabbing a passing bus...
Then he had me repeat it as he walked without centeredness and some
tenseness. I pulled him around and off balance easily. We did it a couple
more times, with different grips and whoever was balanced, centered and
relaxed came out best every time. A relaxed grip let you hang onto it
better as well.
Then we did it again, but he didn't give specific instructions to me, but
was doing it properly himself, and I kinda wondered what would happen if
the snatcher knew about relaxation and centeredness too...so I used that
when I snatched the "purse" again. Since Simcox sensei was doing the same
thing, *something* had to yield...and it was the "purse". The strap came
apart like wet spaghetti. Great demo once the class understood what had
happened, and Simcox sensei wasn't upset in the least, but I felt bad about
wrecking his bag. That's why I made him his "bag of ki" to replace it in
class for such demos.
Saddle leather, double stitched everywhere, and designed like a half a
saddlebag, with a 1.5" leather strap that went *around* the bottom of the
bag and connected with 2" steel rings. Carved a "ki" kanji for the front.
Version #1 got torn up by the senior students the following weekend...only
riveted the straps to the steel rings. Fixed that with more rivets and a
lot of stitching, and it survived after that. I hear he used it on a trip
once too, so it wasn't just for practice. :^)
-- Mike "I don't know if the dojo or his family has it now" Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 20:21:36 +0800
From: Aylwin Tan
Subject: Centering (was RE: tales of centering)
> Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 21:41:59 -0400
> From: Mike Bartman
> Subject: Re: Centering (was RE: tales of centering)
>
> The best way to learn it that I know of is the way I got it at the dojo.
I
> really doubt I'd have gotten it from reading anyone's e-mail...though once
> I'd experienced a few things, the e-mails did help here and there. Ki
> Society works on this stuff on its own, other styles let you pick it up
> from practice of techniques. They all seem to rely on it a lot, so trying
> to figure it out is a good idea. :^)
Yes, I've heard a lot from my friend who started with Ki Society but only
occasionally during practice in my dojo. Each time I go for practice, I'm
hoping that I can get the 'feel' of something close to what I've heard or
read (on and off the list) about centering. (But I think most of the time
I'm too concerned about getting the techniques right that I'm not even sure
I remember, other times I might be doing it without even realising.)
Aylwin
"One does not need buildings, money, power, or status to practice the Art of
Peace. Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to
train." -- O-Sensei Morihei Ueshiba
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 16:44:31 +0200
From: "James R. Acker"
Subject: Re: Centering (was RE: tales of centering)
I personally have gotten help on a lot of technique here on this list.
For one thing, I never heard ANY talk of "unbendable arm" at my dojo. Only in
books and here. The concept (I think) is closely related to centering, and even
if my idea of it is wrong, it definitely helped me with rolling because the
"unbendable arm" idea is pretty necessary for that.
I think I have gotten concepts and lots of really excellent help here with
things like that. I think I understand a little about centering but it seems to
me to be a feeling as well as balance, and muscle relaxing, etc... I think it is
like relaxed concentration among other things. I think it is when "everything is
working right" and you go to the correct place and don't overextend and are
relaxed and ...well, lot's of things.
I just cannot explain it.
Jim
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 06:47:51 -0700
From: Patric Senson
Subject: Re: Centering (was RE: tales of centering)
Hi,
--- Aylwin Tan wrote:
> Each time I go for practice,
> I'm
> hoping that I can get the 'feel' of something close to what I've heard
> or
> read (on and off the list) about centering. (But I think most of the
> time
> I'm too concerned about getting the techniques right that I'm not even
> sure
> I remember, other times I might be doing it without even realising.)
Interesting...and I know what you mean...my current personal practice
theme is 'OK, so I know the forms of most of the techniques, time to get
rid of that and worry about the centering' Curiously enough it's making my
technique much stronger *grin* I guess this kind of ties into the mushin
thing in another thread...
Pat
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Last updated on 13 Sep 2002