| "It is
highly unlikely thet you will ever slip into your hakama, sling your
katana at your side, and saunter down the street prepared to use
your iaido skills to defend yourslef or to take up the cause of the
downtrodden like the samurai of the old" (Flashing Steel, p 13). So
what benefit is there in Iaido training?
Many people - including myself, I
suppose - got involved in Iaido after watching too many Hollywood
films including samurai swords and 'cool' fencing sequenses. Iaido
training might seem too dull or boring for people of today who are
looking for fancy moves and a new set of techniques every week.
95 % of the people attending a
beginners course in Iaido will be gone at the end of the course. A
couple of students will stay a bit longer, but it is quite rare that
more than 1 or 2 individuals from the same course are still
practising after 2 years.
If you want to study Iaido you have
to be prepared for practising and refining the same basic techniques
(often 11-12 katas) for many years. You have to find a meaning in
going to the dojo 2-4 times / week to do the same katas as you did
last week, the week before that week and so on.
There is probably no common or
shared reason to why people go on practising Iaido (and any other
Martial Art for that matter). Every individual finds his/her own
meaning in it
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