I have had an
epiphany.
Two years ago when I was still practicing aikido regularly, I went for a day to the week-long Galway summer school, in UCG. Aikidoka from all over Ireland, America, Spain, France, Holland
and the Isle of Mann came to train in Aikido.
We were instructed by Henry Kono and Alan Ruddock, two men who, in the sixties, went to Japan to train with O-sensei, Morihei Ueshiba.
During the course of the afternoon I reached some kind of different place in my mind, what chaos magicians would call a gnostic state - nothing could go wrong, I was aware of everything and everything was aware of me. I was conscious of people across the large hall and their relationship in space to me.
Sadly I had been unable to re-create this. Then there was the accident which put paid to my training for a over a year.
Last night Henry Kono came to visit Cork (the Galway summer school has informally extended beyond the week in Galway, as Henry stays for a week in Dublin and a week in Cork before going to Galway. The people who travel to Galway now take two or three weeks out and follow him around to the other two cities). He tried to explain to us the concept of personal space, and how to use it relative to Uke. While practicing with Joe, who is from New York I suddenly realised that by concentrating on my hands, the markers of my personal space, I could end up doing anything. And it's never a matter of decision as to what maneuvre to do, you just do what must be done. While intending to do simple Ikkio I would sometimes end up doing more "complicated" things like nikkio, shihonage, jujinage etc.
And on top of it all was this heightened awareness, the sort of thing people describe after trying cocaine or ecstacy, except all that had caused this was an abandonment of all the crap we spend our lives thinking about.
I feel transcendent.
I can't wait til thursday.