Published by Mark Matloff, Ph.D.

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What is Aikido?

Aikido is a powerful and beautiful martial art. It means: "The Way of Harmonizing Energy." Aikido practitioners learn to blend and steer an opponent's force to safely control a situation.

Aikido stands out as a moral martial art. Injury is to be avoided. And yet it is very effective. The beauty and power of the art has to be seen and experienced to be believed. Aikido has nothing to do with conquest. It emphasizes living in harmony with yourself, with others, and with the world.

What are AikiPaths?

AikiPaths use the teachings of Aikido (and other arts) and the wisdom of psychology to help improve and enrich our lives. We can learn to blend with ourselves and with others, to reduce or eliminate conflicts, and live more fully.

Life in the Center

One of the most fundamental concepts in Aikido, as in all martial arts, is the importance of being centered.
Your center (or "hara") is a very important spot. Your center is a hypothetical spot within your body, located in your lower abdomen - about two inches below your navel.

From a philosophical point of view, the center (also referred to as the "one point") is considered to be the "home base" of your soul. From a practical point of view, it is your center of gravity. Awareness of and connection with your center allows for maximum utilization of both upper and lower extremities. Head, neck, shoulders, arms, hands, trunk, thighs, legs, feet, toes all work best in coordination with your center.

Connection with your center is essential for martial technique to flow smoothly and powerfully.

This principle sounds simple, right? It isn't. But it takes practice to maintain your center (for years I wanted to call a toll-fee number to see if mine had been located!).

In reality, our attention often gets diverted from our center - either by our training partner, our concern about our performance, or something that is on our mind.

What happens then? When our attention is distracted from our center, our energy follows suit, and the technique ends up flawed. As the center goes, so goes the technique.

One of the ongoing goals of Aikido training is to continuously perfect our relationship to our own center. If you practice Aikido, or have ever seen a class, you are familiar with the practice of Aiki breathing. This is a form of controlled, concentrated breathing, in which you inhale air through your nose, and draw it all the way down to your center, hold it, and then exhale through your mouth, be empty of breath, and then start again. As you begin breathing in this manner, your awareness is focused on your center. As you continue breathing like this, you gradually can expand your awareness to include all around you - without sacrificing the experience of being centered.

There are many variations of Aiki breathing. One is available in my upcoming e-book for Alzheimer's caregivers. You can learn about it on my web site

Throughout training, martial artists will "re-centrify" themselves with breathing and other techniques.

What does this have to do with real life? Everything.

Think about the last time you felt really stressed out. What was pulling you away from yourself? What was knocking you off balance? How did it feel?

Life constantly throws curves at us. Stuff like work, health, parenting, family, finances, relationship problems, can all hog center stage. These stressors can throw us off balance, de-centrify us, and send us into a tailspin - ESPECIALLY IF WE LET THEM!

Think about how it feels when you are on top of your game, and everything is running smoothly. Odds are you are centered at those times. Life is still busy throwing snowballs at you, but they seem easier to dodge or handle.

I have a challenge for you.

1. Try to be aware of the ways in which you center yourself. What works for you? Write them down.
    
2. Then, take a week and deliberately practice the things you do to be centered.
    
3. Notice how you feel. Odds are, as you continue to center yourself, you can feel more calm, powerful, and in control.