Written by Cathy Okada
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Inclusion and accessibility can be a wonderful and fruitful thing. Before starting the dojo, I worked in schools for over a decade and I became very used to creating music lessons where everyone from the most physically dexterous and confident children, to children who are non-verbal, have physical disabilities, or complex neurodivergent needs, could participate. The results are often amazing. You see children who are sometimes written off in other areas find something they enjoy and start to thrive. This approach is invaluable really. It is a skill that I have found somewhat transferable to teaching Aikido.
With regards to adults, and Aikido, I have seen newcomers to the dojo who didn’t know their arse from their elbow, or full of fear, against all the odds stick with it, and become almost unrecognisable in the space of half a year. Several years on and you would never believe it was the same person who walked in for the first time. Equally there are other people who do a few lessons, they are confident, their bodies very co-ordinated and integrated, and they pick up the forms quite quickly. They say they love it, and then never come back.
It demonstrates that you have to give people a chance, because you just never know who will take to it. They can start off super rough and then become technically strong and a core member of the dojo community. People surprise you. The way we teach at Gyodokan and Aikido of London is highly individual, and we have different pedagogical approaches depending on the student’s current technical and indeed, emotional capacity, which have to be balanced with the needs of the whole class. This is good teaching practice. As a result, we have diverse dojos, with different kinds of people and levels training together. But the ones who truly thrive all have something in common.
These particular people have been willing to give themselves to the training. Not necessarily to sign their whole lives away to Aikido, but willing to adapt to meet the minimum threshold for meaningful participation. To trust themselves to the process, to be challenged and to adapt themselves to the dojo culture. To raise their own game. They acknowledged what was going to be required from their side, and they got to work.
Then there is the other side of the coin. Those who, whether consciously or not, expect everything to be altered for their own individual comfort. For the art and the environment to bend significantly to meet them where they are at. The more conscious ones talk about how times have changed from when Aikido was first born. We know better now is the implication.
I’m sure some of the very people who think this way would be horrified to be accused of “western superiority complex” or “cultural appropriation”, but to me, this kind of thinking wreaks of it. Let’s not forget where the art came from. Can people be so narcissistic to expect an entire art and training system with thousands of years of experience within in its folds, to be changed to accommodate them, or do they think those Japanese guys back in the day got the approach all wrong? Katrina from human resources knows best!
For a while, the Shodo piece on our Kamiza was Kenshō- “seeing one’s true nature”. The more I practise, the more I see the intelligence of our training system, and how it is a way of stripping off- of dropping off layers of our superficial selves, to uncover our true nature. I had an intuition about this at the very beginning of my training, but I recognise it more and more. Some people bring themselves, so heavily, into the dojo. Everything from the practical training to the dojo etiquette is designed to chip away at this.
Dojo Etiquette is heavily practical. Nothing is there for the sake of it. To arrive 10 to 15 minutes early is not some arbitrary rule just for politeness. We have to get the mats laid out for practice, but it also gives transition time, from your outside life to the mat. Anyone who has been late to class or rushed in just on time knows the feeling of bringing the stress from their day or their commute onto the mat with them. All in a fluster, all up in your head. Arriving early helps with this. It can’t always be helped, especially in London, but the way I see it, if you arrive just a couple minutes before class, you are already late.
Our etiquette list also calls for all jewellery to be removed. We work very physically with one another, so it can be very easy to scratch someone else, or get piercings snagged on someone’s gi, or scratch the expensive mats with a ring. But it is more than just health and safety. Can you let go? Can you drop off another notion of who you think you are, and your “identity”. Can you remove the superficial “stuff” and bring just yourself onto the mat as you are? After all, is it this stuff that truly makes us who we are anyway? Will you stop loving your wife if you remove your wedding ring? If you remove your eyebrow piercing, does it remove your identity?
I know that many dojo websites say Aikido is for everyone, and anyone can do it regardless of fitness level- you get fit from the training! This is true to an extent, but in order to actually be able to participate meaningfully and safely, there really needs to be a baseline level of fitness. It’s not that it is entirely impossible otherwise, but it is damn hard. We often guide people with what they need to do outside of the dojo to support their Aikido.
What are you doing outside, to support your training inside? People don’t always think of it that way round. A good dojo community is a supportive one, but not always in the way you might want or expect. It can be a practical and emotional support network, a family, and the training itself can be cathartic and emotionally stirring. It brings up fear, deep insecurities, anger and joy. But it is not therapy. And I say this as someone who has had two years of psychotherapy. The nature of the work is different. There are times in the dojo something might boil over- a strong emotion will erupt to the surface. Everyone has moments of struggle and pain throughout their lives, some more fortunate than others. I myself have broken down during training. There are times when it is reasonable. But a dojo is not a place to repeatedly bring one’s emotional world for everyone to experience with you. If this is something that happens repeatedly then you surely have to ask yourself- am I ready for this kind of training? How can I take the responsibility to make myself more ready for it?
I don’t know what draws people to Aikido in the first place, I suppose everyone has different reasons, but I think the single thread running through each of them is ultimately a pursuit of some form of change. Which means the student has to be willing to be changed- which is never entirely easy and comfortable. A practice or teacher who bends to a student’s every discomfort will never be transformative. It’s a bit like staring at a table of ingredients, saying some nice supportive words to them, and expecting them to turn into a hot meal.
Miracles don’t happen in our dojo, only training.