Sekiya-san is a complex person. He is currently in his mid-seventies, but is extremely
healthy for a person his age. He is very much the product of the traditional approaches
to budo. His teaching style in turn emphasizes the manner in which he learned.
On several occations he has mentioned long practice in simple, basic exercises before
more complex techniques were attempted. Over and again, he stresses basic, fundamental
concepts: low posture, correct breathing, a straight back, heavy hands, soft technique, flexibility, etc. His Aikido instruction is largely limited to a small set
of defences. I think this is because he is not so much interested in teaching technique,
but in underlying principles. In every class, he starts with Shomenuchi Ikkyo.
Iriminage, Kokyunage, and Shihonage are his most often demonstrated techniques. He
stresses that uke should attack strongly, but be flexible. Thus the hand grips firmly,
but the arms and shoulders are loose. Below are some of the things he demonstrated
and taught at length at the seminar.
Of all of the things sensei had to teach at the seminar, good posture was at the very
top. On two separate occasions, he had everyone in the class assume a low posture
while he went around and corrected everyone. Correct posture, according to Sekiya
sensei consists of the following:
In addition to a low posture, Sekiya sensei places a great deal of importance on keeping
a straight, vertical posture. He compared it to an axle which runs from the top
of the head to the bottom of the spine. Bending the spine or neck while erect leads
to a loss of balance.
An old wooden tsuba in the dojo served as a practice device. With it balanced on
the top of the head, sensei had me walk around, kneel into seiza, and stand again.
I also tried several techniques (shihonage, kokyunage, etc.) with the tsuba on my
head. Balancing it is hard, but really causes you to be aware of your posture since bending even slightly will cause it to fall.
Sensei demonstrated a practical use of Ki called heavy hands. By placing a great
deal of his body weight into his hands, sensei is able to extert a great deal of
control over an attacker even to the point of bringing him all the way to the ground
and immobilizing him there. This was demonstrated against a variety of attacks including tsuki. Uke was unable to resist or lift himself up.
To accomplish heavy hands, a low posture and straight back is combined with projecting
a large amount of Ki downwards through the hands. It can be visualized as making
the hands feel very heavy, so heavy that they cannot be held up and are dragged down
by gravity. Sekiya showed this privately to Lou Perriello last year (1990) and indicated
that it was one of O-Sensei's advanced trainings to his students.
An interesting variation on Nikkyo was demonstrated. Sensei said that if resistance
was encountered while applying Nikkyo, lifting one leg (the leg closest to the Uke)
will greatly help in applying the technique. The reason that this works is that
lifting one leg causes you to become more aware of your center. It is easier to lower
the hara and thus makes the Nikkyo more effective. There some potential disadvantages
since the defender may be easier to unbalance if he is unable to center himself properly while standing on one leg.
Another unusual technique against a punch to the mid-section was demonstrated. Instead of stepping
back or turning to one side to avoid the punch, Sekiya showed a kokyunage variations
where the hands are crossed directly in front, just over the elbow of arm making
the attack. Heavy hands technique is used to drop uke's arm to the ground, taking
him with it. This must be done quickly and with total relaxation in the crossed
hands. Done correctly, the attacker is slammed into the ground, face-first.