Sunday was an all-day training for the members and friends of the new (and yet unnamed) Aikido Association formed here in the Greater Bay Area earlier this year. About twenty-five Aikido instructors and students met in Palo Alto. Some came from as far away as Portland, Oregon (this was Frager Sensei’s son, Eddie Frager, who was featured here last December) and locally the distance prize went to the group that drove down from Willits (CA).
The day began with weapons training in a nearby park. After a brief break for morning coffee, everyone returned to the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology’s building where Frager Sensei’s dojo is located. There, with the inspiring original calligraphy by O Sensei on the far wall, we trained for an hour, exploring Hiroshi Kato Sensei’s insights into what he learned from training with The Founder.
One of the most profound moments was when Frager Sensei shared a personal experience he had with O Sensei. He told us that when he would attack O Sensei and The Founder simply was not there. He didn’t feel any pressure or push that one would normally feel that resulted in a throw. Yet, he would still find himself on the mat, having gone from Point “A” to Point “B” and not understanding how this had happened.
He related that this finally reached a point where he got up after one attack, in a high state of frustration from not understanding what had been happening to him. O Sensei saw this and told him to kneel in seza (a kneeling position on the mat where the feet are under the practioner). O Sensei then brought his opened hand so they were in front of him, about chest high. Placing his hand gently on top of Frager Sensei’s two hands he instructed him to push up as hard as he could.
Frager Sensei was then in his 20’s and very strong. O Sensei was probably in his middle or late 70’s. Frager Sensei remarked, “It felt like a feather was touching my hands.” When he pushed up as hard as he could, nothing changed. It still felt like a feather was touching his hands. He also could not move O Sensei’s hand one inch! It stayed just where it was.Even when Frager Sensei put all his strength into pushing upward on O Sensei’s hand, he could not move it and that feather sensation stayed the same.
“I thought about this for thirty years,” he concluded. Adding that he finally realized that O Sensei had achieved such a perfect balance, that included a balance between the both of them, that that balance remained no matter how much Frager Sensei tried to shift or change this. “I felt he had given me an initiation.”
And this is what we worked on during that part of our training. That is, how can one effectively connect and move into a technique without the other person feeling that they had been thrown or pushed. For one, this involved having a balance within yourself where both hands came into equal partnership and play during the technique. (There is much more here that I'll write about later.)
A sweaty hour passed all too quickly and it was time for lunch. Frager Sensei joined us but did not eat due to Ramadan (he is a local Sufi leader). Another instructor from our new Association taught the next section of the workshop. And a final session was learning and practicing Kato Sensei’s jo techniques. A later feature will explore Kato Sensei’s jo and bokken practices because they deserve an explanation in greater detail.
Thank you Frager Sensei for your hospitality yesterday and the opportunity to learn and hear more about your experiences with O Sensei.
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