In a thread on a previous post, Rob asked if I had considered other martial arts before deciding on Aikido.
The short answer here is yes—although I don't have enough experience with all of the alternative physical arts to really do a full comparison. Instead, I'll outline what I think the most interesting parts of a martial art are, and why Aikido is a fairly good fit.
- I'm not interested in kicking someone's ass. Contrary to my prior Aikido post (where I described attempting to kick some ass in class) I'm really not learning a martial art solely to beat up on the kids over at the Cobra Kai Dojo. I realize that attack has its place in a fight, but I'm always more interested in pinning an attacker than smashing him in the nuts.
- I'd like some rudimentary weapons training. Being able to swing a stick around in a meaningful manner is a damned useful skill, and Aikido is one of the few arts that gives a gentle blend of weapons work along with the traditional hand-to-hand training. It's not the primary focus of the art, but it's not left out entirely, either.
- I'm interested in a very fluid art. Aikido does not typically involve harsh and choppy moves—most of the techniques are very graceful. This impressed me more than anything else. For those of you who don't know, watch an Aikido demonstration some time (you can probably find some videos on the web). It's amazing stuff.
- I want to throw people. This is the kid in me talking, but I've always wanted to practice an art that involves tossing people around. Tossing someone across a room is much more impressive than a jab to the knee.
Those are the big reasons. After my first class, I'm seeing that there's a good deal of community built up around the art and I'm excited to have a good close connection with its practitioners.
I agree with most of your sentiments. The idea of just kicking someone or just punching them never really excited me. One thing that you didn't directly mention is what I've read to be Aikido's notion of the transference of energy - or using your enemy's attack against them. That has always seemed cool.
Judo, jujitsu, and Aikido all heavily involve redirection of energy. I agree—very, very cool.
First, as someone who has been thrown through a wall, I am not into the throwing people around part.
Second, I didn't know it was so close to Judo at first. I had a close friend who taught Judo for years.
Aikido = JuJuTsu + Buddhism/Taoism + efficency of movement
Judo = JuJuTsu - bone breaking/killing moves
I did JuJuTsu for a while about 8 years ago (moving to NM/running out of money ended that). As part of it we talked about the arts that descended from it. The father of Aikido wanted to make JuJuTsu more fluid and spiritual. The father of Judo wanted to turn JuJuTsu into a tournament sport like Karate and away from a technique designed to kill yout opponent (almost every "move" in JuJuTsu ends in a killing or bone breaking blow). I've wanted to get back into it, but my options are very limited in Socorro.