Day 153 of writing every day
This Saturday and Sunday was the seminar for May 2023 for my Aikido dojo. We’ve been hosting seminars at a monthly rate, giving us more than plenty of material to review and learn through practice on our own and keeping things fresh with new content to learn before we get “bored” of the exact same thing.
While Aikido has a repertoire of techniques, the mastery required to truly understand them and recreate the masterful movements of quality teachers requires continued practice and honest self-reflection. Constructive and honest feedback from partners who share the same vision also goes a long way to help in the learning process. You can’t feel your own techniques so partners are the only ones who can tell you what your techniques feel like.
I hope things continue to go well for my dojo as a major challenge facing it and many other dojos is having enough members to sustain the practice. Rent alone is hard enough to pay for many places with just membership dues for dojos, and it’s critical to a dojo’s identity to maintain a space for their members to use on a regular basis. Oftentimes different organizations have to share the same space, and from a rent perspective that would maximize earnings, but from the perspective of establishing something like a home, it’s not a pleasant arrangement unless you want your dojo to be used for a host of different things that will ultimately change the feeling of the space.
Thanks for reading!
One Chance Works 