In Part 1 we traced how aikido rank went from a meaningful signal of a real teacher-student relationship to a notarial stamp on a financial transaction. Here we look at what that transaction actually costs.

There is a price you can see and a price you can’t.

The visible price is on the fee schedule. As Liese Klein documented in her investigative piece, Rank greed in aikido, a shodan by examination through the Aikikai Foundation costs approximately $148 at current rates—covering membership, processing, and the international yudansha book. That is the base. Above yondan, fees are no longer fixed; they are negotiated, and the organizations sitting between the practitioner and Hombu set their own terms.

In the United States, an organization might charge its members $250 for a 1st dan, retaining the difference to fund its own operations. Liese Klein’s analysis of the USAF’s public tax filings revealed a surplus of over $83,000 on rank revenue in 2023—the gap between what members paid for certificates and what was remitted to Japan.

European federations tend to operate differently. I spent 15 years running a national federation in Slovenia, where we passed Hombu’s rates through without a surcharge, absorbing the administrative work into general membership. In our system, nobody was profiting from rank.

But the visible price was never really the point.

The price behind the price

The situation in France illustrates the scale. Its two main federations, the FFAAA and FFAB, held a combined 40,500 licensees as of 2024—a significant drop from their 1990s peak of roughly 60,000. These numbers have been contracting for two decades, a decline only accelerated by the pandemic. In my own federation, only about a quarter of practitioners remained active post-corona. While some Western European organizations have since recovered, the broader trend has not reversed.

Institutions under revenue pressure tend to do what any struggling franchise does: they expand. They seek more affiliated groups, more authorized examiners, and more certificates flowing through the system. The shihan title—once rare enough to imply a specific, singular mastery—has become more widely distributed. Recently, I’ve noticed shihan titles appearing among relatively young Eastern European instructors, a phenomenon I hadn’t seen before.

I am not questioning the individuals involved. I am questioning the function. When the shihan title operates primarily as a license to conduct dan examinations—and that license is issued more broadly to sustain volume—the standard behind the examination becomes a variable.

Here is the actual price behind the price. When you paid for your dan certificate, you weren’t just buying a piece of paper; you were paying for association with a standard. You were paying for a signal that your training had been assessed through a meaningful line of transmission. That standard is the real asset. The certificate economy, in its effort to sustain itself against declining numbers, is quietly spending that asset down. Every time the franchise expands to compensate for revenue loss, the credential already on your wall loses value. Not because your training was wrong, but because the brand you paid to join is over-leveraged.

Through the wrong doors

I traveled to Japan five times for Aikido. My first trip was to plant the seeds for our federation’s official recognition. At the time, I wasn’t asking questions about money or standards. I was doing what you do when you trust the system and the people within it: following the logic, playing the role, and going where I was told it mattered to go.

What I found at Hombu was not what the art’s reputation had led me to expect. There was a significant gap between the prestige printed on the certificates and the reality behind the doors—not in the training itself, but in the institution surrounding it. It felt like an organization governed from a different century. Yet, I had enough reverence then to adjust my interpretation rather than my conclusion. That is what you do inside an institution: you force the experience to fit the story you were given.

The international congresses offered a different perspective. At one IAF congress, I sat with Yamada Shihan and a group of global leaders. Within minutes, he was openly criticizing Aikikai grading politics and greed. I was floored—not just by the critique, but that someone of his stature would speak so bluntly, in a group, without hesitation. At that stage, such candor was unthinkable to me.

I stayed within that institutional logic for longer than I care to admit. When I finally stepped out, I could see the full ledger: not just the fees, but the years, the energy, and the self-deception required to stay useful to the machine.

That is a cost that appears on no fee schedule. It makes it worth asking what else is missing from the books.

Where the money didn’t go

Here is the number that clarifies the scale. A godan (5th dan) certificate costs approximately €500. A nanadan (7th dan) can range toward €2,000—fees above yondan are not fixed by Hombu and vary by organization. Add to this the pilgrimage to Japan to receive the rank at the Kagamibiraki ceremony: another €1,500 to €2,000 in flights, lodging, and the ceremonial expenses of the occasion.

Yet, most of these practitioners have never spent €200 on a pedagogy course.

This isn’t because they don’t care about teaching; it’s because the system never framed teaching as a necessary investment. The “dan economy” rewards rank acquisition, but it says nothing about one’s ability to transfer knowledge. Rob Liberti puts the underlying issue plainly: skill is personal, but teaching is reproducible. A system that measures the former while ignoring the latter produces a specific kind of practitioner—technically experienced and institutionally validated, yet often quietly puzzled by why their students aren’t growing as people. They may execute techniques more cleanly, but they aren’t necessarily changing how they handle conflict, pressure, or a difficult conversation off the mat.

That same budget, spent differently, could bring in a guest teacher from outside the Aikido bubble: a kinesiologist, a movement educator, a psychologist specializing in performance, or a somatic coach. It could fund a junior instructor’s first year of seminar travel, cover a new dojo’s equipment costs, or subsidize a talented practitioner who would otherwise drop out due to fees. These are not idealistic alternatives; they are what professionals in almost every other field do routinely as a basic condition of staying current.

What’s your next aikido investment?

The art grows where attention and resources are directed. For decades, a significant portion of both has flowed toward paper.

Writer Simone Chierchini once observed that there are no rokudan violinists. There are only violinists who are a pleasure to listen to and those who are unbearable. No musician ever improved by paying for a certificate; they improved by playing—by investing their resources into the craft itself rather than the credential meant to represent it.

This isn’t a question of whether the Aikikai or the ranking system should exist. The question is far more personal: the next time you have resources to invest in your development, where will they go?

Every choice you make as a practitioner is a vote for the future of the art.

What’s coming next

In Part 3 — the deepest cost of aiki-consumerism isn’t financial. It’s the practitioner who collected certificates while something more essential didn’t get built — and finds that out not on the mat, but in ordinary life.

Community question: What’s the most useful thing you’ve spent money on in your aikido development — and was it a certificate?

An ongoing conversation about the meaning of dan rank is unfolding everywhere: in Reddit threads, across social media, and increasingly, in the quiet of the changing room after class. In my own dojo, the questions have become louder. Instructors are beginning to acknowledge that the system often rewards something other than skill, while students wonder why they continue to pay for a status that feels disconnected from their actual practice.

This frustration isn’t new, but it deserves a systematic look. This is the first of a four-part series. We begin with history—not to assign blame for where we are, but to understand how we got here. The problem did not arrive overnight.

When a certificate meant something

In the 1960s and ’70s, Aikido’s global expansion followed a straightforward model. The Aikikai Hombu Dojo dispatched shihan—senior instructors—to establish organizations across the United States, Europe, and South America. These were not consultants or visiting lecturers; they were resident teachers who built national structures from the ground up, led daily training, and knew their students personally over decades.

In that era, a Hombu rank certificate carried a specific weight: it was proof that a practitioner had been seen, tested, and vouched for by someone with a direct line to the art’s source. The certificate was evidence of a relationship, and the relationship was the point.

The model worked. In a single generation, Aikido spread to tens of thousands of practitioners across dozens of countries. The Aikikai became the world’s largest aikido organization, and Hombu rank became the global currency of legitimacy.

The first fractures

By the 1990s, the model began to stretch. National organizations—now large enough to harbor their own internal politics—started to splinter. Disagreements over direction, style, and authority produced institutional rifts; where one national body had once existed, suddenly there were three.

Alongside the resident shihan, a new figure emerged: the guest shihan. These were Aikikai-recognized teachers who visited affiliated groups two or three times a year to provide technical guidance and conduct gradings. Many were genuinely accomplished practitioners, but the nature of the relationship had shifted. A guest who visits twice a year cannot know a student the way a resident teacher does. Grading became something closer to an inspection than a mentorship.

This was not a failure of integrity; it was a structural shift driven by growth and fragmentation. However, the resulting certificate began to signify something different: a connection to a lineage, rather than a teacher’s direct, personal assessment of a student’s progress.

The notarial era

From the early 2000s onward, fragmentation accelerated. As national organizations continued to splinter, the Aikikai abandoned its “one-country, one-body” policy and began recognizing multiple groups. This shift fundamentally altered how rank flows.

To maintain legitimacy, each new splinter group required a relationship with an Aikikai shihan to recommend promotions. A new arrangement emerged: mid-tier instructors—both Japanese and Western—built expansive networks of affiliated groups. They visited periodically, conducted examinations, signed recommendation forms, and forwarded the paperwork—along with the required fees—to Hombu.

In many cases, the instructor conducting the exam had no prior relationship with the students. They hadn’t watched these practitioners train week-to-week, hadn’t corrected their ukemi, and knew nothing of their injuries or characters. They reviewed a single performance on a specific day, signed a form, and the certificate was processed.

The document now certified a financial transaction and an organizational affiliation. The relationship it once represented had, in many cases, quietly disappeared.

This produced a situation captured perfectly by writer Simone Chierchini: instructors who train students from white belt to dan level—who know those students better than anyone—must still send paperwork to someone on the other side of the world who has never seen them train. This is done because a stranger’s stamp is deemed more “legitimate” than the teacher’s own lifelong assessment.

It is worth sitting with that for a moment.

A structural outcome, not a conspiracy

None of this required bad actors. The organizations built what they could with the tools available. Hombu needed revenue to maintain its infrastructure as Japanese government and business support shifted over the decades. National organizations needed legitimacy to hold their communities together during splits. Guest instructors needed roles that justified their travel and sustained their income. Everyone was responding rationally to their situation.

The result, however, must be named honestly: a system originally designed to certify mastery now primarily certifies the payment of fees and membership in a specific organizational chain. For many practitioners—especially at the higher dan levels—the certificate says almost nothing about what they can actually do or teach.

There is also a quiet irony worth noting. The Doshu—the head of the Aikikai and the person whose authority underlies every certificate the organization issues—holds no dan grade himself. The Ueshiba family grants rank; it does not receive it.

Where this leaves us

Practitioners asking what their rank actually certifies are not being cynical. These conversations happen at international seminars and IAF congresses—not in the official sessions, but in hotel lobbies late in the evening, after a few rounds, when people finally say what they think. I have sat through versions of this conversation more times than I can count. These practitioners are simply responding rationally to a system that has drifted from its original purpose.

History explains the drift without excusing it. What this drift costs us—in money, in personal development, and in the very integrity of training—is what the next parts of this series will examine.

What’s coming next

In Part 2 — the price of a dan certificate is the cost you can calculate. What you didn’t invest in instead is the one that compounds.

Further reading: Liese Klein’s Rank greed in aikido documents the financial mechanics of the US system in detail. Simone Chierchini’s The twilight of Aikikai grades covers the full historical arc.

Community question: When did you last think about what your rank certifies? Was there a moment — on the mat or off it — when the answer felt unclear?

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If you are starting here, Part 1 covers the neuroscience of the plateau, and Part 2 offers strategies for individual reorientation. This final part addresses what happens when those strategies fail because the environment itself is the obstacle.

You have mapped your pillars. You have tried process goals, distributed your social glue, and attempted to author your own path. If you are still struggling to find the “spark,” you must consider an uncomfortable possibility: your motivation isn’t failing. It is being actively dismantled.

The assumption in traditional martial arts is that the institution is a neutral vessel for the art. It is not. Institutions are architectural designs that either nourish or starve the people inside them.

How systems dismantle the pillars

While individual practitioners lose motivation through biological adaptation, institutions kill it through structural design.

Autonomy death occurs when tradition is used as a tool for conformity rather than a framework for inquiry. If you are a 40-year-old practitioner with a knee injury being told you must move exactly like a 20-year-old shihan, your autonomy is being suppressed. When asking “why” is interpreted as “disrespect,” or when your choice of seminars is dictated by political loyalty rather than technical curiosity, the system has removed you from the driver’s seat of your own practice.

Competence sabotage happens when pedagogy is replaced by hierarchy. In many dojos, progress is a black box. Testing depends on favor, timing, or political standing rather than a clear, principle-based curriculum. When your instructor cannot articulate how a technique works—relying instead on “just watch and copy”—your ability to achieve mastery is capped by their inability to teach. You aren’t stuck on a plateau; you are being held in a room with no exit.

Relatedness as a burden. Healthy connection should be a resource. In toxic institutions, it becomes a debt. This happens when the dojo functions like a closed clan where “belonging” requires silence in the face of poor leadership or unsafe behavior. When your primary social circle is used as leverage to keep you in a system that no longer serves you, relatedness has been weaponized.

The Environmental Assessment

Before deciding your next move, you must diagnose the room. Use these four questions to determine if your environment is capable of supporting the “Reorientation” strategies we discussed in Part 2:

1. The Inquiry Test: When you ask a technical “why,” is the answer based on physics and mechanics, or on authority and tradition?

2. The Safety Test: Are the social bonds in the dojo based on mutual growth, or on a shared silence regarding leadership flaws?

3. The Pedagogy Test: Is there a transparent roadmap for your progress, or does your advancement feel like a gift granted by a gatekeeper?

4. The Response Test: When you express a need for a different training pace or focus, is the reaction one of adaptation or one of “this is how we’ve always done it”?

The Fork in the Road

Once you recognize that the environment is thumping the hollows of your motivation, the “quiet resolve” of the survivor changes. You no longer ask how to stay; you ask how to train.

There is a moment in every long-term practitioner’s life where they must choose between the Institution and the Art. They are rarely the same thing. Those who choose the art usually find themselves on one of three paths:

• Extraction: You remain in the dojo but mentally “check out” of the politics. You train for yourself and treat the institution as a simple rental agreement for mat space.

• Reformation: You build a sub-culture of inquiry and safety within the existing structure. This is the hardest path, often ending in friction.

• Reconstruction: You leave. You build a new structure that prioritizes the practitioner’s growth over the organization’s legacy.

The Price of Staying

The most dangerous advice in aikido is “just keep showing up.”

If the environment is healthy, that advice is gold. If the environment is thwarting your basic human needs, then “just showing up” is a slow-motion act of self-betrayal. You are training yourself to accept stagnation as tradition and silence as loyalty.

After almost 20 years of practice, I realized that my pillars weren’t wobbling because of a plateau. They were being cut down by a system that valued my conformity more than my mastery. Stepping away wasn’t a loss of motivation; it was the only way to save my practice.

The 6th dan who “just didn’t quit” is often held up as the ideal. But we rarely ask what they had to sacrifice to stay—whether they maintained their curiosity and integrity, or if they simply became part of the machinery that makes others want to leave.

Quiet Resolve

The plateau will always be there. But you should not have to fight your organisation and your brain at the same time.

If you have applied the strategies and the spark hasn’t returned, stop looking inward. Look at the room. Look at the leadership. If the architecture is broken, no amount of personal discipline will fix the house.

Your loyalty belongs to your growth, not a membership card or dan certificate. This is where the maturity of the practitioner begins: when you stop asking for permission to enjoy your practice and start building the conditions that make it possible.

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Where is your motivation actually stuck? Join the discussion and share which pillar is struggling for you.

In the first part, we saw how pain forces practitioners to re-map movement and discover lessons their teachers never explained. But the question remains – why do these same injuries keep happening decade after decade? Why do so many aikidoka learn only after getting hurt?

Across dozens of testimonies, one uncomfortable truth emerges: aikido’s injury patterns are systemic, not accidental.

The culture of self-blame

Most practitioners blamed themselves. They said they were careless, too stiff, too tired, or pushed too hard. Few mentioned their teachers or dojo culture. That silence says a lot.

“I should have listened to my body,” one wrote. “I was trying to look good for a grading.” Another said, “I knew I shouldn’t train with beginners when I was exhausted. My fault.”

Self-responsibility is valuable, but the pattern reveals something deeper: aikido’s teaching culture conditions students to internalize all fault. Pain becomes a private failure, not a collective warning. The dojo absorbs no responsibility, and so the system never learns.

The analysis of injury blame shows a complex pattern. While self-inflicted error is the most frequently mentioned cause of injury, community consensus (measured by upvotes and awards) assigns the highest impact to external factors. Practitioners tend to blame themselves, yet the broader discussion points to poor partners as the source of the worst injuries – and to the instructional system as ultimately responsible for not preparing them for either scenario.

When tradition becomes repetition

A recurring theme was parrot teaching – instructors repeating forms without fully understanding the principles behind them. One practitioner who went on to study the topic deeply at university after an injury wrote:

“The vast majority of coaches are just parroting what they were taught, often worse than they received. They don’t really understand taisabaki – body movement – from a skeletal or kinetic standpoint. The knowledge was there once, but it’s been lost.”

This loss of depth creates two outcomes: poor movement models and unsafe dojos. Without a clear understanding of biomechanics, even sincere instructors can unknowingly pass down habits that damage joints over years.

Another comment pointed out a generational gap:

“Most clubs are run by older instructors without planned successors. It’s not a fluke. We’ve lost five generations of coaches.”

The invisible pressure to conform

Aikido is supposed to be non-competitive, yet the social dynamics inside dojos often breed quiet competition. Practitioners push to impress instructors or prove toughness. “We say it’s about harmony,” one person wrote, “but there’s a hidden hierarchy of endurance. Whoever can take more pain earns more respect.”

Instructors rarely encourage this openly – but they also rarely stop it. The result is a dojo culture where restraint looks like weakness and injury becomes a badge of commitment. One commenter recalled being injured by a higher-ranked partner testing pins without consent: “I dislocated my shoulder. He dropped my hand, turned, and walked away.”

Missing pedagogy

Many stories pointed to a simple lack of teaching skills. A black belt might have decades of technique, but that doesn’t mean they know how to teach it safely. Several practitioners noted that aikido has almost no formal instructor training compared to other sports.

“If coaches were trained in anatomy or sports science, half these injuries wouldn’t happen,” one wrote. “We teach complex joint locks to beginners with no foundation in safe movement.”

Another practitioner described the shock of realizing how many things were taught without explanation: “For years, I practiced tenkan with my weight on the back foot. Nobody corrected me. Then my knees gave out.”

In other martial arts, biomechanics and conditioning are core parts of instruction. In aikido, they’re often treated as optional – something you’re expected to figure out by feel or faith.

This extends the conversation from this post:

The myth of harmlessness

Aikido is often marketed as a gentle art. That illusion makes injuries harder to discuss. “We’re told it’s safe for all ages,” wrote one veteran, “but the rate of knee surgeries among senior teachers says otherwise.”

Several practitioners noted that smooth mats and soft landings hide the real stress on joints. “You don’t feel it until years later,” one said. “Modern surfaces let you slide and torque without noticing.” The result: chronic injuries mistaken for aging.

Even small things like seminar overcrowding become accepted risks. One participant recounted, “I’ve seen multiple concussions from people colliding during ukemi at big events. When I said we should limit numbers, I got the kind of look you get when you question religion.”

Ego, speed, and the illusion of progress

Pain often begins with impatience – wanting to be fast, to master forms, to prove something. “Going smoothly and slowly is always better than trying to be fast,” one practitioner wrote. Yet most dojos reward speed and precision over awareness and control.

That same reward structure shapes how instructors evaluate progress. Students who move quickly look confident. Those who slow down to feel alignment seem hesitant. Over time, this creates a culture that praises external form over internal understanding.

The irony is that aikido’s very name – the way of harmony — points toward cooperation, not competition. But harmony can’t exist without safety. When ego enters, the body becomes collateral damage.

The emotional residue of injury

Beyond physical pain, many described the emotional shock that follows. Some left aikido entirely, not out of bitterness but disillusionment. “I realized joy in aikido isn’t always shared,” one person wrote. “For some, it’s about control, not connection.”

Others turned their injuries into catalysts for change. One practitioner said, “I learned more from reconstructive training than from ten years of practice.” Another used recovery time to study aikido history and movement science: “Necessity became invention. I started asking better questions.”

These are rare stories – not because others lack insight, but because most leave quietly when the art hurts them more than it helps.

What needs to change

If aikido is to evolve, it must stop treating injuries as personal failures. They are feedback – signals about how we train, teach, and organize practice.

Some dojos have already begun adapting: emphasizing functional conditioning, teaching biomechanics, and creating open dialogue about safety. In those places, progress is slower but more sustainable. Practitioners age better, move better, and stay longer.

At Aikicraft, our mission is to help both teachers and practitioners become more aware of these issues and to offer practical solutions. The Teach Better section (aikicraft.org/s/method) exists precisely for this reason – to bridge insight and action, turning awareness into safer, smarter practice.

But the broader culture still resists change. “We’re stuck between tradition and denial,” one instructor admitted. “People think talking about safety undermines the spirit of budo. It doesn’t – it honors it.”

Wisdom that the system forgets

Pain teaches what lineage sometimes forgets: attention, humility, adaptability. If aikido wants to stay alive, it must learn from its own bruises.

The injuries we ignore become the lessons we’re forced to repeat.

Next: Part 3 – The injuries that made me better.

My shoulder hurt for a full year after a botched throw. The dull, constant ache became a relentless reminder every time I took ukemi, and when my doctor ordered a break, I refused. The injury became my forced teacher.

Unable to muscle through techniques, I had to internally re-map my movement. I became intensely mindful, feeling my way through throws and pins to find subtle, pain-free shifts in weight and angle.

This necessity led to a fascinating discovery: multiple internal pathways exist for the same external technique. Pain helped me overcome blockages, revealing movement options I hadn’t known existed and achieving a more subtle practice.

Later, my knee went – meniscus damage from shikko. Another season of pain, surgery, and forced re-mapping only deepened that original lesson.

I wondered if others experienced this, so I asked the Aikido community on Reddit what their injuries had taught them.

What the community learned

After reading through more than 50 personal accounts, a clear sequence of injury and suffering emerged, crossing all styles and levels. The journey from beginner to advanced practitioner is marked by three primary battle scars: shoulders, wrists, and knees.

The beginner’s tax: Shoulders

Shoulders are often the first casualty—the beginner’s tax. Too stiff, too slow, resisting a fall – the shoulder absorbs the shock of unlearned ukemi. Many reported that they only finally learned to relax after the pain forced them to.

The mid-level threat: Wrists

As proficiency increases, the danger shifts to the joints most exposed during controls. Wrists come next, mostly from misaligned locks and partners who don’t control their finishes. Sankyo, nikyo, and shihonage appear in too many stories. A brief surge of tension or pride is enough to cause an injury that requires months of recovery

The advanced practitioner’s fate: Knees

Knees ultimately suffer most. The culprits are familiar, insidious, and cumulative: tenkan done with planted feet, zagi that grinds the joints, and bad long-term ukemi. Smooth, modern mats make sliding easy – and long-term damage invisible. The reality is summed up in this dark joke from the community: “I don’t think there’s a 7th dan who hasn’t had knee surgery”.

Collateral Damage and Ego

Beyond the primary three, practitioners endure toes, backs, and ankles – collateral damage from bad falls or crowded mats. One person summed up the sheer variety: “sprained hip, torn labrum, and ‘sprained ass muscles,’ ending with, “The list is endless.”

But the worst, most universal injury is not physical. It is what compels us to ignore the warnings and keep training: “Ego and feelings. OOOOOHHHHH!” – a comment earning a knowing laugh from everyone who has ever pushed too hard.

The hard-earned wisdom

The most repeated insight is simple: safety before ego. Practitioners wished they had slowed down, prioritizing smooth and aware over fast and strong. This philosophy is best summarized: “The first goal in Aikido should be safety – ours and our partner’s. Everything else follows.”

Training Partners

Injuries forced practitioners to choose partners carefully. The consensus is that beginners are inherently dangerous, especially when you are tired. The hard lesson: “Go join the blackbelts/advanced students, they will take care of you. A beginner might let you injure yourself.”

The caution extends to all ranks: Be “ultra cautious when training with people I don’t know,” because even a Dan grade doesn’t guarantee a perfect or safe technique.

Technical corrections

Pain forced specific, fundamental corrections that many only fully understood after an injury:

• Footwork: Pick up your feet during tenkan to stop twisting on planted joints.

• Seated Movement: Keep your feet underneath you and avoid leaving a foot behind during shikko (knee-walking).

• Ukemi: Never fall directly onto your knee during ushiro ukemi (backward fall).

As one person reflected, “I learned more about reconstructive training in recovery than in years of regular practice,” concluding that the injury ultimately taught them “how to not hurt myself.”

The cracks in teaching

Beyond personal lessons, some practitioners saw deeper issues. They noticed that many injuries start with how aikido is taught. “The vast majority of coaches just parrot what they were taught,” one commenter said. “They don’t really understand taisabaki — body movement — from a skeletal or kinetic standpoint.”

Others blamed dojo culture: pressure to go fast, to look good, to match a teacher’s rhythm instead of one’s own. “I realized joy in aikido isn’t always shared,” one person wrote. “For many, the end goal is power until they reach some kind of spiritual awakening. Injury might just be inevitable on that path.”

Another practitioner described leaving his dojo after a dislocated shoulder: “I should have trusted my gut. My partner was resentful of the instructor, and I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. If I could go back, I’d have left early.”

The quiet wisdom of pain

Over and over, the same theme appeared: pain forced reflection. It slowed people down enough to see what was really happening in their bodies and dojos. A few found that it even improved their aikido. “Since those days,” one wrote, “I understand a little about aiki and subtle kuzushi. I no longer muscle techniques, and I can look after my uke better.”

Some saw humor in hindsight. “Growing old ain’t for sissies,” one veteran wrote after listing decades of joint injuries. Another said his only regret was that it took pain to make him train smarter: “Maybe I just mellowed with age — or maybe I finally wised up.”

What all this means

If there’s one rule hidden in hundreds of bruises and surgeries, it’s this: the body remembers what the ego forgets. Pain is information. It teaches alignment, humility, and presence better than words ever could. Every practitioner eventually learns it – some gently, others violently.

Aikido’s principles are supposed to protect, not punish. But the way we train often blurs that line. We speak of harmony, yet push through resistance. We say relax, yet chase rank and speed. The result isn’t just physical strain — it’s a cultural blind spot where injury becomes normal instead of instructive.

Pain can be a teacher, but it shouldn’t be the curriculum.

The first law of the dojo

The mat is not a battlefield. It’s a laboratory. Each fall is feedback, each ache a quiet reminder: awareness matters more than ambition. As one practitioner wrote, “Going slowly and smoothly is always better than trying to be fast.”

Maybe that’s the truest aiki lesson of all – not avoiding conflict, but moving through it with attention.

That’s what Part 2 explores – why aikido keeps producing the same injuries despite decades of experience, and what needs to change in how we teach and train.

If you’ve been injured in aikido, what did it force you to learn? Share your experience in the comments, especially if you discovered something unexpected about how you move or train.

The foundation of everything

“I am, at heart, a person shaped by simplicity. I was raised in a modest family, in an unpretentious place, and I carry that grounding within me as a quiet compass.”

This isn’t false modesty from someone who built one of Europe’s most successful youth aikido programs. It’s the bedrock philosophy that guided Nadia Korichi through decades of international teaching, institutional pressures, and ultimately, a choice that would redefine her entire relationship with the art.

For 25 years, Nadia traveled across Europe and beyond, teaching seminars and building connections across cultures. But her proudest achievement wasn’t the prestigious invitations or international recognition. It was over 160 teenagers who genuinely loved training in her dojo.

“You have to take care of them. You have to really want to work with them, not only just to show yourself,” she explains.

While other programs struggled to retain young students, her approach created something different—a community where teenagers actually wanted to spend their time.

When values meet reality

The success came from living three core principles that eventually put her at odds with institutional expectations.

Authenticity over politics became her first cornerstone. “I want people to be honest,” she says simply. This meant teaching what genuinely made a difference with students rather than what looked impressive at seminars. It meant acknowledging when traditional approaches needed adaptation for contemporary learners. Most challenging of all, it meant speaking truthfully about organizational problems including inequality and commercialization that she observed in the broader aikido world.

Service, not self-promotion, guided her teaching philosophy. “I never sought recognition through popularity,” she reflects. Even as her reputation spread internationally, her focus remained on nurturing students rather than advancing herself. The 160 teenagers thrived because their teacher genuinely invested in their growth, not because she needed validation of her own status.

Universal inclusion shaped every choice she made as a teacher. “I wanted a universal Aikido, one that truly connects people across cultures.” This was not abstract language but a guiding principle in her daily teaching. It meant adapting communication styles, recognizing different learning preferences, and creating space where every student could find their own way into the art.

The Moment of Choice

Five years ago, these values collided with institutional realities. The very qualities that made her program thrive—cultural sensitivity, student-centered focus, and honest recognition of systemic problems—soon created friction with organizational expectations.

“I began making it clear to everyone that I could not agree,” she recalls. “I told them, you say you want young people to come, yet you keep presenting models that do not reach them. If the aim is truly to engage youth, then we must show them something that speaks to their reality.”

Her criticism was precise: leaders spoke of youth engagement while showcasing only aging authority figures. They invoked inclusion while closing doors to diverse voices. Success was measured through hierarchy and politics rather than genuine student development.

When she continued to speak plainly about these contradictions, the response was swift: she was pushed aside. The very integrity that had sustained her teaching became a threat to systems more concerned with preservation than renewal.

Her concerns reached beyond gender.

“For me, it’s not normal that someone receives grades simply for loyalty or technical display, without proving themselves as genuine teachers.”

The deeper wound lay in how ordinary practitioners were regarded:

“There is scarcely any regard for the practitioners themselves. Too often, those in professional positions reduce them to financial instruments—treating dedicated students as revenue streams rather than human beings in search of growth.”

The Cost of Authenticity

The consequences were immediate. Professional relationships changed. Income disappeared. The institutional support system she’d been part of for decades closed ranks against her voice.

Through this difficult period—compounded by the loss of both parents—a deeper understanding emerged. The real secret wasn’t in the techniques or the ranks or the organizational politics.

“Aikido lives in the care you show to people. If everyday practitioners are not respected, the art loses its heart.”

This insight explains the success with 160 teenagers. They thrived not because of superior technical instruction, but because someone genuinely cared about their development as individuals. They stayed because they felt seen, respected, and valued—not just as students, but as people.

Looking Forward

Today, Nadia stands as a guide for what European aikido could yet become: a practice shaped by care for practitioners, genuine respect, and a vision of networks that rise above institutional limits.

Her forward focus is clear: creating an international women’s network that enhances practitioner development, amplifies women’s contributions, and builds authentic connections across cultures while drawing on her experience with traditional organizational approaches to create something more effective.

“I just want to help where I can. My wish is to see Aikido practiced with calm honesty and genuine respect.”

Her story reminds us why we train—not for rank or recognition, but for the transformation that happens when authentic teaching meets genuine learning. When someone with deep skill and deeper character decides that students matter more than systems.

Her dojo became proof that Aikido flourishes when taught with care and integrity. In our next post we will share how to build such student-centered practice in your own dojo. → Subscribe to receive it first.

“The heart of Aikido is the care you give to people—the art only truly lives when we honor those who step on the mat beside us.”

That line is as true for a single class as it is for the future of the art.

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In future posts, we’ll explore the practical approaches that created such remarkable engagement with young practitioners—because the world needs more teachers who understand that care, not curriculum, creates lasting transformation.

When I asked r/aikido about gender balance, the post reached close to 50,000 viewers and generated a 100 responses from practitioners worldwide— almost half from the US and Canada, 6% from the UK, and the rest mostly from Europe. Some shared experiences. Others offered theories. A few got defensive. The community response revealed something more than individual comments alone: what the community validates, rejects, what critical issues went unaddressed, and what institutional efforts remain invisible.

What gets validated

The highest-rated comment came from a woman who trained seriously for 17 years before leaving due to systemic sexism. Her documentation was specific:

“Hitting on female students. Sexual or sexist comments and jokes. Disparaging female students or holding them to double standards. Mansplaining on and off the mat. Fewer training opportunities for women. Female teachers relegated to teaching kids classes. Female students expected to perform caretaking tasks while men are not. Sexual harassment. More senior man dates junior woman and when they break up, she leaves because of his seniority. Fewer female teachers to serve as role models.

All of this was done while saying ‘our dojo welcomes women.’”

The community confirmed her experience matched their own. Pattern recognition, not isolated incident.

Another observation received strong support:

“If so many of you assume women aren’t interested in martial arts, why should you do anything to make them feel welcome? Then you scratch your heads and say ‘welp, I guess they just don’t like martial arts.’”

The community recognized how dismissive assumptions create self-fulfilling prophecies.

What gets rejected

When one commenter dismissed the entire discussion with “mostly men are interested in martial arts. And that is OK,” the response was mixed. Some agreement, but significant pushback showed in the controversy flag.

When another claimed “No doubt dojos like this exist. Certainly I have been lucky enough never to have trained in one,” the community pushed back hard. The message: “not in my dojo” doesn’t count as evidence when women document otherwise.

The attempted defense of “natural gender imbalance” through running statistics received minimal engagement. Weak positioning, weak response.

The structural reality few discuss

The second-most supported insight addressed something rarely mentioned in aikido conversations: scheduling and caretaking burdens.

“So many women are caretakers, whether they want to be or not. Every class time our dojo offers is not good for anyone who has to parent through meal and bed time or take people to extra-curriculars. Even if women want to train, they have to find a time that doesn’t conflict with every other family obligation.”

Another practitioner expanded this:

“For so many women working 9-5, there are family obligations before and after work. Kids at any age take so much time, household work and if part of the sandwich generation, aging relatives. So I would ask of our menfolk looking around the mat wondering where the women are: if you have kids or aging parents, who’s taking care of them? The potluck after the last dan test, who cooked the dish you brought?”

Strong community agreement confirmed recognition of the “second shift.” The disproportionate caregiving burden makes “just show up to class” impossible for many women.

This matters because barriers extend beyond sexism into structure. Organizations could address these realities if they provided actual support rather than empty statements about inclusion.

What the discussion missed entirely

Here’s what troubles me most: the conversation focused almost entirely on mat ratios and physical strength differences. Important topics, but they miss the deeper issue.

Even in dojos with decent female participation—say 30-40% on the mat—look at who’s teaching. Look at who holds leadership positions. Look at who makes organizational decisions. The numbers drop dramatically.

When one commenter questioned whether female leadership actually changes anything, another responded from direct experience:

“My dojo was in constant conflict with our federation until a woman took the role for dealing with them. Since then, no conflict.”

When women lead, organizations function differently. Who feels welcome changes. What gets prioritized shifts.

But the community discussion barely touched this. Most responses treated gender balance as a participation problem (getting women on the mat) rather than a power problem (who shapes direction). That gap in awareness matters as much as the institutional silence.

The visibility challenge

Not one respondent mentioned the IAF Gender Balance Working Group. despite its steady activity since 2016, including regular meetings and seminars, focused on inclusion and representation.

The gap reveals a visibility and communication challenge. When practitioners actively discussing gender barriers don’t know institutional support exists, opportunities for collaboration and impact get lost.

The 2024 election of the IAF’s first female Chairperson marks a historic moment. It opens the door for the Gender Balance Working Group to gain the platform and reach its work deserves - provided it is empowered to act with real independence and accountability.

Now is the time. Across the aikido world, practitioners are naming structural barriers and sharing lived experiences. The foundation exists: committed individuals at the community level, and an institutional group with global reach.

The next step is clarity. Who is involved? What progress has been made? How can practitioners engage? Visibility and transparency aren’t just communication goals—they’re what enable collaboration, trust, and lasting change.

A way forward

Progress depends on connecting grassroots insight with institutional action. The community is ready. The structures are in place. What’s needed now is a visible bridge between them—so that gender equity in aikido becomes not just a value, but a shared and supported practice.

That work begins with those already building what the community needs, proving what works, and documenting what doesn’t. Their voices need platforms. Their experiences need recognition and support.

Next, we’ll meet someone who proved inclusive communities work—over 160 teenagers thrived in her dojo, and women saw someone who looked like them leading with skill and care.

When she questioned why organizations prioritize hierarchy over student development, reward loyalty over teaching skill, and shut out diverse voices, the response was swift.

Have you experienced or observed the barriers documented here? What would meaningful institutional support actually look like? Share your thoughts in the comments.

The bottle of țuică appeared in the Romanian dojo changing room within minutes of training ending. By the time we had showered and changed, the potent plum brandy had already disappeared among the aikidoka.

This moment perfectly captured aikido's unspoken relationship with alcohol - instant camaraderie mixed with cultural tradition, while raising uncomfortable questions about what we're really doing when we train.

This experience led me to dive deep into a fascinating Reddit discussion that reveals the intersection of tradition, spirituality, performance, and human nature in modern martial arts practice.

The founder's complicated legacy

The alcohol debate often centers on O-Sensei, with practitioners citing his supposed teachings about having "no desire but to practice aikido." Many interpret this as calling for monastic dedication that would naturally exclude drinking.

The reality is more human than the mythology suggests.

As one longtime practitioner and researcher pointed out in the discussion:

"Morihei Ueshiba never, ever, condemned drinking. He did drink less as he got older, as many people do, but some of that was related to his liver problems. He never stopped drinking."

His designated successor died in a drunken brawl. His official 10th Dan injured his back falling down stairs while intoxicated. Even his son Kisshomaru struggled with alcohol dependency.”

These aren't moral failings - they're reminders that aikido founders were human beings navigating the same tensions we face today.

The performance question

The practical tension every serious practitioner faces comes down to optimization:

"I'm not paying money for a seminar to feel like shit on the mat because I drank some beer the night before."

It’s ultimately about investment and return. If you're spending time, money, and physical effort improving your skills, why voluntarily impair your ability to learn and perform?

Modern research confirms what most athletes know intuitively - alcohol significantly disrupts the body's ability to adapt to training, essentially switching off the biological triggers that lead to improvement.

Yet the counterargument carries weight too. Some of the most profound aikido conversations happen not on the mat, but around the table afterward, when formal hierarchies soften and genuine connection occurs.

Some argue that aikido should be proof against any condition, that a few drinks or a restless night shouldn’t matter if the principles are truly embodied. A friend who trained as uchi-deshi under Isoyama Sensei told me about being ordered to drink a bottle of sake before practice. The lesson, supposedly, was that a samurai must be ready to perform in any condition.

The cultural divide

In Japan, where aikido originated, drinking after training isn't just accepted - it's woven into the social fabric. As one practitioner noted:

"Most seminars in Japan include a heavy amount of drinking - it's one of the few safety valves in Japanese society."

This creates tension for Western practitioners caught between authentic cultural practice and personal optimization. Are you honoring the art's roots, or importing cultural baggage that doesn't serve your goals?

The question becomes more complex when you consider that many aspects of traditional Japanese training culture - the emphasis on endurance over technique refinement, the rigid hierarchy, the resistance to questioning methods - don't necessarily translate well to contemporary learning environments.

The Sobriety Spectrum

Perhaps the most powerful voices in the discussion come from those who've made the decision to abstain entirely. Their stories reveal both the social pressure that exists and the clarity that comes from stepping away:

"I lost two teachers to alcohol — one died, the other became impossible to train with. So for me, it's serious."

"Aikido makes me want to be deeply connected to reality, so blunting my senses is less desirable."

These aren't judgmental pronouncements but personal testimonies that highlight an uncomfortable truth: for some practitioners, the social drinking culture of aikido becomes genuinely problematic.

The individual choice

For some practitioners, a drink after training feels harmless, even natural. For others, it directly undermines their purpose on the mat. The line is deeply personal. What refreshes one person can dull another’s clarity. The key isn’t to follow a fixed rule but to recognize that each choice shapes our practice. Respect for the art includes respect for how we care for our own body and mind.

Listen to yourself and do what serves you. But also recognize: alcohol is a dangerous and cunning beast. For anyone wrestling with dependency, it clouds judgment, twists self-perception, and makes sincerity nearly impossible. Ignoring that reality risks turning practice into pretense.

Finding your way

Beyond culture and preference lies the sharper question: what are we really training for? If aikido is meant to cultivate presence and honesty, then anything that clouds those qualities is not neutral. Community bonding can be valuable, but not if it pulls us away from clarity.

A balanced approach is to treat alcohol as we treat any principle in practice: stay centered, remain aware of your situation, and respond according to genuine needs rather than external pressure. For some, that may include sharing a drink. For others, it means clear boundaries to protect training and well‑being.

If drinking is a regular pattern, ask a close friend you trust to tell you honestly whether they see it as a problem. If their answer unsettles you, it may be time to seek help.

The question isn't whether drinking after training is right or wrong. It's whether your choice serves the person you're trying to become through your practice.

Rob Liberti called out Iwama-style practitioners for claiming superior knowledge while lacking demonstrable skills. His question cut straight to the bone: "If your method is so superior, where are all the skilled practitioners it should produce? Is there even one?"

The response? Predictable tribal warfare. Iwama defenders. Aikikai critics. Internal power advocates. Everyone claiming their lineage holds the secret while others are deluded.

But here's what nobody wants to admit: we're all doing the same thing.

Every group thinks they're special. Every lineage has its "secret transmission" story. And while we're busy defending our version of the truth, the art is dying around us. Time to ask some uncomfortable questions about what we're really protecting - and whether it's worth saving.

The delusion exposed

The debate revealed the inconvenient truth: every aikido group has the same delusion.

Iwama:
"We trained longest with O-Sensei during the war years when it was just him and Saito Sensei."

Yoshinkan:
"We preserved the pure pre-war techniques before O-Sensei went soft."

Aikikai:
"We're the official headquarters - the direct family lineage."

Tomiki:
"We added realistic pressure testing that others lack."

Everyone else:
"Those mainstream groups lost the real essence that only we maintain."

The pattern is always identical:

It's like wine enthusiasts who trace every bottle back to the same famous vineyard, as if proximity to greatness automatically transfers quality. Except we're all making the same claim about the same founder.

Meanwhile, as Steven Bender noted in the thread, most practitioners never develop beyond basic structural techniques. The promised "ki tai" level - where movement becomes effortless and guided by internal awareness rather than muscle - remains theoretical. The internal skills stay mythical.

Here I disagree. Internal development is established science in sport psychology—it's called 'flow state,' and this quality can be systematically developed through structured practice. Here's how to apply it in aikido training.

The real problem isn't that internal skills are impossible - it's that we're too busy defending territorial claims to actually develop them.

The institutional protection racket

Organizations don't preserve technique - they preserve territory.

Look at the documented history. When Tomiki introduced competitive aikido to university students, the Aikikai didn't engage with his methods or test their effectiveness. They simply excluded him. Announced over loudspeakers that "this isn't what aikido is."

Why? Because competitive aikido was attracting younger practitioners faster than traditional training. Membership numbers matter more than skill development.

The Kisshomaru quote about "friendship through aikido" that sparked this whole debate is a marketing copy. The same man who preached unity spent decades systematically excluding anyone who trained differently.

Every aikido organization operates the same way:

• Create mythology to justify existence

• Exclude competitors to protect market share

• Maintain certification monopolies

• Punish innovation that threatens control

When your business model depends on being the "authentic" source, you can't afford to let other approaches succeed. Better to discredit them as "not real aikido" than compete on results.

This isn't about preserving O-Sensei's legacy. It's about protecting institutional power fifty years after his death.

The skills gap nobody talks about

Going back to the debate, here's the question that makes everyone uncomfortable: Where are all the masters?

If these "superior" methods actually worked, we should see consistent results. Instead, we get excuses and exceptions. But they're exceptions, not products of any particular system. Meanwhile, the "one true way" advocates remain stuck in basic structural techniques while claiming advanced knowledge.

But here's my real question: How does any of this matter?

Even if someone finally develops internal skills to move all MMA/BJJ fighters at once - and then what? How does it help anyone? Aikido could be so much more than a contest over who can knock people down most efficiently.

The toxicity cycle

And that's where the real damage happens. Superiority claims create defensive communities. Criticism becomes heresy. Questions become attacks. Energy goes to defending the system, not improving it.

New students inherit the tribal mentality before they learn basic techniques. They're taught to dismiss other approaches before understanding their own. The community becomes about being right, not getting better.

Meanwhile, practitioners who ask honest questions get labeled outsiders. Those who cross-train get viewed with suspicion. Anyone suggesting evolution gets accused of corrupting the tradition.

We've created isolated echo chambers where delusion reinforces itself. Where loyalty matters more than competence. Where protecting the myth becomes more important than developing the person.

The art isn't dying from external criticism. It's suffocating from internal toxicity.

The solution space. So what actually works?

Not extensive technical debates about correct form. Not historical research into who learned what from whom. Not calls for "unity" that ignore the root causes.

Here's what might actually shift things:

Stop asking "Is this real aikido?" Start asking "Does this solve real problems?"

When aikido principles help executives navigate difficult conversations, nobody cares which lineage taught them. When conflict resolution techniques actually defuse workplace tension, the historical purity becomes irrelevant.

Move from martial art to methodology.

Instead of defending aikido against MMA comparisons, apply it where it actually has value:

• Leadership presence and authentic authority

• Positioning in conflicts without escalation

• Stress management through embodied awareness

• Team dynamics based on natural flow and timing

Measure results, not credentials.

Can your students handle pressure better after training? Do they communicate more effectively? Are they less reactive in difficult situations? These questions cut through tribal mythology.

Create space for honest conversation.

The tribal boundaries only matter inside institutional walls. Independent platforms, cross-training opportunities, and result-focused communities dissolve the artificial divisions.

When aikido becomes about helping people solve real challenges, the "one true way" arguments lose their power. You can't fake results when someone's actual life improves.

The art survives by being useful, not by being pure.

This is why I started Aikicraft - an independent publication free from institutional politics and tribal loyalties. A space where we can have honest conversations about what works, what doesn't, and what aikido could become if we focused on helping people instead of protecting traditions.

No lineage gatekeeping. No purity tests. Just practical exploration of how timeless wisdom can solve present-day challenges.

And if you want to be part of the solution - sharing insights, asking better questions, building something worth saving - write to us at hello@aikicraft.org.

The art needs voices willing to move beyond "my teacher said" toward "this actually helps people." Be one of them.

When I finally earned my own I had this creeping feeling I’d faked it. Like I somehow slipped through the cracks. But slowly, with more practice, the feeling changed. The body grew into the shape. It became part of me. And that first dan meant something.

Each promotion brought the same flicker of excitement, a quiet rush of pride, and yes, again, a bit of disbelief. Still, I custom-framed each diploma and lined four of them up on the wall, evenly spaced, like quiet milestones I wasn’t ready to question.

Then came the fifth. I didn’t even take it out of the envelope.

That wasn’t a decision. It just stayed there. Days passed. Then weeks. Then years. And I started to ask myself why.

When we talk about black belts, we usually talk about achievements, milestones, recognition, access, teaching, belonging. For many, the black belt marks not just technical achievement, but a certain arrival.

In a recent Reddit discussion, one comment stood out:

“For me, the black belt gave me a goal to aim for during my first seven years of practice. It was my primary motivation. Since receiving it... my confidence in my skills is boosted and I am happy with the recognition that came with it.”

In the same thread, others echoed how much the early black belt means:

"It improved my posture ;) Also when you go for seminars people really do treat you differently. Compared to when you're a white belt."

"Earning that rank was a personal achievement, something I had strived to do for a long time. Mentally, I hold myself more accountable to my training and technique, and my personal behavior."

"Black belts to me are like check marks that show your current skill and gained knowledge in relation to what you still need to train and understand. And, most importantly, it’s a signal to your fellow Aikidoka that shows what you know thus far."

"At the time, I saw it as an acknowledgement from people that I highly respected that I had reached a certain level of skill... It has changed how others treat me a great deal, both on and off the mats. It absolutely opened doors to teaching."

"I came up under a strict teacher with high standards. He did not hand out dan rankings like candy or for just showing up. Shodan for me was a personal achievement that held a lot of meaning because it validated the hard work, effort and endurance it took, and acknowledged that my teacher saw that in me."

And of course, someone reminded us not to take ourselves too seriously:

"A piece of cloth with which to fix my gi and hakama on."

These stories feel familiar and sincere. The early black belts meant something because they landed at the intersection of effort, recognition, and timing. We trained hard, looked up to our teachers, and tried to live up to the image we had built around the rank. That meaning wasn't handed to us—we constructed it ourselves, over time, on the mat.

But as time goes on, something shifts.

"After sandan it felt like I was just collecting paperwork."

"Ranks are granted for different reasons to different people. Some people are given a rank because they excel, but sometimes they are given for other (sometimes political, sometimes not) reasons."

"Some organizations are pretty much 'diploma mills', there are no real standards, and no oversight … Morihei Ueshiba himself didn't care for them, or think much of them, they were implemented in the Aikikai primarily as a marketing tactic. Today they are mostly an income stream."

And the most stinging indictment of the monetization of recognition:

The more you pay for a diploma, the less value it has.”

These comments capture the unfiltered frustrations felt by practitioners who’ve progressed beyond the initial excitement—and now see rank as a hollow symbol rather than a meaningful milestone. A strong assertion that dan ranks' validity has eroded over time and quantity.

It’s not criticism or bitterness. It’s perspective. The further you go, the more you realise that what we once saw as milestones are, in fact, part of a larger economy—one we feed by paying for rank, by craving status, by staying silent even when something doesn’t sit right.

And yet, we keep buying. Promotions. Certificates. Seminar fees. Because on some level, they still mean something—or we want them to.

So what is it that we're really buying? Recognition? Safety? Identity? Validation? What story are we helping to tell? Let’s be honest. Sometimes, it’s about ego. Sometimes, it’s about community. Often, it’s about not wanting to fall behind in a system we no longer believe in.

I sometimes ask myself: did any of these belts make me a better teacher? A better partner? A better person? The answer is usually no. Not directly.

And yet, without them, I might not have stayed. Not because I needed the status, but because I needed the structure. The story. A sign that the path I was on wasn’t just a loop.

Now, the story has changed. I still train, teach, explore. But the belt no longer defines the work. It’s just where I am on the trail.

Sometimes I walk past the wall where my dan certificates used to hang—carefully framed, lovingly aligned. One by one they came down. In their place now hangs a piece of artwork that speaks to me in a different language. One that holds no title, no seal, no kanji. One that doesn’t validate me to anyone else. One that never asked to be framed. One that reminds me why I started in the first place.

“Great teacher - what does that mean?” That deceptively simple question, posed by Rob Liberti, sparked a nuanced and at times uncomfortably honest reflection on the often-blurred line between technical mastery and the true art of teaching in Aikido.

Rob begins by challenging the near-sacred status of "O-Sensei," noting that while Morihei Ueshiba was undeniably a remarkable practitioner, calling him a great teacher remains unexamined dogma. We would never call Mike Tyson a great coach just because he was a legendary boxer, Rob points out. So why do we assume that martial brilliance naturally implies pedagogical mastery?

This sparked a thoughtful and wide-ranging discussion, spanning everything from Japanese honorifics to the way teacher training is approached in organizations like Birankai. Many voices echoed a shared concern: in Aikido, there is little to no structured development of teaching skills. Rank is often awarded based on time served and loyalty, not on demonstrable teaching ability. In some cases, the conferral of rank seems more symbolic than skill-based — what one contributor mockingly calls a "participation trophy."

At the core of this thread lies a sharp critique of uncritical hierarchy. Several voices, including Ravi Kumar and Josh Lovic, echo the distinction between being good at something and being good at teaching it — a principle widely accepted in other fields, but still largely absent in Aikido. Teaching is a separate skill. One that can and should be taught.

Rob also shares his own teaching experiment: starting class by announcing a clear goal, engaging each student through direct contact, and summarizing the key learning points — never more than three — to promote retention. He credits this approach not to Aikido tradition, but to outside methodologies like kaizen—a Japanese philosophy of continuous, incremental improvement—and structured teaching frameworks used in formal education.

The discussion shifts at points to linguistic nuance, questioning the translation and cultural baggage of terms like Sensei, Ō-Sensei, and Daishihan. While some defend the use of titles as part of a broader cultural context, others see them as barriers to honest evaluation.

Overall sentiment:

The dominant tone of the thread is one of disillusioned clarity — a collective urge to separate reverence from real pedagogy. There’s a longing for accountability, transparency, and results-based teaching evaluation. Emotional loyalty and lineage, the thread suggests, cannot substitute for effective skill transmission.

To borrow Rob’s bluntest moment: “If he’s such a great teacher and you’ve been learning from him for over 30 years, why do you suck so much?”

The thread doesn’t attack tradition — it asks it to grow up.

Key takeaway for teachers:

If you want to be called a great teacher, show us your students. Not your resume, not your rank. Show us who you've lifted.

I don’t have all the answers. But I’ve been on the mat long enough to know that asking the right questions matters. If you’re on a similar path, welcome aboard. 

The future of Aikido — how do you see it? And what would you change (or protect) to help it grow or evolve?

Accompanied by this graph from Google Trends:

We’re living through a slow, visible decline in Aikido’s global relevance. Cultural shifts, the rise of MMA and BJJ, questions of effectiveness, relevance, tradition, reputation, and evolution — the reasons are many.

But I didn’t ask for blame — I asked fellow practitioners for insight.

Here’s what came back: 11 sharp, sincere perspectives from people who still show up on the mat.

TL;DR

• Aikido is facing both an image crisis and an internal crossroads.

• There is no consensus — and that’s part of its identity.

• Some want evolution: pressure, realism, new teaching methods.

• Others want preservation: less noise, more clarity, simpler joy.

• Everyone cares — and what they want is sincerity.

1. Poor perception of martial value.

Insight: We need to move beyond preservation and into participation. Aikido will not survive by preserving ashes — we must carry the fire. Making the art our own, with humility and respect for lineage, is not betrayal but continuity.

“We are the current generation, it is our responsibility to keep breathing life into the art... We cannot expect O'Sensei or any of the old masters to propagate it from the grave.” — UncleBiroh

2. Resistance to evolution vs. relevance to modern combat sports.

Insight: Some arts fossilize beautifully — but Aikido may not be one of them. We can either polish tradition like a museum piece or let it breathe and adapt. Both choices come with sacrifice.

“You can either agree to preserve it in amber... or you can try to evolve it.” — DukeMacManus

3. Aikido lacks pressure testing and real-world application.

Insight: Without feeling the heat of real resistance, our skills remain theoretical. Introducing failure-friendly pressure — not to win, but to awaken — may be key to making training feel alive again.

“The samurai train kata (the known) to prepare for the battlefield (the unknown)... it is okay and useful to fail and make mistakes.” — Ruryou

4. Poor reputation, mocked in the U.S. compared to respect in Europe.

Insight: Aikido’s image has been shaped by misrepresentation as much as by mastery. Holding higher standards, embracing media, and addressing the fantasy-fueled performances might slowly restore credibility.

“Too much of that Jedi Aikido stuff on YouTube... Maybe the Aikikai needs to start getting stricter with giving out ranks.” — bossaboom

5. Aikido doesn’t meet expectations of effectiveness in youth.

Insight: Younger students don’t seek philosophy — they seek answers. Acknowledging their “what-if” questions with honest exploration rather than canned tradition could be a bridge.

“The kinds of questions kids ask are revealing... sometimes tough to answer with purely traditional Aikido responses.” — startupwithferas

6. Mismatch of expectations — fighting art vs. philosophy.

Insight: Selling Aikido as a fighting art sets it up for disappointment. Reframing it as a path for health, awareness, or movement could meet people where they are — honestly.

“Aikido can reinvent itself as a health art... stop pretending to be a fighting art when it is not.” — DukeMacManus

7. Aikido is miscommunicated — people misunderstand what it actually is.

Insight: Aikido isn’t a combat sport. Trying to compare it to MMA or BJJ misses the point entirely. Better communication about its nature — as a developmental art, not a competition — could prevent disillusionment.

“Aikido is a martial art, BJJ and MMA are combat sports... They are addressing two different target groups.” — ZeroGRanger

8. Excessive debate on tradition and purity.

Insight: What if we stopped trying to define Aikido as either-or? Tradition and evolution aren’t mutually exclusive. Respect doesn’t require rigidity.

“Aikidō is broader than a single interpretation... It’s not about techniques, but about energy.” — Heavy-Employer-3186

9. No clear communication of goals or unique value.

Insight: Aikido’s message gets lost in comparison. If we clarified who we’re for — not who we’re against — we might draw in the right people, and keep them longer.

“The biggest problem Aikido has is that it tries to be in competition with combat sports... That difference needs to be communicated better.” — ZeroGRanger

10. Lack of positive online community for Aikido.

Insight: Digital dojos matter too. If every online space feels like a critique, not a community, newcomers won’t stick around. We need more joy, more storytelling, more visible love for the art.

“Sometimes it feels even the place that’s supposed to be for Aikido... is filled with people telling me I’m wasting my time.” — AikiThrowaway

11. Some just want to practice in peace

Insight: And finally, not everyone wants to change the art. Some simply enjoy it as it is. Growth doesn't have to mean overhaul — sometimes it means letting people connect with the art on their own terms.

“I like training Aikido just the way it is at my dojo. If I wanted BJJ/MMA/etc., I’d do that.” — Herdsengineers
“Leave it the way it is... to grow the skill of the practitioner.” — kimbapslice

Where Do We Go From Here?

Aikido is at a quiet crossroads. There’s no one answer, and maybe that’s the point.

But here’s what I didn’t hear enough about: how we teach.

Pedagogy matters. Students today arrive with different bodies, expectations, and cultural backgrounds. If we don’t meet them where they are — physically, socially, cognitively, and emotionally — we risk losing them right after they get stuck and before they start enjoying koshi-nage. 😉

One Small Offering

If you’ve ever felt stuck in your practice, or seen your students struggling to find “flow,” this piece may help:

👉 From Tension to Flow: Aikido training with clarity

It’s a practical framework based on three internal qualities — relaxation, stability, and clarity — that help shift Aikido from something performed to something embodied.

No mysticism. No dogma. Just mindful tools to help refine what you already feel — and bring it to life on the mat.

If something in this post resonates — or if you disagree — I’d love to hear from you.

• What keeps you training?

• What do you think Aikido still offers?

• And what would you do to help it grow?

👉 Leave a comment. Or just reply with your own version of: “Why I still show up.”

I don’t know (yet) how we turn this around. But I still believe your voice matters.

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Saša / Aikicraft