The path to the harmonious union of forces

Here we are,

Slowly moving forward. A foot then the other.
You need to be sure of your footing.
You have watch your steps, don’t you?
The rest depends on it.
You find the right distance, calmly, in other words, the right timing. The Japanese have a word for this, which refers to not space and time, but also to the silence, the interval, the space between two opponents.

It’s not about the fight.
If it’s a fight you want, go out into the street and Satan will grab you.

But rather it is about developing the capacity to suddenly be in the conflicting presence of another, to make oneself the object of their focus, becoming an integral part of it.

It’s how the master breaks the spear.

He renounces the fight by becoming the core of the force of the battle. In the eye of the storm, he brings his own peace.
Time slows down, sometimes abolishing itself. The body that has been trained for so long in its automatisms, acts as if without us. We make ourselves discreet for our partner, like a courteous host stepping aside for his guest.
He goes towards his downfall, robed from himself, while we take our leave from the
moment.

Because, in this practice, as in all the others that are worthwhile, here’s the great affair:

We are superfluous.

All the labour is designed to make us light and able, like the unseen wind, to carry an unexpected wing.

What are we to do? The aîkidokas, uncertain heirs of the fierce samurai. How far we are from these truths discovered in the midst of their battles to the death.

We are unsure, but we have a confused feeling that there is something fitting and sensible in the way these distant masters to use the simulacrum of combat to try to learn how to live without causing unnecessary harm.

To others. To oneself.

We understand nothing, for a long time, sometimes to the very end. We strive to do the exact opposite of what this uncompromising art of combat, like all art, offers.

It’s all there: pride, false humility, taking advantage of the weak, pandering to the strong.

Where silence is needed, we ramble. We plot, we envy, we resent, we engage in politics, we can’t wait to get there before we even know where the starting line is.

And so it goes on, and we repeat ourselves, tirelessly, nauseously.
At the centre of ourselves we nurture sombre schemes.

Our “stomachs” are black.
Then comes the sick urge.

You have to ‘tie up your insides’, as the Japanese say.
To have guts, if you will.

This is what Aikido is all about, this is what practising an art means. Struggle, surrender.
Relentlessly letting go.

And holding on.

A friend of mine, a dancer, gave a wonderful title to his latest creation: “Le bateau qui va vraiment sur la mer” (“The boat that really cross the sea”).

This is a lesson.

Lessons don’t just take place in the Dojo, unless the Dojo is also books, music, the sacred space of museums, but also the forgotten horse at the bottom of the meadow, attentive to our distraction, the hand without the brush, the painter kneeling in front of the tree.

What do you believe? That we’ll make it? That in the end, the good master will give a lovely reward to the good and scheming child?

Ah, how we pin it to our lack of centre, this black belt, still unaware that, faded by the passage of time, washed away by our tear-filled bodies, it will return, if we’re lucky, to its initial whiteness, that of the beginner, you know, the one who felt ashamed as he confused his hands and feet but who thirsted for more knowledge.

And yet, how lucky we are, thrown to an unfortunate fate, to have found, without knowing we were looking for it, a possible path, a passage towards the open, a path of knowledge, a mountain at last impossible to climb, that will elevate us.

For a long time now, I’ve been watching our gestures, our impulses, our curious embraces.

And I wonder.

What are we trying to say to each other when words no longer seem enough?
What do the boxers say to each other in their tragic explanation? What secret do these couples exchange in the abrazo of Tango? What does the hushed exchange of Aikido hold?

As always, you have to take a step back, stop taking part in the general tussle, and
contemplate the whole motion from afar.
To see bodies, leaving behind the chatter of their gesticulation, trying to discipline
themselves and bring to light the signs they embody.

It takes discipline and hard work to extricate from our confusion, from the effective lie, a semblance of alignment with the forces that run through us.

Once again we are asked to clear the floor, not to crowd the tatami unnecessarily, to be present for good.

It doesn’t go without saying. Doesn’t it?

It may be that, with a great deal of practice, we will come to understand.

There is no end-goal!

As the old master used to say, a little worn out by the senseless hopes of his disciples, the goal of the practice is to practice. And he prayed that it would be a good one.

But then, what’s the point? Why all these rituals, all this fatigue, all these pathetic victories,
all these pitiful results? Since, at the end of it all, here we are, more or less the same as ever, not really changed despite our virtuous diligence, our humble kneelings, the maniacal care for our slightly grimy kimonos and the usurped elegance of the midnight-blue hakama?

We didn’t want to see what was being said everywhere and displayed through the colours:
the white of ignorance, the bluish darkness of our night, this waltz that we are struggling to learn, the meaning of its whirlwind.

It’s that, nothing but that, all of that.

Yes,

Positioning yourself correctly, paying attention to your posture, allowing a little of the great breath that drives everything to pass through your joints.

Be vertical, become a blade.

Why ?
But to finally tear away the veil of our own night and understand:

We are the question raised to the universe, forever prostrate in its violent silence.

Our bodies, caught in the fight, the dance, the great movement that men are able to make when they have the wisdom to turn away from routine dormancy or the foolish and bloody response that is murder, our bodies come together and whisper to each other, speaking out their torment.

And coming together in their dances of love and war, they sometimes achieve beauty and grace.

That’s the culmination!

They speak.

We don’t hear it well, we turn a deaf ear.

Yet the message is clear: we are the bearers of our own night. It is we who produce a darkness so great it drowns out the sun.

It’s a premonition and we need to be prepared.

One day the true opponent will come, the true blade-bearer. He will stand before us as he always has. Visible at last. Determined, calm, his guard down, his face caught in the shadows, slightly turned away.

We’ll know then that, despite all our knowledge of combat, our accumulated savoir-faire,
the skill of always dodging what has always faced us, we won’t be able to avoid this blow.

The blade will come down, black, white, blinding,
Like lightning tearing through a night.

Heddy Maalem

Choreographer – Director and Aïkido teacher in a former life