10/11/2026
Outside of Senshin Center, at all the dojo I have trained in since 1986, I have always found there to be at least one as***le, usually more, and at least one weirdo, usually more. I have never found a dojo 100% populated by caring, serving, respectful, and compassionate people until Senshin Center. To the modern Aikidoka, this may seem like an irrelevant statistic, but they would be wrong. They are wrong because the art, including the modern one, always pays lip-service to its ability to cultivate the spirit and to develop character. If it is doing such, why all the as***les and weirdos?
I recall one day I was attending a federation Shihan seminar at a different Shihan's dojo. Because of the mind manipulation that had capitalized upon the predominantly gullible disposition of its target audience, allowing said audience to confuse rank and title with skill and allowing them to ignore how poor a training environment the federite seminar truly is, the mat was crowded: Federites wall-to-wall. As such, people came from different Uke systems of choreography, different dance troupes, and after a while I could feel on the other side of the mat an energy being charged.
It was the energy that happens when cognitive dissonance arises and belief preservation efforts are about to fail - what happens when a Nage's delusion that he had been moving Uke (instead of Uke moving himself) is about to be exposed, which occurs when another Uke from a different dance troupe is trained to respond to different behavioral cues and so does not respond "correctly." Because part of Modern Aikido choreography is hiding it from oneself (when Uke) and keeping it from being overtly revealed to Nage - because unhiding it destroys the fantasy, in the same way a sexual partner destroys a role-playing fe**sh fantasy by jumping out of character - this energy that was brewing on the other side of the mat was both ontologically and epistemologically charged! Reality and the reality of self were both at stake!
Subsequently, two so-called practitioners of the art of peace - both Yudansha with teaching licenses - began fighting each other over one person not faking the art in the right way and/or not faking the art enough. In said fighting, the two ego-defenders adopted not the tactics of mid-range grappling (e.g. Aikido) and/or the first principle of the art - non-contestation - but instead wildly threw multiple punches and shoved each other into other uninvolved people and ultimately into a wall: There, they were broken up. For such, they received no public rebuke, nor did their Shihan teachers, they received no demotions, no rescinding of their teaching licenses. Instead, they were merely separated and allowed to continue attending the seminar: The attendees were not addressed in any way; no discussion or learning opportunity from this obvious deviation from the art took place. Everything continued on as if nothing had happened.
Senshin Center's 100% as***le-free/weirdo-free mat is not the luck of the draw. This is a systematic ongoing process that many had access to witnessing just the other week, when a dojo guest acted disrespectfully and inappropriately - which resulted in his immediate expulsion and banning from the training group, etc. As a systematic effort, yes, the dojocho has to be someone willing and capable of keeping the mat a pure space, one free of as***les and weirdos. However, what is really at the heart of it all is that the dojocho holds and keeps the first principle of Budo: The art has a spiritual aspect to it; and, that said spiritual aspect shows up and is made visible in one's character.
This is what was absent from the lineage and the dojo and the practitioners mentioned above, and this is why the as***les and weirdos were on the mat in the first place. It is clear from such that for federites, the art is clearly some sort of worldly or mundane physical thing only: It is something you do, and it is not something you are. This should be obvious to all, first, because their proposed idea that doing exercise can lead to character and/or spiritual development through sympathetic magic is ludicrous. But, it is also obvious in why the mat is not 100% filled by caring, serving, respectful, and compassionate people - why there are always one or more as***les and weirdos. And, it is obvious in why the as***les and weirdos are not immediately called out, publicly rebuked, forced to suffer negative consequences, and/or immediately expelled. None of this happens because for Modern Aikido, the art - a purely physical thing - CAN BE practiced with an immature spiritual and despite having a character free of emotional and/or social intelligence. The first principle - the art can only be practiced by the spiritually mature - is rejected. Instead, the federite shouts, "As****es, weirdos, serial killers, child abusers, murderers, thieves, liars, drug addicts, etc., can all jog, and so they can all do Aikido."
Voilà! Now you know why modern Aikido has no internal aspects, does not regularly train in live environments, and opts to Yang/Yang Clash and choreograph Uke instead of adopting non-contestation as a tactical priority. For these are all things that cannot be done without the ability to unself, without spiritual maturity.
