Take your hand, and see if if there's any part of your body you can't touch with that hand. If you're particularly flexible, you may be able reach almost anywhere, so try to find the most difficult place to reach.
The exact target is immaterial, so long as you really can't reach it. The exercise, though, is to try for all you're worth. Again, if you're flexible, you might have to get creative. Can you reach the back of your neck by reaching under your arm? No? Good.
Let your whole body move, and don't fix your feet to the floor. If you do this correctly, the very act of pushing with the chaser hand will pull the target away. Let yourself become like a dog chasing its tail. Be single-minded and relentless. Be silly and playful.
This is how to be uke in aikido. Commit your whole being to pursuing a goal, even if it continually slips just beyond your grasp. Maintain unwavering focus, but be aware of your surroundings. Push the attack as hard as you can, but not harder, because if you injure or overstrain yourself, you cannot sustain the endeavor.
This is also how to be tori. Let the attack move you. Without thought or stratagem, be moved rationally, logically, and inevitably. Being linked to the attack, there is no push or pull, just a rhythm of alternating compression and tension. Throwing, locking, evading, pinning... these are not even in the equation, except perhaps as side effects.
Uke and tori move as one body. Being one, there is no need even to blend, as blending requires different things coming together. There are different parts involved, but they are parts of a single moving thing. It moves convulsively or with grace and coherence, but it moves as one body, one mind, until body and mind disappear.
However, sometimes the dog actually catches its tail. I don't know if you've actually seen this, but it can be comic to watch. The dog grips its own tail and pulls against it, while the hindquarters strain to free the tail. Movement slows, the dog stumbles, and the system is generally locked.
What motivates movement in the first place is a perceptual kind of chicken-and-egg problem. We generally like to think that the body follows the mind. If the mind is in the brain, then the head moves the body. But I like to make the case that it's a mistake to think of the brain as separate from the rest of the nervous system. In my view, the mind is distributed throughout the body.
A playful dog may notice its own tail wagging and chase it like it's prey. Although part of a distributed system, the brain nevertheless is the central control center. So the head tells the body to chase the tail. But what's informing the brain, if not the tail? Clearly there is a feedback loop where the target (the tail) is leading the leader.
If uke is the head, and tori is the tail, then who or what initiates the encounter? It's uke's decision to attack and close distance to engage, but uke would not do so if no target were perceived. Does this make tori the instigator? In one sense, yes, and in cases where tori is actively provocative, then that sense is made stronger. But it's not always the case that tori is just "asking for it," and motives of hostility are better assigned to the one who manifests the actual aggression.
However, we can philosophically chase our own tails around and around if we bring questions of intentionality into it. I often find it more useful to take the view that we are dealing with systems of attraction and repulsion. If one part is attracted to another part, then movement to close the distance may occur.
If A is attracted to B while B is equally repulsed by A, then interesting things can happen. If B is immovable, then A must be held at some distance in an uneasy equiliibrium. There will be an impasse. On the other hand, if B moves freely, then A's pursuit is the very thing that directs B. Now there is an endless chase, either in a straight line or in a chaotic filigree.
The situation can get even more complicated. Uke (A) may behave as if attracted to tori (B) until within reach, at which point uke may ground their energy and try to exert a pull on tori. In other words, uke reverses polarity. Still, if tori is repulsed (or repulsing) at all times like a magnetic monopole, then not all that much has changed.
If the forces are balanced, then perpetual motion or stasis is achieved and in theory, no harm ever comes to either component. We could almost call this aiki. In practice, the forces are never perfectly balanced, the energy that drives the system has to come from somewhere, and nothing like resolution can be found.
Once again, we are like the dog that has caught its tail, and neither push nor pull frees us from the bind. The Principle of Circularity is not always our friend.
Ideally, we'd like to keep the circle open, as with spirals or curlicues. Then we can at least work with the tendency of energy to run toward a naturally grounded state. When we do find ourselves in a deadlock, we can remember that the head is no more free than the tail, and to relax rather than struggle.
Whenever a dog chases its own tail, it becomes easy for the tail to wag the dog. Both situations, however result in a less that optimal alignment.
When all the parts are in accord, head and shoulders and hips and feet move in synchrony. Power, beauty, speed, elegance and efficiency are not only possible, but likely.
But wait a minute... didn't I start out by saying that you could learn good aikido by pretending to be a dog chasing its tail? And am I not now saying that isn't right, that you should correct your alignment and move like a greyhound unleashed? How could I have gotten myself into such a tangle?
Actually, both assertions encompass the larger truth.
It is true that an attack disrupts an underlying unity, and that systems out of balance can tear themselves apart. In the case where a component in a system might come loose, we have to engineer solutions for keeping the system fail-safe. It's this kind of fail-safe engineering that comprises much of our aikido training.
It's also true that keeping system components aligned and in working order from the outset is better engineering. There should be feedback mechanisms that monitor the balance with instantaneous self-adjusting features built in. Pressure valves, or what-have-you. It's this kind of preemptive engineering that comprises much of our daily lives, with attention to the details of our thoughts, habits, relationships, and larger social structures.
A dog may nick at its tail to bite a flea. In this case it would be great if the tail did not respond as if attacked. A dog may chase its tail for play. In this case it is good if the tail provides healthy sport to promote fitness, sharpen reflexes and perceptions, and yes -- for fun.
The dog that attacks its tail in earnest may be rabid, and beyond intervention. But other forms of madness can be calmed, and it's good if we can keep the poor beast from hurting itself until a remedy is found.
Coming back to my original point, it can be a lot of fun, and there's much to be learned from being both the head of the dog that chases its tail, and the tail that wags the dog. Separate parts playing distinct roles, but always part of the same creature, learning how better to express inescapable oneness.
Still Point Aikido Systems
Austin TX, USA