People often ask about whether Aikido can be used to defend yourself in real life. For me, the value in Aikido practise goes beyond that to where it can be used in situations every day. Often Aikido training helps to avoid confrontations before they escalate.
One such situation comes to mind from a Christmas night out many years ago. But, I have to warn you, this is a bit weird and hard to believe!
I used to work in a team at the HMRC in Glasgow. There were maybe 12 of us and we had went on a Christmas night out.
We ended up at a place called Sloan’s in the centre of Glasgow.
I did not feel comfortable there from the moment we walked in. This is unusual for me. It seems I usually end up in good environments. I like to imagine that as I am always trying to extend positive ki into the world that this leads me to good places to be.
I looked around the room and was aware of a few groups in the pub that seemed like they could be a problem. There were two tables in particular that stood out. One was a table of 3 men that instantly caught my attention. My feeling was that they were looking for a fight. Once again, that is rarely something I sense from people but this night it appeared to be the case.
At one point in the night, one of these men came over to one of my colleagues and began to make fun of him. It seemed like nothing much at first but the man just would not stop and it was clearly starting to intimidate my colleague.
Funnily enough, a few weeks before I had been in an almost identical situation with my friend Gareth in a chip shop. In that scenario Gareth had had a really bad day and a man in the chip shop starting to make fun of him out of the blue (despite the fact that Gareth is 6’3 and built like a rugby player). Clearly Gareth was not comfortable but was not sure who to respond.
I sensed that in that situation, the man did not have violent intentions. I calmly walked over to him and asked him politely but firmly not to continue to pick on my friend as he had not had a good day. The man apologised and said he did not mean to cause offence. We accepted the apology and it went no further.
I remember that Gareth told me that he thought the man would have retalitated and become violent. But I could feel that he did not have that intention at all despite his behaviour. In Aikido training, we aim to “know our partner’s mind”.
Back to Sloan’s…
I considered intervening in a similar way in the situation at Sloan’s but this time it seemed to me this would almost certainly lead to a confrontation. This man was looking for any excuse and could explode any minute it seemed.
I decided to try an unusual experiment.
I stood at he bar and decided to visualise that I was extending ki into the room. This was not something I had ever really tried before but for some reason the idea came to me in that moment.
I must have stood there for a few minutes doing this and who knows what people around me thought.
Well, you may or may not believe this but after a while I looked up and noticed that the feeling in the room had completely changed.
The 3 men that seemed like they were looking for a fight had disappeared and never returned that night. Not only that but the other table that seemed to be upsetting the atmosphere of the room had also gone.
Perhaps that was just a coincidence? Or maybe our ki does have an influence on the people and the environments around us.
If that is the case, we should always be careful in what energy we are sending out there. We should endeavour to keep sending out our positive intentions and positive ki into the world.
Aikido For Glasgow 