Itten Dojo

The June edition of Sword and Spirit has been posted. In this issue, guest contributor Edward Castillo (Salahuddin Muhammed) Sensei continues his series on dojo culture with “Creating Dilemmas in Martial Arts: Hot to Build Thinkers, Not Just Robots,” a methodology for instructors to “develop students that can thrive under pressure, not just perform under instruction.” This is one of his best-ever essays! Download the newsletter by joining the Sword and Spirit group on Facebook, or directly from our website, at https://www.ittendojo.org/dbfiles/download/swordandspirit/pdf/92. All back issues of Sword and Spirit are available at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/swordandspirit. #ittendojo #japanesemartialartscenter #iaido #jujutsu #judo #shodo

The May edition of Sword and Spirit has been posted. In “Loaded Guns,” Itten Dojo chief instructor Robert Wolfe responds to a recent and entirely unnecessary incident in the judo study group that resulted in injury, citing the fact that while in modern practice martial arts techniques have been “declawed” to make training safer for the general public, the claws have only been retracted, not removed, and are still present just beneath the surface. Download the newsletter by joining the Sword and Spirit group on Facebook, or directly from our website, at https://www.ittendojo.org/dbfiles/download/swordandspirit/pdf/91. All back issues of Sword and Spirit are available at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/swordandspirit. #ittendojo #japanesemartialartscenter #iaido #jujutsu #judo #shodo

The April edition of Sword and Spirit has been posted. In this issue, guest contributor Edward Castillo (Salahuddin Muhammed) Sensei continues his series on dojo culture with an examination of “Pitfalls of Natural Talent.” Download the newsletter by joining the Sword and Spirit group on Facebook, or directly from our website, at https://www.ittendojo.org/dbfiles/download/swordandspirit/pdf/90. All back issues of Sword and Spirit are available at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/swordandspirit. #ittendojo #japanesemartialartscenter #iaido #jujutsu #judo #shodo  

  The March edition of Sword and Spirit has been posted. In “Back to JMAC, Again,” Itten Dojo chief instructor Robert Wolfe reports on our February visit to the Japanese Martial Arts Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan, for an especially intense weekend of training with Suino Sensei and our iaido, jujutsu, and judo sempai. Download the newsletter by joining the Sword and Spirit group on Facebook, or directly from our website, at https://www.ittendojo.org/dbfiles/download/swordandspirit/pdf/89. All back issues of Sword and Spirit are available at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/swordandspirit. #ittendojo #japanesemartialartscenter #iaido #jujutsu #judo #shodo

The February edition of Sword and Spirit has been posted. Guest contributor Edward Castillo (Salahuddin Muhammed) Sensei continues his series on dojo culture with “Dojo Health and the Sempai.” Download the newsletter by joining the Sword and Spirit group on Facebook, or directly from our website, at https://www.ittendojo.org/dbfiles/download/swordandspirit/pdf/88. All back issues of Sword and Spirit are available at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/swordandspirit. #ittendojo #japanesemartialartscenter #iaido #jujutsu #judo #shodo

 A recent post that included video of an old iaido form called “So Makuri” (“Complete Resolution”) garnered a number of disparaging comments on Facebook, such as: “Won’t do much against a pistol.” “Please do tell me how your ( sic ) going to use a sword in a fight with those moves.” The solo forms of Muso Jikiden Eishin-ryu are not really about fighting. The forms are primarily studies in physical structure and the optimal generation and application of internal power, but also include encoded tactical insights from the Edo Period of Japanese history. There are paired forms using wooden swords that preserve the actual fighting techniques of the style — in our line we also do free-sparring with wooden swords to pressure test — and there are armed grappling (jujutsu) techniques, as well. We do tameshigiri (“test-cutting”) with shinken (“live,” i.e., sharpened steel swords). Although practical self-defense in a modern context is not the focus of this type of martial art, I do person...