Go and Aikido

    Keywords: Culture & History

On this page, people who have practiced both Go and Aikido, can relate of their experiences.


Dieter: Aikido has been my only and short experience with oriental martial arts. I've found a big similarity in the state of mind you need to excel at either art. In the West, we tend to equate a quiet mind with passivity and equate aggressive action with anger. The spirit behind Aikido and probably martial arts in general is to reach a peaceful mind in order to do what is necessary, be it attack or defense.

When a westerner starts with Go, he will often equate the call for kiai (fighting spirit) with the act of wildly fighting about. The skilled Go master will calmly return his rage. That's the kind of wrong interpretation we have heard before, but I have encountered at least as often the western player who thinks that a calm state of mind is reflected by lame moves that accomplish nothing but reinforcing alive groups. The skilled Go master will calmly take control of the larger area. This is more of a surprise to the romantic seeker of Eastern values. It reminded me of an Aikido lesson where my teacher asked me to hit him on the head. I brought my arm down to stop right above his head. He smiled and said: if you do not attack me, I don't have to defend myself. I want to show you how to defend, so please hit me on the head.

So, I learnt that you should reach a calm mind in order to be sharp at the execution of what is necessary. Kill a group for instance, if that's what the situation calls for. Anger and blood thirst will blur the reading skill and the strategic vision. Fear and laziness too.


DJ: Dieter, thx for writing this words of beauty, I cannot agree more.

I practised intensively Aikido for about one year, long ago (I also tried a little Yai-do, the Art of unsheating the sword, but Aikido remains my favourite). I even published an extensive article on Go on the Italian Aikido magazine...

It was there that I fully appreciated the oriental way of teaching: no unnecessary words, the Sensei acts, and you repeat and repeat, trying your best. Still today my favourite way to study Go is to go through professional games - I do some problems every now and then, but mostly I love to see pro at work, trying to understand their ways, either in the Fuseki or in the infighting: besides improving your go, it is like listening to a symphony.

But in general I think the aim of Go is different from that of Martial Arts, although purely defensive ones as Aikido. After all in Go you just need to have one more point...


Jared: I studied Aikido many years ago. Ai Ki Do means Way of Harmonious Energy (litterally). Harmony between attacker and defender's energy on the practice mat is the same as harmony on the goban.


Bildstein: I haven't played enough Go or studied martial arts for long enough to make me an expert in either, but some would say that to master either art you must stop thinking in terms of "winning", perhaps concentrating instead on concepts like "correct" or "effective".

Jared: See Selfless Go


This is a copy of the living page "Go and Aikido" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2009 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.
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