By Régis Soavi Why talk about life force while the topic seems old-fashioned (it is considered today as a kind of ideological remnant from the 60’s), or remains apparently in the privileged field of a small quantity of people looking for mysterious effects? If physical force remains for many reasons and in many cases an … Continue reading Life Force
by Régis Soavi “Non-fighting” is not the same as refusing to fight, in the same way that “non-doing” is never the same as “doing-nothing”. Understanding life in its most unusual, most upsetting, most incongruous and sometimes apparently most incomprehensible manifestations is perhaps the real fight to be carried. Practising Aikido and returning to the origins … Continue reading Legitimising Fighting or Understanding Life
by Régis Soavi In our relationship with the dojo, we often deal with Reishiki (etiquette). From our first contact with martial arts, as soon as we enter a dojo, we see people bowing very respectfully at the entrance and then greeting each other, or sometimes heading towards the kamiza after picking up a weapon. Every … Continue reading Reishiki: A Musical Score
While no single practice is obviously a ready-made solution to the situation we are experiencing [March 2020 lockdown], continuing a daily practice often helps us to hold our inner course and keep our balance in an unstable situation full of unknowns. The practical philosophy taught by Itsuo Tsuda is also a path to rediscovering our … Continue reading Holding One’s Course
by Manon Soavi Our world is sick with violence (whether physical, verbal, psychological, symbolic, social, economic, etc.), sick with a dominant model based on competition, appropriation and fear that has been in place for centuries. From the powerful who own the world to our entertainment and media, violence is everywhere. The world often leaves us … Continue reading The World We Live In
by Régis Soavi Seitai: philosophy or therapy? ‘Seitai deals, above all, with the individual in his or her individuality, and not with an average person created out of statistics. Life itself is invisible, but in manifesting itself in individuals, it creates an infinite variety of different combinations.’ (Tsuda Itsuo) Seitai 整体, and its corollary … Continue reading To Live Seitai
by Régis Soavi Nowadays it seems that the meaning of the word “pride” has become misleadingly loaded, and pride has almost become a major flaw in certain classes of society. The word “proud” is wrongly used to define “someone who believes themselves to be superior to others and shows it by their behaviour”, when in … Continue reading Humble, Yes, But Proud of Yourself
Interview of Régis Soavi about Katsugen Undō (or Regenerating Movement), a practice made by Noguchi Noguchi and spread in Europe by Itsuo Tsuda. Article by Monica Rossi publisehd in the review Arti d’Oriente (#4, May 2000). Part 1 ‘After reading the books of Tsuda Itsuo (1914-1984), I was fascinated by his arguments, which range … Continue reading Hello Illness #1
continuation of #1 The Idea of the Body in Japanese Culture and its Dismantlement by Hiroyuki Noguchi, published in 20041 Part 2/4 Perceiving Life in All Things Among the policies of Westernization that drove the disassembly of traditional Japanese culture was the calendar change, issued in 1873. With this, the Meiji government decided to … Continue reading #2 The Idea of the Body in Japanese Culture and its Dismantlement
An interview with Régis Soavi. Our appointment is at 6:45 AM, in Milan’s Chinese quarter. The place: a former garage, transformed into a traditional, spartan-looking dojo where, once inside, you are told gently but firmly to remove your shoes. The participants arrive little by little, sleepy-faced; they murmur their greetings as though reluctant to disturb … Continue reading Simple as Breath
by Régis Soavi In almost all dōjōs, it is customary to refer to the few exercises that precede a class as “preparation” or “warm-up”. But what if it were not gymnastics, nor physical education, but something else entirely! Tsuda sensei wrote that his master, Ueshiba Morihei, was furious when, even back then, and although he … Continue reading The “Respiratory Practice”
by Régis Soavi One of the great strengths of aikidō lies in its high degree of mobility and its rotational movements. These movements create spirals that generate a combination of centripetal and, their counterpart, centrifugal forces, forming an invisible shape that is constantly unfolding: the sphere. Techniques that use a rear attack provide the clearest … Continue reading Mobility and Body Awareness
The story begins with the publication of Manon Soavi’s book in 2022. Unless… it actually began on 8 December 1967! On that day, Paris publisher Gallimard released Raoul Vaneigem’s The Revolution of Everyday Life. Vaneigem was a writer (now the author of some fifty books), philosopher and historian specialising in heresy. An anarchist and Situationist, … Continue reading For an Alchemy of The Self
by Manon Soavi When we talk about self-mastery, the first image that usually comes to mind is that of an individual rising to mastery, to unalterable calm. Those who are masters of themselves are detached individuals, dominating their passions and emotions much as one dominates nature and subordinate beings. Seen in this light, self-mastery is … Continue reading Contemplating The Sound of The World
by Manon Soavi Tsuda Itsuo sensei said, ‘There is no black belt in mental emptiness’, emphasising that what is essential cannot be measured or compared. Following this line of thinking, Régis Soavi sensei made the radical choice in the 1980s to establish a school without grades. This choice stands out in our competition-based society. An … Continue reading Without Fixed Reference, A School Without Grades
by Manon Soavi Max Stirner wrote in 1844: ‘there are […] intellectual vagabonds to whom the ancestral home of their fathers seems too cramped and oppressive for them to be willing to content themselves with the limited space anymore ; instead of staying within the bounds of a moderate way of thinking, and taking as … Continue reading External Things are Neither Certain Nor Necessary
by Manon Soavi Ikebana master Mei Ando Keiko recounts how, as a child, she would watch her grandmother practising her art: ‘I saw her take two leaves from the plant and place them in front of the tokonoma, on a perfectly ironed white cloth where a small number of other plants were already arranged. Then … Continue reading The Art of Dissatisfaction
by Manon Soavi Everyone experiences fear to varying degrees, but we do not all experience the same fears, and when we talk about fear in general terms, we tend to refer to it in masculine terms. While fear is obviously not exclusive to women, there are specific aspects to female fear in our world, and … Continue reading Between Submission and Rage: Fear
The event surrounding the publication of Itsuo Tsuda’s book Calligraphies de Printemps [Spring Calligraphies] was held on 18 and 19 November 2017 at Dojo Tenshin in Paris. The audience was able to enjoy nearly 100 reproductions of Itsuo Tsuda’s calligraphies and discover the 468-page book. A look back in video, images… and text! Presentation by … Continue reading Itsuo Tsuda Spring Calligraphies
[Apr. 23] Interview with Manon Soavi for the publication of Itsuo Tsuda, The Anarchist Master — The Art of Living Utopia, published by L’Originel (Obernai, France). By Louise Vertigo, on AligreFM radio programme Respirations, 17 February 2023 broadcast live. Listen to the podcast here [in French] or read the [English] transcript below: Would you … Continue reading The Path of Itsuo Tsuda – Interview With Manon Soavi
When Tsuda Itsuo returned to France in the early 1970s, he wanted to build a bridge between East and West, to introduce this culture so different from his own to what he himself had discovered through his research on ‘ki’: ways to awaken sensitivity and rediscover inner freedom. He saw in Aikidō, which he practised … Continue reading In Complete Autonomy – Yuki Hô dojo
by Manon Soavi Did you know that Morihei Ueshiba, one of the greatest budoka of the 20th century, would shout angrily whenever he saw his students practising: ‘No one here is doing aikido! Only the women are doing aikido!’? How could a Japanese man with a traditionalist view of the family and the place of … Continue reading Fukiko Sunadomari and the Women Erased from History
The search for inner freedom in the practice of Aikidō and Seitai by Andrea Quartino Restrictions on freedom of movement are easing [May 2020 lockdown], although the timing and manner remain uncertain. For those who practise Aikidō in a dojo of the Itsuo Tsuda School, the day when they will be able to resume … Continue reading I Go Rediscovering Freedom
Spring Calligraphies is the first monograph devoted to the calligraphic work of philosopher and writer Itsuo Tsuda, bringing together 113 calligraphies and the research we have been able to conduct to date. To mark its publication, an exhibition based on the photos in the book will be held at Tenshin Dojo in Paris on November … Continue reading Spring Calligraphies, Thirty Years of History
by Régis Soavi It is undoubtedly certainties that cause the most harm in the practice of martial arts, as they often stem from thinking that has become stuck in patterns that others have tried and tested in the past. By keeping doubt at bay, we confine ourselves to a familiar world that is certainly reassuring, … Continue reading Living Without Certainty or Uncertainty
by Régis Soavi ‘If I have to give my Aikido a goal, it will be to learn to sit, stand up, move forward and backward.’ Tsuda I. Movement: coordination, posture To move correctly, you need to be stable, and stability issues cannot be resolved through learning. Stability must come from balance, which itself comes from … Continue reading At the Core of Movement – the Involuntary
by Régis Soavi ‘Ki belongs to the realm of feeling, not to that of knowledge.’. Tsuda Itsuo As soon as you mention ki, you are dismissed as a mystic, a kind of crackpot: ‘It’s not scientific; no instrument or machine is capable of proving or demonstrating that ki exists.’ I completely agree. Indeed, if we … Continue reading Ki, a Dimension in its Own Right
It all started on an ordinary afternoon in my neighbourhood of Blanc-Mesnil in the “93” département. It was an altercation like many others, but that day, I found myself pinned down by a boy who was banging my head against the pavement and saying, ‘I’m going to kill you, I’m going to kill you.’ I … Continue reading Fear
He was born in Ueno, a district of Tōkyō, in September 1911. It all began at the age of three or four when he was surprised to find that he had relieved someone’s toothache simply by placing his hands on them. He was a child, and his hands moved toward the target without him realising … Continue reading Haruchika Noguchi
Part 2 of an article written in 1993 by Noguchi Hiroyuki. Translated from the Japanese by the Itsuo Tsuda School. Sequel (and end) of Part 1. 2. The principles of Dōhō and katas If we seek to understand the logic of the principles of Dōhō, katas will arise naturally. Dōhō and kata form a pair, … Continue reading #2 Dôhô and Internal Body Awareness
