“Just this past Wednesday I had the honor of having the night’s class taught by Mary Heiny Sensei, 6th Dan. Her site can be viewed here. But as a brief introduction of her she is one of the few (if not the only) high ranking female instructor of Aikido in the world who studied with O’Sensei. She also studied extensively with Michio Hikisuchi, 10th Dan for a while after his passing.
I’m sure it is the same with other martial arts but it’s always interesting to see women instructors do their thing. Let me give you a short discussion on what I have noticed about women instructors – and women Aikidoka in general.”
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Soft hands, strong hara further reflect this spiritual equilibrium good manners and reasonable behaviours that refrain from unseemly arguments and thereby not inflaming unnecessary conflict.
“There’s a famous quote from Musashi Miyamoto’s Book of Five Rings:
The article below has been selected from the 
“The more I have entered into this quasi social networking blogasphere I have come to realize that there are plenty of the more esoteric karateka that seemed to have divorced themselves from the notion that the end goal of any martial art is to ultimately defend oneself! I mean on the one hand it is good that one has the option to fight or not in today’s society but are we in danger of losing sight of the prize?”
I wanted to update those of you who are on our newsletter mailing list and have not received anything for the last several days. By way of explanation, the ISP hosting our mailing server was recently bought out by another firm and the new company relocated to a different area. Our dedicated mail server was shutdown without notice.
The article below with Aikido Founder Morihei Ueshiba and his son, Second Doshu Kisshomaru Ueshiba, has been selected from the 
“I saw a translation of the Tao Te Ching (道德經) naming the Tao (道) as the Great Integrity. In my engineering experience the word integrity means ability to withhold structural properties. The Cambridge dictionary definition of integrity refers to the quality of being whole and complete, or the state of being unimpaired. In mechanical engineering we also stress the importance of structural integrity. In any kind of construction, we combine materials together to complete a working whole. And this working whole must withstand outside stresses being applied. If the bridge you are standing on is unable to hold its structural integrity, the whole would break apart and the bridge might crack or worse collapse.”
The article below written by International Aikido Federation Chairman Peter Goldsbury has been selected from the 
“In 1994 a movie based on a 1986 novel of the same name by Winston Groom hit the big screens. The movie? Forrest Gump.
Today I had a big surprise waiting for me. One of Aikido Journal’s Facebook fans was kind enough to send me the following link of a Japanese-language movie whose English title is: 
“Next to The Art of War by Sun Tzu, The 36 Strategies is the most widely known Chinese book on strategy. Where AoW is almost a textbook like overview of the subject, The 36 Strategies attempts to teach the general concepts of strategy with six groups of six maxims each.