Shintaido of America Podcast

9. “Discovering the world of true natural body movement”

Episode 9 focuses on Aoki’s research into what constitutes truly natural movement. He identifies qualities of movement common to master craftsmen, babies, and ancient Buddhist statues and describes how he used these observations as criteria for testing the naturalness and effectiveness of many traditional martial arts techniques. This led to the signature gesture of Shintaido, the wide-open hand with palm and fingers stretched and extended. In combination with other hand positions such as a tight fist or a completely relaxed hand, the open hand was integrated into the holistic training system that was to be named “Shintaido.”
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
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We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 
 

8. “The locus of one swing of the sword is a sign”

Aoki criticizes the many 20th-century martial artists who cooperated with the Japanese government during World War II, and finds clues in his own experience of karate clubs where “…the philosophy is very lofty, but the actual practice borders on sadism.” He questions whether many martial arts suffer from “a divorce between spiritual explanation and actual conditions.”
He describes his response in the development of Shintaido: “I tried to remove all spiritual gloss until we could reach a ‘zero point’ … Finally the day came when the meaning of all techniques became zero for me…”
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
🔴 Follow Shintaido of America on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. 
🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 
 

7. “Putting the art back into the martial arts”

If ancient movement arts—if we widen our focus beyond martial arts to include, for example, traditional Japanese Noh theater or tea ceremony—if these ways of movement are not just “museum pieces” but are still relevant for us today as contemporary, living systems of physical training; then we might ask if they should be not just revived or preserved, but somehow re-invented. Aoki explains his goals in the process of inventing Shintaido, as he writes:“By using body movement, we could regain a measure of the genuine communication which has almost disappeared from our lives, and at the same time, repair our bodies and minds from the damaging effects of modern civilization.…“After retracing the last three hundred years of martial arts history, I concluded that just as modern art had to be created in its own historical context, the martial arts could be adapted to modern conditions, and the forms and movements would be completely different from the traditional styles.“…[T]he simple study of classical methods never produces a new way of expression. One cannot be an Andy Warhol merely by practicing drawing for a prescribed amount of time. Similarly, I did not limit my study to karate and the other martial arts in this limited way.”The purpose of Shintaido, as Aoki summarizes it, is “…not to preserve old classical forms and transmit them to succeeding generations,” but to use “…a body movement or the martial arts to examine the conditions of our own age.”
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
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🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 
 

6. “An ancient sword master expands space-time”

“The sword technique of Hariyaga Sekiun: expanding time, space, and energy.” Sekiun’s approach, influenced by Zen, was to strip away occult practices and pre-conceived responses to an attack. Rather than winning, his school emphasized unification with one’s opponent at the instant just before the start of the fight, a moment called ainuke, which Aoki interprets as pathway to sacredness. This, and Sekiun’s concept of nyuwamubyoshi, or soft, rhythmless movement, transcend the world-view of traditional martial arts. Aoki concludes by imploring contemporary martial artists living in democratic societies to move beyond conventional attitudes, to express their opinions, and to confront social and environmental problems.
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
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🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

5. “The martial arts and the evolution of consciousness”

“The martial arts and the history of the evolution of consciousness.” It traces developments through the history of ancient Japanese martial arts from the simplest weapons to the peak classical achievements of the 16th century, after which a dramatic change was spurred by the introduction of the rifle on the battlefields of medieval Japan. From then onward, technological developments in warfare branched off in one direction, leading to the atomic bomb and other inventions. The other branch of martial arts was nurtured by periods of peace when the samurai turned to meditation, calligraphy, tea ceremony, and other art forms. The warrior’s ‘combat’ in the spiritual world grew into the samurai philosophy of living perfectly up to the moment of death.
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
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🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

4. “How is a karate master like a symphonic conductor?”

Imagine that you are watching a group of dancers, or martial artists, moving in synchronization, the group naturally breathing as one, timing synchronized to the microsecond, but not with military rigidity — they are moving with the naturalness and grace a school of fish or a flock of birds. The scene shifts to a classical orchestra, each section and each musician contributing a part, which the conductor weaves together into a spectacular whole.
Part of Aoki’s inspiration in Shintaido was gained through the perspiration as master Egami’s disciple, leading karate training in his school. The choreographer, the orchestral conductor, and the karate master all share something in common: the ability to “orchestrate” group activity, to give “gorei” (号令). Aoki describes his experience leading classes in the Shotokai karate training hall: “Once I started to lead the whole class using a gorei, I was never allowed to break my concentration even for a second.”
In Shintaido, the aim of the leader has shifted away from preparing the participants for combat, and has moved much closer to that of the choreographer or conductor: letting the individual talent of each person shine, while contributing positively to the life of the whole.
Under Egami’s direction, Aoki also immersed himself in the classical kata of karate, researching and documenting them in detail. But his goals lay beyond the preservation of a great tradition. “The difficult task of collecting these karate kata continued,” writes Aoki, “as well as my study of other body movements. Eventually, this all blossomed into Tenshingoso (the Five Cosmic Breaths), …which became the first basic technique (or kata) of Shintaido.”
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
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🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

3. “Meeting karate master Egami-sensei”

Before Shintaido was created decades ago, its founder, Hiroyuki Aoki, was a young student of drama and visual art. It was only by accident — when his acting teacher suggested that he should study karate to improve his acting skills — that he met karate master Shigeru Egami. Aoki’s artistic approach to body movement gave impetus to the discipline that eventually became Shintaido.“As a lover of music and art, I also wanted Shintaido to have the same value as the works of Bach or Mozart in music, or as the works of Michelangelo, Cezanne or Picasso in the world of art, or as the great works of literature.… The philosophy of these artists in the modern period is as familiar to most Japanese as boiled rice and miso soup.”
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
🔴 Follow Shintaido of America on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. 
🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America!
We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

2. ”What is Shintaido?”

“As a mood or feeling, Shintaido is more religious and artistic than scientific. It is more emotional and primitive than rational,” writes Shintaido’s founder, Hiroyuki Aoki. “It involves cooperation more than competition in its movements. But it is cooperation that emphasizes individual expression, rather than passive group enjoyment.… Shintaido cannot be understood by trying to pigeon-hole it into traditional or popular categories such as martial arts, gymnastics, health fads, or religion.”The difficulty of creating an art that overcomes barriers to mutual understanding is something Aoki understands well. Shintaido grows from the soil of Japan’s ancient traditions, but it is not necessary to “turn Japanese” to master it. A child of the 1960s, Shintaido speaks to an international audience and invites everyone to experience movement that is not “…constrained by tense shoulders, …[and] clenched fists, but rather one in which our hands and bodies are open to our partner and our neighbor in a gesture of respect, forgiveness and acceptance.” Thinking about body movement this way, it is easier to see how Shintaido, although born from the masters of the samurai tradition, may be closer in spirit to master artists such as Gauguin or William Blake.
🔴 More info about the episode and the podcast here.
🔴 Follow Shintaido of America on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. 
🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America! We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

Trailer to season 1

Welcome to Shintaido of America podcast! Shintaido is a unique combination of martial arts and body movement that cultivates the spirit along with the mind and body. It has been called a moving meditation. In Japanese, Shintaido means “new body way.” Shintaido’s forms exemplify openness and freedom. The movements of Shintaido provide a new way of experiencing our relationship with ourselves, others, nature, and the spiritual world.🔴More info about the episode and the podcast here🔴 Follow Shintaido of America on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube 🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America! We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast. 

1. “The atom bomb inspires an avant-garde martial art”

Hiroyuki Aoki, the founder of Shintaido, has been called a “pioneer,” and the discipline he created with the Rakutenkai group in the 1960s has been called “an avant-garde martial art.” As children, Aoki and members of the group experienced the bombing of Japan during World War Two, and many lost family members to the atomic bomb. But even as the technology of war continued to increase its destructive power, these young people dove deep into the traditional fighting techniques of Japanese martial arts to transform the essence of these ancient teachings into a movement discipline for modern society.
As one of Aoki’s students, Michael Thompson, writes: “Shintaido contains elements of the martial arts which appear violent and meditation which is quite calm and peaceful. They are not any more mutually exclusive than the two hemispheres of our brain.”
Another of Aoki’s students, Haruyoshi Ito, writes: “The more violence is turned into a form of spiritual garbage through misunderstanding and suppression, the more virulent is its odor when the cap blows off and it is finally released…”
Mr Aoki’s aim in founding the Rakutenkai group was to seek creative solutions to the psychological, interpersonal, and ecological challenges of violence. Along the way, they invented an amazing system of training for both body and mind that can benefit everyone, regardless of age, gender, or physical condition.
This is the story of the body movement discipline they created in answer to the challenges of modernity: Shintaido, the “new body way.”🔴More info about the episode and the podcast here🔴 Follow Shintaido of America on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube 🔴 Donate to Shintaido of America! We are a non-profit organization depending on loads of volunteer work yet some tasks require more than that. With your support, we are able to progress in our activities, create more educational materials and work on innovative projects such as this podcast.