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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nAs you can imagine, my circumstances force me to be highly selective with what courses I attend. It would be great to go to them all but I simply can\u2019t. At my current level (5th<\/sup> dan) attending courses is non-optional. I need to get on the mats with people that are better than me to keep learning. This means that I need to go to courses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I first started going to them I went to as many as I could. I quickly realised though that this was a wasted endeavour. While I always learned something from every course I learned a lot more in some than others. It was time to be more cautious, so I started doing some stuff that became a standard system for me. Over the years this helped to maximise my return on investment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find out if the person is legitimate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are a lot of fake people out there and they bill themselves as professionals. They are in it for the money and usually lack anything but the most basic of skill. Training with them would be a complete waste of resources. Conveniently this is often very easy to determine, especially in aikido. You can usually tell from the seminar advert whether or not the person is a fraud. It tends to be fairly obvious, i.e. 6th<\/sup> dans that look to be 25; holding a sword with a poor grip; that kind of thing. In fairness I would point out that I have seen very little of this in aikido.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is their base style and does it differ significantly from mine?<\/p>\n\n\n\n In terms of lineage the closest thing I could say about my style is that it stems a lot from Tohei and in some ways from O Sensei himself (one of my teachers was Alan Ruddock, an Irishman who trained extensively with O Sensei in the 1960s). As fun as it is to go to Shodokan, Yoshinkan, etc. courses, it\u2019s so different that I get very little out of it. If the seminar style is very different to mine I just don\u2019t go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Have I heard of this person?<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are some aikidoka out there that are extremely well known. They are well known because they are very good. Often times it is worth attending their seminar regardless of style. For instance, Donovan Waite is considered to be an excellent teacher. Although his style is quite different to mine I did pick up some teaching tips from watching how rather than what he was teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another aspect of training with these individuals is that, strangely, it can lend legitimacy by association. It\u2019s strange, but true. People mentally adjust their opinion when they find you\u2019ve been to courses by \u2018x\u2019 person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This step is very loose in my process. It will more likely inform the other steps than be a make or break decision. Just because I have, or have not, heard of someone is no guarantee I\u2019ll turn up. If I haven\u2019t heard of them the next step becomes much more important. If I have heard of them chances are I\u2019ve already carried out Step 4 and can decide if I want to go or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What do they actually do on the mats?<\/p>\n\n\n\nStep 1<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Step 2<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Step 3<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Step 4<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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