Aikido is a martial art consisting in harmony of the souls and the body. The original philosophy of aikido is reflected in the approach towards life itself. Aikido is, therefore, broadly considered to be something much more than one of the martial arts. It is said to be a 'war art", without the actual fighting but filled with psychology and philosophy.
The tactics of aikido is about making evasive actions, blocks, lifts, throws, etc… It is the fluency of the motions that makes a well-trained aikido practician a serious opponent, even for a group of attackers. The idea of defending is getting out of the way of the attacker making a sudden turn of the body. The aikido practician does not fight with the attacker… he actually avoids his blows. It enables him to take control over the attacker through depraving him of his balance and power.
The contemporary aikido has been influenced by various martial arts, which have developed and overlapped over the years. It has always been very tightly linked to the culture and customs of the societies. Aikido did reach its final image in the XX but one could easily find its roots in the most ancient times of the history of Japan.
In its masterful image, aikido is not only very effective as self-defence but at the same time, it is also extremely graceful and pleasant to look at. One can stare with enchantment at these very fluent and graceful moves of the Master making it so easy to fight back even the wildest and the harshest attacks.
Aikido is acknowledged to be a very complicated and difficult art. It requires an enormous amount of hard work and long years of exercise before achieving efficiency in self-defence. What is very interesting is that even the greatest Masters after a several years of practice do say that they have only just started their way…