Mitsugi Saotome 五月女貢 (p.1/2)

Mitsugi Saotome (五月女貢 Saotome Mitsugi) (born March 7, 1937) is a Japanese aikido teacher currently living in the United States.
Mitsugi Saotome is a master in the martial art of aikido and is a direct disciple of the founder of aikido, Morihei Ueshiba.
At the age of 16, Saotome began his martial arts training in judo. At the age of 18, he entered the Aikikai Hombu Dojo in Tokyo in order to train under Ueshiba. He became an uchi-deshi in 1958 and trained there for fifteen years until his teacher's death in 1969.
Saotome began teaching at the Aikikai Hombu Dojo in 1960. He was very well respected as an instructor, receiving many honors. He obtained the title of shihan and ultimately was appointed a senior instructor. He held that position until 1975.
At this time Saotome began to give great thought and meditation as to his future purpose. After many days of consideration, he was said to have felt the hand of divine spiritual intervention. This was instrumental in his decision to relocate to the United States. He felt that the US was at a point of development that embraced new ideas, and that this would be an ideal environment to spread the message of peace and harmony implicit in the study of aikido.
When asked about his decision to move to the US, Saotome said "I meditated on Ōsensei's spirit for three days and three nights and I felt it was his wish that I should go. This country is a great experiment, a melting pot of people from many different cultural backgrounds living together, the world condensed into one nation. The goal of aikido and Ōsensei's dream is that all the peoples of the world live together as one family, in harmony with each other and with their environment. The United States has the opportunity to set a great example."
After relocating to the US, Saotome founded an organization known as Aikido Schools of Ueshiba. He continues to serve as chief instructor for the organization, which has rejoined the Aikikai and resumed its association with Hombu Dojo.
Saotome is especially skilled in the use of traditional Japanese weapons, including the wooden staffs jo and bo, and the wooden sword bokken. He has also developed a system for working with two swords in aikido. Saotome feels that learning the movements and skills associated with proficiency in these weapons not only increases speed and agility, but harmony with one's partner. Grace and perfection are very important since a single accidental blow with one of these 'practice' weapons can be excruciatingly painful. Since aikido emphasizes harmony between oneself and the universe, respect for one's partner is very important. The consequences of your techniques are immediately obvious and intense concentration and training should ultimately lead one to a controlled and harmonious interaction.
Mitsugi Saotome currently resides in the state of Florida in the US. He continues to teach at the Aiki Shrine Dojo in Myakka City, Florida, but spends approximately 6 weeks each year teaching at the Aikido Shobukan Dojo, the home dojo of the Aikido Schools of Ueshiba in Washington, DC. He also travels extensively, teaching seminars throughout the US.
Saotome has also written three books on Aikido: Aikido and the Harmony of Nature, The Principles of Aikido, Aikido: Living By Design and produced a collection of videos demonstrating various techniques, including a video on the two-sword technique.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• Mitsugi
• Saotome
• 五月女貢
• hadronica
• paburo
• aikido

[ChuckerThe1]

@kbub8

Not dangerous so much as making sure Uke is giving an honest attack. Saotome Sensei has great control. But yes i agree, would be a great challenge to take ukemi from Saotome Sensei

[thkun33]

Very great demonstration. Pity that I am not his student

[silviaikidoka]

Saotome Sensei is a real model for me. I read The Principles of Aikido. It is really inspiring. I wanted to make it more popular and did some readings from it on my youtube channel! Feel free to drop by and listen to them in my The Voice of Aikido Playlist.

[kbub8]

Tough to uke to this guy... he's seems pretty dangerous for one thing. Very samurai, very cool. Kudos.

[Aiglos]

@dtorfleming i would also add the possibility that it keeps uke honest in that he doesn't know if he's going to have his hand shaken or have a technique applied to him. lol At least that's what I see happening in addition to your point.

[dtorfleming]

@kbub8

The handshake is a demonstration that doing the unexpected can stop the attack. It is natural to shake an offered hand and hard to attack someone who is trying to be friendly.

[kbub8]

What's with the handshake? Is he telling uke to slow down or stop?

[lucianoestivill]

@ROA9274 No es nada mi amigo, el agradecido soy yo por permitir intercambiar opiniones en un ámbito de total respeto, algo que hace falta en los tiempos que corren, sobre todo en youtube. Muchas Gracias ROA9274.

[ROA9274]

Interesantes sus opiniones, gracias por los comentarios

[lucianoestivill]

@ROA9274 Eso sí: el tema de los videos, es siempre un tema controversial pues nadie cree que un combate real es como se ve en los videos. Pero tampoco lo que se ve en los videos de Karate o Krav Maga es real.

Lo que se ve acá son aproximaciones al encarar una práctica básica. El entrenamiento "real" de Saotome es muy distinto. Pero por expresa orden del Sensei, NO HAY videos ni fotos de como sacar un Koshinage al recibir una patada alta, por dar un ejemplo. Lo mejor NO ESTA en videos. Creeme.