Gerhard Walter (Aikidoka)

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Gerhard Walter (* 1944) is a high-ranking German Aikido teacher ( Shihan ). He has the 8th Dan in Aikido and is a board member of the Federal Association of Aikido Teachers .

Life

At the age of 20, Gerhard Walter turned to Zen and Aikido. He began to train Aikido with Katsuaki Asai , who came to West Germany from Japan in 1965, and took his first Dan exams with him . Through Asai he came into contact with other high-ranking Shihans of Aikido in Europe such as Hiroshi Tada and Masamichi Noro , with whom he trained as Uchi deshi in Paris . In 1968 he made his first Zen sesshin at Nagaya Roshi and visited in Paris Zen Dojo of Taisen Deshimaru Roshi .

To deepen his experience in Aikido and Zen, he went to Japan in 1974, where he met the Aikido master Tōhei Kōichi and trained Aikido with Seigo Yamaguchi in the Aikikai Hombu Dojo , which significantly shaped his Aikido style. During his stays in Japan, he lived in Kamakura and practiced zazen with the Zen master Yamada Roshi . He later became a lay monk at the Zen monastery of Harada Roshi near Kyoto, which he was able to leave for aikido courses and his work as an aikido teacher. The encounter with Karlfried Graf Dürckheim in the 1970s was significant for his therapeutic work with Zen . He has been running his own aikido dojo since the 1970s and from 1976 onwards he set up an institute for aikido zen in Berlin. Gerhard Walter belongs to the second generation of Aikidoka in Germany.

After differences with Katsuaki Asai in Aikikai Germany, master students of Asai, among them Gerhard Walter, founded the Association of German Aikido Schools in 1987 , which was renamed the Federal Association of Aikido Teachers (BDAL) in 2008 . In this professional association, which comprises 56 dojos (as of 2014), independent aikido associations have come together. Gerhard Walter is responsible for fundamental questions on the BDAL board.

Since 1995 he has been leading a Zen project for therapists for the University of Graz (Bad Gleichenberg).

Aikido style

Gerhard Walter explicitly combines Aikido and Zen in order to bring out the dynamic and meditative aspects of life. He is based on a holistic approach that understands dualisms as abstractions that do not correspond to reality. Therefore, the idea that mind and body are separate and must be reunited should be dropped because it deceives us about the original and inalienable unity of being and perception. Zen is about presence; H. about the holistic perception of the immediately present reality, which is conscious being. Aikido, like basically every martial art, is based on natural movement and mindfulness. This enables the experience that mind and body are not separate and that it is important to stop “dividing ourselves apart”. Aikido teachers therefore have to show "how to stop preventing natural movement". Since the secret of effectiveness z. If, for example, self-defense is based on natural movement, the technical aspect of self-defense in Aikido Zen is clearly less important, as the techniques are much more a vehicle for regaining the relationship to the natural posture. Due to the holistic approach, the understanding of the technique and also the expenditure in Aikido is necessary, but one cannot gain access to Aikido via mere technique. “It's less about technology than about being where you are. It's about being one with yourself and the moment. From this grows natural movement and natural action ”, the always present Ki of the whole.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ life or limb
  2. ^ A b G. Walter: My teachers.
  3. ↑ http://www.aikikai.de/index.php?w=54#kap5 Leisinger: History of the Aikikai.
  4. ^ Federal Association of Aikido Teachers (BDAL) eV
  5. ↑ http://www.bdas.de/?dojosuche=deutschland BDAL member associations
  6. ↑ Walter 2005a: p. 15; see. Koichi Tohei: Ki in daily life.
  7. ^ Gerhard Walter: Geography of Silence.
  8. ↑ Walter 2004b: p 15; Walter 2006b: p. 15.
  9. ^ Gerhard Walter: Geography of Silence. See also G. Walter: Aikido-Zen. ( Memento from August 16, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  10. ↑ Walter 2005b: p. 14; Walter 2006b: p. 15.
  11. ↑ Walter 2004a: p. 14.
  12. ↑ Walter 2006b: p. 14.
  13. ↑ Walter 2004a: p. 14
  14. ↑ Walter 2004b: p. 15.
  15. ↑ Walter 2004a: p. 15
  16. ↑ Walter 2004a: p. 14.
  17. ↑ Walter 2005a: p. 15.
  18. ↑ Walter 2004b: p. 14
  19. ↑ Walter 2005a: p. 15
  20. ↑ Walter 2005b: p. 14.
personal data
SURNAME Walter, Gerhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German aikido teacher
DATE OF BIRTH 1944