Early Training: Started Aikido at Age 5

I was five years old when I first stepped onto a tatami mat.

My parents thought it would be good for discipline. They weren't wrong, but they had no idea they were setting in motion something that would shape not just my body, but my understanding of what it means to move through the world.

The Beginning

My first sensei was a gentle giant named Robert-san. He stood six feet tall but moved like water, his white hakama flowing around him as he demonstrated techniques that seemed to defy physics. When attackers came at him with full force, he would simply... not be there. And somehow, they would find themselves gently placed on the ground, unharmed but thoroughly redirected.

To a five-year-old, this looked like magic.

I remember my first lesson: learning to fall. Not how to avoid falling — how to fall safely. How to roll out of a throw, how to absorb impact, how to turn what looked like defeat into a graceful recovery.

It was my first lesson in a much larger truth: sometimes the way forward is to go with the flow rather than resist it.

The Dojo as Sanctuary

The dojo became my second home. After school, weekends, whenever my parents would drive me there, I was ready. The familiar smell of tatami mats, the sound of hakama whispering across the floor, the quiet intensity of focused practice — it all felt like stepping into a different world.

A world where size didn't matter as much as timing. Where force wasn't the answer to every problem. Where the most important opponent was often yourself — your own fear, your own impatience, your own desire to rush toward a goal instead of being present for the journey.

Learning Without Knowing

Children learn differently than adults. We don't analyze the mechanics of a technique or debate the philosophy behind a principle. We simply absorb. Move. Imitate. Play.

I spent years practicing basic movements without understanding their deeper meaning. Tenkan — the turning movement that teaches you to step out of the line of attack while maintaining connection with your partner. Irimi — the entering movement that shows you how to move toward conflict rather than away from it, but from a place of center rather than aggression.

I was learning a language I wouldn't fully understand for decades.

The Invisible Lessons

While I thought I was learning self-defense, I was actually learning something much more valuable: how to be present under pressure. How to maintain my center when everything around me was chaotic. How to respond rather than react.

These lessons showed up everywhere. In school, when other kids would try to provoke me, I found myself naturally stepping to the side — physically and emotionally — rather than meeting aggression with aggression. On the playground, I became the kid who could defuse situations rather than escalate them.

I didn't realize it at the time, but I was learning to be a peacemaker.

Growing Up on the Mat

As I grew older, the physical practice became more challenging. The techniques required more precision, more awareness, more genuine skill. But the foundation remained the same: blend rather than resist, redirect rather than oppose, maintain your center no matter what's happening around you.

I tested for rank regularly, each belt representing not just technical proficiency but a deeper understanding of the principles. By the time I was a teenager, I could execute the techniques with reasonable competence. But I was still a long way from understanding what they really meant.

The Teenage Years

Adolescence brought its own challenges to training. Suddenly, I was stronger, faster, more athletic. I could muscle through techniques that required finesse. I could overpower newer students rather than demonstrating proper form.

This was both a blessing and a curse. My athletic ability allowed me to perform advanced techniques, but it also allowed me to miss the point of those techniques. I was learning to apply force rather than principle, to dominate rather than harmonize.

My sensei, wise as always, would quietly adjust my technique, showing me that the power wasn't in the muscle but in the timing, the positioning, the ability to use my partner's energy rather than overwhelming it with my own.

The Foundation

Those early years created something in me that would last long after I stopped regular training. A way of moving through conflict that valued connection over domination. A understanding that true strength comes from flexibility rather than rigidity. A sense that the most important battles are often fought within ourselves.

When I eventually left Aikido to explore other martial arts, I took these lessons with me without realizing it. When I returned years later, they were still there, waiting to be rediscovered and deepened.

The Gift of Early Training

Starting Aikido as a child gave me something invaluable: the experience of learning without the interference of adult assumptions about how conflict should be handled. I absorbed the principles before I had preconceptions about what fighting should look like.

By the time I was old enough to question whether Aikido was "practical" or "effective," it was already woven into my nervous system. The movements, the principles, the way of being — they had become part of who I was rather than something I had learned.

Looking Back

Now, decades later, I can see how those early years shaped everything that came after. The discipline I learned didn't just apply to martial arts — it applied to approaching any challenge with patience and presence. The respect I learned to show for my training partners translated into respect for all the people in my life.

Most importantly, I learned that strength isn't about what you can do to others — it's about what you can maintain within yourself when external circumstances try to knock you off balance.

The Continuing Journey

That five-year-old boy who first stepped onto the mat had no idea he was beginning a lifelong journey. He thought he was learning to defend himself, but he was actually learning to understand himself.

The techniques I learned in those early years are the same ones I practice now, but they continue to reveal new depths, new applications, new ways of understanding what it means to move through life with presence and purpose.

The foundation was laid in those childhood years. Everything since has been building on that foundation, adding stories and experiences and wisdom, but always returning to those basic principles: blend rather than resist, maintain your center, treat your training partners with respect, and remember that the real opponent is often your own ego.

Some gifts take a lifetime to unwrap. Aikido was one of those gifts, given to me by parents who thought they were just signing me up for after-school activities, and received by a child who thought he was just learning to fall down safely.

In truth, I was learning to stand up — not just physically, but in every way that matters.