Ukemi, Youkemi, Hekemi, Shekemi - Shidoshi Suess

I was asked an interesting question the other day concerning Ukemi. The questioner wished to know if he was missing any key points to improve his own movement. In fact, he was having difficulty returning to a position of balance. The only way I know how to do this is by learning to give way to gravity and control our spine to activate our posture.


If we think about how a ball rolls, smooth and symmetrical, we get a sense of a body 'with no corners.' If we can then imagine how a water balloon rolls, we get a sense of giving way to gravity and the spine's activation in doing so. The trick is knowing when to be the ball or the balloon.

The best way to learn this is not on your own, but with a partner. Controlling the space between us and them allows a firm grip on how our bodies can be manipulated to 'take up' or 'give up' space inside the kukan. Unless we become experienced with this, we can only ever hope to have 'by the book' ukemi, such as front rolls and so forth.

Try having a partner throw you with any kind of joint lock; don't resist the lock, just get a sense of the where and the how and the when they're using to throw you down. Once you've experienced this several times, try it again, but with the anticipation of what's in store. Just before your partner commits to the lock/throw change your positioning to break his balance and throw them instead. This positional change should be reflective of the nagare of multi-directional movement and should allow us the freedom to change our kamae while breaking theirs.

Training this connection allows us to expand our sense of mobility and in turn internalize the movement for our own.