Aiki-Lab training is meant to replace or augment technique emulation training models. For takemusu aiki (spontaneously manifesting aikido beyond technique) to manifest, we must be able to transcend automatic responses to the perception of threat. These automatic responses, created by the brain, create embodiments that represent battlefield intention. By learning to recognize "spear," "shield," and "withdrawal" energy we can discern when those involuntary intentions are creating deterrents to aiki. In an aiki interaction, these often unrecognized embodied intentions can appear in nage or uke. Aikido can not manifest if there is no attack. Attack is by nature an extension of "spear" energy - energy that penetrates the target. "Shield" energy is meant to deflect "spear" energy from the central core and hence is NOT an attack. A withdrawal is not an attack, but a retraction of an attack or an escape. To apply aikido movements to someone withdrawing or manifesting "shield" energy, would be to attack using those movements, not to create aikido. By recognizing various embodied energetic states we can then learn how to manifest the "flood" of energy that combines with spear energy to produce the most effective aikido.

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