Introduction to Verbal Stretching

A free e-book extract of Verbal Aikido Vol. 2

The art of directing verbal attacks to a balanced outcome

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Also in this series:

“Verbal Aikido – Green Belt” – ISBN: 978-1478198079

available in French – ISBN: 978-1482652284

“Verbal Aikido – Orange Belt” – ISBN: 978-1500188979

All books in the Verbal Aikido series exist in electronic format on Amazon.

Copyright © 2016 Luke A. Archer (luke@verbal-aikido.com)

All rights reserved

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For my Dad.

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Contents

Reviews of Verbal Aikido .............................................................................. 5 Acknowledgements ...................................................................................... 6 Introduction ................................................................................................... 7 Some notes about Verbal Aikido ............................................................... 12 Prologue ...................................................................................................... 14

IINNTTRROODDUUCCTTIIOONN TTOO VVEERRBBAALL SSTTRREETTCCHHIINNGG ......................................... 17

WORDS ARE ALIVE ................................................................................................ 17 STEPPING ONTO THE VERBAL MAT ........................................................................... 22 THE VERBAL MATRIX – A 3D LEARNING EMPORIUM ................................................... 25

ABOUT THE AUTHOR .................................................................................... 32

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Reviews of Verbal Aikido

“After training in Verbal Aikido I was empowered to approach conflictual situations

serenely. During this training I was able to learn concrete techniques to use in daily

life when confronted with verbal attacks, objections and criticisms. Today I am no

longer afraid to -dialogue- with people who attack me verbally. Before I had no idea

how resolve a conflict, but that was before!” Alessia Vonau, CEO at Diléal

“I had a chance to accompany Luke in his venture and was overwhelmed by his

optimism and go-get-it spirit. So, if you dream to work with an inspiring leader or

need an inspiring partner – don’t hesitate to call on Luke!

The theme of his venture is about turning verbal violence into peace (I told you it’s

world changing!) – anybody can use it at home, at work and elsewhere. Wanna try

it – give Luke a call!” Leon Rubinstein, Partner at TBK Consult

“Had my appointment this morning (the one I was so apprehensive about), and…

they guy apologized! We split the cost, and I was happy. We left… on friendly

terms. More than that I was calm and in control during the discussion. THANK YOU

VERBAL AIKIDO!!!” Carol Bausor, Director ILTC

“Verbal Aikido enables us to be more serene in both our professional and personal

lives. It brings well-being, balance and the capacity to be at peace with oneself and

others”. Marie-C. Bellier, Medical Trainer at Pôle Formation Santé

“I have the pleasure to meet Luke in two different situations. First when he was our

‘Management of Innovation’ teacher at IMIS, then during ‘Verbal Aikido’ training. In

both situations, Luke was very inventive and creative in the way how to implement

new ideas, how to come up with solutions. Also, he brings with himself this great

capacity to put you in confidence very quickly. Luke is someone with high human

sensitiveness that inspires a spirit of teamwork!”

Ana Paula de Almeida Aranha, Consultant in Vaccines and Pharmaceuticals

“Always making you use your brain without you knowing it. Excellent speaker, good

writer and talented conflict solver. His out-of-the box teaching skills have not only

improved my language skills, but my personality as well. Can’t get enough of his

teaching.” Romain Breschet, Junior Engineer at BPR / TETRATECH Canada

“I can only recommend Verbal Aikido training, for getting out of delicate situations

without entering into conflict, justifying yourself or taking things to heart.”

Delphine Locussol, Health Training Professional at Pôle Formation Santé

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Acknowledgements

Thanks and glory to God, the Most Merciful.

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Introduction (taken from Verbal Aikido Orange Belt)

It wasn’t long after I began training in physical aikido that I discovered

the philosophy behind it, and asked myself if it really was a martial art.

Of course, without thinking, most people would say that aikido is just

that, and I guess it’s quite understandable that it got put into the

‘martial’ category. But despite the scornful looks and disparaging

remarks that my question met, I still hesitated in accepting it as such.

My interest in words and their origin showed me that a ‘martial’ art

is de facto an art of war – remember ‘Mars’ (root of the word ‘martial’)

the Roman god of war? And sure, I knew the various aspects of aikido

help us deal with the ‘wars’ that people manifest both internally and

externally, but I just couldn’t get it to fit... I couldn’t see how this art,

whose creator proclaimed its intention as being “to unify the world in

love and harmony”, could really be considered as martial?

Indeed, anyone who has gone just a little further than the mat, knows

how much aikido’s founder, Morihei Ueshiba, insisted that “budo1 is

love” and that aikido was “not a technique to fight with or defeat the

enemy. It is a way to reconcile the world and make human beings one

family.” And that was where I got

stuck, because no matter how I

looked at it, I couldn’t seem to

make the founder’s philosophy

stick with the idea of an art of war.

“So if it’s not a martial art, what is

it then?” I hear you, I hear you.

Well, in this journey of

understanding that I had begun,

my first stop was in the opposite

direction. Instead of qualifying this

art in relation to a god of war, I

thought that surely we could find some sort of ‘god of love and

harmony’, to be more in line with O-Sensei’s vision of aikido. Still

1 The Japanese term ‘budo’ has often been translated as ‘martial way’ or ‘martial

art’, but the founder redefined this concept, separating it from any idea of war.

“Those who seek to compete and better one another are

making a terrible mistake. To smash, injure, or destroy is the worst thing a human

being can do. The real Way of a Warrior is to prevent such slaughter — it is the Art of Peace, the power of love.”

Morihei Ueshiba

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holding a torch for the roman mythological references, it wasn’t long

before I stumbled upon Venus who, just like Mars, before becoming a

planet, started out her life as one of the gods. Indeed, you may find it

curiously significant how, even on an astrological level, this would be

considered as the opposite direction; on the one side of our beautiful

planet we find war (Mars), and on the other side… yep, love.

So Venus was known as the goddess of love, and anything pertaining to

Venus may well be called venusian, and I guess, if I wanted to open a

debate or provoke a storm of contesting views, I would insist that aikido

is much closer to a venusian art than a martial one… but that is not my

intention. However to avoid both confusion and controversy, when

speaking of aikido I will replace the use of the terms ‘martial arts’ and

‘martial way’ by the original term ‘budo’, which can be translated as

‘the way of brave and enlightened activity’. But do let your own sense of

‘budo’ develop alongside your understanding and practice of it.

Even if you still maintain that Aikido is a martial art, you will most likely

uphold that it is so much more than that too, and that the physical

approach simply demonstrates what is possible on so many other levels

– emotional, intellectual, verbal and so on. It demonstrates that, no

matter what we are confronted with in life, we can neutralize or

transform it by accepting, blending with and redirecting the energy,

whatever form it takes.

I discovered aikido in the 90s, and actually stopped going to classes

quite quickly because I couldn’t get the hang of (i.e. had an irrational

fear of) falling. But even so, it was already too late; I had fallen in love

with the philosophy. Years later, after overcoming my fear, I finally

returned to learn the physical aspect of the budo, but I’ve never

considered myself to be an exemplary physical practitioner at all. In fact

I go to my dojo quite sporadically, as I find the learning that I experience

there so rich that it can take me weeks, months or even years to get my

head around how it applies to my life. But that is why I go – to learn to

apply the philosophy of Aikido off the mat.

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Since my journey with aikido has begun, and especially with Verbal

Aikido, there have been far too many touching, exciting and mind-

opening experiences to note, but the most rewarding has without a

doubt been the work done with Luc Pavan. Luc is a high-school teacher

at the Collège Paul Portier – about 200 miles from where I live. When

he asked me if I could bring Verbal Aikido training to the students and

the teachers of the school, I knew immediately that I was about to

embark on the path of its true vocation in educational development. I

mentioned in the first book that for most people there’s a much higher

chance of getting attacked verbally than physically, and as much as

most adult exchanges remain civilized to a degree, you and I both know

– high-school can be a real jungle!

We worked together for the whole school year, Luc endlessly fine-tuning

the approach to the students as we focused on keeping it a fun-to-learn

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training that everyone could grasp

and use in everyday life. The results

went beyond our expectations,

culminating in a ‘graduation’

ceremony where the students acted

out the conflictual situations that

they had experienced – first without

and then with their newly acquired

conflict transformation techniques.

They then showed us how they were

able to avoid engaging in conflict, by

spontaneously responding to random

attacks (“you idiot”, “you’re such a

pain in the neck”, “you’re ugly”, etc.)

drawn from our Sacattack bag2 and fired at them. Remaining centred

and using empathy to disarm, every single one of these fourteen and

fifteen year olds managed the attacks skilfully, and earned their Green

Bracelet3 and certificate.

Indeed this was a challenge and an adventure that struck close to my

heart, as I was far from being the most popular kid at my school. I

couldn’t help thinking that if I had only known even a fraction of the

concepts these teenagers had demonstrated, my ‘sick-days’ as a youth

wouldn’t have been so frequent.

I guess it’s also quite reassuring to know that no matter what age you

are, the concepts of the philosophy are readily accessible, and

practicable to you. Although we do train using techniques, Verbal Aikido

is more specifically an attitude training, mostly involving:

your capacity to return to, and act from a centered position

(emotionally) when you get destabilized,

2 The students anonymously wrote the verbal attacks they had heard or received

on cards that we put into a bag, and used for verbal sparring.

3 A symbolic reminder to use The Three Steps and an alternative path in conflict.

More information at www.verbal-aikido.com/how-to-remember-it-every-day

“The purpose of the Art of Peace is to fashion sincere human beings; a sincere human being is one who

has unified body and spirit, one who is free of hesitation or doubt, and one who understands the

power of words.”

Morihei Ueshiba

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using empathy to disarm and defuse an aggressive or negative

attitude,

inserting an intention of harmony rather than domination or

submission in your exchanges.

The objective of this free e-book is to give you one of the means to

make this approach to conflict transformation one that you can

implement easily in your daily life, and sense the benefits rapidly. If you

do consider aikido to be an art of peace and/or love, if you’re ready to

deepen your understanding of yourself and others to develop this art,

then I encourage you, beyond the scope of what you may experience in

this book, to make the world your mat.

Luke Archer, 22 November 2015

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Some notes about Verbal Aikido

Hold on just a minute. Before you jump in, don’t forget your verbal

aikido-gi4! If you haven’t yet read volume 1 or perused the multitude of

free resources on www.verbal-aikido.com, here are a few pointers that

will make your reading experience (and your overall practice of the art)

just a little smoother.

1. DON’T worry if you find yourself getting caught up in a heated

exchange.

2. DO take the necessary time to ‘recenter’ when you realize you’re

not calm.

3. DON’T try to dominate a situation or ‘win’ an exchange.

4. DO insert the intention of harmony (at the very least, inner-

harmony) before you continue.

5. DON’T take anything anyone says personally… ever.

6. DO consider that whatever is being said could be a reflection, a

transfer or a projection of the speaker himself.

7. DON’T forget to be sincere when you’re trying to understand the

other’s position.

8. DO avoid a sterile exchange by proposing an Ai-ki (energy balance)

as soon as you detect a destabilization.

9. DON’T let the exchange continue further if you have proposed three

consecutive Ai-kis and you still feel attacked.

10. DO use all the exchanges you encounter as opportunities to

practice and develop your art.

4 name for the uniform used in aikido training

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The Three Steps are:

1. Get in touch with your inner stability before acting (Inner Smile),

2. Accompany the attacker with empathy (verbal Irimi) until the

attack diminishes or up to the point of destabilizing them,

3. Propose an energy balance (Ai-ki) when you detect the

destabilization and orient the exchange towards a positive

outcome.

The basic symbols used throughout the books and articles to describe

emotional states in the verbal exchanges are:

[…] Inner Smile – a serene confidence and stable emotional position,

[***] Destabilization – a momentary state of instability/surprise,

[- - -] Ai-ki – a balanced state for both parties involved in an exchange.

You can find an immediate example of how these are used in the

prologue (coming up next).

There’s always a certain amount of jargon and buzz words that arise in

the development of any new domain. Verbal Aikido is no exception, so I

do try to explain the concepts and techniques as clearly as I can

whenever they turn up. To distinguish the language that is specific to

Verbal Aikido for you, you’ll notice that it appears with capitals and is

italicized when it comes up first, just like the terms above. You can find

an extensive glossary at the back of the books where all these terms

are explained clearly. But if you’re really stuck, or if you just want to

check a few things, feel free to contact us at info@verbal-aikido.com.

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Prologue (from Orange Belt)

When you came across the Verbal Aikido book series, the concept of a

Green or Orange Belt may have been a new one for you. If it seemed

strange in some way, you won’t be surprised to know that I have

received many ‘questions’ about this notion of belts in relation to

aikido. Here would be a typical exchange:

“Green belt in aikido? Nonsense – we don’t use colored belts in aikido!”

“[…] I’ve also heard that – it’s an interesting concept.”

“It’s true!”

“[…] I can see that you believe it.”

“[***] Well why on earth do you talk about a green belt then?”

“[…] Would you really like to know?”

“[***] Go on then…”

“[…] “Well, among other things, it gives me many opportunities to

understand people’s varying points of view about the concept of belts...

Why don’t you tell me more about what your belt means for you?”

[- - -] “Hmm, let me think…”

You may well be smiling if you recognize this technique as the Meaning

Prod, covered in volume 1, but truly this question – “What does your

belt mean for you?” – is an extremely beneficial starting point when

discussing any such abstract or symbolic concept as belts, degrees,

titles, and so on. When you listen to how each individual expresses the

meaning they put behind these ideas, you’ll find such a wide variety of

answers that may make you wonder if they’re even talking about the

same things at all!

You might even go so far as to start seeing the merits of doing away

with the use of belts entirely. One could even ask: why differentiate

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between green and orange, or even white and black? No matter what

your answer to this question is, it’s rooted (deeply or not) in your belief

system. However common or rare you think your answer is, it’s just the

tip of the iceberg in understanding what your belt actually means to

you.

If you currently have a belt in any discipline, take a second to ask

yourself if:

it implies that you’re better or worse than someone who has a

different color belt than you,

it means you’ve got the same capacities as someone with the

same color belt,

it gives you a sense of pride, doubt, or is linked to your self-

esteem in any way.

If you’ve answered ‘yes’ to any of the above statements, then I’m

delighted to share with you the contrasting philosophy behind the

concept of belts in Verbal Aikido. You may already know that the non-

competitive philosophy of aikido greatly emphasizes self-victory rather

than comparison with external references. Consequently, the

significance of the belts can only concern the path that each individual

has chosen to take. If you’re interested in knowing more about the

belt/path system we have developed for Verbal Aikido, check out:

www.verbal-aikido.com/whats-in-a-belt-2/

I remember being told that as soon as you’ve had one class of aikido,

you should start to teach someone else what you’ve learned. Indeed

this is also true of Verbal Aikido, and the very act of sharing any newly

acquired knowledge has the benefit of reinforcing your own

understanding of what you have learned, or at the very least, helping

you see what is missing from your understanding. The specificity of

following a path to White Belt (an instructor’s path) is that there is a

clear intention to accompany an individual, or group of individuals long-

term to their goals.

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It may even be helpful to consider that if you intend to:

use the basic steps effectively,

deepen your internal and external understanding of the

dynamics,

continue to share, accompany and learn through the people you

have the privilege of encountering in your life,

… you might just be on all paths simultaneously, or a motorway, if you

prefer. So whatever your path, however wide or winding it may be, it’s

now time to tighten that knot and get en route to our Verbal Dojo!

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IInnttrroodduuccttiioonn ttoo VVeerrbbaall SSttrreettcchhiinngg

“The only thing constant is change.” ~ Buddha

We are in exponential times and the evolution in language is no

exception. Confucius once illustrated this phenomenon of an evolving

language when he asked us to take our definition of what a ‘king’

means, and to compare it with what a king signified a few hundred

years beforehand. Now, some 2500 years later this exercise still

illustrates the same point: the meaning we give to words is in no way

fixed.

Words are alive

It may seem like a no-brainer, but think about it – what is a ‘phone’?

Consider your definition of this word and then ask yourself – does this

everyday word have the same connotations now as it did 30 years ago?

What about a ‘network’ 20 years ago? A ‘social network’ 10 years ago?

Can we even start to imagine what a ‘phone’ will have become 5 years

from now? Things just ain’t what they used to be.

Strangely enough, we freely accept the constant evolution and

redefinition of what ‘stylish’ is in the clothes we wear or the cars we

drive, but we fail to recognize and acknowledge the changes in the very

words we use. Yet, when we look just a little closer, we can observe,

and maybe even embrace, the fashionable aspect of language too. If

you have kids, the chances are you’ll also have noticed the regular

evolution of what ‘cool’ really means.

Why would there be new editions of dictionaries if there wasn’t a need

to get a momentary snapshot of this living, mutating entity that we call

language? As much as some may feel that dictionaries are the ultimate

reference for word definitions, they are simply a picture of our

understanding at a given time, and they will forever be playing catch-up

with the spoken reality of a living language.

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Whether we like it or not, new words are arriving into our daily

vocabulary at an astonishing rate, and if you wanted you could

contribute to this growth too! How? It’s relatively easy: just invent and

name a new service, product or concept, and if it gets popular enough,

you will also have created an evolution in vocabulary. Kleenex and

Hoover quickly became household names, Xerox made it big in the

offices, but how many Twitter-esque words can you count in your

vocabulary nowadays? Neologisms (not sure what this word means?

Google it...) are abundant, and resistance to their usage is as veritably

futile as trying to stop a train with a fishing rod.

Grammar too is also evolving, although at a seemingly slower pace.

Some grammarians remind us that it’s more precise to consider what

we call ‘grammar’ to be a collection of ‘tendencies’ rather than a

veritable set of ‘rules’. Seeing grammar as having this fluidity and

movement greatly facilitates such artistic endeavours as song-writing,

literature, poetry and the like. Indeed, if William Shakespeare, James

Joyce and Eminem had just one thing in common, it might certainly be

the elasticity in their use of the language.

Suspending, even for a moment, a conservative judgment that

something is invalid because it is not yet in ‘the dictionary’ or grammar

books, surely helps us to embrace an evolution in language more

easily. This in turn enables us to encourage an artistic opening in

language learning, development and creativity, without which, well…

this book, and many others may not have come into existence.

However, developing this particular type of opening involves ‘letting go

of being right’, which is generally more difficult than it seems, because

if we’re not right… well then we’re wrong, right?

I was chatting with a colleague recently who was telling me about his

wife who “loves to be right”. I remember wondering “Well, who loves to

be wrong?” Indeed everybody needs to feel right about certain things in

order to construct a life with any degree of stability, but in instances of

conflict transformation, holding on to what we feel to be the only truth

has an annoying way of making matters escalate.

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If you stand in opposition or in resistance to

another person’s point of view, the chances

of reaching any sort of efficient outcome

(balanced or not) are of course greatly

compromised. Compare how long, on

average, a boxing combat takes to the time

most exchanges in aikido take; compare how much effort is used and

how much pain is endured on both sides... Now ask yourself this: do

you stick to your guns and fight your corner when someone’s point of

view differs from yours? Well rest assured, there is something quite

simple that will help take you out of that verbal boxing match and into

an exchange that greatly reduces your time, effort and pain.

In fact, your initial stance plays a greater role than you can imagine

both physically and verbally. In aikido, the physical stance or kamae,

enables you to receive and blend with your attacker. There are different

kamae; kneeling, standing, left-oriented, right-oriented, etc., but

whatever your stance, it is key that you find a centred and balanced

position that gives you enough flexibility to let the energy flow (Ki-no

Nagare5) and manage whatever comes at you.

In Verbal Aikido, we call this kamae Open Attitude. Indeed even in

physical aikido, our kamae pertains to much more than just how one’s

body is positioned; it concerns an overall mind-set too. When dealing

with verbal conflict, you have an edge over any attacker when you begin

from this open-attitude stance, being

able to let go, if only momentarily, of

what you believe to be right or wrong,

and to replace it with a humble and

sincere curiosity to discover more, about

yourself or someone else. Indeed, a

certain naïve openness is required to

learn anything, for the simple reason

that cynicism puts up barriers that prevent us from accepting any new

information. To enable this attitude it is important to create a sort of

5 The verbal Ki-no Nagare technique is demonstrated in chapter 6 of Orange Belt.

“Attachment to views is the greatest impediment to the spiritual path.”

Thích Nhat Hanh

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inner ‘silence’ or emptiness, that in turn enables new information can

be embraced.

A couple of years ago I was walking to the mall with my son and to my

surprise I realized that he hadn’t told me the truth about something. It

was rather insignificant but my parenting role still seemed to dictate

that I warn him of the consequences of lying, so I briefly referred to the

classic story of Peter and the wolf. Now my son Seán, who was 11 at

the time, had already become quite experienced at using Irimi…

“Ok but what is lying?” he asked with a little smile budding on the

corners of his lips. I decided to entertain the question and see where it

would lead us.

“Well, it’s when you decide to mislead someone or to not tell the truth.”

“What is the truth?”

“[***] Good question young padawan. Well, if you know in your heart

that you’re not trying to mislead someone, then you’re on the right

track!”

“Yeah, but how do I know something is really true?”

“An absolute truth?”

For the next 15 minutes I challenged Seán to find something that was

always true. In every case I found an exception. When he said “That’s

easy: 1 + 1 = 2”, I replied “Well, in maths that’s true… but what about if

you put one male and one female together for long enough, your 1 + 1

could become 3… or more!” When he put forward that “Everyone closes

their eyes when they sleep”, I asked “What about the guy who lost his

eyelids when his face was burnt?” Now this did get frustrating, and

sometimes a little gory, but the point was not to prove him wrong, just

to explore the limits of what we believe to be ‘universally true’. Finally

his frustration got the better of him and he blurted out “OK, so you tell

me! What’s true then?” I smiled as I replied “For me, the only real truth

is how we feel in a given moment, and right now, I love you – that’s an

absolute truth. Your truth is how you feel, and no-one can take that

away from you” [- - -]. His wide grin told me that we had found an Ai-ki.

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As it happened, a short while later, we were watching a science

documentary which explained that right now, the most advanced and

widely accepted theory in astrophysics concerning the content of the

universe is that over two thirds of it is made up of dark energy, more

than a quarter consists of dark matter (the ‘dark’ here meaning simply

that it remains undetected by our senses), and what’s left – less than

5% – is what we can actually perceive. “Wow,” he whispered to me, “we

really know nothing.”

Well, at least we know that we know nothing! So with our greatest

scientists’ humble estimation that we can only fathom one twentieth of

what we think exists – how can we believe that any theory or belief can

give us the full picture? Indeed our understanding and knowledge will

never be complete, all we can hope to do is continue to enjoy

discovering new ideas, techniques and points of view... which is exactly

the sort of opportunity that can arise when one of our ideas about

what’s right or wrong, true or false is challenged – and when we meet it

with that open-attitude kamae.

In fact, it can help and even accelerate our learning potential to see

things without having an attribute of ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, or at least to

suspend this sort of judgment momentarily. Rather, there is only ‘our

evolving reality’, and maybe the only absolute truth is how we feel at a

particular moment. Indeed, on the quest to understand another

person’s truth you may even catch a glimpse of your own...

Yes, the understanding we have of our reality is constantly changing, so

it’s hardly surprising that the way we talk about it is too. Our language,

whichever one it is, has roots, branches, and buds; it has ancestors,

families and newborns. It will continue to evolve and expand, because it

is alive and growing every second of every day. It is with this view of

language that we can start to envisage the internal expansion of our

understanding of it… or, in other words, do some Verbal Stretching.

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Stepping onto the verbal mat

Why do people warm-up and stretch

before a physical activity? Your

answers to this question will be

remarkably similar to the reasons why

Verbal Stretching is practiced in

Verbal Aikido: elasticity, flexibility and

injury prevention.

Just like physical stretching, Verbal

Stretching enables us to:

feel more supple and

comfortable with our

movement and articulation(s),

avoid getting hurt when

pushed or pulled in certain

directions,

fall more gracefully.

Before starting a Verbal Stretching exercise in the Verbal Aikido

workshops, the guidelines (the open-attitude kamae) are explained as

follows:

1. Let go of the need to be right (about your definition of the word

being “stretched”).

2. Search with curiosity to increase one’s global understanding of

the given word or phrase (especially as seen by another

person).

3. Stay open to the perspective that words are always evolving.

There are various fun ways to choose a word to be stretched. For

example, you can get participants to write words on small cards (one

per card) and then pick one randomly, or find inspiration in a couple of

“A dojo is a miniature cosmos where we make

contact with ourselves – our fears, anxieties,

reactions and habits. It is an arena of confined

conflict where we confront an opponent who is not an

opponent but rather a partner engaged in

helping us understand ourselves more fully.”

Joe Hyams

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the words that come up in the banter when people are arriving at the

Verbal Dojo.

So let’s take the word ‘flexibility’ that appeared at the beginning of this

section and see where it takes us in this transcript of a Verbal

Stretching exercise. Pay special attention to your own feeling about the

responses given hereunder.

A (Stretch Facilitator): “What does the word ‘flexible’ mean for you?”

B (Active Participant): “Emm, adaptable I suppose, like someone who

can go along easily with what other people are doing, without

complaining.”

A: “OK, and for you what is positive about being flexible?”

B: “Positive? Well sure... it’s positive, I mean, you need to be flexible in

life!”

A: “Why is that?”

B: “Because things change, and if you never adapt to the things that

change, you’ll never… you won’t survive. I mean, especially in the

business world.”

A: “What negative aspects can you see in being flexible?”

B: “Negative? I dunno, I suppose if you’re too flexible, people will walk

all over you.”

A: “OK. What would be the opposite of flexible for you?”

B: “Rigid… is the first word that comes to mind.”

A: “Anything else?”

B: “Stuck in their ways, strict, never giving in…”

A: “And what is the opposite of that?”

B: “Always giving in I suppose.”

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A: “What is the connection for you between ‘giving in’ and ‘being

flexible’?”

B: “[***] Ummm, the connection between the two… letting go?”

Can you feel the stretch? In the course of reading this exchange, did

you find yourself thinking “that’s right”, or “I wouldn’t say that” at any

moment? If you did, you lost your kamae. It’s not as easy as it sounds,

and even after leading this sort of

exercise hundreds of times, I still

have to occasionally stop myself

from anticipating a response or

displaying facial gestures that may

influence an answer. Quite recently

one of the participants suggested a

stretch with the word ‘woman’, and

when I asked for the opposite, I recognized that I had lost my kamae.

Instead of answering with anything masculine, she gave her opposite of

‘woman’ as ‘girl’... There are indeed many possible directions we can go

to find an opposite of a word! If you are facilitating, filtering out

expectations and maintaining your kamae enables you to give the

Active Participant as much freedom and as little influence as possible.

We really start to sense the variety and abundance in the definition of

our words when the same word is stretched by subsequent

participants. After exploring a word, a Stretch Facilitator can validate

their efficiency with the Active Participant by simply asking “Do you feel

understood?” It’s also a good idea to record these stretching exercises,

as many students have found that listening to them again between

classes contributes to multiple aspects of their development.

You may already have started to recognize how the techniques

proposed for stretching can contribute greatly to all involved. Those

who are simply listening (passive participants) have the opportunity to

work on their open-attitude kamae and develop empathy by genuinely

attempting to perceive from another’s perspective. The Stretch

Facilitators get to practice many Irimi techniques such as the Meaning

Prod, and also develop their empathy and their capacity to detect

“Cast off limiting thoughts and return to true

emptiness. Stand in the midst of the great void.”

Morihei Ueshiba

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destabilization6. Finally, the person being questioned can focus on

stabilizing their Inner Smile in exchanges and developing their verbal

eloquence.

This exercise can last from just a couple of minutes to an extensive 20

minute stretch or more. It is also a practice that can be done as a daily

or regular exercise and with more than one word at a time (i.e. phrases

like “just not good enough” or “a wonderful person”, and so on.

Whenever and however you do it, you may also find great benefit in

stretching one word or term that has a negative connotation and

another that has a positive one.

Even though learners find this activity

enriching in itself, the benefits are

most apparent later on, during verbal

sparring, when a word that has come

up in stretching appears. There’s

almost a sigh of relief as people take

on a word which they are now able to

manage with greater ease and

articulation. Above all, when we have extensively stretched a word with

a negative connation (criticism, insults, etc.) you can truly sense the

verbal flexibility with which the learners respond – preventing injury

from both themselves and their partner.

The Verbal matrix – a 3D learning emporium

I never really got into golfing. Maybe I will someday, but a few years

ago, I did give it a go. Before attempting a ‘first nine’ with a colleague,

we had a professional golf coach accompany us. He explained to us

that, when aiming for the green and needing to avoid a water obstacle,

many beginners automatically seemed to focus on ‘not getting the ball

in the water’. It sounds natural enough, but he told us that by using this

type of focus, about 80% of the shots ended up in the water. However,

6 i.e. if the active participant hesitates with a response.

“What you do with aikido off the mat is really more important than what you do with it on the mat.”

Robert Nadeau

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for the golfers who had learned to deliberately focus on ‘getting the

shot on the green’, the figures were also close to 80% success.

Isn’t it funny how our brain tends to filter out the ‘negatives’ or

negations from what we give it? For example, if I say to you “Whatever

you do, don’t think about an orange elephant – just don’t let that image

of an orange elephant into your brain!” Well… give it a second... now,

did you find yourself thinking about an orange elephant?

You may have heard the theory that thoughts create, and whether you

believe it or not, it is hard to refute that if you have a project and you

stop thinking about that project, there’s a good chance that it won’t

move forward for you. On a verbal construction level, the stretching

exercises help us explore the very spatial positioning, the verbal

geometry if you will, of various words and ideas.

A basic two-dimensional exercise is the Triangular Stretch, wherein we

take a word, explore around it, make the opposite apparent, then find

the opposite to this opposite. For example, you may say that the

opposite of ‘peace’ is ‘war’, but when asked what the opposite of ‘war’

is, you might suggest ‘diplomacy’. Then, to complete the Triangular

Stretch, you’ll be asked what the connection between ‘diplomacy’ and

‘peace’ is.

Figure 1. Example of a Triangular Stretch

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This style of Verbal Stretching is elaborated in the example given with

the word ‘flexible’. But just like in preparation for physical activities,

there are many types of stretch you can do... The next example we look

at uses the Yin-Yang Stretch, and here are some guidelines on how it is

carried out:

Figure 2. Yin-Yang Stretch guidelines

The previous transcription of a stretch with ‘flexible’ was a participant’s

suggestion for a word with a positive connotation; here is another

example stretch with a suggestion for a ‘negative’ word: obstacle.

A: “What comes to mind when you think of the word ‘obstacle’?”

B: “Problems, difficulties. Things getting in the way of a smooth

operation.”

A: “For example…?”

B: “Well, lack of money can be an obstacle when we’re trying to create

an event.”

A: “OK. What feeling does this idea evoke?”

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B: “Frustration. Emm, yeah mostly frustration.”

A: “Why do obstacles exist?”

B: “Umm, to make my life difficult!”

A: “Continue.”

B: “[***] I really don’t know.”

A: “What different sorts of obstacles are there?”

B: “Temporary and permanent, I suppose…”

A: “And what’s the opposite of an obstacle?”

B: “A solution.”

A: “What other words do you see here?”

B: “A way through, or emm… an idea that works.”

A: “What links these words?”

B: “Obstacle and solution?”

A: “Yes.”

B: “There’s a goal or a project of some sort needed for either to exist.”

A: “What could be a negative aspect about a solution?”

B: “Well, if it’s like a makeshift solution that doesn’t work for long or

doesn’t take into consideration all the needs.”

A: “And what could be a positive aspect about an obstacle?”

B: “Emm, [***] I think it makes us delve into our resourcefulness or

creativity.”

A: “OK, what’s the link between ‘frustration’ and ‘resourcefulness’?”

B: “Wow, jeez, [***] my brain is starting to hurt…”

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If you’re stretching, yours may well hurt a little too! But these sorts of

explorations actually help us momentarily situate each concept in the

brain of the other. Try to see, if you will, each word as one of the 100

billion or so neurons in your brain, connected to many others.

Understanding your own connections or ‘connecting the dots’ about the

words and concepts that exist in your reality enables you to function

more freely as an individual.

When you are able to enter

deeply into another person’s

reality, into the three-dimensional

matrix of their understanding, the

directions you can take to reach

a positive outcome become

instantly more freely available

too.

It can be very beneficial to train with these two exercises as they

particularly enhance your Internal Antonym Finder – an incredibly

useful tool when dealing with negative remarks7. But don’t limit yourself

to these stretching approaches! Below are a few more questions that

may lead you off the beaten track and, if asked appropriately may get

some intriguing and/or astonishing answers.

Is it possible to have [X] and [opposite of X] at the same time?

What color do you associate with [X]?

What is the result/goal/origin of [X]?

What is your earliest/most recent memory of [X]?

What would life be like if [X] didn’t exist?

How does [X] change with time?

How many types of [X] can you think of?

7 See the Reverso technique in chapter 5 of Orange Belt

30

Which type of [X] speaks to you most?

How do you feel deep down about [X]?

Who does [X] remind you/make you think of?

And you can of course add “Why?”, “How is that?” or “Go on.” as follow

up questions to these, as you see fit. Don’t worry if answers don’t come

immediately – accept, wait a while, and move on to something or

someone else if your partner is ‘stretched out’… it’s all part of the

exploration.

The greatest thing about these

stretching exercises is that you can

practice quite naturally in

conversation outside the Verbal

Dojo… and you may be very surprised

by what you hear. One of the adult

learners I worked with had done the

stretching exercises in class a few times before she started to

experiment with them at home. She came to class one week explaining

how she had carried out a stretch with her unsuspecting husband and

that, after ten years of frustrating misunderstandings in their marriage,

it was only after using her open-attitude kamae that she could realize

what he really meant.

“Empathizing with someone’s ‘no’ protects us from taking it personally.”

Marshall Rosenberg

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In a nutshell…

Language is a living, growing entity.

Being able to suppress one’s own judgment of what is ‘right’

and replace it with a curiosity for another person’s reality

enables an open-attitude stance (kamae); this is an ideal

position with which to begin an exchange.

Verbal Stretching enhances empathy, articulation, self-

knowledge and the capacity to suspend judgment.

A ‘stretched’ word makes it easier to apprehend.

You can explore words and their meaning on a geometric level.

Stretching that involves asking for opposites helps train our

Internal Antonym Finder.

Openly explore other directions that can help understand the

other’s connections and associations, and your own too.

This free e-book is an extract from “Verbal Aikido: Orange Belt.”

Practice your open-attitude kamae with Verbal Stretching:

1. During a natural conversation, ask a speaker what they mean by a

particular word or term

2. Suspend your own opinion about the term for as long as you can

3. Proceed to ‘stretch’ the term with the speaker with the genuine

intention of understanding his or her viewpoint

Suggested Exercise

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About the author

Luke Archer is an Irish-born teacher trainer and international public speaker on

communication, conflict management, and pedagogy. He currently resides in Lyon,

France, where after almost twenty years of experience in teaching and learning

management, he founded the Betterfly France teaching institute in 2008.

(photo with thanks to

Martin Charpentier /

TEDxLaRochelle 2013)

Since its development in 2009, Luke has been giving conferences and facilitating

workshops on Verbal Aikido for schools, organizations and individuals around the globe.

He continues to develop and write about the art, and organizes weekly classes in Lyon.

Verbal Aikido is one of the many perspectives on the aikido philosophy taught at the

Aiki Extensions seminars. Aiki Extensions is a non-profit organization dedicated to

applying and promoting the principles and methods of the nonviolent martial art of

aikido in all aspects of life. Find out more at www.aikiextensions.org.

The Aiki Extensions team in 2014

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Feel like a stretch or a bit of verbal sparring? Check out our workshops

and trainings on http://www.verbal-aikido.com/get-trained-up/

…or start your own Practice Group/Verbal Dojo!

Find everything you need on the club site www.verbalaikido.org

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