Aikido of the Carolinas will be offering private lessons and classes soon in Myrtle Beach!

Alright! I talked to Starz Dance Connection, right down the street from my Massage Therapy office, and they are gonna let me rent the space for classes and private lessons as Aikido of the Carolinas! As of this week we are officially part of the USAF and I’ve put in an application to the Zoning Dept for the County so I can get my business license after they approve me. 

Next will be getting mats and dojo insurance, then I’ll be able to start teaching.

If you would like to help me get started, you can become a member of my Patreon!

https://www.patreon.com/annangallagher

Or you can use Venmo, Paypal, or Zelle. Email me if you want to contribute!

Right now, I have clients waiting to be able to take classes in a variety of formats. Traditional Aikido, Movement therapy with a focus of Aikido fundamentals, Movement Arts, Ukemi classes, etc... Having the opportunity to use the space at the dance studio will help expand my ability to help the community through movement and teaching them to make space for themselves as well! I'm going to keep you guys updated as things come together. I'm super grateful for all for your support!

The gift of Aikido

Aikido training has taught me to see conflict as a tool to navigate conflict, growth, change, transition, empathy, and curiosity in a whole new language. Being a student of this art, I have met some of the most authentic people. I have also had a chance to meet myself. Being able to strip away layers of learned reactions, to open to new ways of interacting and perceiving information- both inside me and around me. These are lessons that I have raised my children with. These are lessons that have taught the young child in me to feel safe again, even if it’s only been at moments at a time some days. The overall outcome of this training is seeing the world as a active, living, adapting, flowing, combination of loving and taking care of the people around me/you. Being able to train with people who have changed my life gave way to me being able to hopefully offer someone else the same.

Being able to break down fundamental movements and add self study in the atmosphere of having to work on this training from home, alone but with online partners, has lead to the next level of curiosity in training. Can we really all take the time to figure out where we are in space, how to find some balance, and do the hardest work of being consistent? Showing up for ourselves so that when we can work with partner we’ll be so appreciative of their time, efforts, and their safety.

This challenging time has been a much needed reflection of who we are and how do we want to move forward. Take time to do your own healing. Be conscientious of how much or little you had done before or how much we still need to do. There is no end to this training. There is only fine tuning the elements that are awakened by doing the work in the first place. Even it starts with home practice. There is much to learn by having to deal with yourself first before partners. Learn how to let yourself learn. Be okay with imperfection but practice doing the right thing. Owning mistakes then trying again. Learning to get back up and keep going when you fall. Learning how to slow down your fall and keep yourself safe. Trusting that the work is different for all of us.

I wish you peace, safety, health, and compassion. I wish you time to explore new love and knowledge. I wish you time to just be. I wish you time to live. Be well.

The Big Work

This is Heart work. Everything is changing. I know that I am sitting with all the discomfort and repeating, “I don’t want to go back”. I don’t want the world to go back to the way it was. I honestly don’t think it’s even possible. So how do I use my actions and words to make that real? The events over the last 4 months only amplified everything already that needed work. I got triggered and reacted with fear that I had buried. It shed light on things I had never even remembered while knowing the whole world was suffering the loudest and most united even in trauma that it’s ever been. Being able to feel my own pain and empathy for all those hurting around me is a gift. Being able to be concerned and to do something about it is a gift. Heartbreak is a gift and once it breaks it keeps growing and breaking more. Can I sit in it? Let it change me? Am I the same as I was in Feb or March? I’m not. I don’t want to go back either. I don’t want to ever close my heart down. Surrendering to the suspension of chaos and creation that lives in heartbreak. To make space for more change. This surrender not sacrifice. So I train at home, teach from home. I train for me and for you. There is a sense of responsibility for being a part of nurturing this new life, especially because the new world is taking shape. Aikido is the non-verbal communication of love and consideration with gigantic lessons in ego death that I can only find when I do the hardest work. It requires me to be sitting in the discomfort of doing 1,000 irimi tenkans at home until we can be safe going back to the dojo.  It’s the time I take to find the holding patterns, the locked up memories in my framework, the allowance of acknowledgement, the forgiveness necessary to be able to allow a new flow of information where once only trauma lived. Because it isn’t about how powerful that I can throw someone or how it feels when you see someone fly across the room. It should be about how much I can take care of the person who is offering themselves to help me learn through an authentic amount of risk and connection to help me learn how to evolve as a human. To be able to train without speaking the same language as I do, to be able to consider loving and caring for the person without even knowing their name, the framework, their training background. To be able to see beyond gender or race. To be aware of your own framework and sit in the discomfort of unlearning damaging, old habits. To give someone unconscious permission to feel safe. Maybe for the first time. It’s about how much capacity that I have to look outside of just myself and take care of the people around me. My training partners and teachers gave me this gift. It is my charge, my call to action to provide this for others. 

The + internal work and the external work +.  This is the work that I will be doing right alongside you. It’s medicine and it’s nutrition. It’s necessary and it’s time. Take care of each other. We are changing the world.

It starts with me. It starts with you.

With love, Anna

Self Defense is Self Care Workshop

In this workshop, we will explore movement from an introspective side to find grounding, balance, and our ability to extend ourselves within safe boundaries. There is an opportunity in our current situation that is breeding grief, confusion, and frustration. In Aikido and yoga there is a centering effect that helps up gauge our situation from a different view. There is no time like now to figure out how much we matter when we feel these intense feelings. Learning to move in the present moment with consideration, vigilance, and compassion is the root of martial arts like Aikido. I want to share this with you. You can do this from home or anywhere. Plan to move, bring a journal and pen, and just bring you exactly where you are today. 

Saturday, June 13th 2pm-4:30pm $50

Saturday, June 27th 2pm-4:30pm $50

Saturday, July 11th 2pm-4:30pm $50

If you want you attend but are experiencing a financial hardship, please email stochasticindustries@gmail.com so we can send you a coupon code to attend the class.  

The reasons we don’t quit can be the hardest to admit.

In an effort to put shape into some fears, I will attempt to open a window into some places I try to often to forget. The most humbling thing I have had to learn about my training has been how mean, unforgivable, impatient, and indifferent I can be with myself. It’s easier to find people or events to blame it on, even if some had everything to contribute to how I feel about myself. Framework is like driftwood. It gets shaped by everything we have ever experienced. Sometimes mine feels covered in duct tape tied to splints as I try to remember that I am not everything I’ve been through or have done. I am me now. I am worth being loved, supported, nurtured, forgiven, etc… I want to remember this when I am faced with fears of punishment, of success, of power struggles, of loneliness, of action, of growth. I want to trust that the work matters because we all matter. I train because I needed to remember that I matter too.

I needed to know that I could stop them next time. I needed to know that I could do everything in my power to see that there wasn't a next time. I want to share time and tools to help you remember that you matter. I want you to know that you can be anything and do anything that you are inspired to do because that is what the unwinding process of the inside and outside work of things like Yoga and Aikido afford. Opportunities for you to YOU and find community that loves you for it.
With support and love, don’t quit.

Anna

Taking care of each other on the mat is part of the training.

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When we step on the mat day one, we have an opportunity to meet people who are more experienced in the art. We can open our minds and hearts to know that we are being held in a unique experience of learning how to be there for each other. The wealth of information given can be overwhelming, so I encourage you to throw out whatever expectation that you had before showing up and just be there with your community. This is when training can shift it’s focus to be about Community. In Aikido, we work with partners in intense conditions so that we can provide real risk in situations of proximity. The person closest to you is your partner first, but keeping in mind that you are both not alone on the mat is important.

The initial connection once you bow into your partner is an agreement to be there together, paying attention to speed, space, timing, and strength. Be mindful of your approach to assessing the situation in your responsibility of your own movement first and how it connects to the other person as a whole. If you can tell that someone is scared and disconnected, that is when you slow down to help them find themselves so they can show up to the technique and be present as a way to protect themselves instead of shielding, blocking, or disassociating. Once you decide who will go first (be nage or the one that gets attacked first) the attacker (uke) makes a commitment to give an authentic attack. This is not just about how well you can do a technique! This doesn’t necessarily mean going fast either. It means the attack has to be consistent and complete with their full spirit with respect to the situation of variables offered by the instruction of the technique. Staying fully present as nage (the one doing the technique) we have to be paying total attention to how are actions, position, and speed are effecting our partners ability to stay connected so that we can keep them safe. Doing all of this slowly to really work on the timing and making a true connection is the key. Repeating a technique but training slowly can be worth so much more than doing it once with full power and disregard to their partners level of ability.

Move like you are under water with them. Be consistent. Stay connected. You have an opportunity to realize that every moment with them in this setting is a gift and that you are learning how to truly take care of another person even under dangerous and intense conditions. Then we switch and the roles reverse so that we both have the opportunity to learn the technique and ukemi from both sides of the “conflict.” Even though we are in this playground of variables, the suspension of all of these dynamic pieces have to be happening at the same time. Aikido at it’s roots, includes compassion for the attacker but not backing down or letting our space be sacrificed. We get to surrender to the movements with them and allow beauty to flow through the connection between us. I encourage you to slow down, find your partners energy, see where they truly are in each moment and pay careful attention to make sure that you both have proper position through the movements respective to you roles in each given moment. The information available will help you keep each other safe. It can offer many layers of awareness that will help build strong foundations and your overall awareness that I hope becomes second nature as well as becomes how you approach seeing the outside of the dojo world as well. Please take care of each other and I look forward to seeing you on the mat.

Love, Anna

Thank you to the Aikido Journal and Josh Gold for this incredible opportunity! We are humbled and grateful!

Kelly Truitt and I are so honored to have our work shown for the world at https://aikidojournal.com/2019/07/15/photo-journal-anna-gallagher/ . Kelly is a gifted photographer and I am still in awe of the photoshoot that lead to this opportunity. The work is real. It can’t stop. I understand this on the most intimate level. I train daily because I have to. I will fall, mess up, get cluttered, confused, disorganized, upset, frustrated, and emotional. This work helps the transition through these emotions toward the healing process and our teachers give us the guidance to navigate it with grace and fierce love. I am forever grateful for the opportunity to be a part of the Aikido Journal’s work that has helped keep the community connected and informed for almost 5 decades now.

Thank you Josh Gold and keep up the great work!! We believe in you! Keep going! See you on the mat somewhere, sometime soon!

Love, Anna

June 2019, Movement Arts and Aikido Photoshoot with Kelly Truitt Photograghy

Photos by Kelly Truitt Photography

I am very grateful for the path I’m on. It’s never been easy, but I’ve grown a lot. Our Aikido and Yoga community is nurturing and fertile ground for discovery. Thank you to all of my teachers who have spent years offering their guidance, love, and spirit to help all of us. I hope to continue their work as a channel to pass it on. It has become my work too. Surrendering to the path. Loving the adventure. Learning to embrace the days when it feels heavy and confusing. Process and practice daily. I struggle and remember that is why I train and won’t stop. I can’t. The lessons of getting back up when I fall have to be practiced, because I will fall and I know that I am supported enough to get back up again. I trust that the universe has a plan. I trust that learning to love in the most intense pain can lead to compassion for what we don’t understand. I want to help people know that they can heal themselves by learning to trust again. Knowing that their space is worth holding because they matter. Extending themselves into their own lives authentically. I will be practicing this right next to you and with you. I have to take my medicine too. Constant lessons in ego death and forgiveness can lead to loving beyond the deepest struggles. We can be there to support each other. Wishing you time to heal. Time to practice. Time to rest. Time to grow. One soul seed at a time. See you on the mat.

Love,

Anna

Why do Aikido?

Why do Aikido?

We thrive on connection.

Aikido creates opportunity for community and connection in a setting of traditional format within safe boundaries for exploring conscious conflict resolution: mentally, physically, and emotionally.

First, get off the line of attack. Who, me? Who’s line? First, we have to deal with the judgments we place on our own reasons for showing up. Self defense? Understanding martial arts? Proving strength? Winning? Proving ourselves? We have to learn to get comfortable with being uncomfortable in starting the process of clearing out our minds so your body can experience the movements. If you can be willing instead of searching for a “moment to win”, then you can explore you own practice with respect to those around you, taking their wellbeing into consideration.

Self defense begins with knowing you are worth protecting. Knowing you are worth being cared for and knowing the “attacker” is someone who cares about your wellbeing, too.The defense part is knowing when to move and when to respond. The connection between two people in Aikido is in the moment of awareness and engagement before physical contact. After contact might be too late to make a move to a safe position and one or both of you could get injured, especially if you are disconnected prior to contact.

The connection with yourself and your own reasons for showing up can begin the conversation of safety as you watch the instructor guide the class through the etiquette of the traditional class environment. Then watch closely and allow your mind to embrace the content available in the warm ups. Watch their posture and breathing patterns. This is where the connection of class and community starts. After warm ups, We watch the instructor demonstrate what we will explore and learn together. By paying attention, we can find valuable information to inform our own movement when we have the opportunity of a willing partner to train with. During the discovery period of class (after bowing to your partner), take into consideration that both of you are learning in that moment no matter how long either one of you has been training. Every opportunity to explore Aikido technique with different body styles, ability levels, backgrounds, ages, and shapes can offer a new perspective on what you think you already know. Being willing to surrender those preset notions of “already knowing” anything can be a freeing concept that motivates us to pay more attention to the person in front of us.

Remembering that part of the process is for you both to make it through the technique safely can lead to tremendous enlightenment about what is actually happening, how it feels to stay balanced and move from our center to communicate effectively with flexibility. There are consistent foundations in all of the techniques in Aikido: Get off the line of attack, connect with your partner, control the flow while your partner keeps their promise of staying with your movement so that both of you can make it to the point where you disengage safely.

After all, we want to end class intact with a feeling of a great experience and inspiration to show up to the next class excited to explore AIkido all over again. We turn to our partners at the end of each class, with hearts blazing in gratitude, saying “thank you so much”, then part ways knowing that the experience will be with you forever along with the amazing connections and friendships that you make along the way. It requires your willingness to show up. The rest will be waiting for you. See you on the mat!

By: Anna Gallagher

April 16, 2019