On my way back to my friend's house that very night I was mobbed and left in a pitiful state. I recall watching television shortly afterwards about the teaching of Morihei Ueshiba or known to Aikidokas as O Sensei. This was a martial art of total defense where you do not strike in aggression, but ironically the power is in relaxation. I watched a bit of Ki Aikido and wished I had been taught this at school. I was taught as a Christian to turn the other cheek, but was it unchristian to defend oneself?

I left college and became depressed, until I took up a gardening job. I enjoyed this employment, as I was put to work in a big garden in the countryside with all the wonders of nature around me. I went back to college in the autumn and studied for two years. However, before the first year was up I had a psychotic breakdown, for which I was prescribed medicine. I was only nineteen and suffered badly, until I went into an asylum and received an intramuscular depot injection and was diagnosed as suffering from schizophrenia. At first the medication caused drowsiness and I would shuffle around the ward. However, my delusions and hallucinations subsided and when the medication was lowered to a maintenance dose I suffered very little from side effects except for weight gain.

Before the administration of medicine I heard voices. Fellow Christians thought I was influenced by demons or actually possessed. Others thought I took street drugs and became so ill. Neither were true of course, but often I would pray to the Sovereign in an attempt to be released from the demons. I was fighting all sorts of stigmas and I had very little answers until I read up about my illness and gained a useful insight. At One time I was virtually forced out of work by an arrogant employer and pressurized by people for being far from rational.

One August I joined a local dojo and began Ki Aikido with my friend. The hardest exercises are the Ki exercises. We practice with great respect for one another and a true Aikidoka will defend himself without harming the attacker even if they were Samurai. In fact Aikido was developed to fight the Samurai swordsmen, yes the same warrior that Genghis Kahn could not smash even with his great empire.

>Ki exercises are difficult for everybody, but I think that it would be particularly hard for somebody who suffers from schizophrenia. We have to unify our mind and body with Ki. Any fool can do the moves, but the basic principles of Ki may take six months to understand.

I recall how often our Sensei told us to rely on our one point, which is a point in the abdomen. You focus on it and divide it until it does not divide any further and let it go and at that point the mind and body becomes unified. He always told us “If you are in doubt rely on your one point".

Time went past when our Sensei approached my friend and I. He asked if we wanted to do our grading. We paid up and went to the "Mark", the top Ki Aikido dojo in the UK, to be tested.

We were called up and we had to kneel in front of the instructors. It was nerve racking. We went through a couple of exercises when I heard the instructor say, "Now unify mind and body". I panicked and my heart missed a beat and then thumped hard in my chest. If only I as a schizophrenic could master this I would most surely have accomplished something. I was terrified and looked about when suddenly I recall the echo of my Sensei saying, "If in doubt rely on your one point". I knew it was make or break.

I breathed in and focused on a point in front of me on the wall to get the balance right as I kneeled. I closed my eyes and focused on my abdomen and divided the mystical point until mind and body became one. I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder and it tried to move me, but I was a solid as a rock. He then tried to lift my leg and arms but I was as solid as a rock meditating on my one point.

I was anxious to pass and that is why this story is worth telling. I have over twenty-three years warred against the stigma of schizophrenia starting from the time my father suffered from it. I was a warrior anyway; somebody who spat in the face of the stigma and grabbed the bull by the horns. I have a mind that has lost its synchronicity and it is a disease, and I deserve a happy life like anyone else. I don’t deserve to be disabled again by prejudice!

I think somebody with schizophrenia should be applauded for even trying to get their yellow belt in Ki Aikido. We waited fifteen minutes. Then we knelt down in front of our instructors. They started with the ones who passed their brown belt, then the blue belts, then the green belts and then the orange belts. Then they read out a whole list of newly qualified yellow belts. My eyes hit the floor as the instructor came to the end of the list and paused..... then he spoke my name. I could not believe the people congratulating me.  I was so euphoric I had to bite my tongue. I was so emotionally overwhelmed. I passed my first step in becoming a warrior.

The motto is never underestimate the mentally ill. Great leaders, artist and writers have been mentally ill including John Nash Nobel peace prizewinner.