so... Aikido, and perhaps what?

[JusticeZero]

Frankly, i'd just do the aikido. But make sure you get the Atemi techniques that Aikido was created with - striking techniques to augment the throws which are an intrinsic part of Aikido, though many teachers nowadays frown on them out of some misguided sense of purity, trying to take out the little bit of aggression that O'Sensei left in for reasons that were probably best left untampered with.

[jedimc]

Judo is a good compliment, Jigoro Kano respected O sensei very much as they both had the same aim in the martial arts, to create a martial art that doesn't need to hurt an opponent.

Kano sent many of his senior students to learn Aikido.

Koichi Tohei (ki society), Gozo Shioda(yoshinkan) and Kenji Tomiki (shodokan) had all studied Judo.

[Enviroman]

The only judo school near me is in a really nasty area...otherwise I would have considered checking it out.

Judo uses a lot of the same ukemi that Aikido uses, so that's a bonus.

[sdargie]

Any striking art that feels "natural" to you would compliment Aikido. That way, when you need to atemi to "soften" your uke up you'll really be confident with it.

[Nick_sam]

yeah you hit it on the head, sdargie. its hard to know where to start to find a system of "natural" striking. karate seems (at least what i've seen) rather rigid and regimented in its forms, so im not sure if that is for me.

i have so far narrowed down my options to kuk sool won, and hapkido, although i do have my doubts about both!

i do intend on sticking with aikido for a while longer before i start anything new, btw. i want to keep that my main art, tho i feel i would like to eventually have another (more offensive or striking based) style under my belt (no pun)

[sdargie]

Have you checked out Kung Fu? I know what little I know so far feels much more natural to me and blends right in with Aikidos fluid movements.

Isn't Hapkido a combined form of Aikijutsu and TKD?

[Nick_sam]

yes i am looking into kung fu as well, there are just so many styles its hard to know which one would be right for me and where to start looking!

i think you're right about hapkido, except it doesnt really use hight kicks, from what i understand. looks interesting tho!

[jedimc]

Hapkido would be alot like Aikido, not the same but similar. Hapkido has kicks and blocks.

[Nick_sam]

my only reservation about hapkido is that it has a lot of similarities to aikido and so it would be easy to confuse one technique with the other.

[jedimc]

It will probaly be same techniques but differnt ways of doing them.