Plan to Succeed

   The black belt success cycle has never made more sense than it does right now. 

- Have a goal, make a plan, have a success coach, take CONSISTENT action, review your progress, review your goal.

   Sound easy enough, child's play right? Actually it is. So why am I only now realizing this?

   The reason I bring this up is simple, I have wasted the year of the Rat with excuses and inaction, waiting for opportunity instead of creating opportunity. I should have tested for my Black Belt this year, instead I have squandered away the year of the Rat, hoping that someone else would tell me when I was ready, tell me what to do and how to do it. I needed to make a choice, time was running out.

    The decision not to grade this year was heartbreaking. But it was the right thing to do. If I had chosen to grade this year, it would have been a disaster, an insult and waste of time to not just the grading board and the school, but to what being a black belt actually means. Luckily, Master Brinker and the other Sifus, through his and their guidance, managed to open my eyes to just where I was on my journey. I was stagnant, I was complacent. My attitude towards grading was "there is always next year so I'll give it a try and see what happens". Wrong wrong wrong!! I was missing the point of what grading is all about. I was coasting, my passion for a black belt was an ember in a far away fire. Not any more. 

   As of today, I have started preparing for next years grading. Master Brinker always tells us, be ready to grade by September 1, I never got that till now. That is only 11 months from now!! So I don't have a year to train, I have 11 months! I've already lost a month, poof gone. So now is the time to pour jet fuel on that ember and turn it into an inferno, seize every opportunity I can to train and when the time comes next year, there will be no try, there will only be do. 

   With so much knowledge and passion for Kung Fu all around us at Silent River Kung Fu, the path to mastery is RIGHT THERE, laid out in front of us, begging us to just believe in ourselves, that we are all black belts, we just need to find and embrace that person in ourselves, to be the best we can be. 

I'm all in.

  

I Get It

    So for "fun" yesterday ( Saturday Sept 19 ), the other Black Belt candidates and I ( except Mr White-Horse Strong and Mr Raw ) ran through the fitness test ( minus the 2km run ). We wanted to get a base line of where we are at. Wow, now I get it. 

   By the time we wrapped things up, my mind was as tired as my body. Over 3 hours of non-stop running, punching, push ups, sit ups, kicking, and encouraging each other on. There was no time to think of ANYTHING else other that what you are doing at that moment. It was fantastic and humbling at the same time. I found my limits, now I need to go past them. With a week to recover and correct until the actual fitness test, I need to pick my "battles" as to which deficiency I want to address the most. I know there is no way I can improve, in the amount of time I have, some of the things I outright sucked at, but the ones I am borderline on, watch out, I'm coming for you mediocrity. 

   I want to thank my fellow candidates for that awesome sweat fest and for pushing me to go to my "limit", I am now looking at the test in a little bit different way. I only wish we could have done this 6 months ago, giving us all time to correct, but such is life. I have learned some valuable lessons from this, so I will use that new knowledge and move on. 

Open Training, How I missed You!

    That felt good. Finally being allowed back into open training was good in every way possible. It was two of the most productive hours in Kung Fu that I have had in quite a while.I'm not saying I don't practice outside of the Kwoon, but being there on the mats is entirely different. It was almost a full room, 17ish people I think, and anyone who missed out really honestly missed out on something special. There was action and excitement in every corner of the Kwoon. Forms here, weapons there, people working with and for each other, this was magic!! I truly enjoy open training just for the simple fact that we are all there for the same reason, to learn Kung Fu. So glad open training is back, this is a huge tool to use in building my Kung Fu temple.

   Having Sifu Lindstrom's help was a benefit to me beyond words. His help takes my training to a new level, to be able to not get frustrated or stuck on a particular move, to move forward with a purpose. His guidance and demonstrations opened my flood gates of memory. Thank you Sifu, the help you supplied yesterday has lifted a cloud from my memory and allowed my to move forward on many different levels. 

   Also a quick thank you to those fellow student that helped me move some "stuff" in our storage afterwards. Many hands do truley make light work, especially when I bring the right keys to open the door (my bad). Sifu Simon Kohut, Nate Kohut, Ethan Thomson and of course Deb and Kody Bjorkquist, thank you for your help.

   Grading day #1, less that 2 weeks away. What will it be? Forms? Fitness? 5 apps? Curriculum? I  am terribly excited and awesomely nervous either way.It feels like 10 second ago that I was on the 3 week count down, now it's 2 weeks!! Time to wrap this up and do some quiet training while the rest of the house sleeps.

See you on the mats

Time

    20 days and counting. That is how much time (approx) there is till the first grading day (Sept 26, 9AM). That is 480 hours, or 28,800 minutes, or 1,728,000 seconds. That includes sleeping, working, eating, being a parent, being a son, being a husband, being a citizen, being a student, blogging, and NOT going insane. Oh ya, and preparing and training for grading day. That time will vanish in the blink of a eye, poof, gone. I must endeavor to consume that time in the most economical way I can, but at the same time, if I am truly ready, that time will seem like an eternity from now. 

   In yesterdays online meeting, one of the items discussed was about not learning anything new but refining what you already know. Makes sense, that is doable. At this point in my training, I am either ready or not, it's entirely up to me. I have had the time to prepare, after all, I started Kung Fu March 1, 2014. It's not like I didn't know that one day I might be grading for a black belt. And here it is, close enough to touch but scary and thrilling as can be.

   Am I nervous, H#$* yes. Am I excited, of course I am. Am I ready, that is the real question. All I can truly say is I will give it everything I can, to slightly better than the best of my abilities. The standard or minimum required to become a black belt are incredibly high, as they should be. As Master Brinker has said, "anybody can get a black belt, but not everyone is a black belt". No truer words can be spoken at this time. I know which one I want to be.

   I can look at it two different ways, I have a mountain to climb in a very short time or there is no mountain, only a path that is leading me to a better me. I choose the path, lead on Kung Fu, I am yours to guide.