Searching

    Looking out my window this lovely morning (Sun Aug 28 7am 10c perfectly clear sky very slight breeze - chilly but gorgeous - Johnny Cash playing on my Air Pods), I can't help but feel fortunate. My dog lays at my feet snoring, the two people I love the most are enjoying a morning of as much sleep as they want, I feel good - at peace. 

   It is the day after my latest assessment, two hours of pushing myself as hard as my mind and body would allow. It was a great day, it was a humbling day, it was a priceless learning day. 

   While I was disappointed with my overall results, I look at the day as a win. Why? What makes this assessment different than the other ones? That is a hard one to put into words. I will try to summarize my thoughts on this so this may be a bit disjointed.

   In no way do I want to come across sounding negative or using excuses to describe the day and what I have learned. Keep that in mind, these are just thoughts rambling around in my oversized melon. 

#1- I payed no attention to my numbers, I blocked them out, I just did as much as I could. Sure the numbers still matter, but I wanted to focus on what each piece of the test brought to the table. Speed was no longer my enemy, it was my ally, poking me to push just a little harder, to not listen to my body saying "stop", but to my mind saying "go". I found by doing this I was able to visualize better how this benefited my Kung Fu. No longer was I just going through the motions, I was saying before each one, this will benefit me by so and so. And believe it or not this made me actually enjoy doing it. And that made me laugh at myself. 

#2 - Laughing at myself made me realize I have been approaching this entirely wrong. I was sacrificing everything that is the most important for speed, for a number. Instead of using this as all or nothing approach, I now see more of the actual purpose that I need to apply to my training. Master Brinker calls it a scorched earth approach versus a sustainable lifetime approach. Where do I want to be when I am 60, 70, 80 and so on.

#3 - Where to go from here? Well forward of course. I will adjust some aspects of my training, but most will stay the same because I enjoy them. And that is so very important to my journey because if I no longer enjoy what I am doing, I will stop doing it. So I will start my day with Tai Chi, I will do my push ups and sit ups, I will squeeze in other forms when time permits, I will stretch, and somewhere in this I will kick and kick and kick till either I need new hips or my kicks become something I can be proud of. 

That is all for now, the day calls and I am listening, time to do, not do not.

Blurred

    It's the end of August (almost), and I feeling as though I have let so many golden opportunities pass me by this summer. Yes it rained for the month of June then has been stupid hot for the last two months but still, mother nature doesn't care what my schedule is so I am the one at fault. 

   I think I am spending to much time lamenting on things I didn't do and not focusing on what time I have left to get the things done that I want to still do. Even writing this blog, a list of unfinished projects and desires pop up in front of me. 

   I don't know why I have fallen into this funk but I don't like it. So this will be a short blog cause I am now annoyed at my lack of gumption and I am going to get my butt moving and throw my but out the window.

4 Degress to the Right

    In applying my previous blog about the all mighty question not questioning, I have felt doors opening all around me. Gone (mostly) is toxic way of thinking that I only want to do something "my way".

 Standing in front of me now like a shining beacon of white light is the wonderful face of opportunity. It has made me more aware of my Kung Fu in ways that I am super excited to explore.

 I must admit that I am struggling with trying to apply some of the new knowledge that  I am taking in, but that is okay with me cause I have no time limit other that mortality holding me back. It has slowed things down for me, I am no longer rushing to learn ten things at once but instead savoring the one or two thing I can actually digest and apply. 

So if you see me watching and I look confused, I am just wondering how you are doing something and how I can maybe try to apply that to my Kung Fu. 

I feel like a white belt again, all is new and shiny. I am very excited to start a new phase of my Kung Fu  journey. All I have learned up to this point is step one, now to take my next step, then my next and so on.

2 Degrees to the Left

    Sometimes I get pretty rigid in my way of doing things, and my Kung Fu is no exception. In last weeks blog I talked about generating questions. While I still do find it tough to generate a question that asks a question and doesn't seem like I am questioning for the purpose of ego fulfillment, I must still strive to generate properly thought out questions or my Kung Fu will stagnate.

   Saturday's morning candidate's class helped me with this. It comes down to a simple idea, instead of saying "this particular move/technique doesn't work for me", I should ask myself "why doesn't this particular move/technique work for me?". 

   So right after the class, Kody and I practiced some forms that I had questions on. I presented my question to him, showed him "my" way of doing a particular move, then watched "his" way of doing the same thing. Similar but different. But who was right? And that right there is the crux of the issue. I have been asking questions to suit the answer I want or expect, trying to show I am right. 

   With my question in mind, I tried his way, then my way, then his way, then my way, until I not only saw the difference but felt the difference. Wow, his way does work for me. My now understood problem was I just thought my way was better so I resisted trying his way to the fullest possible extent, dismissing it before understanding it. That was a fairly big aha moment.

   So with a 2 degree shift to the left, I think I now see the difference between a question to help with growth versus a questioning something to massage my ego.