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.
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