Thursday, June 26, 2008

Balancing Act

I’ve had some difficulty maintaining a regular blogging schedule in spite of my declaration to be more consistent. I guess I just don’t want to bore everyone with the same thing over and over or mindless filler blogging that hasn’t a real point. I’m usually so tired at night that when I blog, I wake up and find a whole mess of stream-of-consciousness writing staring back at me.

I’ve sort of hit an era of transition in my life, and I’m trying to let training carry me through it, but not distract me from it. This distinction was brought again to my attention over the last three days training. I was away for 5 days at a wedding so I was definitely suffering from withdrawal, but on top of the happiness in returning classes have been additionally great. N’ou has been back bringing extra chi to L2. Tuesday’s class was the most chi I’ve felt in a class possibly ever; there are lots of new people making classes bigger and Randy was there to help push me further on my handstands and straddle split. Last night, the demo team was in full force learning a sword form. It feels like the beginning of a new stage of my training journey, and one that I want to maximize and fully immerse myself in.

As I’ve said before, I am somewhere between wanting to be amateur and wanting to be a pro kung fu trainee. Do I want to be on demo team some day? That would be rad. But I don’t want to lose focus on those things I’m trying to sort out in my “real life” as well. Training is a big part of my life, but unless I’m angling to be a Sifu, it can’t be the only part. I’m trying to tell myself to balance the addiction with other goals. But then, if I had done that the last three nights I would have missed some great classes. It’s all about balance, but if you’ve seen some of my forms, you know that’s something I need work on both literally and figuratively…

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Roller Coaster Chi

Last night was one of the most difficult classes I've had training. Not because of Heng N'ou who was teaching or the hot and humid air. It's this unbearable pain and pure frustration.

After each of the jump, I almost broke down in tears.

I guess it's time I admit my limitation.

I started hurting my right knee over a year ago. And just recently I felt myself stronger. I was able to stop using knee braces and go through classes without pain. I felt chi through the roof and I could train as much as I wanted!

But it came back - the pain - with vengeance. This time it moved to my left knee. What did I do? What should I do now? I want to keep training because it's one of a few things I have that keep me sane. But this pain and frustration is driving me even crazier. This is no-win.

I guess I'll just go insane for a few weeks until my knees heal then.