Float Like a Butterfly, Sting Like a Bee

Yesterday's Level 2 class was thoroughly satisfying for me. Only eight people showed up last night so I knew we were gonna work har-dah. And, it was my first Khalid-led class. At first, I was a little anxious because I have heard that he loves jumping (which my cranky knees don't always love) and I've seen the explosive level of chi he exhibits usually. But, to my delight, he slowed it down to a calm pace and went over a smaller group of basics with greater attention to details. Sort of a less can be more approach. Not that we had less chi, but that it was not as frenetic and more exacting.

We did some stuff I hadn't tried before, including the so-called jumping lihetui, which is gonna take me some time to wrap my mind around. In particular, we spent a good chunk of time on punches, which can be overlooked sometimes. Khalid reminded us to be graceful with our punches, again not lacking with the explosive chi, and maintaining our balance and fluidity. He told us to envision some of the best fighters like Muhammad Ali, who move swiftly and quietly, but stun with their punches.

For the last part of class, he decided to teach me, Mike J. and Carlos what I consider to be one of the truly awesome basics of Level 2 -- xuanzi aka butterfly kick. Up until this Level 2 class, I had been learning some new Level 2 basics, but all of them seemed to be a slight variation of things we already kinda knew, whether it be a combination of Level 1 basics (e.g., gongbu shuang tuizhang housatui gongbu liang zhiang) or a new kick or punch. But xuanzi has always seemed distinctly Level 2 to me. If done correctly, xuanzi makes you look like you're floating in the air as your legs fly up above the rest of your body. It had always excited me to see the more senior students practice them before Level 1 class started, but I wasn't sure of the possibility of myself ever executing one. Then, my friends who got to Level 2 before me started learning it and only then did I think, hey, maybe that'll be me in a little while. And finally, last night, I reached that point.

At first, after Khalid broke down the move for us, I found myself thinking way too much about each step individually. But then he went off to check on the others working on their respective forms and left us newbies alone to practice. The three of us kept taking turns over and over again, trying to take the thinking process out of it and beginning the building of our muscle memories. It became clear to me that my mind was weighing down my ability to fly and whip my legs around, so I just went for it, with encouragement from the guys. And finally, by the time Khalid came by at the end of class to check on our progress, he said to me in his quiet way, "You got it."

Not that I've perfected it, and that's it. But that I was off to a good start. And that's all I needed to hear last night.

Pain in the Back

I’m the first to admit, I’m of a melodramatic nature. The refrain of my childhood was my mother saying, “Stop being so dramatic.” So when I reach some physical or mental barrier in kung fu I really do try to reign in the grimaces and groans and involuntary gesticulations of frustration, pain and exhaustion. Everyone is tired. Everyone has pain. Everyone makes mistakes.

This is what my intellect is telling me. But my emotional reactions are, as I said, involuntary, and so controlling them can be difficult. Half of the time I don’t even realize that I am doing X melodramatic thing. Still, I don’t want to look like I am trying to prove something or enlist sympathy through my expostulating, so I am trying to learn to identify and control it. I don’t want to be making excuses even if they are subconscious scowls of pain.

That being said, where’s the line from mind over matter, and when is it ok to say, “I’m hurt.”? Saturday and then last night, Xu and the Sifu both asked me if I was all right. Going to show that however much I might try, my lower back pain has reached the un-hide-able point. I don’t want to be macho and deny that I am in pain. But I don’t want to be a pansy about making excuses. My penchant for melodrama can easily lead into whining and self-indulgence. My back hurts. But it isn’t so severe I shouldn’t be able to train. And if I make the choice to train then I should train. I shouldn’t be half-assing it.

There’s always going to be something bothering me; that’s part of the cycle of building muscles and flexibility. If I’m soreness and pain free I probably haven’t been training very hard. If I am unable to push through my aches without drawing attention to myself, then I need to acknowledge the weakness in my mind or body.

Sometimes I expect too much of myself. But I can’t stand knowing that I could have trained harder but I was being lazy or scared or weak-willed. Or melodramatic. Last night, the pain was not hindering me so much as a mental incapability of pushing through. I got really frustrated and trained worse than my two week back saga warranted. And that got me more frustrated and I was really struggling just to focus on the task at hand. And when a clock is mental and not physical, that makes me feel even more frustrated because the only thing tripping me up is me. Notice the recurrence of “frustration.” It took all my energy to control the melodramatic outburst that was violently bubbling under the surface. I don’t WANT to be irrational. And I recognize when I’m doing it and still can’t seem to flatten my heart.

Tonight I am skipping training to go get acupuncture which I am hoping will benefit both my physical pain and my mental build up. Because more than pain, I am tired of psychoanalyzing myself; I just want to train.

Pondering Caijiao

For the first time Shifu had me teach Caijiao today. I took it as a compliment and an ultimate validation of my training progress. Think about it. This was the awesomest Heng Li's job. And for one class, I got to do it.

Although I don't think I was as good a teacher as he had been, I'm still feeling giddy.

Watching my two brand new students kept trying, I was reminded of how my Caijiao must have looked like when I first started. And I found a new appreciation for my training progress.

.........

But now thinking about it while writing this post, I start to doubt myself. Why do I need any validation from Shifu to appreciate my own progress? Why couldn't I realize that for myself? I mean I train hard and I like training. Why can't that be enough?

OK. I guess it was enough. I am happy with my chi. Outside confirmation is good. But the only real confirmation is from myself.

This is difficult.

I guess I'll just train harder and stop thinking. For now.

Hawaii 5-0

Last night we reached 50 students! It was the biggest class I've been in for I don't know how long. Combined with the weather making one final attempt at summer, it was extra steamy and sweaty in the temple; definitely felt like the tropics. But I don't mind extra sweaty-ness from extra classmates because that always means great chi. I don't know if it's testing bringing people out to train or the large quantity of newer students, but either way it was a fun time. Richu told me about how in L2 on Monday they had to do everything with a smile on their face. This seemed like decent logic to me, and while I couldn't quite make myself grin the whole time, a la Sucheela :-D, I did try to concentrate on the fun I was having as opposed to thinking about being tired or testing or any of the other things occupying my mind. Magically, this made everything seem a lot easier even though I was training just as hard as I could. Adrenaline is awesome that way.

With testing a scant 5 classes away (sorry Qbertplaya but the truth must be known) it was reassuring to know that I’m still capable of having fun in class and am not totally lost in the world of learning forms and thinking about Level 2. Course, the not thinking did lead to some mistakes. In the middle of erluquan I started doing chuji quantao (stupid pubus) So I definitely need to address the line between over thinking and relying on muscle memory. But because I was having fun, I didn't get angry at myself, I just started over. Hopefully it just doesn't happen during testing!

I went to class expecting to sort of grind out my stress by sweating and training until I wanted to pass out, but instead found my release through enjoying class and realizing how much fun it is just to play kung fu with my Shaolin brothers, who, incidentally, have been most awesome this past week. Amituofo everyone, I can't wait to test with you guys!

You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)

Made it to class tonight after an entire week of not training. Mercifully, Xu taught so I didn't have to endure any special coaxing from Shifu. Felt the effects of the humidity again which made training a little woozy. At one point during forms practice, I went to the changing room to retrieve my hand towel so I could mop myself in between turns on the carpet. Heng Jian recommended I not do so because he believes that removing the sweat results in your body perspiring even more, and causes you to get dehydrated even faster. Whatcha think?

A week off from training might have done me some good, at least in terms of practicing the all mighty sweep kick. I guess because my head wasn't entirely in it tonight, I just slashed through forms and when I got to the gongbu right before the sweep, I dropped down and just went for it. And to my delight, I managed to make it around a number of times. The no-think method of approaching the hump served me well tonight. I ran out of gas a little by the end of class, but I avoided rebruising the inside of my right knee that kept slamming into the carpet last week. Yay!

After class, we headed to Thai Son with a good number of the crew -- almost had a dirty dozen, including some faces who hadn't joined us before -- Ryan, Brian and Raul. On our walk over, Niederwelt, Billy and I entertained ourselves (and made children cry and dogs bark) with our renditions of classic '80s tunes by bands like The Cars and Journey! So in honor of that, and my good sweep night, I'm doing a long distance dedication to all of you dorks with a video by one of the best one-hit wonders to come out of that lush decade. Here's Dead Or Alive singing "You Spin Me Round (Like A Record)." Yeah, baby!

my kung fu brothers - may I hear you say....

Do people not utter the names of moves before performing them anymore?

I ventured to the side a couple of times today to skip jumping. It was so quiet. No chi. Silent. Tired. Slow. I tried cheering the line up and a few people just smiled at me. I yelled out names of moves to set example and our standard "more chi" from the top of my lung - all I heard back was cricket.

What happened?

I remember when I first started the back was as loud as the front - even more sometimes. It was fun to be in the back. And I trained hard.

Did we not set good example as older students? Did we not make the class fun for newer students?

Should I even worry about this?

Waibaitui + Badassness

Last night, during Waibaitui, I had this epiphany: Relax!

When I stretched my mind at that moment to accomodate that notion, suddenly my legs turned into vertical propellers, I was extending infinitely, my arms were the picture of Up, Straight, and Not Bouncing, and I wasn't about to pass out at the end of my turn!

Goes to show what overthinking can do...

PS: My pinky finger got thwacked today in Fan Yao. It's all black and blue now. Don't tell anyone, but I secretly like my Kung Fu war wounds. It is evidence that bad-assness has taken place.