I had a Dream...

Sunday night I had a bad dream. I couldn't do caijiao. And then everyone was standing around and Sifu cancelled class. He told me if anyone showed up that night then I should teach class. How can someone who doesn't know caijiao teach class?! I looked around frantically for some way out, but I couldn't leave because class was being held at the Hamptons....

Taking a psychoanalytic view of this dream, I would say - I'm a dork. Kung fu is supposed to ALLEVIATE stress, not invade my subconscious and disturb my hours of rest. That's the time for my OTHER anxieties to invade my subconscious. And why am I stressing for testing? Nothing is hanging on it. and even if something was, it doesn't matter. As Mo put it last night, as per Heng Nai, "Kung fu has no meaning, and no purpose." Instead of being depressing I found this very comforting. I mean Buddhism's base tenet is no attachment, so it's kind of antithetical to get worked up over my "action meditation." So to say kung fu has no meaning and no purpose is not to discount it specifically, but a reminder that just like all things in life, it is transitory and it's bad to get wrapped up in it, just like getting wrapped up in money, or people or any of those other things I've let stress me out and give me bad dreams.... Dinosaurs... outer space... high school calculus... Here's hoping now I can get back to having those nightmares instead.... Actually, here's hoping now I can have those dreams only now I know kung fu and can defeat the dinosaurs, or calculus, or whatever....

Smashing Out Of Your Comfort Zone

Another guest entry from Heng De. Amituofo!

So I've recently been playing a lot of a certain video game called Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Wii. Basically, it's every Nintendo character you can think of, and probably some you can't, fighting each other trying to knock the others off the screen. I first played the original version for N64 when I was just a wee lad back in 1999. In addition to moving around you basically have 4 other motions -- attack, special, shield/dodge, and grab. I never used the shield at all back in the N64 version, and rarely used the grab.

As I started playing Brawl, I was decent, but I realized (especially after playing a few matches online) that to get better, I would seriously have to start blocking and dodging. While trying to learn to incorporate these new things into my play, of course my level of play would go down a bit because I wouldn't know exactly what I was doing. But after practicing over and over I knew that my overall game would improve greatly.

So basically what this made me think of was how we go through a lot of the same things in kung fu. We get comfortable doing the movements a certain way, and then at some point maybe realize that the form isn't exactly correct, or the physics are a little different, or something. But it's hard to stop doing what we've become so used to to try to implement the new thing. Especially when it feels like we already are getting enough power/pop/looks good from what we're doing.

Some moves I can think of off the top of my head where I've had to do this are:

- bian tui and cechuatui -- the whole using the hip and not your leg to kick thing, especially because when you first start to use your hip more it feels like you don't have any power.
- tornado -- I noticed from a picture taken recently that I'm not tucking my leg at all, despite my tornado apparently looking purty; need to fix this.

- gongbu -- keeping your body straight forward, especially in forms like xiaohongquan.

- strumming both up and down instead of just down while playing Guitar Hero (for when it gets really fast).
- pubu chuanzhang -- using hips to power it instead of arms.
- Actually in basically every movement using your hips for power instead of whatever else.

I guess this whole thing can be extended to life in general too; to change and improve ourselves we have to step outside our comfort zones and be willing to try something new. Hmmm....and who says video games aren't good for you!

"Why do we come here?"

I want to post something insightful and/or inspirational about coming back from illness and training hard and so on and so forth. But in my head I just see Sifu telling me to ceshoufan faster, or myself trying vainly to wrench my leg around in mopan saotui. I am starting to feel desperate about ever regaining the head flip; I'm regressing to fear of bawang zakui. Every time I jump I feel like I'm half as high as people who are half my height. I'm not worried about testing. It will come and go and I'll do my best. I'm more concerned that my best has ceased to impress me. I haven't been training two years and already I have learned so much, but then the other half of me says, I've been training almost two years and I still go at a snail's pace in ceshoufan...

I'm not trying to get all gloomy; testing time is always a moment for self-assessment and I feel like I have never trained as hard as I claimed or intended. I mean, if I wanted a better ceshoufan I would have gotten it by now. It's not an aerial. The head flip I had, so there's no excuse for wallowing around in self pity over it. I've spent a lot of my blogging indulging in complaints about this or that soreness, or the alleged difficulty of something. EZ says in class "Not just hard, Hard-ER!" And while this makes myself, Sifu, and everyone else laugh good naturedly, it's true. I'm not saying I don't train hard, but I can definitely train harder.

Sick-o

Lately, in spite of trying to bring the chi, I've been feeling sort of degenerative and sloppy. Training has been good, but I haven't felt that super about my performance. Not a good feeling right before testing. Luckily, the last few classes things finally started to click, I felt like I was training hard and actually pushing through to a new level instead of training hard and feeling like I'm getting worse. Maybe it's because Friday N'ou came back after a long absence from Level 2. (I love all our L2 teachers but no one pushes us quite like N'ou.) Maybe it was training 6 days last week, I was not just maintaining but moving forward. Or maybe it was going off coffee for a week..... Whatever the cause I was in a really good place - which is why I was so bummed when I got sick yesterday.

Monday morning I biked to work, and felt ok. But as the day progressed I got more and more tired and started coughing something fierce; I knew I shouldn't/couldn't train. Coming home to a fever of 102, I saw I had made the right decision. Aside from possibly passing out, it was wise because there is no greater sin than making everyone else sick right before testing. But now as I sit here tonight, continuing to recuperate, knowing they are just now starting forms, I am really lamenting my terrible luck in falling sick. But is it bad luck? Or is it possible, **gasp**, I over-trained and weakened my immune system? Now that's just crazy talk. Everyone knows training kills sick. I'll be back in action tomorrow, but will the streak be gone? I don't want to lose the chi! Testing is coming! Sick delirium spiraling into illogical panic and nervous breakdown! Ok, so KF does make you sick, but in a mentally ill way... :P

Twisting and Soaring through the Sky!

For the past year, I've had a nemesis. Its name was Téng Kōng Fān Yāo (騰空翻腰). I could never twist fast enough or jump without taking steps and therefore I would lose my momentum. I was halfway falling through the sky instead of soaring through it. I closely watched and studied Xu, Li, Zhou and Josh. They have really amazing and beautiful Téng Kōng Fān Yāo's. When they are soaring, it looked as if they were suspended in air on a puff of cloud. Then, gently, the clouds would part and set them down gracefully. Oh!! How it would pluck the strings of jealousy in my heart!! I know it takes time. I know the muscles need to be built. I know techniques need years of refinement. But, I wanted to SOAR!! I wanted to FLY!!!

Today, for the first time, I felt a glimpse of what Teng Kong Fan Yao is all about. Zhou led the line and had us do it over and over again non-stop. I twisted, I jumped, and I soared!! I popped into the sky and landed softly. The feeling is incredible. It's everything as I imagined it would be. The exhilaration!


The key is the step. It's all in that one step. To achieve the lift necessary to soar, you have to step quickly into the next jump to build up more and more momentum. That step is the epitome of everything we are learning at temple. That step takes courage, heart and confidence. If you lack in either of those, it's easy to falter. It's easy to fall. It's too easy not to believe in yourself.

"If you don't give your heart wings you'll NEVER never ever fly."
-Footloose

I hope today is the start of a new me. The start of flight!

Expiration Date

Thursday night was my first night back at temple after almost 3 weeks. And I'm still recovering. I am sore all over and it leads me to wonder why my muscles have lost their chi so quickly. Is there an expiration date in all of us? Is there a number of days we have to use our muscles and train or we start losing the flexibility and strength? Is there a time limit or can we prolong it by adding quarters cross training? What about stamina? To keep the chi up throughout basics is a must. But what goes first? Stamina? Flexibility? Strength? Maybe I'm just getting old, and my body is no longer able to keep up its stamina and strength without constant training.

I am thinking of this only because I foresee a future where I am working on TV/Film sets or the stage all the time and all over the world and have much less time to come train at temple. It's very hard to train while working 12 hour days being emotionally available. It's a different kind of training. More like chi kung. Energy based. An internal style.

Well, it sounds like I need to stop whining and writing and actually get my sorry sore butt to temple. How else am I going to get that CHI back?!!

Action Meditation

At dinner after the class tonight, we talked about how people train differently to achieve the state of meditation... Actually, EZ and Jaka talked mostly and the rest of us listened.

EZ mentioned that he trained Karate for quite a while. His training was tied to Zen Buddhism similar to our training with Chan Buddhism. The ideas are the same - to achieve the state of meditation through actions or movements. But the expressions are different. While our training encourages us to express ourselves, his past training discouraged individualism. Movements were done uniformly and quietly.

Jaka pointed out that it might be Japanese influence rather than Zen as he is very familiar with Zen Buddhism which also has its own kind of action meditation - seated meditation where people actively sit, while being aware and in control of their bodies.

Regardless of the type of training we choose, the point is to be present, mindful and aware of our actions, bodies and the surroundings.

In the Buddhism class last weekend, somebody said that Chan is everything. Everything you do can be a meditation. It's kind of difficult to be in the moment and enjoy it at all time.

I guess this is why I need and enjoy training. It forces me to be present for at least two hours a day.

Ma-boo

Last night in L2 Mo, Sucheela, Fu and I finished xiao hong quan! Excitement! Celebration! Now we have 2 1/2 weeks to try and clean it up for testing; sort of frightening, but definitely better than finishing it up the Friday before. Time to pound pound pound away at it.

Not minimizing the awesomeness of finishing my first L2 form, but in so doing, it brought to light how bad my mabu has gotten. (The end stance of the form is a mabu.) Now I'm the first to admit that my mabu has never been super low or very flexible; and it is not exactly my favorite move so I don't go out of my way to give it extra work. But I hadn't realized the extent of the damage. The thing is, I'm building up a lot of strength in L2, but that means the muscles around my hips are reducing my flexibility. And while I have been working on stretching my hips, (which has worked wonders for the recurring hip pain, incidentally!) I guess I'm not getting at the right muscles, because I have felt my mabu getting higher and higher. There aren't a lot of mabus in L2. You get gongbus by the truckload. Fair amount of pubus, but not a lot of ye olde horse stance.

Seeing it in the mirror last night, for the first time in awhile, I was appalled. It looked even more grotesquely off because with my unfortunate long legs everything is exaggerated. (Also, it didn't help that at this point I was next to Han who can hit the floor in mabu without breaking a sweat.) So the sum of it is, the stance needs work. Lots of it. Time to overcome my hatred of mabu and focus on ways to get lower and open my hips more. I'm going to do it untill I love it. Untill when Sifu calls out mabu, I smile instead of inwardly groan. Until when I go "Huoy!" (hui, hoy, huay, how, hue, hu-ee?) at the end of xiao hong quan, it's my celebratory shout for how good my mabu has gotten.

This and That on a Tuesday Night

Tonight was my first L1 class in a over a week, and my first L1 night class in two weeks. It's not that I'm feeling too proud for L1, just a combination of engagements (and well, ok, laziness) kept me away this week. And you have to have SOME time off... Yeah, my protesting is really just a sign of guilt...

Anyway, it was really nice to come back and be in a big old class of 31 and work on polishing some basics for testing. Boy do they need it; there were definitely some places I felt myself being sloppy. What really threw me off, though, were my forms. What with teaching and learning xiao hong quan and worrying about L2 basics, there is definitely less polish on my L1 forms. I know that Sifu is going to call me on erluquan for testing, and I haven't done it all the way through more than once in the last month. My balance off in places, missing little details; I am starting to get nervous. I might even be more worried about erluquan this time around that in October! I keep going into a L2 basic, gongbu shuangtuizhang housaotui gongbu lianzhang, after the sweep. BAD! I need to get refocused, and quick.

Even so, it was a good reminder that I have to be responsible for my own training. I have to make sure that I work on those things that need it, even if it means taking time outside of class. Naturally the more you learn, the less time you can devote in class to each individual thing. So, instead of attempting headflips before class, I am going to start making sure my forms are on point. I would hate for Sifu to ask for my certificates back! :P

Noise Level

Sifu always tells us to express ourselves when training. Some people do it more audibly that others, but we all definitely have times when our grunts and pants manifest into something a little louder and more distinct of not totally intelligible. I started training in total silence, but as I've opened up more, and especially since Level 2, I've really come to appreciate the extra chi from combining an explosive noise with an explosive move, and have come to notice everyone else's unique noises. This said, I try to reign it in a little, and so have been looking forward to learning the end of xiaohongquan in Level 2 and my first "official" noises.

(Ok, that's not true, there are noises in luohan duanda which I learned in Austria, but I'm still too wimpy to do that one in class.....)

The last few L2 classes I've felt I finally found the chi for xiaohongquan, that is to say, that I've been able to alternate the times I did it slowly, trying to master the details, with doing it faster and explosive. Today, cruising on the 15 hours of sleep carrying over from Sunday, I was really pumped through the whole class, and when Hwalan told us to come over to work on xiaohongquan I was ready to make some noise. The thing was, we didn't learn the noises. We learned the movements, but Hwalan didn't mention the "mmmm -YI!" that goes with them. I figured it was probably more important to learn the move properly than get distracted by making noises. Or maybe you just don't get "taught them" per se. Turns out, after class, she told Mo she just forgot to get to that part, (clearly I'm focused on the less important though more overt parts of the form); still, it means I can go ahead and make the noises without feeling surreptitious about it. :P so everyone get ready.....

mmmmmmmmm - YI!