I Believe I Can Fly!

What's even better than spending 2 full days doing kung fu on a spiritual retreat at a secluded monastery? Okay, not much, but Monday night's Level 2 class was definitely a fun way to bookend a great, and I mean FANTASTIC Memorial Day Weekend.

Heng De taught class and we had our Austrian Temple brothers Marc and Seppi join us. Halfway through class, De said, "Okay. Let's get the trampoline and the big blue mat!" My heart skipped a beat. I've been dying to jump on that trampoline since the first day I watched the kids jump on it. I always kept myself out of their fun by saying, "No, no, Leo. You're a big boy now. You don't need to pretend you're six and play with the kids on a trampoline." Well, that all changed. De wanted all of us to work on the tornado. To help us with the jumping and twisting mechanics of the tornado, we would take off from the trampoline and land on the mat. And I must say, it was the most fun I've had in Level 2 class so far! We all flew and soared through the air! Marc and Seppi were doing acrobatic tumbling. They were amazing! Seppi did a DOUBLE 騰空雙飛腳 (Tengkong Shuangfeijiao) in the air. Every time he jumped, we watched in awe. He even tried touching the ceiling! Shifu came over to watch and I could see it in his eyes that he really wanted to give it a try too. I was almost about to say, "Join us Shifu!!"

My first jump (first jump ever on a trampoline) was full of skittish excitement. I barely jumped. I sort of just stumbled and fell. But that all changed with my next few jumps. I twisted like a 720 through the air sideways. I don't know how I looked, but everyone's faces lit up laughing, "Um...Leo...What are you doing?!" With so much air time, I wanted to see how much twist I could have through the air. I have a feeling it will really help my tornado.

We had to get ready for forms so we put the mat away but I can't wait to jump off that trampoline again!!!

Retreat!!

It would be impossible to do justice to the entire awesomeness, and all the fun shenanigans from this weekend's retreat, so I will try to sum up my top ten moments.

10. Yummy thai food. Congee for breakfast is the bomb.

9. Learning the second posture for the chi gong form, Yi jin jing. Starting the day's training with chi gong was very beautiful and remarkably invigorating. The five postures we learned were all fun and definitely challenging, but my favorite was the second: opening your chest and standing, legs apart, arms and fingers outstretched, face to the sky. It made me feel tall, strong, open, and totally connected with the day and the people around me.

8. Diving into the ocean after our final kung fu class. Freezing cold, and kinda rocky, but totally fun and refreshing. When you're near the ocean, you gotta jump in. Thanks for leading the pack, Mo!

7. Learning more DHQ. Self-explanatory.

6. Being the first person in the shower on Saturday night. After a day training in the sun, there's nothing more satisfying than beating the masses back to the monastery. Important high-point. :)

5. Spending evenings around the fire talking to my Shaolin brothers and making new friends. Whether talking to an old friend and learning more about them, or chatting with someone newly introduced to temple, it was a wonderful opportunity bonding with everyone, laughing non-stop, and trying unsuccessfully to find a song to which everyone knew the lyrics.

4. Chocolate chili cookies. Sucheela is a genius. Totally great (spicy!) cookie and a super way to make new friends.

3. Getting to see the stars at night walking through the woods. The country girl in me felt at home. It felt amazing to be out of this city, smelling the woods and seeing the stars.

2. Our Shaolin brother John Sid sleeping outside at the fire with a brick as a pillow. HARDCORE!

1. Knowing that even though this one is over, I will get to come back again.

How about everyone else?

Semi-pro?

Ok, so I know that I'm not training to be a shaolin master, or compete in Ninja Warrior or the UFC and wushu isn't even an Olympic sport, so I shouldn't feel compelled to train 7 - or even 4 - days a week. I'm not looking to make a career or compete in kung fu. This means I have the rest of my life to train and don't need to be in a hurry to master something if I would rather take the night off and do... whatever normal people do on a night off.

But what if I want to train that much? Today, there was nothing doing at work and I thought I would slip out for another double, just for fun. But in debating it with myself I came to the fairly rational conclusion that I was already sore and I had already trained S/M/T, and I didn't want to be beat for L2, or worse, injure myself over-training right before the retreat.

Talking with Richu, he once told me if you're crazy enough you can train through pain. My pain tolerance is low I guess. When something hurts I can't be a stoic and I'm paranoid about injury having thus far avoided anything serious. That makes it hard for me to determine when I actually DO need a break. Around day 4 when the muscles are throbbing and joints are aching I think I need to give them a night off to rebuild and recover, even if what I want to do is go to class. Logic and the study of human physiology say this is reasonable and wise. My embittered and stubborn ego says it is weak and complaining and I should suck it up and train harder if I want to get stronger. Everyone else trains through tiredness and soreness and I am just being a martyr... Where's the line for fanaticism?

But seriously, I am struggling with finding the balance that works for my mind, my body and my ambitions. I WANT to be able to train more without feeling like a lead weight, but the class after a night or two off feels so much better than the fourth night in a row. But if I take nights off how will I ever get stronger and be able to train those day classes on a whim without worrying about a potential over-training injury? I can't afford a full time masseuse and chiropractor like a professional athlete. and I don't want to be a professional athlete. But I don't want to be an amateur either just dabbling around. I know that if I want to excel I have to do more concerted training outside of class, but I don't want to be an all consumed workout-aholic. I do have other interests... Stop laughing. I DO. They're just not as interesting... Oh well, as we say, train harder. Just do it. More chi. And so on.

Packing for the Retreat?

Now that we are counting down to this weekend-long training away from home, I start to worry about what to bring. From Ji's post last year, she said her 3 uniforms and 10 t-shirts were not enough!

We will only be there for 2 days and 2 nights....

I thought I would just bring 2 uniforms (including the dirty one from Friday night's class), a few t-shirts/tank tops, a pair sleeping pants, a few pair of socks and a pair of running shoes.

Oh and a flashlight and sunscreen and lots of cookies for the road.

What are you going to pack? What else should I pack (other than the suggested 17 t-shirts)?

Flippin' sweet!

I often play a little game with myself in my head, thinking about maybe perhaps possibly not training even when I know 99.9% that I will. I am very glad I didn't give in to that vague inclination today because tonight's class - well frankly, it rocked. N'ou has been busy of late so he has been popping in and out of L2 sporadically. I hadn't seen him in awhile, and when he came though the door tonight I started to get excited.

Ok, I was already excited because before class I finally landed my head flip again. I then landed it ten more times!! So when N'ou walked in and then twenty-five of us lined up, I was rarin' to go.

Class was so much fun. The chi was amazing and my SBS was dormant, I was able to kick so much better that N'ou even had me demonstrate lunbi caijiao. Even though that promptly made me forget how to do it right, it still didn't dampen my chi. When it came time to do liyu dating, I landed the head flip each time on my first try! At the end of the class we got to work on some DHQ and I ended class feeling even better than when I started.

It's always a lovely reawakening to find class exhilarating and fun when it has been fraught with pain or a ponderous energy. It's a great way to feel right before the retreat and a wonderful way to start the week.

Wait...Is that ME I'm looking at?

As I walked through the Temple's doors on Saturday, I was immediately struck by two things -- Number 1, there was a PBS television TV crew for the Program Religion and Ethics at the Temple doing a special on 師父 (Shifu). And number 2, there was nobody in class. Well, I think the final number was around 20, but only FOUR Level 2's (Heng Bao, Me, Heng Po, and Aubrey). 師父 obviously would like to have a huge class to show our chi and so I was pumped for class because I knew I would be responsible for not "losing face." (丟臉) When we have guests, 師父 seldom takes the time to introduce them before class starts. This time, they were introduced right after we lined up. You can tell from 師父's face that this was important to him.

I immediately jumped to the front of the line with Heng Bao leading the other side. We walked quite a bit. ( I lost count how many times.) 師父 wanted good technique instead of speed. I don't know how well I did in this department. I am quite comfortable being in front of a camera for my acting, but when the camera was at Temple, I got all flustered and my eyes kept darting towards the camera. And perhaps being too vain, I messed up a few moves. It just goes to show that I have a while to go before I can be comfortable doing Kung Fu in front of a camera. Hopefully, they didn't notice too much or at least can edit my stupid looks at camera out. I'd bet they thought I was some amateur. Sigh...well...luckily, we had Heng Yu pumping everyone up with his chi.

After basics, while in the changing room, one of our temple brothers said, "Nothing like Vanity to pump up your chi, eh?" Class was supposed to have been difficult. I was still sore from the Level 2 class the night before. But class felt invigorating. I had a blast. The best part was at the end when they interviewed 師父 for about 30 minutes. The topics the interviewer tossed were intriguing, and 師父's answers were enlightening. I especially remember this:

Interviewer: "Is there anything difficult that you do?"
師父: "Nothing is difficult. Nothing is easy."

師父 went on to explain that if you want to do it, difficult is easy. If you don't want to do it, even easy things become difficult. This statement really hit home for me. Too often, I rank tasks by order of difficulty, not by whether or not I want to do it. Take my obsession with the Tornado for instance. It is a difficult move, but because I really want to get it, it is almost within reach! Every time I fall, I feel I am getting closer. I look around my life and I definitely don't do that enough. It's time to break this bad habit. If I don't, sooner or later, my life will be surrounded by difficulties too challenging to overcome.

Teach me to learn

I have never felt like an awesome teacher; mostly because I feel so green and unskilled myself. I am more self-conscious having people see me teach than watching me do forms in line. When Sifu is watching...forget it. I get flustered, so the person I'm teaching then gets flustered, and suddenly neither of us knows what we're doing.

But part of training is mastering yourself mentally and building confidence, so as time has gone on I have gotten somewhat more confident when called upon to impart some grain of wisdom to a newer student.

However, the last few classes, Sifu has had to come and stop me from teaching things straight-up wrong. Last night it was chuji quantuao. I was steadfastly correcting this poor girl's movement when Sifu came over and said "No," and had us revert back to doing it the way she had been originally. This has happened a few times before with other moves, and I am never certain if I was taught something that way or I changed it myself without realizing it.

At first I was pretty upset at myself, and embarrassed for forgetting the most basic form. But I figured, what with different people teaching the same move slightly differently, watching more advanced students and gleaning the details of their forms, unconsciously developing shortcuts, and just plain misunderstanding a movement, it's not surprising that one can end up doing things a little differently. I just have to train harder at always being in the moment and mindful of every move I make, incorporating corrections, and being happy when I get feedback and not embarrassed.

Women and Sports

Not too long after I hurt my knee back in September of last year, I got into an argument with my father, who had said to me, "I don't think women should do kung fu." I know he probably was reacting to seeing his daughter hurt herself while he came and watched a class and had found an awkward way to show his concern, and, well, he also is kinda old school, but his statement infuriated me. How could he say that to me, especially after watching me and several of my female friends train so hard for nearly two hours? Hmph!

It is interesting, however, taking into account how many of us women do suffer from various joint (especially knee) injuries. I've heard that women are more susceptible to such injuries for a number of reasons such as our general greater flexibility leads to overextension, or that wider hips lead to a different sense of balance, or that higher tolerance for pain results in us ignoring warning signs, or we feel like we have to prove something while performing against males by pushing even harder.

In fact, this past Sunday's New York Times Magazine featured an article discussing sports and women (in the context of soccer). Check it out. It suggests that perhaps because we are built differently, we should be aware of such differences, and not necessarily view them as limitations, but train with them in mind. The article also mentioned the importance of "sufficient core muscle strength, balance or overall coordination to play safely."

I remember reading recently in one of those free magazines you find while riding an airplane about building core strength, a concept with which I was only vaguely familiar. There is belief that emphasis in building "core" areas such as the abs, pelvis, shoulders and general torso area will result in a safer overall development of one's physicality.

Perhaps it would be prudent to be smarter about training kung fu rather than just slashing through everything? What do you think?

(Also, here is a follow-up discussion to the Times article.)

IT'S A SNAPDRAGON!

Congrats Heng Ji and Chadie on your new arrival! She started her entry into this world on a terrifically blustery day, and now that she's finally here, what a gloriously sunny one it is!

We cannot wait to welcome her! Amituofo! <3<3<3

A bounce in my step, a spring in my heart!

In the changing room on Friday, while my gaze was fixed on the ground (changing room etiquette), I noticed that Richu has inserts in his feiyues. I asked what they were and Eric answered for Richu that they were for support. Then he said, "You gotta have 'em when you're a high-flier. Leo, you're a high-flier too, you gotta get them. Your knees and back need support."


After thinking about it quickly, it makes perfect sense. Maybe that's how I hurt my lower back during testing. So Saturday, I went out and got the Dr. Sholl's Tri-Comfort Orthopedic insert.

On Sunday, I got a chance to try them out for the first time. I have to say, Temple training is a whole new experience. I don't know why I didn't get them a year ago! They felt really good! They made my every step have a bounciness instead of the ground jarring sensation each time after a kick, move, or jump. The Feiyues don't offer much in the arch support area. Actually, they barely offer any support. They are flat and unforgiving. The best running shoes have amazing support because the foot is constantly pounding the pavement/ground. Even though we are on carpet, our repeated kicks and foot hitting the ground will take its toll. It's one reason on the first step of my gongbu, I never seem to feel right. The heel hitting the ground too hard always sends a vibration up my spine that I don't particular like. Today, that first step felt kinda nice! I was genuinely surprised!

There is a drawback though. It threw off my balance quite a bit, especially in forms. I wasn't used to having an extra layer in my shoes. And the bouncy support also changed how my stances were executed. But, by the end of class, my balance adjusted and I feel that with a little more getting used to, my forms will be even better than before.

There are different type of sole inserts. Some are for arch support; Some for knee support; Some for lower back pain. Maybe I'll mix it up and see which one I like best. Or maybe I should get something like this? Do you think 師父 (Shifu) would approve? My 騰空翻腰 (Tengkong fanyao) would really soar!! :D