Riding on the Wings of Victory

The Aerial. I did it. I landed one.

After seeing it all my life in kung fu movies, tv shows and acrobatic tumbling routines, I did something on Friday I've never thought I would be able to do. I landed my own aerial.

It's not that I never thought I would be able to do it. Lots of people can do it. Most of the senior Level 2's can. I remember one of my first classes at the Temple when Heng Li was leading the line and we were doing 側手翻 (CeShouFan). He did aerials oh-so-casually all the way down the line. And if you know Li, when I say "casual", I mean FULL of chi. :) My fancy took flight and I told myself, "If I trained harder, maybe I'll get there too."

It's been a year and a half since that day and I have evolved physically, mentally, and spiritually. I've been feeling and witnessing exponential growth within me. Friday was the day I tasted my first freedom and learned to fly. That's exactly what an aerial is. It's suspended animation gliding through the air. It's as if a mini-worm hole was created and the laws of physics and gravity no longer applied. For that split second, time stopped and the world ceased to exist. I was in a moment of total amazement and bliss. The next second came and the world came rushing back. All I heard was the class exploding in clapping and cheers. I landed one. My very first.

I've been on the cusp many times. But, right when I get to the vertical point, doubt would creep in and I would reach out my hands and fall back down. Not holding out your hands to touch the ground takes courage and fearlessness. You have to believe that your head won't get smashed on the ground. You have to believe that your body has enough momentum to carry you over the 90 degree point. You have to believe in yourself.

I've had horrendous pain in my neck and spine in the past two weeks. I'm not really sure how I got it but it just wouldn't go away. Now I know what that was. It was the blossoming of my wings of victory.

So long, farewell.

I can’t pull two thoughts together for this post because I’m going to CHINA tomorrow. It’s so exciting, intimidating, and downright exhausting thinking of what is in store for us there. I hope to be able to keep the blog fairly well updated with the training over there. But if not, expect a deluge of posts when we return in two weeks. I am going to go with no expectations except for adventure, and hopefully, will come back with all kinds of brilliant philosophical and kung fu insights. Or at least come back with some fun souvenirs and good photos.

Training last night, I got to thinking about how different classes will be for everyone still here with so many of us gone. And I realized, that while taking 21 people out of the mix will affect the numbers somewhat, there is such a strong group of new folks that the absence of those China-bound will not be felt that drastically. And while, I like being missed, I am glad to think that temple won’t be a ghost town while we're away. See you all soon!

Aaaaand we're BACK

Last night, the first half of L2 was an hour and 15 minutes long. Not the first time and I'm sure not the last. but then, we only had six minutes of stretch break before we started again. As the third to go in the wall stretch, I had just enough time to sit down before I heard "Line up!" no great tragedy. I was actually able to waibaitui much stronger having not just strained my hip flexors in the stretch. But when I woke up this morning, I felt the full force of what had happened. Absolutely ZERO stretching.

I go through phases stretching. Sometimes I come home and it's the first thing I do. Or I do it hot from the shower, or when I wake up. Sometimes I have a routine, sometimes I just hop out of bed, touch my toes and run to work. The hour before training I spend a good bit stretching. It feels great after sitting at a desk all day. My recent laziness, culminating with no stretch last night, resulted in an unforeseen level of soreness today. Some muscle around my knee that never hurt before was berating me the whole walk to work. I forgot how quickly you return to sore muscles when you take time off. More importantly, I forgot the crucial message I always give first timers - you MUST stretch. So I'm going to keep this short so that I don't get too comfortable here, and I'm gonna go make amends to my now VERY sore legs.
I do love it though. It's a sign I'm getting back in the groove.

Sloth Style

Last week, I became a master of a rare animal form- one so closely guarded, only a few people have every had the chance to see it, let alone learn it. But I can now name myself amongst the few who have perfected this rare art: sloth style.

In the past we've talked about how KF can be so addictive, that you go into over-training mode without realizing it. You have to take a serious step back and assess yourself when you might be injured. It got to where the only way I could keep myself from training, and rest my body, was to leave all my gear at home.

Then somewhere in the middle of the summer I got deluged with activities and obligations and I was only making it three times a week. "That's okay," I told myself. "Three is still plenty to maintain." then I needed a week of rest. Or two. And I was still only getting three a week. "That's okay. You need to let your brain reboot also." Then I hurt my back and it all went downhill. "That's okay, you don't want to seriously injure yourself, you want to be healthy for the China trip." The voice in my head continued to smother my guilt. A back injury is really hard to push through, because it affects nearly every move you do and you end up so frustrated and in pain that it really is a downer to even come to class. But I knew I couldn't use that excuse forever. Still... "That's okay," the voice in my head continued to reassure me. "Reboot yourself. You have the rest of your life." Stupid devil on my shoulder. Never listen to that little voice. It's the siren song of your doom.

Suddenly, China deployment is this Saturday and I only trained ONCE last week. What the heck?!?! I came to Level Two ready to punish myself, but I realized I lost the chance weeks ago. Somewhere in there, I crossed over from the training addiction to the laziness addiction. Now, I'm glad I realized some balance in my life, and got other extracurriculars going. And I really had a blast this summer. But ONCE? It's amazing how quickly you find the joy of sitting on the sofa and reading for hours, or wasting a lazy sunday in the coffee shop and the park.

This is exactly why I over-trained. Because I knew as soon as I allowed myself the possibility of not training just because, that I would rapidly slide into sloth. Moderation is not a strong point of mine, and balancing in the middle has always been tough. Now suddenly I am slow and heavy and sloppy; my endurance is shot. I'm not sore, but what does that get me? I have to be
representing in China in just a few short days.

Hopefully, tonight's training will help kick start a successful week's prelude. While it won't have me back jumping higher and moving faster, at least I can re-coordinate and sharpen what I've got. And heck, whatever happens, I'm gonna be in Ch-Ch-Ch-China! Maybe everyone else will be learning mantis and tiger, but I'll show them something they never saw before. Sloth Claw!

Sources of Inpiration

Thanks, Cheng, for your inspired call to action! I've been half-writing this post in my head for a bit now without committing any words on my keyboard, but now your poem compelled me to push it out... :)

Anyway, now that I've been training for a bit over 2.5 years now (and still stuck in L1), I am not learning anything "new" per se, so I strive to improve what I already do know by trying to make things sharper, doing actions faster, and so forth. Something that has been sort of a nemesis to me is trying to avoid taking steps in between kicks. Shifu has called me out on it so many times, and it really hit me hard this past Spring. I think I've made some progress in erasing this terrible habit of mine through a long process of almost having to re-learn by observing others, by changing my sense of balance, and by reminding myself that it's not about doing it fast, but doing it correctly. Constant evolution!

Recently, at the 100 day ceremony for Heng Ju, I saw Niederwelt's 5 year old niece Nina spinning cartwheels like it was nobody's business -- she effortlessly did one after another without any pauses or steps across the green carpet much to the amusement of herself and others. It really was ceshou-fun!

The next week I attended a day class and while we were doing ceshoufans during basics, I heard Xu call to me not to take extra steps. Buoyed by my memory of Nina a few days earlier, I tried it out, and wheeeee! boy, did those ceshoufans come whipping by faster! In fact, I felt like I was moving so much quicker that I almost lost my sense of balance and came tumbling down. I guess like with everything, I'm just gonna have to readjust and recalibrate. Oh, and maybe attempt ceshoufan again from the other side...yeahhhhhhh.......

Speaking of observing others, in recent classes I attended, I have noticed a new young fellow who has yet to learn all the basics, but does the most wonderful tenkong fanyaos. I don't know his name (yet) but I am inspired by how fluidly he leaps into the air and rotates. He is gazelle-like and strikes me as a dancer. I shall have to study his movements more and hopefully something will seep into my own labored tengkong fanyao.

It goes to show that you never know when you'll find something from which to learn.

Wispy Participation

Because Summer is busy, it's true-- I haven't been around too much, and I miss my regular 3 or (that wishful) 4 classes per week. And because Cheng cared enough to write a rhymy poem, I wanted to participate in our blog with some non-rhymy musings.

Tonight's class was great. I'm easing back into it after "maintaining" a saddening 1 x per week "schedule". It's more like catch as catch can while work is so busy, and while weekends camping in Vermont are beckoning. I used to feel guilty when I couldn't make it to class, but I don't anymore. I love training when I can train, and while it is of personal importance to me that I maintain a balance in my life, Temple will always be a part of that balance.

To wit: Last week I learned something interesting in a Buddhist workshop that Cheng and I attended: Guilt can be transformed into what they called Intelligent Regret. While guilt eats at you and drains your sensibilities, intelligent regret is steeped in mindfulness and helps guide your future choices toward a more elegant outcome. Intelligent regret highlights the misstep as a lesson to be learned instead of bogging you down in the unhelpful darkness of self-admonishment.

It made me really happy to train tonight, to be back, to see everyone, to move my body, however sluggishly. The choice I made to prioritize training is reinforced by the way I feel when I train. Coming to Temple is a self-perpetuating cycle of awesomeness. If I could insert a checkmark here, I would.

Oh man, a checkmark would just be so perfect.

Absence makes the blog grow duller

I know I KNOW! We've been horribly absent from the blog of late. Aside from a quick, humorless note here and there complaining about my back or some such thing, posts have been haphazard at best. So, while I draft up a nice long new post that will hopefully supply hours of amusement my sparking a firestorm of comments, here is a mea culpa ode.

Oh KFD Bloggers! Where did you go?!
Your posts entertain me and work is so slow.
I know that you’re busy. You all have real lives.
Boyfriends and girlfriends and fake baker-wives.
But I know you’re still training; I saw you last night!
Yet no posts appearing? Now that just ain’t right!
I’m sorry; forgive me. I shouldn't complain.
But there’s something so lovely in sharing your pain.
So turn off the gchat, and turn off the phone,
And come back to blogging, I feel so alone!
It might not be pretty. It won't need to rhyme.
Just mention caijiao and we'll have a great time!

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.

Everybody Sign In?

We have all been through those days when somebody forgot to sign in. Shifu would ask who didn't sign in. And I would have all these thoughts going through my head:

1. I signed in. No problem. It's not me.


2. Did I really sign in? Did I forget today?


3. So I walked in. Said Amituofo. And then did I sign before changing or did I change before signing?


4. Oh phew.... Somebody else. Not me. Yay!

Have you ever wondered why Shifu is so militant about signing in? My theory is that this is just one of the rules that he likes to enforce (other than no shoes in the temple, no talking during class, etc.).

Livia offered an interesting theory today. She said the sign in sheets are on the stool facing the main altar. Whenever we sign in, we bow to the altar unknowingly paying respect to the place. That's why when we forget, Shifu makes us do it.

I guess this is one of the things at the temple that you can make it into what you want. I see it as just one of the rules. Livia sees it a little deeper.

And here are words from Livia:

Bowing

Today after class Sucheela, Cheng, Natalie, and I were talking about Bowing to Sifu. As a matter of fact today was the first time I did the whole bowing thing. I just felt it was right. Also I'm planning in becoming a disciple if Sifu accepts me. We were talking about how if you want to bow you do but if you don't you don't have to. But then I mentioned something that I noticed a long time ago which is that Sifu makes sure that you sign every class and when you sign you Bow. The way the sign in sheet is facing the altar and you have to bend to sign in therefore you bow. And I think is cool even if you don't know you are bowing because regardless you are.

Amituofo.

A note on Sleep

I find when I don’t train I sometimes get insomnia. Not surprising; my body’s got too much pent-up energy; my brain is still going a-mile-a-minute. But oddly, I find that when I do train a lot, while I sleep like a log, I sleep fewer hours and wake up much less exhausted. The last few nights after training I’ve been going home and watching the Olympics until about 1 am. Then, angry at myself, I set my alarm for 8:30 (the absolute latest I can wake up and still get to work) expecting to hit snooze three times. Yet, strangely, I end up waking up at 7:15, all in one piece, and ready for the day.

Maybe it’s just a sign that the rest of my life is no longer stressing me out and making me, contradictorily, perpetually exhausted and insomniac. But I theorize that, once I hit a reasonable training routine, I don’t simply acclimatize, but my body is getting stronger and my mind is clearer, so both need less rest. In either case it’s like getting three extra productive hours a day. And with those, who knows what I could do? Train more? :D