Ingrained Muscle Memory

Over the last week, Sihing Burke and I have started working on the head stack with the lion. I have now worked on this over the last two years with three different heads; despite this, there is not much change to “proper technique” or what I have to do as a tail (who would have thought). Something that has stood out to me during this practice is how involuntary muscle memory is. 

All of the proper stacking technique I established (but didn’t have the chance to ingrain) two years ago has vanished; but I’m aware of what needs to change. I didn’t even need to look at the videos we took to tell what I was doing wrong; I knew right away. It’s like when you throw a really bad kick and you’re like “oh yeah, I know exactly what went wrong”. It’s mostly timing issues too, stuff I hone with practice and repetition. The only issue is that making those adjustments and ingraining that muscle memory is a much more arduous process with a stack as opposed to a kick; I can throw more kicks in an hour than I can perform stacks in a year, it feels like. 

Another interesting realization for me along this topic came with the opportunity to help briefly with the dragon during practice Wednesday night. I was the tail of the dragon for about 3 years from 2015-2018, give or take. That was also a time where we did a lot of dragon practice; jumping into the tail on Wednesday after 7 years didn’t feel foreign at all. A lot of the subtle movements (what to move, where to move, when to move, how to move) came back super naturally. 

It was interesting to see how muscle memory came back for something I practiced for 3 years after a 7 year absence, over something I practiced for a few months over a year long absence. 

Hollow

These last two weeks have been pretty tough, especially on my mental state. That might seem strange, considering everything that has been on the go, but I think that everything on the go is the cause. I have had a lot of stress and emotions that have popped in and out these last two weeks. 

Back to school week had a lot of the usual hubbub and activity, but it left me feeling empty at the ends of the days. Like, I felt fulfilled doing the work I did, but I felt hollow after I had gone home every day. It was a big mix of isolation, regret, sadness, and frustration. I’ve been trying to determine what is causing these feelings, but addressing negative feelings, well, often begets more negative feelings. 

There’s also been a lot of anxiety and stress in my work and personal life lately. I’ve been losing sleep a lot more drastically and suddenly lately. This leads to headaches, fevers, foul moods, and funny enough, more negative emotions. 

I think the hardest thing right now is working on maintaining good health habits and pushing through this slump. I am really, really, REALLY struggling with pushing myself to get up and do a handful of pushups or sit-ups. I was able to get into the Kwoon and work on a few things over the weekend, but even in the Kwoon environment my efforts felt aimless and lacking mindfulness. 

To tally my successes, though, I recognize two fields I was able to get meaningful practice into. I did a lot of drumming this weekend, a lot of mental imagery of how the lion matches the drum. It helped me connect some dots on what I’ve been working on with the lion and the direction I need to go in. I also began playing a little with a weapon I intend for next year (it may seem like jumping the gun, but the change of pace definitely pulled me into a state that made it easier to do my current forms). I also recognize I need to practice a lot more in preparation for next years weapon, as I currently am thinking of doing an offhand sword form. I am excited for it. 

I guess that is the important part; being able to recognize the obstacles currently surrounding you, and adjusting your pace to accommodate for them.  

Lion Dance Championships

I took the opportunity to watch the adult division of the lion dance championships this weekend; I managed to catch 6/8 of the dances and figured I’d blog about it while it was still fresh, since I made a point of trying to take as little videos and notes as possible and trying to immerse myself in the moment. Here are some of my biggest take-aways / afterward notes. 

Disclaimer, I apologize for the length of the blog. It was a pretty big word dump as I went over my thoughts, and I didn’t do much editing since it’s serving as my notes. 

1) The emotions of the dancers. This is specific to the dancers themselves and the emotions I saw before and after they had danced. While I’ve definitely experienced frustration during practice, the performance of a dance has always been positive experiences. My experience with lion dancing has always been as an art and not as a sport. This, however, was lion dancing as a sport. Everyone performed spectacularly, but there were still mistakes. Some teams got docked up to nearly 1.5 points off of their total score. Some teams didn’t get any docks. As such, there was a high level of personal emotion. Happy tears amd upset tears, hugs and cheers, frustrated crouching and nervous preparing. It served as a good reminder to me to relish my own experiences and emotions. 

2) The size and coordination of the drumming / cymbal / gong team and the relationship between that team and the lion. There was almost always six people on the instrument side of things in the dances. With most of the dances, the “instrument team” was very animated. There were pauses, chants, and a lot of coordination that most of our dances don’t necessarily require. I think this contributed to how I perceived the music, which felt different in comparison to our dances. Our “organized freestyle” dance requires a partnership between the drum and the lion. Sometimes the drum cues, sometimes it’s the lion. In comparison, these structured dances had that subconscious feel that the drum was always consistent. To explain it a little better, it’s like you could feel that the drum wasn’t waiting for the lion to get ready, but rather that it was up to the lion to keep up. 

3) The responsibility of the tail! Of all the dances, there was only one where the tail danced in a similar fashion to how I dance. I had a few takeaways from this. The tail definitely felt like it had more responsibilities and roles in comparison to our dances. The movements of the head felt much quicker, snappier, and erratic in the tournament dances and the tails did a good job in keeping up. Maybe this comes down to how structured and practiced these dances are, that there is less reaction involved? But on top of that, there was a lot of stacking, volleying, and climbing on obstacles. While trying to keep up with the speed of the dance, the tails also seemed responsible for managing space while on the elevated platforms, keeping the head in bounds, and basically running point on like, everything. It seemed so busy! I think this pronounced itself in the deductions; I feel like at least 60-70% of the deductions made could be traced back to a mistake made by the tail. I think this is a good example of how important the tail actually is, especially when it may feel like the opposite in some of the dances we do. 

3.1) As a part two to the above point. I mentioned that one of the tails moved in a manner similar to me; with all of the responsibility the tail had to manage in the last point, being able to add extra energy and momentum to the tail is a huge task and I thought it was awesome to see. This was also the first time I saw a full dance with an “energetic tail” from the outside, close up, and in live time. My goal with animating the butt of the lion is to create invisibility through excess visibility; to give the tail enough movement that the lion looks more alive. Watching this performance, it helped me see the lines where too much movement does the opposite of my goal; you can reach a point where the energy of the tail ends up highlighting the stagnancy of the head, and that just defeats the point. There’s a lot more to consider than just shaking my butt!

4) The props. A lot of different props and items were used in the dances. I’ve seen a lot of our dances over the years, and I think we’ve used less props over the span of 12 years than each of these tournament dances used in a single dance. The props made a big impact in telling a story (which I won’t touch much on right now since that’s my next bullet), and as fun as it was, sometimes it felt excessive. Every dance used red benches and platforms to form various types of terrain, such as hills, bridges, and rocks. Nearly every dance also utilized a river in some way, which, when I asked Sifu Brinker about it, is an obstacle which represents a lions fear of water and its ability to overcome a challenge in pursuit of its goal. Some other props included a remote controlled spider, stuffed animals (like tigers and monkeys), small drums, the big lion-sized bottles of wine, and bamboo trees. One of my favourite uses of the props was using the bamboo trees as a way to hold something. Several lions used stacks to grab something out of a tree, and I thought this was a cool way of doing something like the lettuce. Oh, and one of the props was like a scroll, but it was a double sided lightsaber. So when the lion picked it up, it suddenly went foom! and then there were lightsabers coming out the sides of the lions mouth. So much fun!

 5) The stories and the creativity. I touched on it a lil in the props side of things, but there was obviously a lot of creativity that went into telling the stories that were told. Some of the stories included hunting a spider that scurried out from under a bridge, rescuing a baby monkey from a tree and returning it to its parent, and fighting a tiger. As an audience member with no context (the names of the dances weren’t even revealed until the dance had finished), I often understood a lot of what was happening. This was very heavily reliant on the prop use though, I think. The stories we tell, using little more beyond lions, dragons, and buddhas, might be more difficult for the audience to follow along / understand. We as the dancing team, however, know the story and what we are portraying, and that’s what counts. I definitely like that side of things. While the use of props is fun, some of the dances definitely felt… convoluted. With one of them, there were so many props and gimmicks that I lost track of what was happening (and then they pulled out a keyboard???). The old adage of “don’t lose sight of the simple things” definitely applies here, I think. Less is more, and all that. 

6) The judging. I talked a lot with Sifu Brinker about this during my Monday one on one. There were some things that totally caught me off guard. One example was the point docking that occurred during the intro / outros. As one team came onto stage, they scraped the ceiling with their flag. The dancers weren’t even in the lion yet, and there was already points being deducted. I definitely am not jealous about that side of things. It’s given me a little more appreciation for the free style we do. I think that room to breathe really gives dancers the ability to turn a dance into something a little more real? It’s hard to put to words. 

7) The adaptability. I know I said that everything needs to go perfect, but I think that makes the adaptability some of the dancers exhibit much more impressive. At one point, one of the teams ended up knocking a bridge bench off of its path. The gap between the two benches that they were using as a bridge nearly tripled in size. Despite this, they were still able to stack and land on the benches accurately. For how much the teams focus on perfecting what they do, I was wondering how they would respond to something drastic that happened. And it worked well! Our freestyle dance requires the ability to adapt to what’s around you, although the stakes do feel a lot lower. 

8) The stacks. The stacks were obviously a huge part of the dances, and they were super impressive too. Head stacks, volleys, single leg stacks, all that stuff. One of the stacks I noted was a type of volley that was similar to what we had done a few years ago, which involved a rotation once at the apex of the stack. This stack that was done had the lions do a headstack, and then the head kept their legs together, put them over the tails shoulders, and slipped down their back while the tail did a sharp turn. It basically made for a very sharp 180 degree turn. It seems doable? I want to toy with the idea a little bit. Another stack that I always find fascinating is, from a headstack, the head wraps their feet around the tails back and the tail bows forward. This is best used to make the lion look like it’s drinking from a river or some other water source. I can’t even imagine the core strength necessary! 

9) The emotions of the lions. The dancers were very good at portraying different emotions in their lions, but the one that stood out the most I think was fear. At various points, when a dancer wanted to portray fear and the courage that follows it, they did so very well. Like, the whole lion would tremble, from the top of the head to the bottom of the feet. There were also really good portrayals of some standard emotions, like happy, sad, and mad. 

I have like 4 other points, but I’ve been writing this blog for days and just want to get it out ar this point, so maybe part 2 to come?

Growing Past The Jack

This weekend, I’ve made a lot of reflections on the meaning of the IHC team; what it stands for, what it represents, what I gain from it, what I expect from it, all that fun stuff. Through perspective gained via recent one-on-ones, I made a few realizations. 

For the majority of my life, I think I've pretty much excelled as a “jack of all trades” type. When it came to sports or academics, I was never the best at anything, but I was always decent at everything (or at the very least, almost everything). That’s kinda how it’s always been; I like things being well-rounded.

The same can be said for my Kung Fu, I think. As an instructor, a member of the lion/dragon dance team, an IHC member, or a student, I’ve always identified myself as a “jack of all trades”. My goal to support those around me was to let my peers settle into their strengths and fit myself into the gaps that get left behind. This was how I considered myself to be reliable and dependable. This is important to me. 

However, the full saying is “jack of all trades, master of none”. I’m not sure why I’ve never made this connection before, but doesn’t it seem counterintuitive to effectively describe myself as a “master of none” whilst being a member of a team dedicated to mastery? 

Another realization occurred when playing a very simple combat game on the Nintendo switch. For games with strategy or stat building, I’ve always like to round myself out. This time, to change it up, I figured I’d pour everything into only a handful of skills and go from there. I ended up losing. A lot. It was too hard. It was too much of a challenge. Yet I see people play this way and make it work. Are they just inherently better than me?

They are not. They are, however, more committed than I am. I gave up when the challenge became, well, challenging. I slipped back into my comfort zone. It was easier just to do it my way. 

The IHC is not a place for dwelling in comfort zones, though. Being a jack of all trades is convenient when it comes to avoiding dedicated improvement. It’s essentially settling for an all-around “good enough”. It’s essentially settling for mediocrity. The IHC is not a place for growing mediocrity. 

I still value and appreciate my role in filling in the spaces and supporting those around me. I don’t plan on letting that go. I do plan on developing a handful of my abilities, however. Committing more energy to what I care about and what makes me happy rather than every little thing I can think of. This list includes the tail of the lion, snake style, my sword style, and my punches. I am looking forward to seeing what I can accomplish when I take on these challenges. 

July Lessons

This month kinda whirred right past me, if I’m being honest. Like, before I knew it, bam. August. Blogging got away on me too. I’ve been working on some blogs that I have good ideas for, but my brain isn’t producing the words I want it to, yknow? So I figured I would share some progress updates and gratitudes from the last month. 

Work has been tough; it feels like I haven’t done much which isn’t really okay. I kinda got stuck in a “goofy loop” where I wasn’t able to get any traction with my caseload. That said, I also have been trying to recognize what I HAVE done. I took close to half of the month off, and in that time I’ve made good progress on a few files. Since I still expect more from myself, Ive been using the positive feelings and motivation as much as I can to kickstart the stuff I really don’t feel like doing. 

Kung Fu has been good. I’ve gotten to do a lot of lion dancing work; coming up with new moves and techniques has been a lot of fun and it’s given me a lot of motivation to be on the mats. I’ve also had a lot of breakthrough progress with Tai Chi, and I continue to come into my own. I’ve also had the chance to return to instructing a few times, which has been a gratifying experience. 

I’ve been struggling with a lower back injury that I believe I sustained a little under 2 years ago. It’s one of those things where, when it first occurred, I was in a lot of pain but was able to stretch it and nurse it back within a few weeks. After that, however, I’ve gradually experienced more pain whenever I engage in activities which activate the lumbar. While I have been really focusing on stretches and posture, I feel the next steps are to see a professional; the setback I’m experiencing is that I really struggle with the whole “being touched in a vulnerable state by a person I don’t know or trust” type thing. Like, extraordinarily so. This is something I’ve been slowly progressing on. 

I also found out that a teacher of mine from high school passed away a week ago. I wouldn’t say I got along with this teacher; in fact, I recognize that I was an absolute nightmare. I did a lot of coasting and clowning around in high school (which I’m not overly proud of). With reflection, I realize that by no means did I improve this persons life; rather, I made it needlessly more difficult. There is regret and a good bit of shame in that. Moreover, I’m disappointed in myself that it required someone passing for me to make this kind of reflection. Growth is a fickle thing, I suppose. 

A few more updates I can right about, but I’ll save em as a backup idea if I can’t seem to write another blog. 

Acts of Gratitude

As far as our numerical requirements go, acts of kindness have been one of the easier numbers for me to stay on top of. My approach for these has been to reflect on them before bed; to take an opportunity after everything else is done to reflect on my day and find those little moments where I contributed to making the world a wee bit of a better place. I like to try and find five. 

However, it’s not always easy to find five. There are days where I am not in it. You know, those “lazy days”. Never leave the house, most of the time in my room, not a lot of food and water or activity, those type of days. I have them more than I care to admit. Heck, I like them more than I care to admit. I like to be lazy; it’s easy to be lazy. However, you don’t need to be a therapist to determine that these “lazy days” are nothing but detrimental to my mental health. And once upon a time, not so long ago, I was fine with that. 

At the end of these days, I don’t really have much I could come up with for AoK. At some point, the more normal it became to do this end of day review, the more I started feeling guilty about it. It’s been motivating me to try and not rot all day, yknow? Which is important, I think, because I really needed something which naturally motivates me; that doesn’t feel forced. 

Part of this shift in perspective comes from the shift in how I’ve been viewing my AoK. Starting a few months ago, I’ve been treating it as a gratitude exercise. For example, a few weeks ago, I was at a restaurant that didn’t have mobility assistance on the doors. An older couple goes to leave, with the man pushing his partner on her wheelchair, trying to figure out how to get through the door. I get up, I help them through the doors, help them to their car, they go on their way. Act of kindness, boom. But instead of viewing it simply as such, I took the approach of “I am grateful I was able to help these people. It could have been anyone, but it also could have been no one, and as such, I am grateful I was where I was when I was, and that I had the chance to be kind”. 

It’s crazy how powerful this change of perspective has been on me. For one, it has made me a lot more conscious (and grateful) of the kindness that is offered towards me. On top of my own five AoKs that I reflect upon, I have included five AoKs that have been directed towards me by other people. “This stranger did this for me, and this stranger did this, and this stranger did this, and for all of these things I am grateful for these people”. This approach has made me extremely more appreciative towards these gestures, and also more aware of the areas in my life I can improve in such a way that gives back, if that makes sense?

I’ve also become more grateful for a lot of simpler things that I maybe take for granted. When I am grateful I had the opportunity to improve someone’s life, even if only for a moment, it ripples into everything necessary for it to happen. “I am grateful I got to hold this door open” turns into “I am grateful I was invited out to supper, I am grateful for the friends who invite me out to supper, I am grateful for opportunities that let me become friends with these individuals” all the way down to the base of “I am grateful I am alive today”. 

I am grateful I am alive today.

I need that. I need that mindset. That simple, basic mindset is the difference between me allowing myself to waste away versus me forcing myself to go outside, go for a walk, go to a movie, enjoy the sun, and live a little bit of life.

There is more I can add to this but it’s already a short novel, so I’ll likely be doing a part two sometime in the future. To end it, I am grateful for gratitude. And for all of you, if you didn’t know :)

Help Wanted

Something I’ve been missing more and more is lion dancing. Two of my favourite roles in the lion dance are the drum and the tail, and I’ve been working on them as much as I can on my own. Drumming is easy enough to practice on my own, but practicing the tail is trickier. 

I like the tail for how underrated it is. I think the tail is really important and can offer a lot to the dance outside of just matching the head. I like being invisible by doing more, I guess. When cats or other animals play and react, they move with their whole body. As such, I like giving the WHOLE lion a personality, since cats don’t react with just their faces, you know?

With that, this is a request for help. If anyone wants to practice being a head or work on parts of a dance, please reach out. Whether you have experience or not, I’d like to work with as many people as I can. I want to work on everything I can, from the fundamentals of the dance to things like stacks and rolls; so whatever you want to work on, please reach out!