Qualities I Have

Heyo everyone, it was brought up at the last Sihing Class that it would be wise to blog about five qualities a black belt we have and five we don’t. This topic has been touched on in a few blogs already, so I’ll try to make mine a tad different. This week, I will only be writing about the five qualities I believe I already have, along with why I believe they’re a black belt quality, why I believe I have them and why I value them/why I have them. So without further ado, let’s begin.

1. Being spontaneous. At one of the classes this last week, Sifu Brinker mentioned that if someone attacks you, you don’t think about what you’re going to do and then do it, you do it then you think about it. All in all, you have to be spontaneous. I don’t think I’m the most spontaneous person out there, but I find myself comfortable in coming up with things on the fly, whether it be in the warm up, performing techniques or engaging in conversation. Sometimes I think the reason I can come up with something usable on the fly is because I’ve been doing it for quite some time, and practice makes perfect. I’ve always had a mind that moves faster then I can keep up usually, and quite often I trip over my speech. However, it helps me when it comes to doing without actually thinking. I think the reason I value this is because there are times where it’s better not to think, and just to do. Sometimes if you take the time to think, you miss a golden opportunity. 

2. Intent. When striking and blocking, one thing is usually brought up. You can have all the power in the world behind it, but if there’s no intent, that power isn’t living up to any of its potential. However, the whole idea of intent is applied during our time as a green belt. What makes this a black belt concept in my mind is the idea behind the intent. If your intent is to purely to smack through an opponent, that gets the job done, however, it lacks a certain mindset. I try to incorporate my intent with the thought of “I don’t want to smack through someone, but I will if I have to.” I don’t know how much that makes sense written down because it came out better in my head, but all in all intent grows as your understanding of it does.

3. 6 Physical Harmonies. I definitely have a way to go with my harmonies. I would necessarily say this a trait I have down pat because it takes a long time to get these down pat. But I think it’s definitely coming along. One of the big things I’ve been working on over the last few years is making sure my hands are in sync with my feet, my elbows to my knees and my shoulders to my hips. I find a lot of value in this because keeping the body unified is a fundamental in driving power from the earth, through you. The more unified your body is, the better everything flows.

4. Intensity. Something I’ve been commented on over the years is my level of intensity. I find I’m very effective at channeling my energy into something my technique and creating that level of intensity, yet sometimes I can take it a step too far and it effects my technique. Now I’m working making sure my technique and intensity remain balanced: one doesn’t tip the other out of proportion. For me balance has always proven to be a valuable aspect in my life and it’s important to me to make sure everything remains balanced, and so me working on my intensity/technique balance and being able to somewhat get it balanced is big for me.

5. Pulling everything back into proportion. I wasn’t sure exactly how to phrase this one, but what I mean is the ability to be able to consciously see when things are getting out of sorts and your heart is racing and everything is going really fast, and being able to take a few deep breathes and bring everything back down to where it should be. This is something I consciously try to do before my forms and whenever I get stressed and I find it helps me a lot. For me, this is a black belt quality  because it’s something we all need to be able to do, and yet it’s still so difficult yet so easy to do.

I don’t know how many of these made sense to everyone but part two of this will be coming next week.

Backpack of the Mind

Heyo everyone, this weeks lesson is going to be about retaining certain information and using it to prepare yourself for what the future may hold.

Every time I leave my household for any reasons besides school and Kung Fu, I bring along a small green hiking backpack. This is the backpack I use for everything: spending the night at a friends, going for a hike, going to work, etc. Every time I go somewhere, I bring the backpack. For most, bringing a backpack places would seem practical. It’s an efficient way to hold a change of clothes, a water bottle, valuables, etc. And for the same people, if they brought a backpack somewhere, it would hold only what would seem relevant to them for that exact situation. And yet I like to think my backpack is a bit different. There are things in my backpack that never get removed unless it’s for immediate use, and after it’s been used, it goes back into the bag. These items include a 50ft spoil of rope, a pocket knife, a flashlight, some duck tape and electrical tape, and a change of socks (because wet socks are the worst). The thing about these objects is that not all of them were put in the bag all at once. Overtime, I add a new haul of items for a new occasion, and when I go to clear them out for the next day, I look at an object and think “yeah, I may need these later” and back into the bag it goes.

The few objects I keep in the bag are all practical tools if you ever find yourself in a pinch. They all serve a multitude of purposes (even the socks) and can prove to be very useful in a situation where you never would have thought it would have even been applicable. With that, I want to now use my bag as a comparison to the human mind. Just like how for every time I go out I’ll add a few objects with a designate purpose to what I plan on doing, during every second our brain retrieves a certain amount of information relevant to that second. And the same way I empty my bag after my day is over to make room for the new stuff coming up, our brain will empty all that little information it doesn’t need anymore to make room for the next second. And just like how my bag has a few items which are considered practical and reasonable to carry around, our brains will deem some lessons or information practical and reasonable to retain.

I like to think of my brain now as something similar to my bag. There will always be things going in and things going out. Just like how a bag cannot carry everything, a brain can’t hold everything. Yet every once in a while something is important enough to get placed in the bag and in the mind for a long time. These pieces of information and knowledge don’t always stick automatically and it’s up to us to make sure we take it all in properly. Having a large array of knowledge and experience to be able to fall back on is something that helps us get ready for what’s to come in the future. Right now, preparing for grading feels like packing for a big trip. You’re trying to fit as much as you can into your bag, and it doesn’t seem like it will all fit. Lucky for us, we don’t need to get a bigger bag to fit more things when it comes to our minds. We just need to practice more frequently and wisely. By doing so, it’s easy to add more and more effective tools to the backpack of the mind, which means when a time comes where you need to know something, you know it. 

Consistency

Heyo everyone, this weeks blog is going to be about practice, and the importance of practicing properly.

When looking at the amount of classes I attended this week, it was really bad, in comparison to my what I used to be getting. I was only able to get to 3 classes this week, which includes the Wednesday and Thursday morning classes and the IHC class on Thursday. But even though my classes weren’t as good as I’d like, I’d still consider this one of my more successful weeks, because I was finally able to get something off of my plate that was starting to weigh down on my mind; breaking my boards. 

I didn’t want to blog about breaking my boards at first, but I realized there is a lesson in it, so here I am. When I first attempted on Canada Day, I had two major red flags. I failed to break all four in a row and my side heel kick failed to meet the required technique. My kicks have proven to be rather below the level I want them to be, and that was an eye opener for me. Over the past month and a bit since Canada day, one of the big things I’ve been working on is the flexibility in my hip. After a small incident a few years ago I lost a fair bit of the flexibility in a few of my joints. At the time, I thought “no, I’m as good as I was before hand” and with that, I’m pretty sure I’ve been practicing some bad technique for the last few years as a result. 

I ended up slowing down my side heels and practicing them at 25% speed to make sure the toes stayed down, and I’ve slowly begun to speed them up. However, as Sifu Brinker mentioned on Thursday, there are times where my toes do rise above my heel. Despite these flaws, I feel my kicks have come a long ways in a short time, yet they still have long ways to go. With that, I have to work on my other kicks just as equally, because they too have a lot of room to improve. It reminds me that I have a lot of things I still have yet to achieve and everyday I get better.

It reminds me that all we can do is get better. As long as we can identify and create a plan for a problem, we can figure out how to get around it.

The Sun Will Set

Heyo everyone, this weeks blog is going to be about adapting and accepting when things don’t go your way 

For those who weren’t aware, I recently got a job at Canadian Tire. I rather enjoy it, too. It’s helping me build my people person skills, I’ve been getting tons of steps, I’m making a little bit of cash, there’s a lot of pros. However, anything with pros comes with cons. Over the next two weeks, my hours line up so that instead of getting my usual 20+ hours per two weeks of mat time, I’m getting 3. I’ve already begun submitting some schedule changes so I can attend some of the more pressing classes and events. It would be nice to attend them all, but it all comes down now to that precious balance. This job is really good for me and I don’t want to blow it by being so committed to Kung Fu, but I also don’t want to sacrifice my Kung Fu because I’m so focused on doing well in this job.

When I first saw that all my shifts were evenings on Kung Fu days, I was really upset, not going to lie. Some days I work 5-9. That’s literally the Kung Fu time zone! However, I made it clear in my interview that I would be needing to change up some evenings to make room for my Kung Fu and the lady in charge of scheduling said that would be all good, so I’m confident that my change requests will be approved. However, should they get denied, it’s important to keep in mind that, just because I lose the convenience of the evening classes doesn’t mean I lose my ability to train. I can increase the amount I train at home, and I can try to attend the morning classes as much as possible. Just because what I’m used to isn’t there anymore doesn’t mean what I want to do can’t be done.

With that, it’s important to apply this to every aspect of life. You can’t always change the universe to best suit you. Things won’t always go your way. It’s what you do when things go foul that counts. At the end of the day, the sun will set. It will rise again in eight or so hours, and then set again. If things don’t work out immediately, it’s not the end of the world. Earth will keep spinning. So we have to move on, and adapt ourselves to overcome these challenges. I find that if we can do that, the balance will become easier.