Thursday, February 16, 2006
Another notch on my martial bed-post!
Had fun in training today - another notch on my martial bed-post. Some martial achievements can’t help but make you smile.
I was all fired up from a stressful meeting at work yesterday.
I was really looking forward to a 6 rounds on the heavy bag this lunchtime. But I was forced to stop after only 2 because... I broke the punching-bag!!!
There was probably something wrong with the chain – but it sure did feel good. One minute I was hitting it – the next minute –CLANG – as a good 4 feet of the metal support chain fell to the floor glancing off the side of my head (ouch!). I was stunned and angry for about half a second but this soon turned into a beaming smile as I saw the punching bag hanging there - broken. I have finally “beaten” my first punching bag!
The nice thing is that now that I have seen and feel this happe once, I will try to approach every future heavy bag session with the intent and belief that I can truly “beat” the bag into submission!
I was all fired up from a stressful meeting at work yesterday.
I was really looking forward to a 6 rounds on the heavy bag this lunchtime. But I was forced to stop after only 2 because... I broke the punching-bag!!!
There was probably something wrong with the chain – but it sure did feel good. One minute I was hitting it – the next minute –CLANG – as a good 4 feet of the metal support chain fell to the floor glancing off the side of my head (ouch!). I was stunned and angry for about half a second but this soon turned into a beaming smile as I saw the punching bag hanging there - broken. I have finally “beaten” my first punching bag!
The nice thing is that now that I have seen and feel this happe once, I will try to approach every future heavy bag session with the intent and belief that I can truly “beat” the bag into submission!
Monday, February 13, 2006
Monkey say, Monkey do...
My 3 year old is really beginning to impress me with her kung-fu. It is interesting trying to teach her things without actually demonstrating (I often hold a low horsestance as part of my own training whilst trying to describe movements to her). It is strange. Being able to explain a movement without needing to resort to demonstration really tests your understanding. It is harder than you think – try it!
The intricacy and subtlety of the crane system also makes this extremely difficult to do. A 3-year old however, doesn’t understand subtlety (at least mine doesn’t!). This forces me to not only explain movements but to distil these explanations.
The movements she performs do not need to be perfect but the fundamental principals within them need to be correct. This forces me to think hard about each movement: which principals are fundamental to the movement? What principals are a nice-to-have (more subtle or advanced) but not essential to the movement being effective? What is just window-dressing to the movement? What principals, if not followed or understood could actually damage the practitioner?
If my 3-year old’s movements are relaxed, fun for her to do, true to fundamental principals and not causing her any damage – I am happy.
Everyone gives the Chinese arts a hard time with their flowery naming of movements. However, there is often a distilled simplicity in these names that captures the essence of the principals contained.
Even my 3-year old knows where to put her hands in relation to her eyes if I ask her to perform “Beauty looks in the mirror”!
I wish I knew more of the translations for the Chinese names of my movements and principals. I only know those of my first form and some of those in my soft-style form. I will need to try hunting these down.
After finding the names, I guess the next step will be to learn Mandarin! I bet some of the depth of explanation is also lost in their translation to English…
The intricacy and subtlety of the crane system also makes this extremely difficult to do. A 3-year old however, doesn’t understand subtlety (at least mine doesn’t!). This forces me to not only explain movements but to distil these explanations.
The movements she performs do not need to be perfect but the fundamental principals within them need to be correct. This forces me to think hard about each movement: which principals are fundamental to the movement? What principals are a nice-to-have (more subtle or advanced) but not essential to the movement being effective? What is just window-dressing to the movement? What principals, if not followed or understood could actually damage the practitioner?
If my 3-year old’s movements are relaxed, fun for her to do, true to fundamental principals and not causing her any damage – I am happy.
Everyone gives the Chinese arts a hard time with their flowery naming of movements. However, there is often a distilled simplicity in these names that captures the essence of the principals contained.
Even my 3-year old knows where to put her hands in relation to her eyes if I ask her to perform “Beauty looks in the mirror”!
I wish I knew more of the translations for the Chinese names of my movements and principals. I only know those of my first form and some of those in my soft-style form. I will need to try hunting these down.
After finding the names, I guess the next step will be to learn Mandarin! I bet some of the depth of explanation is also lost in their translation to English…
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
Asking the right questions.
I am really working on my wrists at the moment. The sword has really helped me realize how important strong and flexible wrists are. I am always harping on about the importance of foundation yet I feel I have neglected the obvious. The wrist forms part of the triad that helps to generate 3-part-power. The crane system is very intricate and full of subtle wrist movements. The necessity for these movements to remain effective means the wrist needs to be both flexible and strong. This has forced me to refocus on the “sitting limbs” principal within my first form. It is always amazes me how many answers are still waiting for me within my first form! I just need to progress to the level where I can begin to start asking the right questions…
Thursday, February 02, 2006
guilty as charged
Ok ok ok ok....
So I've been lazy with my blog! I blame it on the british weather - dark in the early evening means I have been training at lunchtimes (it is harder for me to make blog entries during the day...). Anyway despite being lazy with my blog - I have been keeping up with my training (allowing for Xmas excess!). My newest discovery - my wrists are pathetically weak. How do I come to this conclusion - one word - BROADSWORD! ;-))
more on this soon...
So I've been lazy with my blog! I blame it on the british weather - dark in the early evening means I have been training at lunchtimes (it is harder for me to make blog entries during the day...). Anyway despite being lazy with my blog - I have been keeping up with my training (allowing for Xmas excess!). My newest discovery - my wrists are pathetically weak. How do I come to this conclusion - one word - BROADSWORD! ;-))
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Kung-Fu Flu
I feel really out of shape at the moment. I haven't trained properly for almost a one and a half weeks! :-(
My daughter was sick… again… 3 year-olds seem to swap diseases at school on an almost daily basis!
She was ill for about 4 days…and then she passed it on to my youngest daughter (who was ill for 2 days). In turn, my youngest passed it on to me - its taken me a whole week, I am on the mend but still not 100% (must be weak chi!). I have now passed it on to my wife who is just starting to fall ill. By the time she recovers…. My 3-year old will have brought something else back from school... sigh.
Anyway - desperate times call for desperate measures. After the majority of initial recovery has taken place (a few days of feeling sorry for myself, an overdose of daytime TV, multivitamin juice and chicken soup!) I find I need to get my body back into its routine. It is amazing how fast you deteriorate when you take a break from training.
The good news is that if your foundation is good - the speed with which you can recover your ability is also pretty fast.
As with all things that have stopped, the hardest part is to get them moving again in the first place. INTERTIA. All movement starts from stillness.
Thank god for tai-chi. It is the perfect way to get your body used to moving again before shocking it into the rigours of hard-style training. After recovering from a bout of illness I tend to do about 3 days focused solely on my soft-style. The rest of the week I perform my hard-style patterns but as if they were soft-style patterns. Helps my body get used to the correct flow of energy again. They are all chi-kung exercises anyway.
After a week of "being nice" to myself - it is time to start recovering fitness.
Apart from running (which I hate) - one of my favourite ways is to do rounds on the heavy bag. Start with 5 two minute rounds and work up to 7 three minute rounds. I bought myself an i-shuffle recently so that I can listen to Bas Rutten yelling at me to hit harder and faster.
[N.B Don't you just hate it mid-workout when a earphone falls out! You have to take off your boxing gloves to replace it and then put them back on again before you can continue! - Infuriating.]
Anyway, Bas's work out tape is great. I like him - My favourite MMA fighter. He reminds me of a grizzly bear that could twist you up and spit you out!. :-)
So this weekend - I'll finish up my hard-style patterns (softly!) and next week whilst at work - my lunchtimes will involve Bas yelling at me to hit the heavy bag!
My daughter was sick… again… 3 year-olds seem to swap diseases at school on an almost daily basis!
She was ill for about 4 days…and then she passed it on to my youngest daughter (who was ill for 2 days). In turn, my youngest passed it on to me - its taken me a whole week, I am on the mend but still not 100% (must be weak chi!). I have now passed it on to my wife who is just starting to fall ill. By the time she recovers…. My 3-year old will have brought something else back from school... sigh.
Anyway - desperate times call for desperate measures. After the majority of initial recovery has taken place (a few days of feeling sorry for myself, an overdose of daytime TV, multivitamin juice and chicken soup!) I find I need to get my body back into its routine. It is amazing how fast you deteriorate when you take a break from training.
The good news is that if your foundation is good - the speed with which you can recover your ability is also pretty fast.
As with all things that have stopped, the hardest part is to get them moving again in the first place. INTERTIA. All movement starts from stillness.
Thank god for tai-chi. It is the perfect way to get your body used to moving again before shocking it into the rigours of hard-style training. After recovering from a bout of illness I tend to do about 3 days focused solely on my soft-style. The rest of the week I perform my hard-style patterns but as if they were soft-style patterns. Helps my body get used to the correct flow of energy again. They are all chi-kung exercises anyway.
After a week of "being nice" to myself - it is time to start recovering fitness.
Apart from running (which I hate) - one of my favourite ways is to do rounds on the heavy bag. Start with 5 two minute rounds and work up to 7 three minute rounds. I bought myself an i-shuffle recently so that I can listen to Bas Rutten yelling at me to hit harder and faster.
[N.B Don't you just hate it mid-workout when a earphone falls out! You have to take off your boxing gloves to replace it and then put them back on again before you can continue! - Infuriating.]
Anyway, Bas's work out tape is great. I like him - My favourite MMA fighter. He reminds me of a grizzly bear that could twist you up and spit you out!. :-)
So this weekend - I'll finish up my hard-style patterns (softly!) and next week whilst at work - my lunchtimes will involve Bas yelling at me to hit the heavy bag!
Friday, October 14, 2005
Don't Worry... it gets easier.
Whilst I was training this lunchtime I couldn’t help over-hear a passing comment between two boxers who were taking turns working out on the heavy bag. After a few rounds one turned to the other and said “Don’t worry, after a while it gets easier…”
It was a simple statement. In many ways when you first hear it, it is one that rings true.
I didn’t have much time to dwell on this during my lunch time session as I was doing my patterns. (When I do my patterns – I just let my mind go – thinking of nothing and/or everything, my space, my time to rediscover my body – I can’t think about anything in particular when I do my patterns as I endeavour to “become the pattern” with my whole being. If my mind is tangled with thoughts and is not “free”... How can I become anything at all?...).
My favourite time to think about my martial arts is during running or stretching. This evening, I was thinking about the boxer’s statement whilst I was stretching.
I believe that the martial arts, if practiced properly, should NEVER become easier – only harder.
People talk about “mind, body & spirit”. Of these three wars, I believe spirit to be the hardest. One’s spirit shines through brightest when you push-on against adversity. As you progress in martial training you become more and more comfortable facing greater and greater obstacles. To fight the “war of spirit” in a truly martial way is to constantly seek out ever-greater obstacles to overcome. As my instructor used to say “learn until you die”.
In other words – if something is getting easier – you are not trying hard enough. Your martial aspirations are not great enough. If you are finding it “easier” to hit the bag for a 3 minute round… then hit it harder.
If you are finding lasting the 3 minute round “easier”… then try a 5 minute round.
This is yet again the danger of complacency.
One’s training path is like climbing a mountain with no summit. By all means celebrate your victories by occasionally looking back down the mountain path to take in the view. Just don’t forget to keep climbing!
To grow one’s spirit - one must constantly test its boundaries.
Hmmm… Better dig out my gloves - I think I’m going to share some quality time with my heavy-bag this weekend.
It was a simple statement. In many ways when you first hear it, it is one that rings true.
I didn’t have much time to dwell on this during my lunch time session as I was doing my patterns. (When I do my patterns – I just let my mind go – thinking of nothing and/or everything, my space, my time to rediscover my body – I can’t think about anything in particular when I do my patterns as I endeavour to “become the pattern” with my whole being. If my mind is tangled with thoughts and is not “free”... How can I become anything at all?...).
My favourite time to think about my martial arts is during running or stretching. This evening, I was thinking about the boxer’s statement whilst I was stretching.
I believe that the martial arts, if practiced properly, should NEVER become easier – only harder.
People talk about “mind, body & spirit”. Of these three wars, I believe spirit to be the hardest. One’s spirit shines through brightest when you push-on against adversity. As you progress in martial training you become more and more comfortable facing greater and greater obstacles. To fight the “war of spirit” in a truly martial way is to constantly seek out ever-greater obstacles to overcome. As my instructor used to say “learn until you die”.
In other words – if something is getting easier – you are not trying hard enough. Your martial aspirations are not great enough. If you are finding it “easier” to hit the bag for a 3 minute round… then hit it harder.
If you are finding lasting the 3 minute round “easier”… then try a 5 minute round.
This is yet again the danger of complacency.
One’s training path is like climbing a mountain with no summit. By all means celebrate your victories by occasionally looking back down the mountain path to take in the view. Just don’t forget to keep climbing!
To grow one’s spirit - one must constantly test its boundaries.
Hmmm… Better dig out my gloves - I think I’m going to share some quality time with my heavy-bag this weekend.
Friday, October 07, 2005
Bagua in High-Heels
Apologies for not having written an entry in almost 2 weeks! Rest assured I have still been training! :-)
For the first time in ages I had the chance to spend some time with a group of my close friends without my family. I was invited to a friend’s weekend stag-party abroad! ;-) I couldn’t bring myself to let all those guys get out of control in a strange city full of blondes - so I felt obliged to attend. >;-)
We all had a great time. It was also nice to spend some quality time with one of my dearest kung-fu brothers.
All the usual boys only antics were on the cards: strip clubs, night clubs etc. (Understand dear reader, that I only attended so as to ensure that the voice of calm, moderation and reason was present within the group – What a load of CRAP! It was great fun!).
So what does this have to do with kungfu you ask? Well when you are obsessed – you see kung-fu in the strangest places. I had to giggle to myself when I realized the level to which I have tuned myself to do this!
I was watching a (rather attractive) young lady performing a pole-dance in a strip club. Was I as a married man thinking all manner of dastardly thoughts???…sort of.
I was noticing how her footwork walking around the pole in both directions reminded me of Bagua footwork (in high-heels!). I was noticing that when she hoisted herself upside down and clamped her legs around the pole she was in fact applying a Brazilian Jujitsu triangle choke! Now that is what I call obsession! ;-)
At various night-clubs, I dusted the cob-webs off my dancing shoes. I remembered how much fun dancing was again! Fun and aerobic exercise do not often go hand-in-hand so it was great for me to rediscover the fun and energy within dancing.
Another important lesson from dancing is rhythm. Picking up a rhythm and moving your body in accordance with it is a very martial skill. Once you can move to a beat, the martial application is to sense the “beat” of an opponent – then fight in the “off-beat”.
Anyway – a great time was had by all who attended. In future I must endeavour not only to balance my martial life with my family life – I cannot afford to ignore my friends – they are too precious to me.
Since my return I have been training at lunchtime whilst at work. I have found a nice hall (it even has a punching bag!) that I can use for free. In the past I have had the hall all to myself however as of late other martial artists are turning up to practice.
Everyone is very open and friendly but there is an element of looking out of the corner of your eye to size each other up. Childish competition – but quite fun! If it makes me push harder during my training session who am I to complain?
I have met a couple of kickboxers a few days ago – great aerobic fitness, extremely strong but their movements seem very “blocky”. They were working out on the bag (using gloves) whilst I was doing my forms. I could sense them thinking “that’s all very pretty – but I bet he can’t throw a decent punch” - I couldn’t resist so I dropped down and did some knuckle bouncing up and down the room. At the end of our sessions we got to talking and agreed that it might be fun to spar together in future.
The following lunchtime we had a great time sparring. Everything was very linear so once I had figured this out it was pretty easy to enter from the side and counter. I did learn a lot about the way they used their knees and I also realized that I completely underutilize my own elbows. Must work on this.
Yesterday in the hall there was a guy skipping his guts out. He asked what I was doing and I told him kung-fu. I asked if he was a boxer and he said no - he was a fencer!
He asked if I did sword… Not yet unfortunately.
We got talking because he said the way I was using my stance and waist to generate whip in my staff had similarities to the way they did things in fencing.
I was most impressed by the way this guy moved. He showed unbelievable agility whilst in impossibly low stances. Fencers seem to feel completely at home in a really low bow-and-arrow stance. The difference between him and me is that from his stance he can REALLY REALLY move. You can’t see him “start to move” - he is just “already there”. Must practice.
For the first time in ages I had the chance to spend some time with a group of my close friends without my family. I was invited to a friend’s weekend stag-party abroad! ;-) I couldn’t bring myself to let all those guys get out of control in a strange city full of blondes - so I felt obliged to attend. >;-)
We all had a great time. It was also nice to spend some quality time with one of my dearest kung-fu brothers.
All the usual boys only antics were on the cards: strip clubs, night clubs etc. (Understand dear reader, that I only attended so as to ensure that the voice of calm, moderation and reason was present within the group – What a load of CRAP! It was great fun!).
So what does this have to do with kungfu you ask? Well when you are obsessed – you see kung-fu in the strangest places. I had to giggle to myself when I realized the level to which I have tuned myself to do this!
I was watching a (rather attractive) young lady performing a pole-dance in a strip club. Was I as a married man thinking all manner of dastardly thoughts???…sort of.
I was noticing how her footwork walking around the pole in both directions reminded me of Bagua footwork (in high-heels!). I was noticing that when she hoisted herself upside down and clamped her legs around the pole she was in fact applying a Brazilian Jujitsu triangle choke! Now that is what I call obsession! ;-)
At various night-clubs, I dusted the cob-webs off my dancing shoes. I remembered how much fun dancing was again! Fun and aerobic exercise do not often go hand-in-hand so it was great for me to rediscover the fun and energy within dancing.
Another important lesson from dancing is rhythm. Picking up a rhythm and moving your body in accordance with it is a very martial skill. Once you can move to a beat, the martial application is to sense the “beat” of an opponent – then fight in the “off-beat”.
Anyway – a great time was had by all who attended. In future I must endeavour not only to balance my martial life with my family life – I cannot afford to ignore my friends – they are too precious to me.
Since my return I have been training at lunchtime whilst at work. I have found a nice hall (it even has a punching bag!) that I can use for free. In the past I have had the hall all to myself however as of late other martial artists are turning up to practice.
Everyone is very open and friendly but there is an element of looking out of the corner of your eye to size each other up. Childish competition – but quite fun! If it makes me push harder during my training session who am I to complain?
I have met a couple of kickboxers a few days ago – great aerobic fitness, extremely strong but their movements seem very “blocky”. They were working out on the bag (using gloves) whilst I was doing my forms. I could sense them thinking “that’s all very pretty – but I bet he can’t throw a decent punch” - I couldn’t resist so I dropped down and did some knuckle bouncing up and down the room. At the end of our sessions we got to talking and agreed that it might be fun to spar together in future.
The following lunchtime we had a great time sparring. Everything was very linear so once I had figured this out it was pretty easy to enter from the side and counter. I did learn a lot about the way they used their knees and I also realized that I completely underutilize my own elbows. Must work on this.
Yesterday in the hall there was a guy skipping his guts out. He asked what I was doing and I told him kung-fu. I asked if he was a boxer and he said no - he was a fencer!
He asked if I did sword… Not yet unfortunately.
We got talking because he said the way I was using my stance and waist to generate whip in my staff had similarities to the way they did things in fencing.
I was most impressed by the way this guy moved. He showed unbelievable agility whilst in impossibly low stances. Fencers seem to feel completely at home in a really low bow-and-arrow stance. The difference between him and me is that from his stance he can REALLY REALLY move. You can’t see him “start to move” - he is just “already there”. Must practice.
