Encouragement

After getting in touch with Matt Bild, and thereby perhaps He Jinbao, I'm pleased to have received confirmation that the methods we've been using in training are essentially correct. I was admonished to remember the intense emphasis of the mind's role in practicing an internal martial art, and reminded of the words I tell myself day-by-day: "you must remember the requirements while training." We do our best to do that, visualizing ourselves training well and correctly with deep stances, good posture, and excellent attention to details when practicing the techniques, and I'm glad to have received a reminder of how important that aspect of training is from the top.

Of course, hearing from them ramped up my training despite the fact that my brother is in town. He and I have been doing a little bit on forms, strikes, and applications while he's been here, but it's clear that because his trips here are so brief, his attention is turned to the myriad social engagements and connections he likes to keep. Being drawn in so many directions makes it hard for him to train when he's here, particularly since so many of his passions are outdoor recreation and physically exhausting. Then again, he also knows he's an island unto himself once he gets back to New Mexico, being the only person in the southern half of that state practicing Yin Style. Alas... but he's intending to move back here at some point, so he keeps the connection to it alive.

Still, I've put in a fair amount of time on the circle: close to fifty minutes today, around seventy-five yesterday (plus a five-minute stint at dawn), and ten to twenty minutes a day on the others since my last post. Those ten and twenty minute days were rough... I think I had a migraine but was training through it. Forty-eight-hour headaches shouldn't exist. Oddly, every time I turned, I felt (almost) better for about an hour, but then it would come crashing back to full intensity later, particularly if the heat dehydrated me (it's f-ing hot here now... 95 today with high humidity, though lower than the last couple of days). Strikes, standing, and forms continue as well, and a decent application session occurred last Saturday, so I feel like I'm still making decent progress.

Now, though, I'm tired. Seated meditation and bed are calling.