Spinadees

The direction I've chosen seems to be a pretty good one, and after reviewing the ping tua forms in the sweeping, cutting, chopping, and hooking palms, I'm starting to see much more clearly some of the ideas in the sweeping form that Matt was attempting to elucidate for us. My sweeping strikes seem to be getting better too, though that general feeling of "heaviness" still is kind of weak. I'm not sure why I have such a hard time with it. I'm probably trying too hard. In any case, it's really strange how looking at those other palms on my own, which I cannot be 100% sure on whether I'm doing them entirely correctly or not, particularly with the stepping, gives better insight into the things that Matt was spelling out perfectly plainly for us a few weeks ago in Vermont. Weird... but good. Certain movements in each of the other forms have made it a lot more clear how valuable it can be to pay attention to these subtle details, and I'm glad I've undertaken the study and seen that.

Unfortunately for me, or fortunately as it may truly be the case, my ability in VT to participate was somewhat limited by the fact that I had hurt my back about a week earlier carrying some boxes. That put a slight limit on what I was and wasn't able to do, which sucked from where I stood because I would have been gladder to give a better showing. I thought it wouldn't be a big deal, but I could tell within a few hours on the first day that it wasn't going to not be a big deal. I just wish I hadn't put off the chiropractic I went to until the day before we left. Perhaps things would have been different. I still would have had to swallow a lot of bitter, but probably not so much as I did.

The title of this post is "spinadees," which is the silly and immature name my brother and I have given back pain after seeing a silly and immature internet cartoon talking about spikes coming out of a back as being "spinadees," spelling here is questionable but the one I've chosen to use for the purpose. Well, for whatever reason (probably desk-jockeying), this week my back went almost completely out after feeling almost completely recovered (as in my hips visibly weren't on straight: cocked to one side, twisted slightly, and tilted forward, with powerful muscle spasms to boot). Since this has happened quite a few times (it's come and gone since a jiu-jitsu incident about 7 years ago, though the actual triggering injury was almost definitely when I was in 9th or 10th grade (about 13 years ago)), and I was in a position to drop everything when it did, most of the damage was prevented, which is to say I was only mostly floor-bound (as opposed to totally) for 6-8 hours one evening until bed (instead of for 3-5 days) and painfully semi-mobile the next day. Today is the next day after that, and I'm about 70% mobile now and in relatively minimal, though constant pain, although "serious discomfort" is closer to the real sensation than "pain." It sucks for me, so far as I can tell, because I had just hit a real stride with my training, both in terms of what felt like positive gains and in terms of strong desire to put in extra time. Don't be misled, though: I'm almost positive what caused the back pain had nothing to do with the training (which I've never been sure of before) and a lot to do with 1) sudden progress at workin my research (which meant obscene amounts of time in desk chairs -- 13+ hours on Thursday alone), and 2) emotional factors (stress, frustration, irritation -- some from the sudden progress and much from the other aspects of my job, i.e. teaching, and quite a bit from my dealing with kids), which I think have more to do with pain than we like to admit here in the West.

In any case, I caught up a lot on my reading in the "down time" and realized a few elements that apply to general qigong training that should apply neatly as nuances to be used in standing practice. I look forward to feeling well enough to test that via hard training. I also spent a lot more time getting into my body through stretching and deep breathing, trying to get into touch with those emotions and tensions that were causing me the pain. I definitely need to put more attention into those two aspects of my training: breathing and stretching, as well as paying attention to subtle forces and changes within my body, even though those don't manifest plainly as being part of the martial art. I was also free to do a lot of contemplation, which was nice for trying to understand the forms. I spent a lot of time envisioning myself using the movements from the ping tua forms on people, much to my amusement and surprise, surprise at how clearly in some cases I could "feel" what would make the move succeed.

I'm really hoping that tomorrow will prove a better day than even today for my back and hips, and if it is, then I'm completely stoked about meeting up with the group and playing with some of these ideas.