The holidays are a difficult season to get training in, so this is a post not so much about amazing dedication as about squeezing a few drops out of what moments we have. In the two weeks, we've had a nearly constant stream of visitors from afar visiting us, one coming in essentially on the day that the last are leaving, and entertaining, maintaining a semblance of a working life, and all of the holiday hustle and bustle have combined nicely to make it seem like every moment that could be set aside for training is filled with something else. I even have some kindly shared notes on ideas for training when time is severely limited, and blocks of time to get through those exercises are as rare as blocks of time for proper training.
What have I done? To avoid being "weird" in front of company, almost every time I turn a corner to go into the other room, there is some form of a stepping drill or small changing drill applied with my hands and arms, and more importantly with my mind. Stepping is a particular favorite, in fact, at the moment. Every time I get the chance, I practice some form of exercise, particularly ones to build and maintain flexibility and strength, for whatever small number of minutes is provided to me. Every night as I go to sleep, I vividly envision practicing techniques in as as varied a way as I can imagine and try to create a real, tactile sensation of those practices and how they would feel "in action." It's been a two-week period of stealing minutes and seconds and making of them what I've been able to.
While I had hoped my brother coming into town for the holidays would provide an increase in my access to a training partner, as it has in the past, it starkly has not this time around. He spread himself, in my opinion, too thin socially, and so the amount of "company" around us when with him is even higher, when he's even around. I don't go out, and he goes out almost daily, so that didn't work out the way I had hoped. As I've said before... one of these days.
Today was nice. I was able to steal a block of time long enough to work up a good sweat with some basic drills, a few hundred strikes, and almost fifteen solid minutes (!!!) on the circle. I'm looking forward to getting back to my long-turning days, though I don't know when they'll be. I'm stealing minutes not just for training, as I said, but also for work, which is in a vastly more intense phase right now than before. Since I think it may be the case now, I think I've just found a couple more minutes to steal, so a few intensely intent-filled runs through some forms is apropos. Hopefully everyone else's holidays have been good to them in terms of the usual meaning as well as finding chances to find training!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Monday, December 22, 2008
Rising Yang
Yesterday was the winter solstice, the most yin day of the year. That means today is the day when yang begins to arise again. Our small group just got together and did some decent training to celebrate... well, actually because it's Monday, the day we usually get together to train. Rising yang or not, it was cold, which was in some ways nice and in others not so nice.
Here in the nearly deep South, we don't see many days a year that are below freezing, even for the low temperature. Tonight, however, it was quite a bit below freezing. Actually, it was 23 F while we were training in our little outdoor pavilion, enjoying the sight of the mighty warrior Orion in the (roughly) Southern sky while we stood and practiced. I would love to believe that I felt the rising yang energy of the world while I was turning there (with four shirts on), but I didn't. It was cold. Still, we put forth a decent effort in the pillars and had an all-around good night, though not as physically demanding a workout as we pulled together on Saturday afternoon, when it was quite a bit warmer (I was wearing one shirt... with short sleeves) and wetter. The weather here is good for teaching us about changes like that: warm and wet on Saturday, bitter and frozen on Monday. Still, there was training.
As much as I'm enjoying learning about my tolerance and ability to adapt to the wintry weather, I must say that today's promise of another cycle of the year, yang rising more to my liking, is welcomed. Working up the will to train hard this time of year is more of a challenge, and my work requirements increase while the available daylight decreases. As spring blooms and invigorating warmth returns, workouts become more accessible, frequently more thorough and demanding, and much sweatier. Still, there are two or three hard months of winter training ahead, and due to seasonal inertia, the coldest is most likely yet to come. On the other hand, just the thought that today had a few more seconds of daylight than yesterday is already warming me up.
Perhaps, if I think about it long enough, I can find the deep connection between the lessons of the solstices and the changes of the year and the changes that form the foundation of baguazhang. I don't believe contemplation alone is going to be sufficient, though. Getting out in the weather, cold and usually wet now and, at another time, hot and desperately humid and training those changes, one strike to the next, one step before the other, each tiny aspect of gradual transformation, will teach me more properly. I call to everyone training in this art and everyone that wants to learn from its lessons, then, to get outside in whatever you're presented with and embrace the change and see what it can teach you. Then, on days like today, come in and enjoy a nice cup of hot cocoa when you're done!
Here in the nearly deep South, we don't see many days a year that are below freezing, even for the low temperature. Tonight, however, it was quite a bit below freezing. Actually, it was 23 F while we were training in our little outdoor pavilion, enjoying the sight of the mighty warrior Orion in the (roughly) Southern sky while we stood and practiced. I would love to believe that I felt the rising yang energy of the world while I was turning there (with four shirts on), but I didn't. It was cold. Still, we put forth a decent effort in the pillars and had an all-around good night, though not as physically demanding a workout as we pulled together on Saturday afternoon, when it was quite a bit warmer (I was wearing one shirt... with short sleeves) and wetter. The weather here is good for teaching us about changes like that: warm and wet on Saturday, bitter and frozen on Monday. Still, there was training.
As much as I'm enjoying learning about my tolerance and ability to adapt to the wintry weather, I must say that today's promise of another cycle of the year, yang rising more to my liking, is welcomed. Working up the will to train hard this time of year is more of a challenge, and my work requirements increase while the available daylight decreases. As spring blooms and invigorating warmth returns, workouts become more accessible, frequently more thorough and demanding, and much sweatier. Still, there are two or three hard months of winter training ahead, and due to seasonal inertia, the coldest is most likely yet to come. On the other hand, just the thought that today had a few more seconds of daylight than yesterday is already warming me up.
Perhaps, if I think about it long enough, I can find the deep connection between the lessons of the solstices and the changes of the year and the changes that form the foundation of baguazhang. I don't believe contemplation alone is going to be sufficient, though. Getting out in the weather, cold and usually wet now and, at another time, hot and desperately humid and training those changes, one strike to the next, one step before the other, each tiny aspect of gradual transformation, will teach me more properly. I call to everyone training in this art and everyone that wants to learn from its lessons, then, to get outside in whatever you're presented with and embrace the change and see what it can teach you. Then, on days like today, come in and enjoy a nice cup of hot cocoa when you're done!
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Changes
Finally, after what has seemed like almost three months of stagnation, I feel like I'm moving forward. First, my advisor set a fire under my ass, and so my dissertation is coming along better. That's well and good for my life but bad for my training. Second, I'm most definitely getting stronger. My proxy saber and I are getting along at least 3-4 times a week, and particularly with my right hand, I'm noticing rather dramatic increases in my ability with the tool, although I'm still nothing to Carl "Hungus." Third, my back seems to be letting up somewhat. The "stuck" feeling has remitted tremendously in the past week and a half thanks to an odd combination of serendipity, yoga, and highly salubrious bagua exercises courtesy of my friend from across the Pond. I've been stretching on my own quite well, my wife wrangled the living crap out of me in a rather uncomfortable position that I thought was going to kill me or maybe break me but seemed to "turn the key in the lock," and then I suffered unbelievably at the edge of my abilities through a couple of the health-building exercises of Yin Style, which led directly to my back crunching around and eventually letting go! The "stuck" feeling has, for the moment, left me, although the musculature on my left side (primarily my iliacus, psoas, gluteus medius, multifidous, and serratus posterior inferior -- looking these up helped release some of their anger) is very knotted and fly-by-wire. Still... my training can now, finally, resume at the level that I had this summer, at least as long as I pretend that my advisor will still be happy if I choose that road. In theory, though, a quarter of a year later, I feel stronger, not weaker, and moving forward, not stuck.
The moral: do your exercises regularly and within your capacity, not pushing yourself too hard too fast, and anything is possible. Also, sometimes you have to burn through your injuries, not overprotect them. That balance is difficult to find.
The moral: do your exercises regularly and within your capacity, not pushing yourself too hard too fast, and anything is possible. Also, sometimes you have to burn through your injuries, not overprotect them. That balance is difficult to find.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Changes
So since admitting to myself a recipe for healing and following it rather determinedly, though not flawlessly, and since implementing even more information about dealing with the lumbar spine and hips, things have been coming along. I'm better than usual, although things are still different, still feeling "stuck," but they aren't holding my training back in any case -- not nearly as much as my dissertation and family-in-for-the-holidays are.
Training is changing too, mostly with the weather. In the past few weeks, we've trained together out in temperatures well below freezing, in sleet, in snow, in the frustration of people not able to meet up with us, and in the excitement of new folks joining our ranks. I'm convinced that training outside is an amazing thing for the body, as I used to loathe being outside this time of year, claiming that I was more of a warm-weather kind of person, but now I find it entirely bearable to endure being outdoors for long periods, if at least mostly properly dressed, and over short periods, I hardly notice that it's cold except in my fingers. A similar turnaround happened for me two summers ago when training outside every day all summer long -- despite loving warm weather, eventually it would be hot enough and humid enough for me to write off on being outside. That situation is no more. I think it's important to live this way too because it just feels all unnatural to remember how sensitive to heat and cold I used to be and how strongly I rejected those natural phenomena.
More specifically, within my training, I've decided I need to learn to root better. I'm moving fairly well, my agility and strength are increasing, my understanding and application of the techniques is seeming to get slowly better, and if I had to isolate a single aspect that is holding me back most in applying the techniques, I would have to guess that it is in my rather limited ability to root myself. When experimenting with strikes the other night with a partner, I noticed that he was able to apply a sudden pushing force to me that would cause me to step back several steps. When I'd repeat the experiment on him, he'd step back one or two, but so would I. I established clearly through that experiment that my root is still too high, or it's not set, or some other terminology that means that I can't root myself well. Since in VT this year I heard the admonition "get heavy" about 1100 times and since throughout my entire martial arts life (extending back well before baguazhang) I've had a problem with achieving proper and heavy base (as my BJJ friends have happily exploited for years), I think I've been in denial of the fact that I never properly developed this particular skill.
When I stand calmly, say before turning or standing practice or just during qigong or while trying to relax, I can palpably feel "sinking qi" flowing like a wave down my body, almost from head to feet and sometimes below. I think that's what I'm looking for, but I believe I need it in a more dynamic sense. When I turn, I can get and stay low, but I'm now thinking there is more to sinking the qi properly, particularly while turning, than just getting and staying low in my stance. When I strike, I sometimes feel fairly rooted, particularly during static striking, but when adding stepping, I only feel somewhat rooted. I think I should be rooting into my legs at the conclusion of every step, every strike, every shift of the weight, and indeed, every movement -- not staying permanently rooted but rather being able to deeply root in an instant, by choice or automatically through disciplined training.
The thing is... how do I get where I need to go? I may apply a technique I use when teaching that is perfectly obviously the way to solve essentially any problem. If I'm given instructions to
get somewhere specific, even if all I have is the name of that place and some details about its location, then my first step is to procure a map. In training, the map is laid out by the requirements and the methodologies of the art, so I have a map, even if it's rather incomplete. Secondly, I have to figure out both where I'm going (which I laid out above) as well as where I am (which I also discussed above). In my case, I believe I might need more details on both of those facets before continuing. Once that is all in hand, so to speak, it's merely a matter of using the map to chart a course (training regimen) that is designed to get me from where I am to where I want to go. To summarize the method: Consider a reasonable representation of the situation (Map); identify where you are/what you have (You Are Here); identify what/where you need to get/be (Goal); draw course (Plan); follow it (Follow-through). As it's always a good idea to seek difficulties and pitfalls ahead of time whenever possible, I'll take a moment to note the largest of them in this particular case. Here, a main difficulty is that many of the roads that exist are not on the map, and since they're not physical roads, I may or may not be able to see them, much less where they go, as I come near them. It is always a good idea to reflect at the end to decide if you're really done getting where you wanted to get and to consider whether or not the path you took was the best one, but I have to walk the road before I can do that.
Training is changing too, mostly with the weather. In the past few weeks, we've trained together out in temperatures well below freezing, in sleet, in snow, in the frustration of people not able to meet up with us, and in the excitement of new folks joining our ranks. I'm convinced that training outside is an amazing thing for the body, as I used to loathe being outside this time of year, claiming that I was more of a warm-weather kind of person, but now I find it entirely bearable to endure being outdoors for long periods, if at least mostly properly dressed, and over short periods, I hardly notice that it's cold except in my fingers. A similar turnaround happened for me two summers ago when training outside every day all summer long -- despite loving warm weather, eventually it would be hot enough and humid enough for me to write off on being outside. That situation is no more. I think it's important to live this way too because it just feels all unnatural to remember how sensitive to heat and cold I used to be and how strongly I rejected those natural phenomena.
More specifically, within my training, I've decided I need to learn to root better. I'm moving fairly well, my agility and strength are increasing, my understanding and application of the techniques is seeming to get slowly better, and if I had to isolate a single aspect that is holding me back most in applying the techniques, I would have to guess that it is in my rather limited ability to root myself. When experimenting with strikes the other night with a partner, I noticed that he was able to apply a sudden pushing force to me that would cause me to step back several steps. When I'd repeat the experiment on him, he'd step back one or two, but so would I. I established clearly through that experiment that my root is still too high, or it's not set, or some other terminology that means that I can't root myself well. Since in VT this year I heard the admonition "get heavy" about 1100 times and since throughout my entire martial arts life (extending back well before baguazhang) I've had a problem with achieving proper and heavy base (as my BJJ friends have happily exploited for years), I think I've been in denial of the fact that I never properly developed this particular skill.
When I stand calmly, say before turning or standing practice or just during qigong or while trying to relax, I can palpably feel "sinking qi" flowing like a wave down my body, almost from head to feet and sometimes below. I think that's what I'm looking for, but I believe I need it in a more dynamic sense. When I turn, I can get and stay low, but I'm now thinking there is more to sinking the qi properly, particularly while turning, than just getting and staying low in my stance. When I strike, I sometimes feel fairly rooted, particularly during static striking, but when adding stepping, I only feel somewhat rooted. I think I should be rooting into my legs at the conclusion of every step, every strike, every shift of the weight, and indeed, every movement -- not staying permanently rooted but rather being able to deeply root in an instant, by choice or automatically through disciplined training.
The thing is... how do I get where I need to go? I may apply a technique I use when teaching that is perfectly obviously the way to solve essentially any problem. If I'm given instructions to
get somewhere specific, even if all I have is the name of that place and some details about its location, then my first step is to procure a map. In training, the map is laid out by the requirements and the methodologies of the art, so I have a map, even if it's rather incomplete. Secondly, I have to figure out both where I'm going (which I laid out above) as well as where I am (which I also discussed above). In my case, I believe I might need more details on both of those facets before continuing. Once that is all in hand, so to speak, it's merely a matter of using the map to chart a course (training regimen) that is designed to get me from where I am to where I want to go. To summarize the method: Consider a reasonable representation of the situation (Map); identify where you are/what you have (You Are Here); identify what/where you need to get/be (Goal); draw course (Plan); follow it (Follow-through). As it's always a good idea to seek difficulties and pitfalls ahead of time whenever possible, I'll take a moment to note the largest of them in this particular case. Here, a main difficulty is that many of the roads that exist are not on the map, and since they're not physical roads, I may or may not be able to see them, much less where they go, as I come near them. It is always a good idea to reflect at the end to decide if you're really done getting where you wanted to get and to consider whether or not the path you took was the best one, but I have to walk the road before I can do that.
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