Road trip!

This weekend I went on a road trip.  It started by dropping off things to my mom in Barrhead and then my brother in Drayton Valley.  Then ended up in Nordegg (found a great hike I want to do this year), the Colombian Icefields, Jasper and back home 12 hours later.  It was YEARS since we did that.  Just driving, stopping when something caught your eye and then moving on.

So how is this related to Kung Fu?   It’s about starting and then about continuing.  My road trip started in one direction and along the way it took a turn or two or ten.  I slowed down to focus on a specific item and then continued forward.  Made a few decisions that altered my path but kept moving on.  Found some neat new things, felt peace, had some laughs, enjoyed nature, and was content.  Had to make adjustments for things out of my control but still ended up up where I needed to be.  It was all about the journey and not the destination.  (And even did my SU/PUs along the way).  Don’t get me wrong, it was exhausting but worth every minute.

Sometimes the best journey is the one you started and then just went with, always moving forward and adapting along the way.  This trip was a perfect analogy of my Kung Fu journey and I can’t wait to do it again!

See you on the mats!

Mindful Eating Part 2

 Another part of my goal to mindful eating is to weigh and record the food waste that was deposited into our garbage.  Why would waste be a part of mindful eating?  Well.....let me tell you the ways....

1) Being mindful of how we are disposing of items.  It is easier to throw items in the garbage than to compost or take them to the chickens, etc.  Easier is not better for our environment.  By having the entire family be involved it starts everyone thinking "can this be composted, does this need to be weighed before it is thrown out" and this thought alone stopped waste going from the garbage and went into the ice cream pail for composting.  We also had a big discussion on the bones from the steak we had for supper.  I was asked by one of my children "How do you prevent that waste?  You can't compost them and they would always be there anyways."  My response was "Vegetarians would not have that waste so it needs to be weighed." We talked about our meat which was from a local farmer, grass fed and hormone free.  Just having these conversations with your family starts people thinking about what they are putting into their bodies.

2) Being mindful of what we are buying and using it before it goes to waste.  Its okay to compost but if you are wasting, it's not only your money that is being wasted.  All the energy that went into growing it, harvesting it, delivering it and storing it was wasted as well.  I was going to clean everything out of my fridge and then start this challenge but being a procrastinator actually helped show the real side because there were 2 rotten peppers and cilantro that were added to the compost bin and that made me feel bad.  I was able to salvage a few overripe tomatoes and freeze them for the next spaghetti sauce. There were a number of other items that I needed to add to my menu plan for early this week and the zucchini went into a chocolate cake for supper and everyone enjoyed that.  

Day 1 had our family discarding 700 gm that consisted mainly of meat.  Outdated lunch meat, a moldy hotdog and the bones and gristle from the steaks.  Hmmm....wonder if this will be a trend.

I challenge you to join me in logging your waste and see if it changes how you are looking at your food consumption.  As this challenge comes right after earth day,  it's a great way to continue to support our environment in a number of ways.  

See you on the mats!

The elusive spinning back kick

 There are two things I want to celebrate today.

The first was during Tai Chi.  I was able to hold the feeling of Chi through most of our warm up and some of the form.  Usually I will get flashes, but this time I actually was was able to sustain it!  So excited!!! Hopefully I’ll be able to repeat this again in the near future.

The second was while I was practicing my spinning back kicks.  My nemesis!  Sifu Brinker told me to slow my spin so I could have my kick as part of the spin instead of my normal “spin fast-pause-kick”.  So I slowed it right down.  Painfully slow!  But after a few kicks, I could start to feel other things.  Was my gaze leading my shoulders?  Was my shoulders leading my hips?  If not, why?  Was I committed to coming fully around while launching the kick or was the kick spinning me?  When I slowed down the spin and started feeling the kick, I started to feel flow and power (or lack there of) but that had me enjoying them.  My next steps are to get 5-10 consistent reps in and then speeding it up a bit.  I’ll keep you posted.

See you on the virtual mats!

Letting it go!

 I have blogged previously about my old chronic shoulder injury, the diagnosis and the treatment.  

There have been two things that have come out of this journey.  The first is the commitment to the physiotherapy exercises.  I started off strong, very strong but once things felt better I lost traction.  So I found a partner and thanks to Ms Ward, things have been going very well and for quite awhile now.  Finding something that works well and is maintainable has had a huge impact on this my shoulder recovery but it has also set the foundation to use on other areas of my journey.

The second was more subtle but still huge.  Just recently, having my shoulders down (relaxed) has become more of a natural state.  I can't remember when that has ever occurred.  Back in University someone was telling me that carry your backpack over one shoulder would cause issues.  Funny how its 30 years later and only then realizing how much truth was in that comment.  If I would have known that the "cool way" would have been such a hard habit to break maybe I would have done things different.  So years of backpacks and carrying a purse has caused me to have my shoulders tight that I thought that was the normal.   

I have really noticed bringing up my shoulders in my forms and applications.  Finally I am feeling it, usually its after quite a few moves so I consciously relax my shoulders and go on.  I then go back to the beginning of the section to find the reason why they they tensed in the first place.  The more I relax my shoulders, the more power I obtain since its easier to connect in my hips and skeleton.  

Who knew that you could actually have a positive out of "Letting it go!"

See you on the virtual mats!

Commitment

The last fews weeks were very busy with work and because of that I had let a commitment to a friend slide.  It was not on purpose but I still hurt my friend.  My initial reactions were "it was not my fault" and "let me explain" but those are just excuses for the one thing that I did not do, communicate that I was unable to do my commitment.

The thing that really surprised me was how much I wanted to give my reasons.  To better understand this, I had to think about what would happen if I didn't give any reasons and just owned it.  I acknowledged that I wanted to shift some of the blame away from me and once I realized this, I have no longer thought about the excuses, they really don't matter.  It still bugs me how strongly I wanted to have the opportunity to explain.  What type of person does that make me?  I use to think that I was a very accountable person, but this experience made me realize that accountability is not just taking responsibility when you were wrong, it is trying to do the right thing in the first place.

I hope this new understanding will help me in other areas.  For example, the hardest thing that I have yet to do is get up early to train before everything else starts in my day.  I know this will help with the scramble that I feel throughout the day but I still don't get up.  There is always something that stops me from dragging my butt out of bed, usually the need for more sleep and as I write this blog at 11:30 pm, I see the excuses already starting for tomorrow.  I need to ignore those excuses and just do it!  Sounds easy right?  I know it will be anything but easy but here's to doing it.

See you on the virtual mats!

Controlled Chaos

 This week and weekend was really busy as my team had a go-live.  Unfortunately we encountered issues and it took us 21 hours to get things resolved.

The positive part was the team that I worked with.  Everyone in all areas was supportive and that is what made the world of difference.  It allowed for control in chaos.

This is the same for any thing in your life. If you are supported and allowed to think outside the box, great things will happen.  Chaos is not as scary.  So make sure you line up your supportive groups now in all areas of your life and then you will be ready to deal with anything!  Thank you to my supportive Kung Fu family because my work chaos creeped into my KF for these last few days but I knew I could start over with no judgement.  

See you on the mats!

Assistance from Others

With only weeks into the year of the Ox,  the one thing that has become very evident is that I cannot do this journey alone.  A great example is my shoulder stretches and exercises, I was great at the beginning and then I let them slide.  I knew that I shouldn't but I did.  Some people are the kind that can set a goal in front of them and just do it.  I am always a great starter but once the initial result is obtained, something distracts me and I start on something else not completely finishing the first task.

I tried a few things to get back on track but they were not sustainable so when Ms Ward was talking about her knee stretches, I jumped at the chance to do it together.  We post back and forth and support each other.  It is so much easier to do them when you are held accountable to report your numbers to another person.  When I started to analyze this, it initially made me doubt myself, thinking that I need to do this by myself.  I need to just stick with the numbers and do it.  But that self doubt didn't feel right so I dug deeper and looked at my strengths and areas for improvement.  

Strengths include being encouraging, striving to be better each day, motivating others, problem solving, supporting others, being flexible (and after Ms Ferris' exercises this will be mentally and physically LOL) and caring about others.  My areas for improvement (formerly known as weaknesses but that gives them more power than they deserve) include procrastination, "best intentions", staying organized, unable to say no, distracted easily, and continually having too much on my plate.  At work I always tell my staff to "focus on your strengths so they overshadow your areas for improvement" so why can't I  use this in Kung Fu as well?  There is no reason not to, so I will be focusing more on my strengths as I continue on my journey.

Is it wrong to look for assistance from others?  I think it depends on the assistance that I am looking for.  I am not looking for anyone to do the work for me, I am looking for people that are heading in the same direction as me and joining them.  I will bring my strengths and they will bring theirs so we can compliment each other.  When I think of it this way, it just feels right.  My hope is that I can contribute to them as much as they are giving me.  I know there will be many people that will come and go on this journey and they will all leave something with me that will continue to mold me into the person that I want to be.  

See you on the mats!