Zheng Gu Shui for my back.
Tiger Balm for my knee.
Salonpas patches for my traps.
Vitamin D drops, Emergen-C packets, fish oil and multivitamin for overall health.
———-
Forms for the memory.
Qigong for the stress.
Heavy bag for unleashing.
Chi Sau for the labratory.
Sparring for the application.
Weights for the CNS.
Sprints for the heart.
———-
“We will not relax.
Relaxing – just another way to say you’re getting old.” – Current Swell
Life involves setbacks, fear, addictions, episodes of depression, hardships and self-doubt. It is my firm belief that we can acquire coping mechanisms by enduring the challenges we face in Gung Fu training. To be human means to suffer and adversity forces us to develop inner strength.
Without struggle, without suffering of some kind, our life journey is rendered meaningless. Consequently, without the ability to endure hardship we create an internal environment of helplessness, perceiving the World as nothing other than a cold, harsh place. If you find yourself in Hell, perhaps you will use your Gung Fu skill to get out.
I continue to be passionate about Wing Chun and Gung Fu. Passion is derived from the latin root; pati, whose etymology means to suffer or to endure, which also incidentally gives ‘Passion of the Christ’ its classic meaning. Learning Wing Chun under Leung sifu, was filled with adversity. The English poet, Lord Byron wrote “adversity is the first path to truth” and for me at least it was a trial by fire. Practice would consist of calisthenics, form work and application. And the private lessons would often overlap with other students’ to enable us to do the partner work consisting of chi sao and sparring.
By pitting my fighting skill against higher skilled seniors, sifu forced me to overcome my fears and insecurities. Sifu’s method was to designed for a student to develop skill quickly. My choice was either to get good or to find myself being victimized by my peers. The lessons were a constant and oppressive uphill struggle, forcing me to improve or get hurt. I learnt the harder you work, the better your skills, the fewer your scars.
The inherent lesson was that the more difficult the situation, the more potential there was for improvement. As a student, I was forced to draw on inner strength and resolve, to push past the point of fatigue and override the pain thresholds. It was this method of learning that helped develop a mindset and attitude to endure through suffering. It was through this very process that I acquired the most important attribute that a Gung Fu man can attain; the will to survive.
When we get those little motivational, inspiration and productive thoughts in our head, we should act – immediately.
We should learn to practice to listen to them and act on them. In relationships, in business and in life.
I believe we would conquer fear and make huge gains across the board. For what I do today is not for today, but for tomorrow.
CTK
Five years later running my own business and I might be getting this right.
Money. What a strange and powerful beast. Need it, but not supposed to have it. Have it, but not supposed to show it. Religious and cultural implications in a capitalistic-driven world.
Analyze: What do you I need to live on? Mortgage, heat the home, groceries, insurance, gas, food, children’s programs.
Analyze: Chinese medicine concept of Heart-Mind (Xin). Where’s the focus? How much can I focus on at a given time in my life? Can I focus on two acupuncture practices, teaching, writing, homeschooling, marriage, family, friends, boxing, Wing Chun, BJJ, Escrima, Facebook, Twitter, emails, etc at the same time? What suffers when spread too thin?
Analyze: Focus on acupuncture practices = money = less stress = more enjoyable time spent with family = happiness. Plus, my job is awesome and I know it. I enjoy it. I’m good at it. And doggone it, people like me.
Affirmation: Why do I always have enough money?
CTK
Jason Gowan sent this to me. Big up, bro!
Do you have a white board that you write on? Send it to me (contact info in the right column of the home page) and I’ll put it up on the blog for the world to see!
CTK
The objective standard that I apply to represent ‘the attacker’ is that of perfection. In my minds-eye he is the ultimate expression of the expert recidivist. Someone so well acquainted with violence, it is as if it were encoded within his DNA.
This pushes me to be a better Gung Fu man.
Do you have a white board that you write on? Send it to me (contact info in the right column of the home page) and I’ll put it up on the blog for the world to see!
This one will get wiped in a few weeks as I start to find other pieces to work on.
CTK
Just thinking aloud. Ignore me if you want. I don’t write for you. I write for me.
Anticipation (and deception) in Gung Fu are skills which can be learned, refined and mastered with experience and practice.
What Is It?
Anticipation in Gung Fu involves;
How To Practice
The problem is that most martial artists, learn through the protracted method of trial and error. A far more efficient way is to employ deliberate practice.
Analyzing The Opponent
The idea of anticipation involves ‘thin-slicing’ or analyzing the opponent and drawing split-second inferences as to how he is likely to attack based on such things as:
Formulating A Response
What separates good from great Gung Fu men, is not the ability to decode the cues better, nor better reaction cues but making the best use of information present. After all, the person anticipating must respond with a tactically sound response, be it;
Where To Develop Anticipation Skills in Gung Fu
Martial artists who engage in sparring and drills such as Chi Sao are better at recognizing patterns of movement because they are exposed to a live and dynamic environment,
The better your skills, the fewer your scars.
In between punch sets during this morning’s Gung Fu training, Tim and I discussed the nature of injuries. We agreed that our ability to endure training despite injuries is the best way to go and that we should simply adapt our training method.
For example, an injury to my left leg does not hinder the use of my good leg and two good arms. All I would need to do is focus on the training of the good limbs while I rehabilitate the dogged leg.
After all, an aggressor is unlikely to be concerned about our injuries before he attacks us. In those moments we are forced to respond or die.
Don’t let injuries set your training back. Think laterally about other things that you can work on. And should your physical ability be so impaired that you are unable to train altogether then train the mind!
Never accept defeat. Never back down. In training and in fighting be the Black Knight.
Don’t be an effing pansy.
At some point, and I can’t tell exactly when but perhaps in the last six months, I stopped researching Wing Chun.
No more videos, no more books, no more articles and no more Youtube.
No more Mr. Sifus, Mr. Masters, Mr. Know-It-Alls and me trying to duplicate something I see someone else do.
I’m just training. I guess you could call it self-research now.
CTK
Always choose your battles well, but be prepared for battle, always.
My work sometimes requires me to knock on people’s doors. Last Friday evening, I knocked. The door swung open and I was met by an oversized teenage male acknowledging me with a grunt.
Avert eye contact and tilt head away.
This gave rise to an awkward silence which I ended up filling with a nervous clearing of my own throat. Hesitant to make eye-contact I looked down at the large envelope I was carrying and asked him if the home owner was in. “No” came the mono-syllabic response which made its way, sloth-like, crossing the ether and travelling into my ears.
After explaining that I had an appointment with his mum and dad, his buddy, even-taller and more physically imposing teenager stomped up the hallway until he was a mere hairs breadth away from me. He loomed forwards like a territorial lion. In just under 12 seconds I had become outnumbered by ‘dumb and dumberer’. Luckily, I’m gifted when it comes to reading people.
Sometimes the bigger man is the one who submits.
I avoided eye-contact so as not to set them off. Subconsciously they read this as a sign that they had won the status battle. After all, they were at the threshold of their cave and had prevented me from entering, whilst also making themselves appear bigger by standing tall, chests heaved out. Conversely I appeared to shrink by shrugging my shoulders and dropping my elbows into my body. They had not done anything to justify an immediate violent reaction from me.
You can deceive a person into thinking they have dominance easily.
My posture was designed to make it harder for them to read a telegraph from my arms if I launched an aggressive attack, should I need to spring forwards, fists poised. My aversion to their gaze resulted in a drop of my chin, which they also construed as a submissive gesture; a strategy that I have played out thousand’s of times in my mind’s eye. My lowered chin gave me good spinal alignment, which would make it harder for them to secure a knock out if any part of my plan backfired.
Despite not looking at them directly, I was perfectly aware of every nuance in their body position’s and prepared for any sudden shift, the data being collected by my peripheral awareness.
Always look for an edge over your opponent. The sharper the better.
I stared down at my right hand which was firmly holding a platinum edition Mont Blanc pen. I moved it causing the pen to shimmer as its hardened, metallic body and needle ink tip caught the light. They had little choice but to look at it, as their fixation reflex had encoded a genetic predisposition to track movement. I wanted them to see the pen. Because as soon as they saw it, they would have acknowledged the way in which it was being gripped, hinting a threat. By this stage they both realized that I had come armed. They hadn’t.
The one who plays the coward may not actually be the fool.
“One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.” C. J. Jung (1875–1961)
Skill – Beauty – Art – Everywhere
