The First Ten Thousand

Let's Face It, I Fail at Blogging

2010-04-01T16:04:00.001-04:00

Oh well, have fun reading the archives. I've no idea what I'll decide to do in the future, but for now, this blog is dead.

Finally went back to iaido, finally meditating, finally exercising

2009-09-05T00:50:00.004-04:00

I finally got back to iaido practice. This makes my second practice since things fell apart, but I feel confident that I'm going to make it to practice again next week. More good news: My sensei said I looked good, almost like I hadn't been away.

A month or two ago I decided to restart hung gar practice again on my own. I'm not starting a school or anything like that (it'd be dishonorable to do so without my sifu's permission). Rather, I'm going through all my old notes and increasingly fuzzy memories, trying to reconstruct my old school's forms and other training. It's been surprisingly interesting to go through everything. Interesting and very physically demanding. I can't believe how rugged I used to be. No good news regarding weight loss though (in fact I'm up to 255 lbs!) but my body's starting to remember how to move again.

I've also started meditating again. Not much, just five minutes a day, and unfortunately I forget often enough. However it makes a difference. Just five minutes in the morning colors how I go about the apartment getting ready for work, and then that changes the way I drive, which in turn alters my mindset at the office, and so on. What a difference a few minutes of breathing can make.

Of course, my cynical side believes that this is just an upswing in the cycle of life, and that it's unlikely that I'll be able to maintain this positive trend forever. That is, there must be a corresponding period of unproductive behavior, probably no matter what I do to avoid it. This blog, for instance, has many examples of trying again and again to maintain my exercise and mental development, and failing again and again.

This time it's going to be different, because I've had a realization: If I focus on success, I fail. If I focus on failing, I fail. If I don't focus, I fail. The only thing that really works for me, so far, is focusing on my state of mind.

Still Soft, Like Clay

2009-06-10T17:41:00.004-04:00

I feel I'm still mush, often enough. My mind is soft and yielding, like pudding. I don't have much will to resist unproductive desires, for example eating. While I was really ill I lost ten or twenty pounds, but since then I've gained it all back and then more besides. Recently most of my diet has consisted of fast food, and a lot of it. In fact, I haven't been this heavy since I started iaido nine years ago. Essentially, weight and fitness-wise, I'm pretty much all the way back to the beginning, the bad old days you might say.

Speaking of iaido, that's the other problem -- I haven't touched my sword in at least six weeks. This means nationals are out of the question, as is making yondan on schedule. This will put me a year behind my peers, depending on how you look at it (some people prefer strict seniority over rank when discerning these matters), but either way, it's a serious loss.

I don't meditate either. Not on my own, and neither do I go to sangha. In a way I'm like the overweight lazy monks in one of the founding legends of shaolin kung fu: My body can't handle the sitting, so my mind does not sharpen, so I have no will to lose weight and gain fitness. It's a vicious circle. I guess I'm waiting for my Boddhidharma to come and teach me yoga.

I've had a lot of trouble getting out of bed in the morning. In a way this is the seed of all my problems -- I get out of work so late that I can't make it to meditation and can't make it to iaido practice either, on their respective evenings.

You ever hear that phrase, "Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger"? It's a partial truth; the hard part is left out: Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger, because often becoming stronger is the only way to recover in the first place.

Maybe there is progress that isn't easily seen, even by myself. That's often the way of it in nature -- seeds germinate out of sight after all.

Starting Out Small . . . Again

2009-04-06T11:27:00.003-04:00

Buddhism, I guess taking a cue from Hinduism, speaks about repeating cycles. The classic example is reincarnation. I don't feel I literally have died and been reborn, but on the other hand, I've found that I've had to start over in several ways over the past two months since my manic/psychotic episode.

One of them has been iaido practice. I lost eight weeks of training, which is a huge problem since I'm warming up for a test in June. It's actually been the longest dry spell since I started practice back in 2000.

I've also had to restart my Buddhist practice. The truth is, for awhile I was afraid of my practice for a couple of reasons, and I'm only recently recovering from that fear. This morning was the first time I'd meditated since my episode. It wasn't much - just counting breaths while walking from my car to the office.

I feel a part of me crashed, hard, and became wreckage. That hurt, a lot. Then the wreckage had to be melted down into raw materials again, and this was painful too. But now parts of me are liquid again, and can be remade into anything I choose.

So I hope, anyway.

. . . And Then, For Awhile, I Went Mad

2009-03-20T16:39:00.006-04:00

No, really. I can't remember a period of my life that was more emotionally harrowing. I experienced suffering of an intensity that I didn't know existed, and it went on for over a month.

See, my family has a history of mental illness. Part of the reason I got into martial arts and Buddhism was to help me develop myself, so I could fight these problems. For awhile, my counsellor thought I had depression, so she prescribed an antidepressant. Turns out I'm actually bipolar -- manic periods and depressed periods. This meant that the antidepressant would be useless and actually counterproductive -- dangerously so -- during a manic episode.

Unfortunately, this is what happened to me a few days after my retreat ended. I'd never really had a manic episode before, so I mistook it for the possibility of Buddhist enlightenment. I started to act erratic, and it developed into actual psychosis after several days -- me believing I could control everything around me, for instance. I guess on some level I knew something was wrong, because I started screaming "Hospital!" and couldn't stop. Luckily I was with my girlfriend at the time. She tried to take me to the hospital, but then I ended up going for a ride in the ambulance. I'm pretty sure I actually walked into the emergency room.

I spent two days in the psych ward, with a bunch of people I didn't know. I think I scared a lady half to death by screaming at her. The memories are naturally pretty vague. For awhile there I was doubting everything -- whether I existed, whether I was who I thought I was, or even if I was alive or dead, or maybe I was in Hell. Definitely though there were gaps in time. I was really, really terrified that I'd hurt someone and couldn't remember it.

Yet, believe it or not, this was the beginning of my suffering. After the manic episode wore off and the Zoloft was flushed down the toilet, my nervous system had no antidepressant active at all for the first time in over two years, and it also had two days of completely crazy stuff to mull over. I have no description at all for my feelings during this period, except that it hurt more than anything I've ever felt before, and it went on for three or four weeks.

I was a complete mess during this period. I tried to go back to work a couple of times when I really probably should not have. Other times I'd spend a couple of days doing nothing but sleeping.

I was being treated though. Over time a balance of medications brought me back, and these days I feel pretty much normal.

So far, anyway. It's been a long, strange trip.

Oh Yeah, One More Thing

2009-01-11T23:03:00.002-05:00

I guess the final-final word on my experience with this experimental retreat is that I'm definitely going to find the time to do it again.

Daily Journal From my Retreat

2009-01-11T22:29:00.003-05:00

The last thing I'm going to post about my retreat is a record of the journal I kept:

Monday. Failed to do morning routine due to oversleeping; did bring lunch though. Evening routine went well, though short of time. I got to bed very late.

Tuesday. Woke up at 6am for zazen but after, fell alseep. : ( Ended up doing nothing but zazen & got to work @ 9:30 am. Going to skip sangha practice* in favor of more at home. Evening - 9:55 pm, barely had time to finish routine, despite getting home at 6 pm.

Wednesday. failure to wake up on time; got to work late, then home late, lateness everywhere. Took a night off from meditation and iaido to clean kitchen; wasited a bunch of time on the internet.

Thursday. went to iai @ gym (note after the fact - Focus on Fitness, my gym, lets me practice solo in the aerobics room); finished cleaning kitchen. did a lot of reflection & journaling of retreat activity. Finished night with 15 minutes of meditation lying in bed.

Friday. giving up on no-restaurant pledge; attachment is attachment even if seen as virtue.

Observations from my Retreat

2009-01-11T11:33:00.003-05:00

To continue from previously ("I'm so full of energy that I don't know what to do with it all."), the effect seems to have worn off, or at least ebbed enough that I feel rather well-balanced again. Lots has been going on in the past couple of days so naturally I can't clearly point to any particular causation anyway.

Anyway, more observations:

Two: I cling and crave much more than I realize, to my pattern of life, to what food I habitually eat, and so on. It's not simply mere wanting or desiring; it's rather the feeling that "things are not okay" unless I achieve the object of my clinging or craving.

Three: My awareness or knowledge of myself and human nature is not yet adequate, at least not in a working sense. That is, I seem to know enough about "the way I am" and "the way people are," but I seem to have difficulty acting on this knowledge in a habitual way. That is, many of my personal habits and near-unconscious responses to stimulus are based on other assumptions about human nature than I currently have.

Four: There is, in me, more vanity, particularly regarding the opinions of me that other people have, than I usually believe. Certainly more than I'm comfortable believing.

Five: My schedule was too ambitious. A lot of time was wasted realizing this. If I'd been more self-aware at the outset, such a realization would have occurred sooner, and thus some difficulty and frustration would have been avoided. I don't sit in judgement over myself over this; rather it's more evidence regarding the usefulness of mindfulness.

Six: I failed to understand how much work and energy I'd really need to prepare my own food and clean up afterwards.

Seven: Skill makes any task easier; conversely, lack of it makes any task more taxing, frustrating, and time-consuming. Even sweeping the floor has methods and useful techniques; it is possible therefore to be very bad at sweeping the floor.

Eight: (Follows perhaps from Seven above.) It is necessary to practice at just about everything. This, I think, is why it's so hard to, for instance, clean the bathroom after ignoring it for a month or two. Roughly, I forgot how to do it. This is probably a big reason I let it go for so long. Too many negative feelings were tangled up with the act of keeping my bathroom clean, because I unconsciously associated it with the frustration of being unskilled at accomplishing the task, and the additional frustration of not understanding this consciously.

Nine: Clinging and craving are counterproductive sources of disruption, imbalance, and emotional stress, even when the object of clinging and craving (that is, the thing to which one is clinging, or the thing for which one is craving) is seen as, or even really is, totally virtuous.

Ten: The effects on my body and mind from this retreat should, to benefit me the most, change my behavior forever.

Rejoining the World

2009-01-10T09:04:00.002-05:00

Well, not really; how can a human being leave the world? We're immersed in it, swimming in it like fish. Leaving it is rather like a fish leaving water -- tends to be an unpleasant and decidedly one-way trip. I guess what I mean is "rejoining my circles of friends, family, video games, and booze," but that doesn't make a very good title.

ANYWAY.

So, a series of useful or otherwise remarkable observations, some about Life, the Universe, and Everything, but some about my personal experiences during the retreat, will follow.

One: I'm so full of energy that I don't know what to do with it all. It's leaking out the seams of my character, making me twitchy and excitable. It can't be caffeine or anything like that, because I haven't had any in several hours (in fact a cup of herbal tea that contains chamomile sits between my forearms as I type this -- hopefully it'll help me calm down). I'm bouncing off the walls, it's crazy. I assume this is the result of all the exercise and manual labor I've done recently -- though I'm sure all my mental efforts have paid dividends too. More on this later.

Going on a Retreat

2009-01-04T22:02:00.004-05:00

Well, not really. I'm not actually going anywhere. Rather, I'm enforcing upon myself a temporary state of near-monasticism. This experiment is going to start tonight at midnight and will end on midnight Friday, which means it'll hopefully last for exactly five days.

Essentially, I'm going to be abstaining from a number of leisure activities and human contact in order to find time to meditate, pray, and practice my two martial arts. I'm also going to cook my own food for a change (more than half of my diet comes from restaurants), and catch up on chores around the house.

What I'm Giving Up

Contact with friends, family, and Kristen (my girlfriend), except that I'm going to check my voicemail once every day.
Entertainment, such as video games, music, and books (though to relax I may read The Kalevala before I fall asleep)
The radio, television, newspapers, magazines, and so on (though all I do normally is listen to NPR)
Meals at restaurants and take-out food
Intoxicants (though I only consume alcohol normally)
Sexual activity of any kind

Daily Morning Schedule

Wake at 6 am
Prayer (I'm a Christian, for those who may not know)
30 minutes of sitting meditation (Buddhist)
30 minutes of exercise (Hung Gar)
Shower, make breakfast, pack lunch, go to work

Daily Evening Schedule

Return home from work
1 hour of iaido (maybe at the gym, which means the schedule may juggle somewhat)
Shower, prepare & eat dinner, clean up
Chores until 9 pm or so
30 minutes of sitting meditation
Prayer
Asleep at about 10 pm

I was thinking of posting a daily note or two about my progress during this experiment, but I think it'd be better to do it all at once. So, I'll post again on Friday.

Wish me luck.

Many Changes, Some Hard, Some Easy

2008-04-15T18:21:00.005-04:00

About four months ago. I decided to quit hung gar, permanently.

I was a student of hung gar for almost as long as iaido. Now that I think of it, I think it was something like five or six years. I'm a family member, though, even though I don't practice hung gar itself anymore, so it's possible that I'll be asked to help out with Chinese New Year for the forseeable future. We'll see if they remember me.

I love hung gar itself very much, and my sifu too, so it may seem paradoxical that I've done them such a disservice. I'll summarize what I said when I left:

"I think, pretty much, that hung gar has turned out to be too much for me. I can't imagine ever finding a better art for self-defense and health. But, it demands a lot of time and an iron will, and I don't really have either one of those. I figure I've been trying to build up a habit of practicing on my own for five years, and I barely throw a punch when I'm not at the kwoon. That's surely a sign.

Another is how happy I was when I realized I'd get all my Sundays and Wednesdays back. Practicing kung fu is a great way to spend a day, surely, but I think I need more walks in the woods and fewer dragons, lions, and war drums. In short, I need more peace in my life, and hung gar, if nothing else, is unpeaceful. "

That's the rationale in a nutshell. These past four months I've come to believe that I made the right decision, for these and other reasons.

Sorry, brief non sequitor -- two little kids are sitting down to dinner (I'm at a local cafe in the city I live in), and they're wearing what look like tae kwon do uniforms. They can't be more then eight or ten years old. One of them has a black belt, I think. Heh, anyway.

These past four months I've come to believe that I made the right decision. I miss my training very much, but my life has opened up a little since I've gained control over an additional four to eight hours every week. I've found the time to attend a weekly buddhist meditation (http://www.nhsangha.org/), for instance. I think I'm happier and more effective as a human being in every way but one: I am not as physically dangerous as I was, due to an ebb in my hung gar training.

I did mean to use the word 'ebb' just now, because there's no way I'm giving up on my years of learning. I have been improved far too much by my teachers to let myself forget it all. I'm going to keep practicing what I've learned, hopefully for the rest of my life, but most likely by myself.

I decided to keep iaido, because it was more compatible with modern life, and I think more suitable to me personally.

Speaking of which, the other big change that's occuring is I'm completely replacing all my iaido equipment, except my obi. Tonight I'm going to the gym to try my new sword.

Not Yet Dead

2008-04-15T13:47:00.003-04:00

I have a lot to share, ventilate perhaps. I'll post again tonight.

New notes about Bak Siu Lum & Ed's form

2007-12-06T00:09:00.000-05:00

Bak Siu Lum

I guess I haven't talked about it much before. It means "Northern Shao Lin" and is in the Northern kung fu style ("longness" feeling everywhere). The things I learned today:

ready-set as usual, but forgo usual bow
right diu ma, dragon claws to NE (slide left foot forward, then right foot circles towards NE as claws come out)
left diu ma, look at palms to NW
move into that Northern-style standing up, palms-to-floor position to N (shift weight forward, then right foot should be able to slide in a crescent shape first Northwards then arcing out Eastwards; circly-arms as weight shifts to the east; finish by stomping with left foot)
fists up in what looks like double uppercuts (no footwork)
both fists crossing at abdomen level (no footwork)
Gold-like, both fists swing out (left low, right high, again no footwork)
shadow side fist to E (right hand obviously)
Tam Toi-like, long left ding ji ma & left hand side punch to W (press down into sei ping ma with left elbow/forearm, then block the attacker at W with same hand then punch out)
rise up to hanging stance as left arm clears raised leg (left arm raises up high first then hits down; right arm comes high curving over the head)
sei ping ma, double forearms to S (left hand scoops up then wrist snaps over, then make fist as right forearm presses S, stance transition is rather similar to loi ji ma)
similar to 10, raise up to hanging stance and clear low again (but with opposite legs & arms, and I'm not sure the clearing arm goes high before coming down)
left ding ji ma with left high block and right side fist to W (right qua towards N with hop to switch hips, then left arcing descending palm down to cover right fist concurrent with rest of transition to sei ping ma with hips facing N; finish with the left hand pressing up to block high as right fist punches out; this took me half the night to understand and I'm still not doing it quite right).

That's as far as I got tonight. I happen to know the rest of Bak Siu Lum but I'm picking up so many interesting subtleties and inner meanings that I really have to write them down lest I forget them before I get the chance to practice them.

Ed's Form

For Ed's form (I can't for the life of me remember the Cantonese name), Ben told me about a few new actions at the end, right after the interesting Gold-like horizontal swinging arm into the funny sei ping ma towards South:

left ding ji ma, side palm to South
Lau Gar-like dual down-pressing palms towards West (loi ji ma as usual)
Buddhist palm with high hand same as bent leg towards SW
same as 2 but towards East
same as 3 but towards SE
weird thing where the hands are waved around yet finishes in same position as end of 6, but facing towards S and with high hand opposite bent leg (that is, right ding ji ma but left hand is high for the hadouken-like shove we do at the end of Buddhist Palm).

A lot of people are surprised when I tell them that we basically do the hadouken from Street Fighter, but without the fireball part.

In fact, one of my earliest lessons in hung gar was watching someone being corrected for rotating the positions of the hands during the press. The instructor said, "Don't do it like on Dragon Ball Z. They do it wrong."

What can I say? Truth is stranger than fiction.

"Nana Korobi - Ya Oki"

2007-10-12T01:15:00.000-04:00

"Nana korobi - ya oki" is Japanese for "Fall seven times - rise eight times," and is a proverb intended to inspire one to perseverance. It means, more fully, "If you fall down seven times, then regain your feet eight times."

I liked it so much I put it in an article about iaido I wrote recently. Actually, the article wasn't about iaido so much as it was about martial arts practice generally.

Namely, we in the community don't usually practice enough on our own. Some arts are more or less amenable to this, naturally, but most of us are supposed to be practicing daily, but we don't.

I include myself. I haven't touched my sword outside the dojo in months. I did stance-work here in my room tonight for the first time in at least a month. It's getting serious: I'm expected to be an example for the less-experienced students at my dojo and my kwoon, and in the coming months and years my iaido and my hung gar are going to be tested ever more strenuously. In two weeks I'm going to a tournament, for example, and in a couple of months I have a seminar.

This isn't acceptable. Somehow or other, I intend to build up to daily practice.

I've tried and tried again, and I can never quite get into the habit. I haven't given up though, which seems like it's the important thing. Really, it's about hope and compassion for myself, which are surprisingly soft, comforting, and uplifting feelings. Perseverance doesn't have to be bad-assed icy stares and spitting out teeth; it can be a fuzzy, happy thing too.

In recent weeks I've once again fallen down. I seem to be getting up again.

Maybe this will be the eighth time. Here's to hoping.

A Belt, a Ring, and New Responsibilities

2007-07-10T12:28:00.000-04:00

I passed that test in March, which means I'm now a black belt in two martial arts -- Hung Gar and Iaido. More seriously, I've been inducted into my sifu's hung gar family, and have been given a silver ring to signify who and what I am. This is actually way more important to me than any belt. I'll explain.

Traditionally, hung gar marks rank by strict seniority, as I understand it, except that "sifu-hood" (official certification to teach given by an existing sifu as well as official recognition as a stupendous badass, heh) is given explicitly and must be earned. The only other traditional measure of a person's rank is whether or not they've been inducted into the "kung fu family." I don't know how other schools do it, but at ours, membership in the family is to be taken very seriously, and is marked by an official ceremony. It symbolizes a dedication to hung gar, and to the people at the school, above and beyond just about everything else in one's life, except for one's biological family. In many ways, it is like joining a profession in the strict sense of the word "profession" as it is applied to doctors or lawyers.

So, my school's belt ranking system is actually sort of superficial compared to this other, deeper sign of commitment.

Anyway, just saying one is a black belt doesn't mean much. Really, anybody can get a black belt in most martial arts that have them. A few schools do make the black belt a lofty goal, but a few also make it pretty easy (say, weekly practice for three years or so) to get one. The bottom line is that you can't tell by the color of a belt, if it is present, how proficient a person is at their art.

Finally, colored belts as signs of rank are actually pretty new: Jigoro Kano (the founder of Judo) started it some time in the early 20th century. It really is sort of a visual sign of what a person's rank is in older system of Japanese ranking. Moreover, they actually use it for all the old traditional arts, such as swordsmanship, go (yes, the board game), and even the tea ceremony. This is why most martial arts, even those that don't use colored belts, seem to have "black belts" when they're spoken of in the media. Hence my "black belt" status in iaido. Really, my rank is "sandan", or "third degree" more or less, but I tell people I'm a third-degree black belt, because people in karate and tae kwon do who are "sandan" are "third-degree black belts".

As usual, it's complicated. But only the parts that don't matter.

Observations on Practice

2007-02-14T23:43:00.000-05:00

I find that I feel very reluctant to begin practice, but that I usually feel pretty great afterwards. On the other hand, I once heard from a "big brother" in hung gar that if you don't feel like garbage after practice, then you weren't training hard enough. Conversely, he said, if you feel good after practice, then it's clear that you haven't trained hard enough at all.

Contrasted with this is the text of Fitness for Dummies, which suggests that feeling terrible after a work-out is a sign of useless and possibly harmful overexertion.

As usual, it looks like I need to work things out for myself.

As to my "quick fifteen minutes" routine . . . it hasn't survived very well. I've practiced only about twice during the past week, that I remember. I did practice tonight though.

It looks like there is no evidence that training at any particular time of the day is substantially superior to any other (mark the word superior here). So, training at 10 or 11 PM is just fine. I've also noticed that it doesn't seem to interfere with my sleeping habits.

Finally, I evidently have a black belt test in hung gar on the 15th of March. I'm a bit nervous, because although I feel my technique is adequate, my stamina is nowhere what it once was. Fortitude and the self-discipline required for its development are the first virtues of any serious martial arts student, especially one studying hung gar.

Back with Yet Another Regimentation Attempt

2007-02-06T23:29:00.000-05:00

So, new firefox, I'm back. Anyway.

Here's a new experimental exercise regimen I'm trying out.

Goals:

Improved cardiac stamina
Weight loss (currently 222, goal 185)
High probability of habitualization

Method:

15 minutes or so
Few or no breaks
No warm-up
Gentle, light technique -- real, but not 100%
Go through each form as follows

Forms practice:

Basic Forms 1-6

1-3 cut down to 3 or 2 repetitions per technique
4 as is
5 cut down to one repetition in each direction
6 as is

Siu Lum 1-3 & 5
Tam Toi 1-5
Bak Siu Lum
If Feel Like It -- Ten Hands, ten repetitions in horse stance

Future plans: After a month or so of daily maintenance, examine longer durations, increased intensity, additions of warm-ups and stretching, chi exercises, and most importantly, stance training.

In summary, the point is to build a good habit and burn calories (since I've graduated from college and started sitting a cubicle for 40 hours per week I've put on a few pounds). Once the habit is made, I plan to raise it into a more and more productive training regimen.

But first things first. Gotta habitualize my training first. Weekly practice isn't good enough.

No more blogging!

2006-10-23T21:32:00.000-04:00

See my other blog:

http://tomkolson.blogspot.com/

"Let's see how I do." -- heh, not very well.

2006-06-15T00:48:00.000-04:00

Last time I decided to do a thought experiment; it didn't work that well, but I've had some good moments. In a fit of productivity I removed the fan blades from my ceiling fan to make room for swinging swords and staves; now I can do most of the Seitei Gata and almost all of the koryu kata I'm famliar with in my own home.

I have to mention that one thing that seems to be helping me with training and with life (is it a sign of my murky mind that I believe is there a difference?) is Zen meditation. I can sort of say that I've had real experience with real Zen Buddhists now, thanks to the Providence Zen Center.

At their evening practices, they meditate (they like to use the verb, 'sit') for twenty-five minutes, then do walking meditation for about ten minutes, then sit again for twenty-five more minutes.

I've done a twenty-five minute period of sitting meditation at home on my own a couple of times since then; it's gone pretty well for me.

Well, the meditation itself is a rolling disaster: I don't know what I'm doing, my mind wanders, I dwell on my discomfort, and I can't maintain good posture.

But it must be beneficial nonetheless, because afterwards my mind is noticeably different, and seemingly improved. There is more . . . hmm, focus is the word I want to use.

If I became a resident at the zen center, would they allow me to practice iaido and hung gar in one of their big rooms?

Hung Gar in the Gym in my Building

2006-06-02T08:54:00.000-04:00

My building has a li'l gym. Basically it's nothing but a few exercise machines, some weights, and one of those huge inflatable bouncy ball things people use nowadays.

Yesterday, I swallowed what I could of my embarrassment and went down there to train. I did five miles on the sit-down bicycle. The machine said it was 200 calories and it took about fifteen minutes. At the end I felt quite tired and my legs were sore, which is all the proof I need that it was worth it. I also did quite a bit of stretching, a few kicks on the heavy bag, some pressing/pushing exercises on the heavy bag. I felt really odd doing the exercises in front of people. I'm a bit self-conscious.

Once people left, I did Bak Siu Lum, Lau Gar, and (what I know of) Gung Ji. I ran through Ten Hands a few times, then some soft chi exercises.

I suppose I should be glad that it counts as a victory, but that's bogus. Why am I attached to winning and losing? Victory and defeat, life and death, inhaling and exhaling, are all the same. Gichin Funakoshi famously said that one should not focus on winning, but rather on not losing. Maybe that insight is useful here.

While I'm thinking about it, I should set some goals. By the end of the year, I'd like to lose about twenty pounds (so I'm down to 185 lbs), become a third dan in iaido, and hmm . . . I guess for hung gar I don't have any specific goals aside from finishing Gung Ji Fook Fu Kuen. After that . . . I suppose I'd like a good hook kick, good sweeps, and good left leg crescents and jumping crescents.

In the spirit of letting go, I'm going to think of achieving them as the same as not achieving them. That way, working towards them will feel the same as doing what I really want to do, which is sit at my computer or at a book and goof off.

Let's see how I do.

Update - doing "okay"

2006-05-31T01:02:00.000-04:00

I went to a kendo tournament over the weekend, but didn't participate (since I am, ostensibly, not a kendo player). I did take a lot of photos though: http://xrl.us/nyckendo

However, I've been interested in kendo for a long time, so now that I have a little time and a little extra money, I'm going to try it. I went to a couple of practices at doshikai a few weeks ago, with mixed results (the kote I was wearing was too tight! Curse my freakishly large hands! Also, I'm slow). Thanks to working full-time I'm having trouble maintaining my weight, so it should help.

The nice thing about kendo, in that way, is that it is fairly straightforward, and I already know more than enough in terms of techniques (or waza, if you like) to keep me occupied for years, probably.

If I had the will (or rather, if I could let go of wanting to do things that aren't practice) I could just train more on my own; lord knows my hung gar and iaido need plenty of attention. But, not being a zen master, I'm stuck with my foolish wants and desires. So I might as well work with what I'm given rather than against it.

In other news, I've got an iaido examination in September; I'm testing for san-dan (that's a third-degree black belt in other arts; real quick, any fool who goes to practice every week for a few years can get a black belt and I'm living proof; they're marks of competence, not mastery). Koryu kata are handed to me regularly now, so that even getting through everything I know even once requires . . . hmm, probably a half an hour or so.

As far as hung gar goes, I'm stuck at the end of Gung Ji Fook Fu Kuen, and have been for a month. I'm pretty sure I've been at it for over a year, and I'm told I have only a few techniques left. It's hard to be patient under such circumstances. Still, I practice when I find the time. Like iaido, at this point, just getting through everything needs a long time.

Went to Iaido Practice

2006-03-15T23:07:00.000-05:00

I hadn't been to iaido practice in three weeks when I went up to practice this past Monday (13 March 2006). It was a surprisingly competent showing, I felt. I seemed to have a natural feeling to my kata that I had been trying to work on. I must be mistaken, of course, because it seems to me there is little chance that putting down the sword for nearly three weeks could possibly improve my swordsmanship.

Still, sometimes a break can be a good thing . . . so long as effort is redoubled afterwards.

Hung Gar Feet

2006-03-09T00:05:00.000-05:00

I started thinking today about all the different kicks that are known to the Hung Gar world. Not counting sweeps, kick-like tripping techniques (Iron Broom, the pulling-in trip in Siu Lum 3 & Gung Ji, etc) and similar stuff, I can think of thirteen:

sideways foot (instep to the sky), sole kick (one of my favorites)
vertical foot sole kick (can be low or high)
pidgeon-toed sole kick (like the first but foot rotated 90 degrees, somewhat like a side kick)
snapping toe kick (straight in)
snapping toe kick from the outside right
snapping toe kick form the outside left
side kick
back kick (very much like a side kick)
outside crescent (that is, from the outside)
inside crescenta (again, from the inside)
hook kick
roundhouse
tiger tail (another of my favorites)

Interestingly, as far as I know Hung Gar does not have the axe kick (ask a tae kwon do student), or toe kicks (Goju people will know what I mean).

If you count jumping, turning, and jumping-and-turning versions of all of these, I bet it would expand into the thirties or forties (though not all make sense as jumping & turning techniques). Likewise, we sometimes kick from the ground.

I'd say I can think of four or five different well-known pure kicking combinations (tiger tail to side kick is one of my favorites), too.

There is a small family if defensive foot & leg techniques as well, for defending against the above.

And all of which, by the way, need much more practice, in my case.

Life in the Way of the Way

2006-02-09T21:55:00.000-05:00

So in the last month or so I've moved out (and two states to the South) and started a new job. With all the hectic changes it's been difficult to find the time or the energy for iai or hung gar. Oh well, I fully intend to being practicing regularly at home.

In the mean time I'm driving to practice on the new routes (from the South instead of the from the North) and I must say my new digs are closer to both schools, which is terrific.

The trick to successful training is not perfect discipline but an unwillingness to surrender to our own flaws.

Okay, Apparently Not Back in the Game After All

2006-01-12T01:06:00.000-05:00

It's been many days since I practiced with sword, staff, or empty hand, so I guess my original experiment with training every day has failed.

I guess I should try again. I'll start tomorrow since it is already very late at night.

Back into the Game

2006-01-07T23:21:00.000-05:00

Thursday night I practiced a little, later in the evening. Friday I went to iaido practice, and got there late. I'm all set up for going to the seminar on the 22nd of January down in Jersey. We seem to be hitting the little Chinese restaurant near our practice location more often, which is fine with me because they have a few kinds of decent beer. In fact, I rather wish I had one right now. Anyway.

Today (Saturday) I did a little stretching, a little weight-bearing arm training, some presses, and a little stance-work (about a half-hour total).

If I had to guess, I'd say stamina and better stance-work are what I'm really lacking in my hung gar training.

I may head down to hung gar practice in Chinatown tomorrow; if not then technically it's an iaido-day.

I think in the brief period of iaido training I did get the other day, I had a bit of a breakthrough. It occured to me that I needed to build a more relaxed, natural movement, especially in the standing kata. I think I feel tense, and almost angry when I do the kata, but I think what I need is a more clear-eyed, "sherriff-around-these-parts" kind of feeling, wherein I'm moving naturally and have a broad field of perception. Less concentration on the technique itself, and more, hmm, emptiness and openness of mind, I think.

Maybe I actually know what I'm talking about here. I'll have to see.

Confessions of Laziness

2006-01-05T02:14:00.000-05:00

Well, since that post I've gone more than 158 hours without any training of any significance. I went to Iaido practice on Friday the 30th of December, but since then I've done little or nothing (form or two here or there, idly). Time to get back on the horse (stance); I'm training hung gar tomorrow and going to iaido Friday night. I'm also going to hung gar practice on Sunday.

I wonder if, as penance/shugyo kind of thing, I should attempt to "catch up" on these lost days? Technically I haven't trained since the first of the year (New Year's Eve, I'd say, is allowed to be a day off?), so I could repent by doing extra practice every day until the lost time is made up (it's about four days' worth, so I'd need to do this until the 9th at the earliest).

I need to remember the forms (paperwork, not kata!) for an upcoming iaido shinsa & seminar. I can't take the test yet (I have to wait until October) but the seminar will be good for me in any case.

And I seem to be adopting a new role as well: A number of my fellow students will be testing, and I perhaps I can help at the seminar by being there to show support for the members of my dojo. I have to admit that I was quite honored and surprised when Poitras-sensei asked me and the other yudansha to give pointers to the new students the other night.

80 Living Rooms and 60 Tea Kettles

2005-12-29T11:25:00.000-05:00

Did (just over) a mile last night, 80 laps back and forth across a 70 ft round trip. 35 ft each way, from my front door through the living room & the kitchen to the backdoor. It took about twelve minutes; I took a few breaks here and there to tighten my belt, spit, etc, but each was less than ten seconds long.

After that, filled up the tea kettle to use as a barbell and did twenty bicep exercises & ten tricep exercises on each arm. Water has a density of 8.33 lb/gal at 20° C (roughly the temperature that day), and I guesstimate that the kettle can hold probably half a gallon, so my little improvised training weight was probably 4 - 6 lbs including the weight of the kettle itself.

That's my hung gar practice for today. I meant to get to forms practice and such last night but decided it was late enough that I'd be better served by getting to sleep early . . . which I didn't really do at all because I stayed up writing.

Oh well, I might as well be in shape. It can only improve my hung gar to have better aerobic endurance, and from what I understand it's the best way of losing weight (which also needs to happen if my hung gar is going to improve, it must be said).

I almost forgot to mention, to give my brain something to do I started cooking up the prime factorization of the count of each lap as I jogged back and forth (almost certainly full of errors).

Iai Practice in the Living Room

2005-12-27T20:16:00.000-05:00

I did "okay" today; not terribly disciplined. I trained for about an hour, but found myself stopping every now and again to goof off . . . again. Still, I got in a few decent kata, I think.

After experimenting a bit, I believe I can do most of the nuketsuke from the seitei gata, including, I believe, all the standing forms. This is pretty useful, since nuketsuke is, as they say, the "life of iai."

Today's practice:

Warm-ups
Basics (menuchi, kiritsuke, nuketsuke, ochiburi, noto; from sitting or standing as room permitted)
seitei gata -- ipponme, nihonme, yohonme
seitei standing kata opening steps & nuketsuke
Eishin Ryu four & five (they're just so funky, I'm fascinated)

Tomorrow, hung gar.

Somewhat Decent Hung Gar Practice

2005-12-27T01:52:00.000-05:00

I went for about 90 minutes this time. Nice warm-up, some forms practice (okay, a lot of forms practice) then some cool-down. I stopped to goof off every few minutes, but I kept going. Looking in the reflection of the TV screen as a sort of mirror (the TV was off), I was able to see some of my own techniques. Much of it needed revision, but a little of it looked better than I thought it would.

Oops, Forgot to Mention

2005-12-26T20:38:00.000-05:00

Thursday, 22 December: I practiced some hung gar forms in the living room.
Friday, 23 December: I went to Iaido practice in Brookline (my dojo, for interested parties, is Doshikai).

That and my two-day hiatus for Christmas Eve & Christmas Day means my record is unbroken.

Provided I can do some hung gar before bed tonight, that is.

Taking a Holiday Break

2005-12-24T23:04:00.000-05:00

I'll start training again on the 26th, which is Boxing Day in Canada.

Every Hung Gar Form I Know

2005-12-22T10:15:00.000-05:00

Here is an organized list of every Hung Gar form I know of. Every Sifu teaches Hung Gar just a little bit differently, so don't be surprised if you're a member of the greater Hung family but have a radically different curriculum.

Basic Forms (aka Practical Forms)

Practical 1: basic fire punches, snap kicks, pik cheung, hammerfist
Practical 2: 45-degree punching, kick-punch/punch/punch combination
Practical 3: crossing arms hit/earth combination
Practical 4: earth/low hit/double dragon combination, wood action, another kick-punch/punch combination
Practical 5: bong sao and associated combination
Practical 6: sideways hammerfist, review of above, sweep/jumping crescent kick combination

Tam Toi (a set of 12 Northern forms; I only know 5)

Tam Toi 1: long punching, an elbow technique, a few defensive techniques (mostly blocks in application, I imagine), side hammerfist from the Practicals again
Tam Toi 2: side punch/straight punch/kick-punch combination
Tam Toi 3: like Tam Toi 1 but with an earth-like uppercut instead of the elbow
Tam Toi 4: Hmm, this is the most kung-fu-movie-like of the Tam Toi forms that I know so far. loi ji ma shadowfist, nifty crane's beak-palm, fingertip spear, that really low stance that you'd expect in a sweep, hammerfirst
Tam Toi 5: Another variant of the pattern established in Tam Toi 1 and Tam Toi 3.

Siu Lum series (our Sifu invented these for us as preparation for later, I believe); I think there are six total

Siu Lum 1: A selection of straight-palm techniques from Ten Hands, a few basics from the practicals, Buddhist Palms, a few new techniques and a jumping kick
Siu Lum 2: Slightly more advanced, lots of circular hand & arm motions; this one is mostly new material
Siu Lum 3: lots of fancy kicking, almost all new material

Other Stand-Alone Hand Sets

Lau Gar: A form from the Lau style; it reminds me a bit of a shorter, perhaps more practically-minded Gung Gee (see below), but what do I know?

Bak Siu Lum: Northern Siu Lum; it's a bit like Tam Toi but more challenging
Plum Blossom Fist: I don't know this one; I hear the man hand position looks like a plum blossom.
Drunken Boxing: Again, I don't know this one either, but it sure looks like fun.
War Palm: I don't know this one either; I hear it's a good thing to learn before proceeding ot the Pillars.
Butterfly Palm: Is this the same as War Palm above? I'm not sure.

The Four Pillars: "Real" or "True" Hung Gar, more or less. They are considered the core of the style. They aren't taught until quite some time has passed in the student's training. In the old days folks used to endure a year or more of basic practice (mostly stance work at that) before being allowed to learn any of these. Nowadays, instead most sifu seem to teach a bunch of more or less "made-up" forms like the Practicals given above.

Gung Gee Fook Foo Kuen: "Taming the tiger in the shape of the character Gung" (Gung looks like a capital I with serifs). This one has a lot of esoteric techniques that I have trouble understanding. It is quite long; it's by far the most challenging form I know. I'm about 7/8 of the way through learning it.
No, I don't know Tiger-Crane
Ha ha, The Ten-Shaped Fist, right, sure
If they showed me Tid Sin I'd probably hurt myself

Weapon Sets: I only know a few of Hung Gar's many weapon forms.

Monkey Staff: A long, practical staff form which is also known as "The Itinerant Monk's Staff". The primary distinguishing feature is that both hands hold the staff in the same way. Think of the difference between holding a kayak paddle and a canoe paddle in your hands; that's the difference between Monkey Staff and most other staff forms.
Single Broadsword (I think I know a "dumbed down" basic practice version)
Weapon Forms I Don't Know include several staff forms, a few spear forms, General Kwan's knife (the famous six-foot Chinese polearm), chain whip, paired chain whip, three-section staff, paired little knives (dunno the official phrase), paired broadsword, paired butterfly swords, straight sword (This is very advanced!), and several partner forms. Hung Gar, to my lasting sadness, has no Meteor Hammer form (as if I didn't have enough to do!). Oh yeah, and tiger fork, don't know that either. Or the bench form (yes, it uses a real bench, as in the kind you sit on; I guess it teaches you the value of improvisation).

Parter Forms

Two-Man Set: (Rusty!) I know a few steps from this one, but it's been a long time. I mostly practice by myself is the reason.
Partner Staff: (Rusty!) I know the B-side of this one, though the final "pose" is beyond me.

In addition to these there are several important "form-like" practice methods I'm familiar with:

Three-Star: The famous "one, two-three" repetetive partnered forearm conditioning exercise. It is used in many styles, I believe, and there are many variations and extra motions that can be added to the drill.
Seven-Point Kicking Drill: A pattern of seven kicks that are done in sequence; you can see Bruce Lee doing it in Enter the Dragon, I believe. Unlike Ten Hands, really there are only three or four techniques that are repeated.
Ten Hands: A pattern of ten important hand and arm motions; these are all done with a "whipping" sort of feeling, and are also done open-handed. They tend to emphasize spearing and slashing, it seems to me. Our sifu has added two additional motions to the traditional set of ten.

PS - I had to revise this post several times because I kept thinking of stuff I, uh, hadn't thought of.

Yesterday: Another ten-minute run

2005-12-22T10:00:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I set the timer on the stove for ten minutes and ran back and forth from the front door to the back door (a more or less straight line). One round-trip is 70 ft, and by measurement I can make about seven laps in one minute. Therefore, I probably did seventy laps in that ten minutes, which works out to 70 * 70 feet total, or about 4900 feet, which is 0.928 miles.

In a related thought, if I do 76 laps I'll hit just over a mile. I guess I'll keep count. A mile every day has to get me somewhere. It's a big pain to run back and forth in the house like that, though.

Still More Undisciplined Hung Gar

2005-12-21T01:37:00.000-05:00

Well, today was even worse than Monday. I barely did anything. Still, it was something: I got a little tired, at least.

Late Night Iai

2005-12-20T00:47:00.000-05:00

Well, somehow the day slipped away from me again. I guess I was legitimately busy for most of it, so there's no reason to blame myself for it, but I usually do anyway.

I only did one or two of each form that would fit in the room, but I did do a solid warm-up. Specifically, I did these seitei:

Ipponme, Mae
Nihonme, Ushiro
Yohonme, Tsuka-ate

And these koryu:

Mae
Migi
Hidari
Eishin Ryu No. 1 (it's like Mae)
Eishin Ryu No. 2 (it's like, hmm, a bit like Yaegaki)
Eishin Ryu No. 4 (the cool-looking one with the esoteric moves)
Eishin Ryu No. 5 (the other cool-looking one with slightly less esoteric moves)

I guess I'm still getting into the (blood) groove. Or perhaps regaining my edge? Maybe once I get a good handle on things I'll be able to steel myself to more strenuous practice. I hope you don't find my sword-humor too pointed.

hung gar practice . . . ?

2005-12-19T02:10:00.000-05:00

Well, thanks to waking up too damn late to do it in the morning, I didn't get to training until late tonight, and right after an overly indulgent supper too. I decided to try something more aerobic but less directly taxing, so I did ten solid minutes of the small jumping exercises we do at hung gar practice sometimes. Not technically kung fu as such, but the fact that I was wheezing and had a pain in my side probably meant I was doing something I needed to do. I guess technically ten minutes isn't really a work out as such, but at least it's better than nothing.

The fact that this (and the jogging/running I've done a couple times recently) was so taxing to me means I should probably add it or similarly aerobic exercise to my regimen.

Hopefully my discipline will improve with time.

First Iaido Practice

2005-12-17T14:55:00.000-05:00

Well, it wasn't very good, but it was a start. I stretched and warmed up (I tend to use the unofficial warm-ups that my iaido sensei takes us through at the beginning of practice), then did basics, then kata. For the basics that need lots of headroom, I used a kneeling position and it worked out beautifully.

I was happy to confirm that I could perform the first, second, and fourth seitei no kata without trouble in the living room, though there is no chance with the third and the fifth through the twelfth because the ceiling is far too low. I imagine a number of the koryu no kata I need to work on would fit into that space as well.

Clearing Up Bak Siu Lum

2005-12-17T11:26:00.000-05:00

So I think I may remember the ending sequence of bak siu lum now, thanks very much to my "little sister" Melanie:

sweep, sweep
side punch in place
rise up, side punch
twist into loi ji ma towards front, butterfly-looking bridge hands
bridge hands again, kick (facing front but kick is to the left; I think it's on a 45° angle between the left and the front)
move forward into left ding ji ma; three continuous side punches (again I think it's on that same 45° angle; could be fully to the left, not sure)
pivot to right ding ji ma, three continuous side punches (this time to the right; probably a 45° angle again)
crossing hands to the left
crossing hands to the right
spearing hand forward (this is all done as a continuous motion):

crescent step in then back with the right foot
shift weight into left ding ji ma facing forward as right foot shoots back
spearing right hand, palm up, towards front
as the technique ends, catch the right forearm (which is shooting out) in the palm of the left hand (there should be a loud striking sound).

close the form in that Northern sort of way (again, continuous):

shift back with the right foot so that the toes are aligned; this is a full standing position (except that the knees are slightly bent
let the arms (which are both out to start with remember) swing down naturally so that the backhand side of the fingers slap the thighs on the way down
maintaining that continuous circle, allow the arms to swing back behind and then up and over the top of the arc above the head (there is some hand-turning here that is hard to explain; I don't think I get it very well anyway)
bring the hands (which are now forward and above the shoulders with palms out, fingers pointing up at the sky) down to the hips, following the great arc the hands have been following for this whole action
end position: standing up, knees slightly bent, hands at hips with palms down towards the earth, elbows bent but arms flush with the body (that is, no "hole" should be visible between the ribs and the crook of the elbow if one is watching the form from in front or behind)

That's it, as far as my current understanding goes.

Already Missed a Day

2005-12-17T02:16:00.000-05:00

Well, I've already missed a day. I went out to a friend's house, hung out drinking home-brewed honeyed porter (quite good) and generally having a good time. I crashed there and ended up spending most of today there as well, frittering away my time on various video games.

Oh well. If the way were an easy one I wouldn't need this blog (or even the training itself) in the first place.

The First Ten Thousand?

2005-12-15T15:22:00.000-05:00

I guess I should explain the title of this blog. Once I was at an Iaido practice and a student seemed to be losing focus after many repititions of a particular technique. Gordon Fisher-sempai, who is a martial arts anecdote jukebox and walking samurai drama video store, was teaching the class that day. He said to the struggling new student, "Relax. The first ten thousand times are the hardest."

This isn't really a public blog per se; I'm more or less using it to manage the pursuit of the two martial arts that I study. Maybe readers will find it useful; feel free to encourage me and offer suggestions!

My plan is this: Train every day in either iaido or hung gar, and switch off between them, documenting my progress herein. A half-hour is considered minimally satisfactory, while an hour to two hours is considered ideal at least for now (In the old days folks used to spend three to four hours every day on training. These were folks with real jobs and private lives, not career soldiers, warriors, or monks who could've spent even more time on their training), with the possibility of ramping things up as I build my stamina.

In any case, here is my tentative hung gar training regimen:

Stretching & warm-ups. About ten to fifteen minutes.
Stances. For now at least a five-minute horse stance until my stamina improves.
Basic techniques. About three or four sets of at least thirty different basics; today I did the new arm-swinging technique I recently stole from one of my instructors (I don't know the name but I think it's in Fu Hok) and earth technique. I'll probably vary it and do various drills and exercises here (the seven-point kicking drill could go here, as could ten-hands).
Forms practice. I think I want to run through every form I know at least once per practice, ideally, and then take some time to work on the forms I'm currently learning. For now, that means Lau Gar, Bak Siu Lum (despite all the help I've gotten I still forgot some of it today!), and Gung Gee. One of these days I'm going to finish Gung Gee, dammit!

I really want to make sure that I'm getting aerobic exercise in. Since moving to NH I've probably gained ten to twenty pounds! This unenlightened one has a Buddha belly! Burarum!

Anyway, today's practice notes:

About an hour, but not terribly focused or diligent (I think it was only thirty minutes of actual kung fu or other exercise).
Didn't do much stretching but the warm-ups were good.
My three-repitition Earth is surprisingly good. It probably means I'm missing something.
Surprisingly, had to wrack my brain for the bit after the elbow-low-high combination in Gung Gee and I'm pretty sure I've forgotten a tiny patch of Bak Siu Lum. I must write everything down!

Plan for tomorrow:

Going to practice iaido, probably in the kitchen.
This means I'm probably ristricted to seiza no kata, and even then not all of them are possible (Ukenagashi stands out, methinks). It's too bad because my standing kata need more work I think, and I might as well get good at what I can.
Shovel/sweep the backyard deck to do standing forms? Even then it's not large enough for all of them (Shihogiri & Sougiri are none too likely there). I have a special place in my heart for Iaido training outside in December; there's something very good about practicing in the cold with the snow nearby.

A larger (and more difficult) question is how to find a space to practice all the iaido forms (nevermind kendo no kata!) on a regular basis. Ideally I'd like to pursue training three or four times per week. It's particularly tough because I need to use an iaito or shinken for the most rewarding training, which rules out most gyms and most public places.