way too many commas

 I am loving. Tonight's class was absolutely amazing.  You would think that two days before the first in-person banquet in 3 years we would be high strung, stressed, and making errors because of nerves, but what happened was the complete opposite. In between each practice run I saw people smiling, congratulating each other, and joking around. During the practice runs people were laser focused and I saw some of the best performances I've seen all year. I was overcome with pride and overwhelmed with love for my fellow teammates. Between the positive comments from the sifus (we're waiting for you guys to get some bad ones out there so we can get them out of the way) to the gift todai Ferris gave me at the end of the night ( even though I've been beating on her for weeks now ) my heart just about exploded on the car ride home.  I am so so so grateful for everyone on this team and for all the hard work everyone has put into this demo, and I can't wait to showcase it all...

It was always my plan to do one big final showcase of my numbers as the year came to a close. Looking back though I realize that this unconsciously was a way of me trying to hide what I was behind on, constantly convincing myself that I would catch up, that I could catch up, that I would make up everything I missed in time for Chinese New Year's eve and then I could present them like I had it all under control this whole time. But I didn't, and you'll see that below. I wanted to put everything on display, even the parts I'm really ashamed of because it is the truth.  For this upcoming Year of the Rabbit I plan to put out my progress monthly to both keep me accountable and keep myself consciously and fully aware of my progress.  I am incredibly proud of everything I was able to accomplish this year, but I also acknowledge there are many areas where I know I need to do better, so in true yin-yang philosophical style I'm going to be showing my final numbers and saying ...

I been thinking about what we talking about at the end of Monday's class, about control. I realized that I have two approaches to my intent during a technique: "learning" mode (getting familiar with how a technique should feel, where you feel strong or weak while you're doing it, figuring out the rhythms of your partner and how they're moving) or starting to move towards "full realism" mode (moving faster, striking with more power, following through even if things don't go they way they're supposed to, trying to feel your heartrate pick up and what it would be like to do the technique full of adrenaline).  I was trying to wrap my head around the concept of control, and why I was having some troubles with it. We talked about one facet of control relating to distancing, and being aware of where things are at all times. I definitely struggle with this in my sparring, I try to keep my techniques clean, but I find I am just out of range for most of my...

This past Saturday's class was overflowing with gems of insight, and one in particular really struck a chord with me. We were discussing the bell block right at the end of Lau Gar III and I wanted to pay extra attention since it has given me nothing but trouble since I first learned it.   *(I want to be careful here because there was a lot of important context surrounding this discussion that I want to make sure future me doesn't take out of that context)* We talked about how sometimes there is no way (for you/right now/but also maybe ever), to do a technique perfectly.  1) That was incredibly vindicating since I still struggle doing this technique despite it being in my chosen hand form for the Year of the Tiger, 2) We talked about how the compromise between having a pure perfect cat stance limits the possibility of doing a perfect bell block and vise versa and how you need to adjust them  together until they are both as solid as you can make them (i.e. your eye fo...

My kung fu has been pretty out of whack for almost all of December.  In preparation for grading day, my training felt very different than I have come to recognize it this past year. Not necessarily in a bad way, just focusing on different things, and training with different mindsets and intents. It did start to feel a bit detrimental to my overall progress the closer we got to the big day, the stress that I was trying to keep a lid on, and the stagnation I felt in my training. I felt like I shouldn't be looking for new things to work on or fix, I shouldn't be asking the sort of questions I usually do because I wouldn't have time to fix them (which was just as well because the usual questions that seem to pop into my head were nowhere to be found during this time). I needed to focus on polishing the things I already knew until they felt solid, working on small fixes that could make a big difference. Shifting completely from Exploration into Maintenance mode and staying in it...